The Coyote
The metaphor "The coyote is your true water-witch" emphasizes how impressed Austin is by the ability of the coyote to find water in impossible places ("where not even an Indian would look for it"), as the word 'witch' connotes magical powers.
The Heat
Austin describes the heat by creating a feeling of suffocation: "The air breathes like cotton wool" connotes that it appears impossible to breathe. Later in the book, she compares the heat to being in a tent, which creates the same effect, as her readers are likely to have been camping before, therefore having firsthand experience of her description: "The midday heaven shuts [the land] in breathlessly like a tent."
The Shoshones
Describing the Indians, she says "The Shoshones live like their trees," which illustrates the great space between each tribe. It also emphasizes that resources are sparse, so the Indians, like the trees, must spread out so that there is no competition for food and water.
The Children of the Shoshones
Idealizing the children of the Shoshones, Austin writes: "Young Shoshones are like young quail, knowing without teaching about feeding and hiding, and learning what civilized children never learn, to be still and to keep on being still, at the first hint of danger or strangeness." Comparing the Indians with the birds emphasizes their innate abilities and instincts, but at the same time serves to criticize the civilized world for having lost their connection with nature.
The Indian Women
Austin explains that the "influx of overlording whites" made the animals wilder and more dangerous. At the same time, she reverses the roles by saying that "the women became in turn the game of the conquerors." Comparing the Indian women to game emphasizes how little respect the white conquerors had for them, and that they were treated as animals rather than humans. Moreover, her statement implies that the Indian women were raped.
