THE APPROACH 



Wrens and linnets are building nests in the 

 cholla, and finches are singing from the top of 

 the sahuaro.* There are plenty of reptiles, 

 rabbits and ground squirrels quietly slipping 

 out of your way ; and now that the sun is up 

 you can see a long sun-burned slant-of-hair 

 trotting up yonder divide and casting an appre- 

 hensive head from side to side as he moves off. 

 It is not often that the old gray wolf shows 

 himself to the traveller. He is usually up in 

 the mountains before sunrise. And seldom 

 now does one see the desert antelope along the 

 mesas, and yet off to the south you can see 

 patches of white that come and go almost like 

 flashing mirrors in the sun. They are stragglers 

 from some band that have drifted up from cen- 

 tral Sonora. No ; they are not far away. A 

 little mirage is already forming over that portion 

 of the mesa and makes them look more distant 

 than they are in reality. You can be deceived 

 on the desert by the nearness of things quite as 

 often as by their remoteness. 



These desert mountains have a fashion of ap- 

 pearing distant until you are almost up to them. 

 Then they seem to give up the game of decep- 

 tion and come out of their hiding-places. It is 

 * Properly Saguaro. 



