THROUGH THE SIERRA MADRES. 209 
was absorbed in melancholy reflections, 
it’ll be sure to remember it when you are 
climbing over the comb of a cliff from 
two thousand to three thousand feet high, 
and at the least movement of your feet or 
twitching of your fingers it will throw its 
head high in the air, like a hound on the 
scent, and go stumbling over every pebble 
and blade of grass on the dangerous way, 
evidently trying to make you regret that 
you had ever tried to punish so delicate a 
creature. At any other time you can 
turn double somersaults on its back, or 
act like a raving maniac, and it will not 
increase its funereal march a foot a day as 
the result of your actions. Whenever,.a 
trail leads exceptionally near a cliff, before 
it turns on the reverse grade down or up 
hill, the Mexican mule never fails to go 
within an inch of the crest and let his 
