4 
THE WILD SHEEP OF THE SIERRA. 
very sky ; rocked in storms, curtained in 
clouds, sleeping in thin, icy air ; but, 
\NTapi)ed in his hairy coat, and nourished 
by a strong, warm mother, defended from 
the talons of the eagle and teeth of the 
sly coyote, the bonnie lamb grows apace. 
He soon learns to nibble the tufted rock- 
grasses and leaves of the white spiraea ; his 
horns begin to shoot, and before summer is 
done he is strong and agile, and goes forth 
with the flock, watched by the same divine 
love that tends the more helpless human 
lamb in its warm cradle by the fireside. 
Nothing is more commonly remarked by 
noisy, dusty trail-travelers in the high Sierra 
than the want of animal life — no birds, no 
deer, no squirrels. But if such could only 
go away quietly into the wilderness, saun- 
tering afoot with natural deliberation, they 
would soon learn that these mountain man- 
sions are not without inhabitants, many of 
whom, confiding and gentle, would not try 
to shun their acquaintance. 
In the fall of 1873 I was tracing the 
j South Fork of the San Joaquin up its wild 
I canon to its farthest glacier fountains. It 
was the season of Alpine Indian summer. 
The sun beamed lovingly; the squirrels 
were nutting in the pine-trees, butterflies 
hovered about the last of the golden-rods, 
willow and maple thickets were yellow, the 
meadows were brown, and the whole sunny, 
mellow landscape glowed like a counte- 
nance with the deepest and sweetest repose. 
On my way over the shining, glacier-pol- 
ished rocks along the foaming river, I came 
to an expanded portion of the canon, about 
two miles long and half a mile wide, in- 
closed with picturesque granite walls, like 
j those of Yosemite Valley, the river pouring 
its crystal floods through garden, meadow, 
! and grove in many a sun-spangled curve. 
This hidden Yosemite was full of wild 
life. Deer, with their supple, well-grown 
fawns, bounded from thicket to thicket as I 
advanced. Grouse kept rising from the 
HEAD OF THE MERINO RAM (DOMESTIC). 
