to Muir I obeyed the impulse without asking whether I "owed" him
a letter, and he followed the same rule--or rather lack of rule.
Sometimes answers to these letters came quickly; sometimes they were
long delayed, so long that they were not answers at all. When I sent him
"news of his mountains and glaciers" that contained items really novel
to him his replies were immediate and enthusiastic. When he had found
in his great outdoor museum some peculiar treasure he talked over his
find with me by letter.

Muir's letters were never commonplace and sometimes they were long and
rich. I preserved them all; and when, a few years ago, an Alaska
steamboat sank to the bottom of the Yukon, carrying with it my library
and all my literary possessions, the loss of these letters from my
friend caused me more sorrow than the loss of almost any other of my
many priceless treasures.

The summer of 1881, the year following that of our second canoe voyage,
Muir went, as scientific and literary expert, with the U.S. revenue
cutter _Rogers_, which was sent by the Government into the Arctic Ocean
in search of the ill-fated De Long exploring party. His published
articles written on the revenue cutter were of great interest; but in
his more intimate letters to me there was a note of disappointment.

"There have been no mountains to climb," he wrote, "although I have had
entrancing long-distance views of many. I have not had a chance to visit
any glaciers. There were no trees in those arctic regions, and but few
flowers. Of God's process of modeling the world I saw but
little--nothing for days but that limitless, relentless ice-pack. I was
confined within the narrow prison of the ship; I had no freedom, I went
at the will of other men; not of my own. It was very different from
those glorious canoe voyages with you in your beautiful, fruitful
wilderness."

A very brief visit at Muir's home near Martinez, California, in the
spring of 1883 found him at what he frankly said was very distasteful
work--managing a large fruit ranch. He was doing the work well and
making his orchards pay large dividends; but his heart was in the hills
and woods. Eagerly he questioned me of my travels and of the "progress"
of the glaciers and woods of Alaska. Beyond a few short mountain trips
he had seen nothing for two years of his beloved wilds.

Passionately he voiced his discontent: "I am losing the precious days. I
am degenerating into a machine for making mone