164 



Sierra Club Bulletin. 



nearer the fire. Three more times during the night 

 some one of us was up to renew the fire. Before long, 

 " morn in the white wake of the morning star came 

 furrowing all the orient with gold." 



At 5 o'clock (July i8th) we were up and cooking our 

 frugal morning repast of bacon and coffee, and by 5 :30 

 had packed our lunch, shouldered rope, ice-ax, camera, 

 and field-glasses, pocketed our Sierra Club register, and 

 were on the march toward the mountain. The air was 

 crisp and cold. The sun, although half an hour above 

 the horizon, was hidden from us behind the mighty wall 

 of Humphreys, which was silhouetted black, clear, and 

 sharp against the blazing east, — every pinnacle, every 

 blade, every jagged spur, every sawtooth clear-cut and 

 sharp, — ^and above all fanlike rays of light shot up into 

 the clear atmosphere. On we went over the granite basin, 

 strewn with glacial erratics, past frozen lakes lying in 

 glacial basins. Every lake had its floating ice and its 

 field of snow. Whatever soil there was, was made soft 

 and spongy by the ice crystals. The traveling was com- 

 paratively easy until the talus slope was reached. Here 

 was a lake, larger than the rest, which had to be skirted. 

 Once past this, the ascent of the talus was commenced. 

 The rocks were small and piled so steep that they started 

 with almost every step. Our course took us up this five 

 hundred feet, to the mouth of the gorge which I have 

 already mentioned as running diagonally up the mountain 

 from left to right. Although we had examined the moun- 

 tain so carefully from a distance, and had mapped out our 

 proper course, yet when actually on its side it was impos- 

 sible to tell which was the correct gorge. Noble, Whitney, 

 and my brother worked up the steep chimney toward the 



