HARRIET— LITTLE MOUNTAIN CLIMBER 237 



the edge. We walked around the top, keeping 

 close to the edge. In most places it dropped off 

 steeply for a hundred feet. The east side is a per- 

 pendicular wall more than a thousand feet high. 

 There were many cracked and loose stones on the 

 edge; many were almost ready to fall overboard, 

 as numerous others had already done. Plainly 

 the top of the Peak had once been much larger. 

 Just as we were sitting down to eat our lunch Har- 

 riet asked: 



"How big was the top once?" 



We sat in a safe place near the edge of a precipice 

 where we could look down into Chasm Lake — a 

 glacier-made basin — 2,000 feet below us. The 

 water, though clear, appeared as green as any emer- 

 ald ink you have ever seen. 



A half-tamed ground-hog, that in summer lived 

 upon the summit, came forth to have scraps of our 

 lunch. A flock of rosy finches alighted near us. 

 A humming-bird flew over without stopping. A 

 number of butterflies circled about in the calm, 

 sunny air. Harriet asked if there were always the 

 same animals on the summit. I told her I had 

 seen Bighorn sheep tracks and mountain lion tracks 

 there. Just once — when I was up with another 

 little girl — I had seen a cotton-tail rabbit on the top, 

 but I could not understand how he came to be 

 there. Blue-birds, robins, ptarmigan, eagles, and 

 weasels sometimes come to the summit. 



We looked at the many-coloured lichens upon the 



