52 GREEN TRAILS AND UPLAND PASTURES 



combination as we had never experienced in the high 

 hills, at once awesome and benignant. Later, as we 

 came to know these mountains as our friends and com- 

 rades, we knew that effect to be the soul of Glacier 

 Park. 



When you mount your horse for your first day on the 

 trail in the Rocky Mountains you feel a Columbus em- 

 barking for the Unknown which calls you deeper into the 

 shadow of those towering cliffs. You are intoxicated 

 with the air, lured by the summons of the high places. 

 Put a boy in a pasture, and he makes for the top of the 

 largest bowlder. Go into Glacier Park, and your feet 

 itch for the upland passes. And if, by chance, you are 

 not a horseman (or horsewoman), your first day's 

 emotions are likely to be somewhat complicated. Your 

 cowboy guide, who knows no more of mercy so the 

 woman declares who is sitting a horse for the first 

 time than he knows of the names of the peaks or the 

 wild flowers (and that is very little!), sets off at a brisk 

 trot at the head of the procession, and his motley 

 cavalcade come bouncing along behind him strewing 

 hairpins by the way. But no trot lasts long in Glacier 

 Park. Set out whither you will, a grade awaits you that 

 pulls your horse down to a walk, a patient, weary walk 

 carefully calculated to take you as close to the abrupt 

 edge of the narrow trail, where it creeps around a 

 precipitous slope, as it is possible to go without falling 

 off. Women give up their ancient prerogative of 



