dusty or exceedingly
stony, and progress is slow. In the daytime (it was the last of June)
the heat is apt to be excessive; but this could be borne, the air is so
absolutely dry and delicious, and breezes occasionally spring up, if it
were not for the dust. It is, notwithstanding the novelty of the
adventure and of the scenery by the way, a tiresome journey of two days.
A day of rest is absolutely required at the canon, so that five days
must be allowed for the trip. This will cost the traveller, according to
the size of the party made up, from forty to fifty dollars. But a much
longer sojourn at the canon is desirable.

Our party of seven was stowed in and on an old Concord coach drawn by
six horses, and piled with camp equipage, bedding, and provisions. A
four-horse team followed, loaded with other supplies and cooking
utensils. The road lies on the east side of the San Francisco Mountain.
Returning, we passed around its west side, gaining thus a complete view
of this shapely peak. The compact range is a group of extinct volcanoes,
the craters of which are distinctly visible. The cup-like summit of the
highest is 13,000 feet above the sea, and snow always lies on the north
escarpment. Rising about 6000 feet above the point of view of the great
plateau, it is from all sides a noble object, the dark rock,
snow-sprinkled, rising out of the dense growth of pine and cedar. We
drove at first through open pine forests, through park-like intervals,
over the foot-hills of the mountain, through growths of scrub cedar, and
out into the ever-varying rolling country to widely-extended prospects.
Two considerable hills on our right attracted us by their unique beauty.
Upon the summit and side of each was a red glow exactly like the tint of
sunset. We thought surely that it was the effect of reflected light, but
the sky was cloudless and the color remained constant. The color came
from the soil. The first was called Sunset Mountain. One of our party
named the other, and the more beautiful, Peachblow Mountain, a poetic
and perfectly descriptive name.

We lunched at noon beside a swift, clouded, cold stream of snow-water
from the San Francisco, along which grew a few gnarled cedars and some
brilliant wild flowers. The scene was more than picturesque; in the
clear hot air of the desert the distant landscape made a hundred
pictures of beauty. Behind us the dark form of San Francisco rose up
6000 feet to its black crater and fields of