The Yosemite Waters. 



307 



THE YOSEMITE WATERS * 



By Harriet Monroe. 



The beauty of falling waters is like the beauty of birds 

 — delicate, musical, swift of flight and brilliant with many 

 colors. It is like the fragile, laboriously wrought beauty 

 of lace, weaving fantastic patterns out of invisible threads. 

 Like the soft white beauty of snow it is, flaking, drifting, 

 draping the rocks, turning to blue and green and lilac in 

 the sparkle of the sun. It is like the beauty of armies — 

 yes, like the beauty of armies is the beauty of falling 

 waters, of armies that march to victory, shouting and 

 waving banners, and booming their haughty guns. It is 

 like the beauty of the will of God — joyous, not to be ques- 

 tioned, working for its own. 



And falling waters have many souls, and none shall 

 gainsay the least of them. Souls of laughing and of 

 weeping have they, of motion and of rest; souls that 

 cry out and others that are still. 



Like a flower is the soul of Bridal Veil, like a white 

 lily nodding in the wind. Now the north wind finds her, 

 and tenderly, appealingly, she leans as for succor unto 

 the granite wall ; now the south wind seeks her, and she 

 spreads out her filmy robes like a dancer and strews 

 the air with her whiteness. Lovely she is, and her voice 

 is soft, and her breath is sweet and fine like the faint 

 scent of azaleas. With light touches she strokes the 

 mountain and he gives her of himself ; yet, though he 

 woo her for a million years, for him she will never 

 change. 



And Illilouette flutters like a ribbon in the wind as she 

 picks her difficult way over the steep black rocks. Glad 

 she is with the gladness of a child, careless of danger, 

 waving her hand in the sun. I see the gleam of her 



* Reprinted by special permission from the North American Review. 

 Copyright, 1908, by the North American Review Publishing Company. 



