like some of the more fantastic engravings of Gustave Dore.

We camped that night at a lake whose banks were pebbled in the manner
of an artificial pond, and whose setting was a thin meadow of the fine
hair-grass, for the grazing of which the horses had to bare their
teeth. All about, the granite mountains rose. The timber-line, even of
the rare shrub-like gnome-trees, ceased here. Above us was nothing
whatever but granite rock, snow, and the sky.

It was just before dusk, and in the lake the fish were jumping eagerly.
They took the fly well, and before the fire was alight we had caught
three for supper. When I say we caught but three, you will understand
that they were of good size. Firewood was scarce, but we dragged in
enough by means of Old Slob and a riata to build us a good fire. And
we needed it, for the cold descended on us with the sharpness and vigor
of eleven thousand feet.

For such an altitude the spot was ideal. The lake just below us was
full of fish. A little stream ran from it by our very elbows. The
slight elevation was level, and covered with enough soil to offer a
fairly good substructure for our beds. The flat in which was the lake
reached on up narrower and narrower to the foot of the last slope,
furnishing for the horses an admirable natural corral about a mile
long. And the view was magnificent.

First of all there were the mountains above us, towering grandly serene
against the sky of morning; then all about us the tumultuous slabs and
boulders and blocks of granite among which dare-devil and hardy little
trees clung to a footing as though in defiance of some great force
exerted against them; then below us a sheer drop, into which our brook
plunged, with its suggestion of depths; and finally beyond those depths
the giant peaks of the highest Sierras rising lofty as the sky,
shrouded in a calm and stately peace.

Next day the Tenderfoot and I climbed to the top. Wes decided at the
last minute that he hadn't lost any mountains, and would prefer to fish.

The ascent was accompanied by much breathlessness and a heavy pounding
of our hearts, so that we were forced to stop every twenty feet to
recover our physical balance. Each step upward dragged at our feet
like a leaden weight. Yet once we were on the level, or once we ceased
our very real exertions for a second or so, the difficulty left us, and
we breathed as easily as in the lower altitudes.

The air itself was of a quality