182 BOOK OF A HUNDRED BEARS 



All of this was at an altitude of 7,000 feet, 

 which, for a lowlander, implies the very limit of 

 bellows power. Somehow I grasped that rope. 

 Somehow I scrambled up that rocky slide by its 

 aid and sank half fainting at the top. There was 

 not air enough in the universe to satisfy me. The 

 wide scope of the heavens, of the starry skies, did 

 not contain enough atmosphere to fill my starved 

 and laboring lungs. 



And, shame of shames, just behind us, climbing 

 swiftly, came a lady dressed in grey serge, mount- 

 ing those awful slopes easily and gracefully, start- 

 ing many minutes behind me and overtaking me 

 at the top without a quickened breath. It was 

 she who had left the rope there for that last three 

 hundred feet, without which I should never have 

 attained the top. She had followed us down, but, 

 being a wise mountain climber, had left the rope 

 where it was most needed. 



When I had made her acquaintance, I was not 

 so much ashamed. An employe of a Washington 

 department, she had made her summer outing like 

 this for years. She had climbed Mt. Shasta and 



