sight, and hidden alleys down which the waters pass with a stealthy step, 

 so that you may pass and repass and not know that you and the brook 

 are neighbors, such a confederation of beauty, entrancing as autumn 

 when it frequents the hills, is all but without competitor. This St. Croix 

 region more nearly reaches this faroff beauty than Rocky Mountain or 

 Sierra or any place I have lit on in my Western wanderings. Here the 

 St. Croix falls down a gorge with multitudinous music. What in old 

 times was perchance a falls is now a turbulent rapids, but is spend- 

 thrift in music; and what more could we require? and I love, sleeping 

 lightly with head at the window so as to miss no music when I wake, if 



THE WALLED ROCKS 



but for a moment (and the waters seem scarcely disquieted, the rapids 

 being not turbulent now nor precipitous) to hear the voices as if an 

 angel shook music from his mantle. The bed and banks of the river 

 are a red granite worn by the polishing of the waters smooth as the pol- 

 ished shaft which tells where lies some blessed sleeper dead, but not 

 forgotten. So polished are these rocks you must step with watchfulness 

 or lame you for your carelessness. Knots of rocks stand in the current 

 of the stream like some sturdy spirit in turbulent wars when others have 

 forgotten to be brave. Some of the wall rocks on the bank are yellow 

 as ocher; and against these dash crests of spray as the stream foams 



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