a few feet of the crest, a white crystalline bank gleaming in the
sun. The winds hurtling over the summit were as cold and fierce as old
Boreas himself, so that I was glad to wear woollen gloves and button my
coat-collar close around my neck; yet it was the Fourth of July, when
the people of the East were sweltering in the intense heat of their low
altitudes. It was a surprise to us to find the wind so much colder here
than it had been on the twenty-eighth of June on the summit of Gray's
Peak, which is considerably farther north. However, there may be times
when the meteorological conditions of the two peaks are reversed,
blowing a gale on Gray's and whispering a zephyr on Tillie Ann.

The usual succession of birds was seen as we toiled up the slopes and
steep inclines, some stopping at the timber-line and others extending
their range far up toward the alpine zone. In the pine belt below the
timber-line a pair of solitaires were observed flitting about on the
ground and the lower branches of the trees, but vouchsafing no song. In
the same woodland the mountain jays held carnival--a bacchanalian revel,
judging from the noise they made; the ruby-crowned kinglets piped their
galloping roundels; a number of wood-pewees--western species--were
screeching, thinking themselves musical; siskins were flitting about,
though not as numerous as they had been in the piny regions below Gray's
Peak; and here for the first time I saw olive-sided flycatchers among
the mountains. I find by consulting Professor Cooke that their breeding
range is from seven thousand to twelve thousand feet. A few juncos and
ruby-crowned kinglets were seen above the timber-line, while many
white-crowned sparrows, some of them singing blithely, climbed as far up
the mountain side as the stunted copses extended.

Oddly enough, no leucostictes were seen on this peak. Why they should
make their homes on Pike's and Gray's Peaks and neglect Tillie Ann is
another of those puzzles in featherdom that cannot be solved. Must a
peak be over fourteen thousand feet above sea-level to meet their
physiological wants in the summery season? Who can tell? There were
pipits on this range, but, for some reason that was doubtless
satisfactory to themselves, they were much shyer than their brothers and
sisters had been on Gray's Peak and Mount Kelso; more than that, they
were seen only on the slopes of the range, none of them being observed
on the crest itself, perhaps on account