114 CALIFORNIA DESERT TRAILS 



sand. The Scriptural phrase, "like the sands of the 

 seashore for multitude," seemed almost weak in 

 view of these great billows like the storm waves of 

 mid-ocean. Here was not only a shore, but a sea of 

 sand. The scene stamped itself strongly on my mind 

 — the strange contours, differing from those of 

 other materials; the shadow masses of clear blue; 

 the amethyst of the nearer ridges of San Jacinto; the 

 deep afternoon purple of the great mountain itself; 

 the gleam of mingled snow and cloud along its crest ; 

 over all the glowing sky, too luminous and aerial to 

 be fairly expressed as blue. 



I had been among these dunes once before, when 

 a youngster from a ranch on the farther side had 

 guided me to the edge of the tract. I was busied with 

 camera and notebook, not noting my companion, 

 when a patter of charging feet and a Comanche yell 

 made me jump. It was only my guide enjoying a 

 desert toboggan-slide. He raced to the edge of a 

 thirty-foot dune, threw up his heels, and took a 

 header down the sharp incline. Running sand at 

 every pore, he pronounced it bully, and recom- 

 mended me to try it, adding that it was one of his 

 and his sister's regular forms of exercise. But I was 

 past twelve, and found it easy to refrain. 



My way lay now more to the south, where, a 

 dozen miles away, was the little railway town of 

 Indio. This lower northwestern arm of the desert, 

 into which Thousand Palm Canon issues, was in- 

 tended to be named the Conchilla Valley, ^ from the 

 myriads of little shells that powder the ground, 



1 Spanish concha, shell; diminutive, conchilla. 



