290 THE WILDERNESS OF THE UPPER YUKON 



snow in the valley, except that of the fox and the rabbit. 

 Late in the afternoon I saw seven ewes and lambs lying 

 on the snow on a slope of an adjacent mountain. They 

 were colored like the others and, after resting, they started 

 single file for a new feeding-ground, walking, running, 

 and jumping over the rocks and rough places. 



September 28. I started early and toiled upward to 

 reach the peak of a high mountain south-east of camp, 

 hoping finally to find the larger rams, for I wanted a big 

 one from the Glenlyons. Just before noon I stood on 

 the apex, fifty-two hundred feet above the river. A vio- 

 lent storm suddenly descended a raging snow blizzard 

 and I had to hold on to a projecting rock to keep from 

 being blown off. Fog settled around, and the blasts of 

 wind whirled the snow in violent eddies about me, filling 

 my neck and even blowing up the inside of my trousers. 

 It lasted three hours and I was so cold it did not seem 

 possible to endure it much longer. The wild desolation 

 of that blizzard, shutting everything from sight and sus- 

 pending me in tumultuous clouds, produced a feeling of 

 profound loneliness. During the storm I heard flocks 

 of ptarmigan going by, and now and then a croaking 

 raven. After it cleared, I went down from the peak to the 

 crest and walked along it all the rest of the day, but saw 

 no animals. When about to return I started to cross a 

 steep slope of hard snow lying solid for two hundred 

 yards, and after going well out in it, it proved steeper 

 than I had thought and I could look two thousand feet 

 almost directly down. Without axe or staff, and wearing 

 rubber shoes with small hobnails, my situation soon be- 



