212 



Sierra Club Bulletin. 



far came to our help, — ^mountaineers, nature-lovers, natu- 

 ralists. Most of our thousand club members wrote to 

 the President or Secretary protesting against the destruc- 

 tive reservoir scheme while other sources of city water 

 as pure or purer than the Hetch-Hetchy were available ; 

 so also did the Oregon and Washington mountaineering 

 clubs and the Appalachian of Boston and public-spirited 

 citizens everywhere. And the President, recognizing the 

 need of beauty as well as bread and water in the life of 

 the nation, far from favoring the destruction of any of 

 our country's natural wonder parks and temples, is trying 

 amid a host of other cares to save them all. Within a 

 very short time he has saved the petrified forests of Ari- 

 zona and the Grand Canon, and in our own State the 

 jagged peaks of San Benito county known as "The Pin- 

 nacles," making them national monuments or parks to 

 be preserved for the people forever. None, therefore, 

 need doubt that everything possible will be done to save 

 Hetch-Hetchy. 



After my first visit, in the autumn of 1871, I have al- 

 ways called it the Tuolumne Yosemite, for it is a won- 

 derfully exact counterpart of the great Yosemite, not only 

 in its crystal river and sublime rocks and waterfalls, but 

 in the gardens, groves, and meadows of its flowery park- 

 like floor. The floor of Yosemite is about 4,000 feet 

 above the sea, the Hetch-Hetchy floor about 3,700; the 

 walls of both are of gray granite, rise abruptly out of 

 the flowery grass and groves, are sculptured in the same 

 style, and in both every rock is a glacial monument. 



Standing boldly out from the south wall is a strik- 

 ingly picturesque rock called "Kolana" by the Indians, 

 the outermost of a group 2,300 feet high corresponding 

 with the Cathedral Rocks of Yosemite both in relative 

 position and form. On the opposite side of the valley 

 facing Kolana there is a counterpart of the El Capitan 

 of Yosemite rising sheer and plain to a height of 1,800 

 feet, and over its massive brow flows a stream which 

 makes the most graceful fall I have ever seen. From 



