November, to a depth of a few inches, after months
of the most charming Indian summer weather imaginable. But in a few
days, this light covering mostly melts from the slopes exposed to the
sun and causes but little apprehension on the part of mountaineers who
may be lingering among the high peaks at this time. The first general
winter storm that yields snow that is to form a lasting portion of the
season's supply, seldom breaks on the mountains before the end of
November. Then, warned by the sky, cautions mountaineers, together with
the wild sheep, deer, and most of the birds and bears, make haste to the
lowlands or foot-hills; and burrowing marmots, mountain beavers,
wood-rats, and such people go into winter quarters, some of them not
again to see the light of day until the general awakening and
resurrection of the spring in June or July. The first heavy fall is
usually from about two to four feet in depth. Then, with intervals of
splendid sunshine, storm succeeds storm, heaping snow on snow, until
thirty to fifty feet has fallen. But on account of its settling and
compacting, and the almost constant waste from melting and evaporation,
the average depth actually found at any time seldom exceeds ten feet in
the forest region, or fifteen feet along the slopes of the summit peaks.

Even during the coldest weather evaporation never wholly ceases, and the
sunshine that abounds between the storms is sufficiently powerful to
melt the surface more or less through all the winter months. Waste from
melting also goes on to some extent on the bottom from heat stored up in
the rocks, and given off slowly to the snow in contact with them, as is
shown by the rising of the streams on all the higher regions after the
first snowfall, and their steady sustained flow all winter.

The greater portion of the snow deposited around the lofty summits of
the range falls in small crisp flakes and broken crystals, or, when
accompanied by strong winds and low temperature, the crystals, instead
of being locked together in their fall to form tufted flakes, are beaten
and broken into meal and fine dust. But down in the forest region the
greater portion comes gently to the ground, light and feathery, some of
the flakes in mild weather being nearly an inch in diameter, and it is
evenly distributed and kept from drifting to any great extent by the
shelter afforded by the large trees. Every tree during the progress of
gentle storms is loaded with, fairy