whirling up the steeps and frequently shoots 

 far above the highest peaks. Across the passes 

 it sweeps, roars down the canons on the eastern 

 slope, and rushes out across the plains. Though 

 the western slope below eleven thousand feet 

 is a calm zone, the entire eastern slope is being 

 whipped and scourged by a flood of wind. 

 Occasionally the temperature of these winds is 

 warm. 



These swift, insistent winds, torn, inter- 

 cepted, and deflected by dashing against the 

 broken skyline, produce currents, counter-cur- 

 rents, sleepy eddies, violent vertical whirls, 

 and milling maelstroms that are tilted at every 

 angle. In places there is a gale blowing upward, 

 and here and there the air pours heavily down 

 in an invisible but almost crushing air-fall. 



One winter I placed an air-meter in Granite 

 Pass, at twelve thousand feet altitude on the 

 slope of Long's Peak. During the first high wind 

 I fought my way up to read what the meter 

 said. Both the meter and myself found the 

 wind exceeded the speed limit. Emerging above 

 the trees at timber-line, I had to face the un- 



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