THE WILD SHEEP 315 



exciting feat ; for, among all the varied experiences 

 of mountaineers, the crossing of boisterous, rock- 

 dashed torrents is found to be one of the most 

 trying to the nerves. Yet these fine fellows walked 

 fearlessly to the brink, and jumped from boulder 

 to boulder, holding themselves in easy poise above 

 the whirling, confusing current, as if they were 

 doing nothing extraordinary. 



In the immediate foreground of this rare picture 

 there was a fold of ice-burnished granite, traversed 

 by a few bold lines in which rock-ferns and tufts of 

 bryanthus were growing, the gray canon walls on 

 the sides, nobly sculptured and adorned with brown 

 cedars and pines ; lofty peaks in the distance, and 

 in the middle ground the snowy fall, the voice and 

 soul of the landscape ; fringing bushes beating time 

 to its thunder-tones, the brave sheep in front of it, 

 their gray forms slightly obscured in the spray, yet 

 standing out in good, heavy relief against the close 

 white water, with their huge horns rising like the 

 upturned roots of dead pine-trees, while the even 

 ing sunbeams streaming up the canon colored all the 

 picture a rosy purple and made it glorious. After 

 crossing the river, the dauntless climbers, led by 

 their chief, at once began to scale the canon wall, 

 turning now right, now left, in long, single file, 

 keeping well apart out of one another's way, and 

 leaping in regular succession from crag to crag, 

 now ascending slippery dome-curves, now walking 

 leisurely along the edges of precipices, stopping at 

 times to gaze down at me from some flat-topped 

 rock, with heads held aslant, as if curious to learn 

 what I thought about it, or whether I was likely to 



