crown
comes in sight, forming a finely balanced picture framed by the massive
canyon walls. In the foreground, when the grass is in flower, you have
the purple meadow willow-thickets on the river banks; in the middle
distance huge swelling bosses of granite that form the base of the
general mass of the mountain, with fringing lines of dark woods marking
the lower curves, smoothly snow-clad except in the autumn.

If you wish to spend two days on the Lyell trip you will find a good
camp-ground on the east side of the river, about a mile above a fine
cascade that comes down over the canyon wall in telling style and makes
good camp music. From here to the top of the mountains is usually an
easy day's work. At one place near the summit careful climbing is
necessary, but it is not so dangerous or difficult as to deter any one
of ordinary skill, while the views are glorious. To the northward are
Mammoth Mountain, Mounts Gibbs, Dana, Warren, Conness and others,
unnumbered and unnamed; to the southeast the indescribably wild and
jagged range of Mount Ritter and the Minarets; southwestward stretches
the dividing ridge between the north fork of the San Joaquin and the
Merced, uniting with the Obelisk or Merced group of peaks that form the
main fountains of the Illilouette branch of the Merced; and to the
north-westward extends the Cathedral spur. These spurs like distinct
ranges meet at your feet; therefore you look at them mostly in the
direction of their extension, and their peaks seem to be massed and
crowded against one another, while immense amphitheaters, canyons
and subordinate ridges with their wealth of lakes, glaciers, and
snow-fields, maze and cluster between them. In making the ascent in
June or October the glacier is easily crossed, for then its snow mantle
is smooth or mostly melted off. But in midsummer the climbing is
exceedingly tedious because the snow is then weathered into curious
and beautiful blades, sharp and slender, and set on edge in a leaning
position. They lean towards the head of the glacier and extend across
from side to side in regular order in a direction at right angles to the
direction of greatest declivity, the distance between the crests being
about two or three feet, and the depth of the troughs between them about
three feet. A more interesting problem than a walk over a glacier thus
sculptured and adorned is seldom presented to the mountaineer.

The Lyell Glacier is about a mile wide and less