The Tuolumne Canon. 



289 



magnificent scenery. The writer found opportunity to 

 make only a few general notes on the flora and fauna. 

 Both are extremely interesting, and so rich and varied 

 that it would require months to make anything like an 

 exhaustive study of its animal life, to say nothing of 

 the vegetation. The general trend of the cafion is a 

 little north of west. This fact entails a great variety 

 of light effects during the course of the day. The width 

 of the canon varies constantly, sometimes narrowing to 

 little more than a hundred feet of churning water, some- 

 times widening to a quarter of a mile of forest and 

 blooming meadow. It should be noted also that the 

 course of the river is much more contorted than the 

 geological survey map would lead one to suppose. 



With provisions for four or five days in our knap- 

 sacks we left the main party at the Tuolumne Meadows 

 and followed the south side of the river to the entrance 

 of the canon. The rough work began soon after we 

 reached the point where Conness Creek enters from the 

 north. Below the wonderful White Cascades, beside a 

 magnificent trout-pool that furnished a palatable con- 

 tribution to our menu, we ate our first luncheon. That 

 afternoon we encountered earthquake taluses overgrown 

 with extraordinarily dense thickets and made compara- 

 tively little headway. Opposite the entrance of Return 

 Creek canon the granite walls are very steep, with 

 numerous abutments resembling giant towers in relief 

 that lead the eye to dizzy altitudes. It was no doubt 

 partially due to the extreme height of these stupendous 

 cafion walls that we seemed unable to get past the en- 

 trance of Return Creek. At every turn of the narrow 

 stream-bed the beetling parapets were still looming above 



