SNOW-BLINDED ON THE SUMMIT 5 



While I was looking at one of these artistically 

 decorated trees, a mass of snow dropped upon me 

 from its top, throwing me headlong and causing me 

 to lose my precious eye-protecting snow glasses. 

 But now I was blind. 



With staff in hand, I stood for a minute or two 

 planning the best manner to get along without 

 eyes. My faculties were intensely awake. Seri- 

 ous situations in the wilds had more than once be- 

 fore this stimulated them to do their best. Tem- 

 porary blindness is a good stimulus for the imagina- 

 tion and the memory — in fact, is good educational 

 training for all the senses. However perilous my 

 predicament during a mountain trip, the possibility 

 of a fatal ending never even occurred to me. Look- 

 ing back now, I cannot but wonder at my matter- 

 of-fact attitude concerning the perils in which that 

 snow-blindness placed me. 



I had planned to cross the pass and descend into 

 a trail at timberline. The appearance of the slope 

 down which I was to travel was distinctly in my 

 mind from my impressions just before darkness 

 settled over me. 



Off I slowly started. I guided myself with in- 

 formation from feet and staff, feeling my way with 

 the staff so as not to step off a cliff or walk over- 

 board into a canon. In imagination I pictured 

 myself following the shadow of a staff-bearing and 

 slouch-hatted form. Did mountain sheep, curious 

 and slightly suspicious, linger on crags to watch 



