down among the traditional
greennesses of learned men, let me say that he was our _pis-aller_,--we
finding ourselves within two hours of the Stockton boat, with nobody to
help pack our mules or care for them and the horses.

The boy we obtained near Mariposa. He was an independent squire to the
man of whom we got the extra animals, and accompanied them as a sort of
trustee and _prochein amy_ to an orphan family of mules. At fifteen
years and in jackets, he was one of the keenest speculators in fire-arms
I ever saw; could swap horses or play poker with anybody; and, take him
for all in all, in the Eastern States, at least, I shall never look upon
his like again.

Thus manned, and leading, turn-about, four or five pack-beasts by as
many tow-lines, we struck up into the well-wooded Sierra foot-hills,
commencing our climb at the very outset from Mariposa. The whole
distance to the Valley was fifty miles. For twelve of these we pursued a
road in some degree practicable to carts, and leading to one of those
inevitable steam saw-mills with which a Yankee always cuts his first
swath into the tall grass of Barbarism. Passing the saw-mill in the very
act of astonishing the wilderness with a dinner-whistle, we struck a
trail and fell into single file. Thenceforward our way was almost a
continuous alternation of descent and climb over outlying ridges of the
Sierra. Our raw-recruited mules, and the elementary condition of our
intellects in the science of professional packing, spun out this portion
of our journey to three days,--though allowance is to be made for the
fact of our stopping at noon of the second day and not resuming our
trail till the morning of the third. This interim we spent in visiting
the Big Trees, which are situated four or five miles off the Yo-Semite
track.

"Clark's," where tourists stop for this purpose, is just half-way
between Mariposa and the great Valley. "Clark" himself is one of the
best-informed men, one of the very best guides, I ever met in the
Californian or any other wilderness. He is a fine-looking, stalwart old
grizzly-hunter and miner of the '49 days, wears a noble full beard hued
like his favorite game, but no head-covering of any kind since he
recovered from a fever which left his head intolerant of even a slouch.
He lives among folk, near Mariposa, in the winter, and in summer
occupies a hermitage built by himself in one of the loveliest lofty
valleys of the Sierra. Here he gives traveller