STEEP TRAILS 



long without food that we cared but Uttle 

 about eating, but we eagerly drank the coffee 

 he prepared for us. Oiu" feet were frozen, and 

 thawing them was painful, and had to be done 

 very slowly by keeping them buried in soft 

 snow for several hours, which avoided perma- 

 nent damage. Five thousand feet below the 

 summit we found only three inches of new 

 snow, and at the base of the mountaiu only a 

 slight shower of rain had fallen, showing how 

 local our storm had been, notwithstanding its 

 terrific fury. Our feet were wrapped in sacking, 

 and we were soon mounted and on our way 

 down into the thick sunshine — " God's Coim- 

 try," as Sisson calls the Chaparral Zone. In 

 two hours' ride the last snow-bank was left 

 behind. Violets appeared along the edges of 

 the trail, and the chaparral was coming into 

 bloom, with young hUes and larkspurs about 

 the open places in rich profusion. How beauti- 

 ful , seemed the golden sunbeams streaming 

 through the woods between the warm brown 

 boles of the cedars and pines! All my friends 

 among the birds and plants seemed like old 

 friends, and we felt like speaking to every one 

 of them as we passed, as if we had been a long 

 time away in some far, strange country. 



In the afternoon we reached Strawberry Val- 

 ley and fell asleep. Next morning we seemed to 



80 



