TIMBER-LINE AND SUMMIT 141 



The summit behind us was not wider than a city lot, 

 and in one magnificent sweep of half a mile, without a 

 big rock or a tree, it swept down, down, down to the bot- 

 tom of a huge, green basin in which a grand army could 

 have encamped. 



On our right, and close at hand, there rose high above 

 us, and also dropped far below, the most awful wall 

 of rock that I saw in British Columbia. From bottom 

 to top its perpendicular face was, I am sure, not less 

 than a thousand feet. From it, there was an almost con- 

 tinuous rattle of falling rock. Even had we seen a sheep 

 on the face of it, we would not have had the heart to 

 shoot the animal and see it fall off. 



The impressive height of that grim wall was strongly 

 emphasized by the softer details of the great basin far 

 below. It was fitting that the grandest precipice should 

 rise from the grandest basin in those mountains, and 

 cradle at its foot a tiny lake that was like a big emerald. 



The world below us was unrolled like a map. The 

 outlines of the dark-green timber, as yet untouched by 

 fire, and the intervening patches of light yellow-green 

 grass, hemmed in on two sides by frowning walls of dark- 

 gray rock and bounded in the distance by a succession of 

 mountains running thirty miles away to the snowy peaks 

 on the Continental Divide, made a grand and impressive 

 picture. 



For half an hour we sat with our backs against the 

 mountain-side, absorbing the magnificent panorama into 

 our systems. We spoke little. All at once I saw some- 

 thing new, and looked quickly at Charlie. At the same 



