Big Trees and already they towered 

 triumphantly to the sky. 



How would it feel to be swinging, 

 on the tippy top of that giant red- 

 wood? See-saw I gave myself up 

 to the soothing fancy now I was 

 swinging in it, as gently as a babe in 

 its cradle, swish, swish when a 

 faint, very faint movement beneath 

 brought me to earth with a jar and 

 stiffened every muscle to wakeful- 

 ness. Something was under the 

 heavy canvas on which rested the 

 rubber bed. Nervous, of course I 

 was after all the day's excitement. 



No, there it was again. Had I 

 remembered to put my horse-hair 

 rope around the bed, the magic rope 

 that is supposed to keep the rattle- 

 snakes away? Had I? Now I remem- 

 ber it was in place! Perhaps I was 

 to have the opportunity of testing it. 

 No one not even the oldest inhabitant, 

 attempts to deny the numerous 

 rattlesnakes in the Sierra. Ah! that 

 sneaking insinuating motion, very 

 gentle, I could hardly feel, or hear, 

 or whatever sense it was that con- 

 veyed the intelligence but unmis- 

 takable. It had gotten under there 



