BUTTERFLIES OF MT. HOOD 169 



hard to the north, and the gods of the storms 

 met on the summit? 



We saw the clouds gathering below us as we 

 started down. On the glacier walls we met the 

 cold winds climbing up and heard their talk 

 of storm until we came within the shelter of the 

 trees about the Inn. During the night I woke to 

 listen for the sound of feet on the mountain, but 

 none bent the pines outside my window, nor 

 swayed the wide wooded slopes that stretched 

 away to the orchards and the valleys below. 

 Near morning a slow rain began to fall. Was 

 this the talk that we had heard along the heights? 

 This the meeting of those forces flying past us 

 toward the summit? Then through the small 

 stepping of the rain I caught far off a mightier 

 tread, a faint concord of crash and roar — or felt 

 it in the very frame of things, as when an organ 

 fills the deep dim places of the church with trem- 

 bling, and no note is heard. Hurrying out, I saw 

 the rain slanting down the canon, the dull sky 

 darkening behind the peak, while all about the 

 summit smoked the gray smother of storm. Sud- 

 denly the smoke lifted, filled, poured over and 

 down till, caught in some mighty draft, the cloud 



