felt confident that we could
force our way through it with no other guidance. After passing the "Hot
Springs" I halted in the lee of a lava-block to let Jerome, who had
fallen a little behind, come up. Here he opened a council in which,
under circumstances sufficiently exciting but without evincing any
bewilderment, he maintained, in opposition to my views, that it was
impossible to proceed. He firmly refused to make the venture to find the
camp, while I, aware of the dangers that would necessarily attend our
efforts, and conscious of being the cause of his present peril, decided
not to leave him.

Our discussions ended, Jerome made a dash from the shelter of the
lava-block and began forcing his way back against the wind to the "Hot
Springs," wavering and struggling to resist being carried away, as if he
were fording a rapid stream. After waiting and watching in vain for
some flaw in the storm that might be urged as a new argument in favor of
attempting the descent, I was compelled to follow. "Here," said Jerome,
as we shivered in the midst of the hissing, sputtering fumaroles, "we
shall be safe from frost." "Yes," said I, "we can lie in this mud and
steam and sludge, warm at least on one side; but how can we protect our
lungs from the acid gases, and how, after our clothing is saturated,
shall we be able to reach camp without freezing, even after the storm is
over? We shall have to wait for sunshine, and when will it come?"

The tempered area to which we had committed ourselves extended over
about one fourth of an acre; but it was only about an eighth of an inch
in thickness, for the scalding gas jets were shorn off close to the
ground by the oversweeping flood of frosty wind. And how lavishly the
snow fell only mountaineers may know. The crisp crystal flowers seemed
to touch one another and fairly to thicken the tremendous blast that
carried them. This was the bloom-time, the summer of the cloud, and
never before have I seen even a mountain cloud flowering so profusely.

When the bloom of the Shasta chaparral is falling, the ground is
sometimes covered for hundreds of square miles to a depth of half an
inch. But the bloom of this fertile snow cloud grew and matured and fell
to a depth of two feet in a few hours. Some crystals landed with their
rays almost perfect, but most of them were worn and broken by striking
against one another, or by rolling on the ground. The touch of these
snow-flowers in calm weather is i