he passes between the peaks and over the Yosemite domes, making
their edges burn; the silver firs in the middle ground catching the glow
on their spiry tops, and our camp grove fills and thrills with the
glorious light. Everything awakening alert and joyful; the birds begin
to stir and innumerable insect people. Deer quietly withdraw into leafy
hiding-places in the chaparral; the dew vanishes, flowers spread their
petals, every pulse beats high, every life cell rejoices, the very rocks
seem to thrill with life. The whole landscape glows like a human face in
a glory of enthusiasm, and the blue sky, pale around the horizon, bends
peacefully down over all like one vast flower.

About noon, as usual, big bossy cumuli began to grow above the forest,
and the rainstorm pouring from them is the most imposing I have yet
seen. The silvery zigzag lightning lances are longer than usual, and
the thunder gloriously impressive, keen, crashing, intensely
concentrated, speaking with such tremendous energy it would seem that an
entire mountain is being shattered at every stroke, but probably only a
few trees are being shattered, many of which I have seen on my walks
hereabouts strewing the ground. At last the clear ringing strokes are
succeeded by deep low tones that grow gradually fainter as they roll
afar into the recesses of the echoing mountains, where they seem to be
welcomed home. Then another and another peal, or rather crashing,
splintering stroke, follows in quick succession, perchance splitting
some giant pine or fir from top to bottom into long rails and slivers,
and scattering them to all points of the compass. Now comes the rain,
with corresponding extravagant grandeur, covering the ground high and
low with a sheet of flowing water, a transparent film fitted like a skin
upon the rugged anatomy of the landscape, making the rocks glitter and
glow, gathering in the ravines, flooding the streams, and making them
shout and boom in reply to the thunder.

How interesting to trace the history of a single raindrop! It is not
long, geologically speaking, as we have seen, since the first raindrops
fell on the newborn leafless Sierra landscapes. How different the lot
of these falling now! Happy the showers that fall on so fair a
wilderness,--scarce a single drop can fail to find a beautiful spot,--on
the tops of the peaks, on the shining glacier pavements, on the great
smooth domes, on forests and gardens and brushy moraines, plashing,