mbers of a log-fire. The flames had long since died, and now it was
just smoldering and smoking. On either side of the fire lay a man,
well-wrapped in his blanket. A gun that for some reason looked very
familiar to me was leaning against the rock near their heads. We could
not see their faces from where we were, but like a flash I remembered
the gun by the leather-covered stock. The two men were Old Ben and a
young fellow who often went with him into the mountains. I never shall
forget how they looked when we waked them by dropping small pebbles from
above. As soon as they would stir a little, we would drop back out of
sight and listen. At last the young fellow muttered something and reached
for his gun. Then Old Ben awoke, sat up, and asked what was the trouble.

"'I'd bet a dollar that rock just dropped on me from above.' Then he
turned his head and looked up into the sky. 'Great Scott, man, what a
place to sleep! A stone might have tumbled on us any minute.' Then he
scrambled to his feet and cried out, 'Man alive! take a look at that
eagle; what an immense bird!' We boys had forgotten the eagle on finding
the men, but we, too, looked upward, and there, not more than a hundred
feet in the air, directly over us, was the biggest bird I ever hope to
see. He seemed to be fixed, motionless, in the air, with wings
outstretched. Just then some of the rest of the boys came shouting up to
where we were. Ben heard them and shouted back. In a few minutes we were
all up on the rocks watching the bird. Ben wanted to shoot, but the other
man wouldn't let him, for he declared he was going to find the nest. It
must have been the smoke from the fire that first attracted the bird,
for it seemed to keep circling directly above the column of smoke. To
this day we never told who dropped the stones--I suppose they think the
eagle did it.

"Well, as we sat there watching the eagle, the sun came up. There never
was such a sunrise before, I don't believe. There was a layer of fluffy,
fuzzy clouds, stretched out over the city as far as we could see. Then
the sun came slowly up--a great crimson ball of fire, the long, yellow
rays lighting up that sea of clouds and the pale-blue sky above, until
the scene looked like a great, boiling pot of gold. Then, far above us,
that immense black bird, wings still outstretched, just winging itself
round and round in great, even circles. I've seen many a choice bit of
mountain scenery, and many a sunrise and