1899] Sierran Canyons 



mighty, unhindered surge. Remembering Henry 

 van Dyke's charming essays on ''Little Rivers," 

 we regretted that fate had never led him to a big 

 one like that. It should be said, however, that 

 fortune favored him at last, for not many years 

 afterward he cast his fly in just such another stream, 

 the upper McCloud, which flows off the south slope 

 of Shasta. This I know, because at a San Francisco 

 dinner in his honor several of us shared the ten- 

 pound Dolly Varden he brought back as evidence 

 of good faith ! 



Kings River Canyon is one of a noble series of 

 glaciated mountain gorges gouged out on the west 

 flank of the Sierra. To these — as to all similar 

 basins — John Muir applied the generic term yosem- 

 ite, the local Indian name for the canyon of the 

 Merced. Other "yosemites" in California are those "ro^em' 

 of the Kern, Kaweah, Upper San Joaquin, Tuolumne, 

 Stanislaus, Moquelumne, American, Yuba, and 

 Feather. The two greatest of them, the Kings 

 River Canyon and Yosemite Valley, necessarily 

 challenge comparison. The Yosemite has grander 

 precipices, majestic waterfalls, and a general air 

 of scenic perfection; Nature has there done well 

 and confidently rests her case. The Canyon seems 

 planned on a larger scale. Its higher walls slope 

 backward out of sight, and the mountains in which 

 it rises are far more massive. 



In the Alps, the Lauterbrunnenthal, the Hinter- 

 rheinthal below the Spliigen, and the Allee Blanche 

 might be accepted geologically as "yosemites." 



From our permanent camp we made many fine 

 trips. Goat Mountain, a rugged peak to the north- 



C 651 1 



lies 



