THE PASSES 81 



footed through these rough passes, oftentimes for 

 a distance of sixty or seventy miles. They are 

 always accompanied by the men, who stride on, 

 unburdened and erect, a little in advance, kindly 

 stooping at difficult places to pile stepping-stones 

 for their patient, pack-animal wives, just as they 

 would prepare the way for their ponies. 



Bears evince great sagacity as mountaineers, but 

 although they are tireless and enterprising travel 

 ers they seldom cross the range. I have several 

 times tracked them through the Mono Pass, but 

 only in late years, after cattle and sheep had 

 passed that way, when they doubtless were follow 

 ing to feed on the stragglers and on those that 

 had been killed by falling over the rocks. Even 

 the wild sheep, the best mountaineers of all, choose 

 regular passes in making journeys across the sum 

 mits. Deer seldom cross the range in either direc 

 tion. I have never yet observed a single specimen 

 of the mule-deer of the Great Basin west of the 

 summit, and rarely one of the black-tailed species 

 on the eastern slope, notwithstanding many of the 

 latter ascend the range nearly to the summit every 

 summer, to feed in the wild gardens and bring 

 forth their young. 



The glaciers are the pass-makers, and it is by 

 them that the courses of all mountaineers are pre 

 destined. Without exception every pass in the 

 Sierra was created by them without the slightest 

 aid or predetermining guidance from any of the 

 cataclysmic agents. I have seen elaborate state 

 ments of the amount of drilling and blasting ac 

 complished in the construction of the railroad 



