40 THE MOUNTAINS OF CALIFOKNIA 



roaring river fills all the arching way with impress 

 ively loud reverberating music, which is sweetened 

 at times by the ouzel, a bird that is not afraid to go 

 wherever a stream may go, and to sing wherever a 

 stream sings. 



All the small alpine pools and lakelets are in like 

 manner obliterated from the winter landscapes, 

 either by being first frozen and then covered by 

 snow, or by being filled in by avalanches. The first 

 avalanche of the season shot into a lake basin may 

 perhaps find the surface frozen. Then there is a 

 grand crashing of breaking ice and dashing of waves 

 mingled with the low, deep booming of the ava 

 lanche. Detached masses of the invading snow, 

 mixed with fragments of ice, drift about in sludgy, 

 island-like heaps, while the main body of it forms 

 a talus with its base wholly or in part resting on 

 the bottom of the basin, as controlled by its depth 

 and the size of the avalanche. The next avalanche, 

 of course, encroaches still farther, and so on with 

 each in succession until the entire basin may be 

 filled and its water sponged up or displaced. This 

 huge mass of sludge, more or less mixed with sand, 

 stones, and perhaps timber, is frozen to a consider 

 able depth, and much sun-heat is required to thaw 

 it. Some of these unfortunate lakelets are not 

 clear of ice and snow until near the end of summer. 

 Others are never quite free, opening only on the 

 side opposite the entrance of the avalanches. Some 

 show only a narrow crescent of water lying between 

 the shore and sheer bluffs of icy compacted snow, 

 masses of which breaking off float in front like ice 

 bergs in a miniature Arctic Ocean, while the ava- 



