CAMP FIRES IN THE YUKON 79 



steep while the other side was a perpendicular drop 

 thousands of feet into a blind canyon, we discovered 

 the rams on a parallel mountain two thousand feet 

 away, resting in absolute security on a rocky pin- 

 nacle which we could not reach within a day's climb 

 from our location and which we could not approach 

 from any side without being in plain view of the 

 game. We decided to forget these rams and to 

 continue our course across the searing rock ridges, 

 in hope of running across other sheep before we 

 came to the other side of the range. The wind 

 blew hard and the temperature was low on the pin- 

 nacles and our efforts were barren of results as we 

 saw no other game, and came at last to the other 

 side of the range, but before descending sat down 

 on a rocky point to take a look at the landscape*. 



Below us the glasses disclosed our horses shrunk 

 to ant proportions, dwindling down the slope to 

 Count Creek, across which reared a mighty rock 

 barrier crowned with snow; beyond this twenty miles 

 the icy shoulders and crest of Mt. Natazhat loomed 

 bluish white in the afternoon sun at a height of 

 seventeen thousand feet. To the left the icy wall 

 of Mt. Constantine ripped the sky above a sea of 

 lesser peaks, while to the south Mt. Wood and Mt. 

 Steele lorded it over the other giants that have 

 banded together to form the St. Elias range. The 

 utter immobility and finality of the panorama, the 

 oppressive silence that weighs heavily upon the hu- 



