WATER BORDERS 



anglers have assisted nature of late, one 

 still comes upon roaring brown waters 

 where trout might very well be, but are 

 not. 



The highest limit of conifers — in the 

 middle Sierras, the white bark pine — is 

 not along the water border. They come 

 to it about the level of the heather, but 

 they have no such affinity for dampness as 

 the tamarack pines. Scarcely any bird- 

 note breaks the stillness of the timber-line, 

 but chipmunks inhabit here, as may be 

 guessed by the gnawed ruddy cones of the 



^ pines, and lowering hours the woodchucks 

 i come down to the water. On a little spit 



\oi land running into Windy Lake we found 



/ one summer the evidence of a tragedy ; a 

 j pair of sheep's horns not fully grown caught 



1 in the crotch of a pine where the living 

 sheep must have lodged them. The trunk 

 214 



