IMPERIAL VALLEY TO YUMA 299 



of rain. These are the moods of the desert in sum- 

 mer. I crept under a discarded piece of canvas, 

 where I ate a cold supper: then watered Kaweah 

 and turned in. 



I was up at dawn and before sunrise we were on 

 the march. The sand-hills, which form a barrier sev- 

 eral miles wide, had lately been rendered passable by 

 the laying of a rough plank roadway, which begins 

 at this point. Kaweah is conservative and this was 

 something new, so there was an argument with 

 quirt and spur before he would set foot on it. The 

 planks had warped and loosened, and he was kept on 

 a continual dance of nervousness: still they were a 

 great boon, for without them the five miles of shift- 

 ing sand would have consumed as many hours. 



The scene was interesting and in a strange way 

 beautiful. The dunes rose in quarter-circle curves, 

 broken sharply away to a face of two angles, one 

 steep, perhaps 60°, the other low, not over 15°. 

 Everywhere the same form was reproduced, the 

 smooth arc, the sharp break at the edge, and the 

 long slant at the foot. Along the faces and from the 

 edges of fracture, a mist of sand was ever curling off 

 and drifting in airy waves and feathers, following 

 every contour of the dune. The whole mass of the 

 sand was enveloped in this fairy-like veil, creeping 

 like smoke, weaving in dainty frills and spirals. The 

 vapor-like action was odd to see in a solid substance. 



The color was wonderful in purity and sheer 

 power of mass. The smooth, large outlines of 

 pale yellow, the water-like transparency of cobalt 

 shadow, and the soft brilliance of the early morning 



