CHAPTER IV 



TRAVEL IN THE MOUNTAINS 



"House-Roof Mountains" — Making Up Packs — When Charlie Threw 

 Down his Pack — Valley Thoroughfares — Green Timber — Down 

 Timber — Trail-Cutting — Berries of the Mountains. 



In the matter of mountain travel, be it remembered 

 that there are mountains and mountains. In some of 

 them, valleys of comfortable width and openness are a 

 kind of habit. Others have a bad way of bringing you 

 up against the rocky nose of an overhanging cliff, and 

 taking toll from your nerves or your muscles before your 

 pack-train is safely by. In some, you are eternally fight- 

 ing with timber, brush, and decaying moss-covered forest 

 debris. By reason of its hot-house atmosphere and rains, 

 I believe the mountains of Borneo are to the climber the 

 most exhausting of all on earth. 



Some mountains seem morally upright and fair, while 

 others, despite their heights, are actually mean. Some 

 give the hunter a fair reward for much hard labor, but 

 others tantalize him into wearing out his soul for naught. 

 Think of seeing twenty-one bears in twenty days, without 

 being able to get a shot at one! (This by reason of snow- 

 bent willows on the slides.) It is not all of hunting to 

 kill game; and why should one hunt in mean mountains, 

 monotonous forests or water-soaked plains! 



35 



