80 GREEN TRAILS AND UPLAND PASTURES 



upon the scene. The bluish-purple lupines and the 

 flaming paint brush, varying in colour from orange to 

 almost pure scarlet, grew in luxurious profusion on a 

 carpet of grass and moss. The columnar trunks were 

 shaggy brown. Between them we looked down into a 

 vast hole and saw the iceberg green lake at the bottom. 

 A cloud ship was trailing its shadow anchor over the 

 mountain wall across the lake. Down the side it came, 

 dusking the forest. It swept out over the water, and 

 where this shadow lay the water changed to amethyst. 

 We lunched at six thousand feet, on the edge of the 

 first snowfield which was rapidly melting under a hot 

 July sun. The snow had receded several feet in the 

 past few days, leaving the ground bare, and through the 

 gray scum which you always find under the accumulated 

 Winter's snow the earliest Spring wild flowers were 

 pushing up, especially dog-tooth violets, which six feet 

 out from the present snow line were shaking their 

 golden bells in the breeze. We were not above timber, 

 however. In the White Mountains of New Hampshire 

 timber line is at 4,500 feet. In the Alps it is at 6,400. 

 The highest timber line that I have ever seen recorded is 

 13,800 feet, on Mount Orizaba, in Mexico. In Colorado 

 and the California Sierras it is between 11,000 and 

 12,000 feet. Above Lake Chelan, it appears to 

 average something under 8,000. At 6,000 feet on War 

 Creek Pass we found the Douglas firs still of consider- 

 able girth and height, but they began rapidly to dwarf 



