STEEP TRAILS 



be the gatherings on the mountains of pieces 

 of people out of repair! 



How sadly unlike the whole-hearted ongoing 

 of the seeker after gold is this partial, compul- 

 sory mountaineering! as if the mountain 

 treasuries contained nothing better than gold! 

 Up the mountains they go, high-heeled and 

 high-hatted, laden like Christian with morti- 

 fications and mortgages of divers sorts and 

 degrees, some suffering from the sting of bad 

 bargains, others exulting in good ones; hunters 

 and fishermen with gun and rod and leggins; 

 blythe and jolly troubadours to whom all 

 Shasta is romance; poets singing their prayers; 

 the weak and the strong, unable or unwilling 

 to bear mental taxation. But, whatever the 

 motive, all will be in some measure benefited. 

 None may wholly escape the good of Nature, 

 however imperfectly exposed to her blessings. 

 The minister will not preach a perfectly flat 

 and sedimentary sermon after climbing a snowy 

 peak; and the fair play and tremendous impar- 

 tiality of Nature, so tellingly displayed, will 

 surely affect the after pleadings of the lawyer. 

 Fresh air at least will get into everybody, and 

 the cares of mere business will be quenched 

 like the fires of a sinking ship. 



Possibly a branch railroad may some time be 

 built to the summit of Mount Shasta like the 



48 



