against the black cliff we gouged footholds with our hob-nailed shoes, ami 

 thus, step by step, we ascended 500 feet. At last we came to the final 

 cliff, which report had given us much reason to dread, but we attacked it 

 without stopping to indulge our dread wherever rt looked least formidable. 

 Not fifty feet had we gone before we were confronted by a wall of perpen- 

 dicular blocks which completely barred our progress. Discouraged, but not 

 utterly cast down, we descended to the snow, and once more tried to work 

 our way up a tiny stream channel worn into the cliff. This time we wen» 

 more fortunate and forged ahead without much hindrance. But clill* 

 climbing for more than a thousand feet is no easy matter, even under the 

 best of circumstances, and we were glad enough to see the end of our 

 strenuous endeavors after nearly two hours of this work. Each upward 

 step had been rewarded by the growing picture of surpassing wildness and 

 beauty which gradually rose to our horizon. 



At last, after scaling huge rock shelves covered with a thin and treacfj- 

 erous coating of ice, we gained the summit Itself, and stood on an airy pin- 

 nacle 13,200 feet above the sea. All that had entranced us before was bull 

 a preparation for the superb panorama which now burst upon our sight. 

 On the flanks of the mountain itself lay seven small glaciers, separated 

 from each other by black jagged ridges which sprung from the summit In 

 fantastic spires and battlements. The sources of the San Joaquin, Its up- 

 per canyon and the great Balloon Dome lay to the south, and eastward 

 stretched the shadowy desert. 



It was hard to descend to earth after such exaltation, but at 2 o'clock, 

 after having been nearly three hours on the summit, we reluctantly turned 

 downwards. The steep snowfield was traversed at the rate of a mife a 

 second — more or less — and another night was spent in sight of the glori- 

 ous mountain. The next night found us at the Tuolumne Camp, and after 

 two more weeks of this simple life, we sadly turned our backs upon it and 

 struck out for civilization. 



Quite a contingent of our Appalachian Club friends have come wes^ 

 ward to join us for the last year or two, and nothing has given the member* 

 of the Sierra Club greater zest for the pleasures of camp life than to share 

 It with friends of like mind, who make a long and expensive journey for 

 the sake of that return to nature which counteracts the effect of the tf\ou- 

 sand ills which flesh is heir to and renews the spirit for its part in the battie 

 of life. 



Medicinal Virtues of Natural 

 Mineral Waters of California 



WINSLOW ANDERSON, A.M.. M.D., M.R.C.P., Londes, Ensland, Et«. 



THE therapeutic value of our natural mineral waters can hardly be 

 overestimated. It is not generally known that natural mineral wat- 

 ers with a smaller proportion of active ingredients are more readily 

 assimilated than larger quantities of the same salts given in a con- 

 centrated form. This, however, is a fact, and is accounted for by the 

 rapid absorption in the human economy of the finely divided partic!ee 

 of the mineral constituents. This therapeutic activity is explained by the fact 

 that the minute mineral ingredients found in natural spring waters are in a 

 state of unstable ionic equilibrium held in colloidal suspension. The ex- 

 treme minuteness of the particles is particularly apt to excite cellular actiy* 

 ity by which the mineral salts are readily given up by the water and quickly 

 absorbed by the cell-energy of the living organism. 



The ionic or minute divisibility which permeates all matter is main- 

 tained in colloidal suspension in fresh or sparkling mineral water by the 



