PLAINS AND FOOTHILLS 189 



dizzy pinnacle of rock, and waving his butterfly-net or 

 his cap in the air, and shouting at the top of his voice 

 to encourage his lagging parent and announce his 

 triumph as a mountaineer. 



However, the birdman can never forget his hobby. 

 There were a few birds on that precipitous mountain 

 side, and that lent it its chief attraction. At one 

 place a spurred towhee flitted about in a bushy clump 

 and called much like a catbird — an almost certain 

 proof of a nest on the steep, rocky wall far up from 

 the roaring torrent in the gorge below\ On a stony 

 ridge still farther up, a rock wren w^as ringing his pecul- 

 iar score, which sounds so much like a challenge, while 

 still farther up, in a cluster of stunted pines, a long- 

 crested jay lilted about and called petulantly, until I 

 came near, when he swung across the caiion, and I saw 

 him no more. 



After a couple of hours of hard climbing, we reached 

 the summit, from which we were afforded a magnificent 

 view^ of the foothills, the mesas, and the stretching plains 

 below us, while above us to the west hills rose on hills 

 until thev culminated in mighty snow-capped peaks and 

 ridges. It must not be supposed, because the snow- 

 mantled summits in the Avest loomed far above our 

 present station, that this mountain which we had as- 

 cended was a comparatively insignificant affair. The 

 fact is, it was of huge bulk and great height measured 



