having got our logs in place on
the cut bank all ready to load, Joe and I, after due consultation,
decided that we would take a day off and climb up to the saddle which
connected the two mountains. We had never been up there before, and we
were curious to see what the country was like on the other side.

Knowing that it would be a long and hard climb, we started about
sunrise, taking a rifle with us; not that we expected to use it, but
because it is not good to be entirely defenseless in those wild,
out-of-the-way places. Following at first our little creek, we went on
up and up, taking it slowly, until presently the pines began to thin
out, the weather-beaten trees, gnarled, twisted and stunted, becoming
few and far between, and pretty soon we left even these behind and
emerged upon the bare rocks above timber-line. Here, too, we left behind
our little creek.

For another thousand feet we scrambled up the rocks, clambering over
great boulders, picking our way along the edges of little precipices,
until at last we stood upon the summit of the saddle.

To right and left were the two great peaks, still three thousand feet
above us, but westward the view was clear. As far as we could see--and
that, I expect, was near two hundred miles--were ranges and masses of
mountains, some of them already capped with snow, a magnificent sight.

"That is fine!" cried Joe, enthusiastically. "It's well worth the
trouble of the climb. I only wish we had a map so that we could tell
which range is which."

"Yes, it's a great sight," said I. "And the view eastward is about as
fine, I think. Look! That cloud of smoke, due east about ten miles away,
comes from the smelters of San Remo, and that other smoke a little to
the left of it is where the coal-mines are. There's the ranch, too, that
green spot in the mesa; you wouldn't think it was nearly a mile square,
would you?"

"That's Sulphide down there, of course," remarked Joe, pointing off
towards the right. "But what are those other, smaller, clouds of smoke?"

"Those are three other little mining-camps, all tributary to the
smelters at San Remo, and all producing refractory ores like the mines
of Sulphide. My! Joe!" I exclaimed, as my thoughts reverted to Tom
Connor and his late core-boring failure. "What a great thing a good vein
of lead ore would be! Better than a gold mine!"

"I expect it would. Poor old Tom! He bears his disappointment pretty
well, doesn't he?"

"He certainly