July 27, 1912 
FOREST AND STREAM 
105 
long absorbing to its minutest detail that 
herculean flood. Gray as the clouds in Novem¬ 
ber, and catching occasional touches of the sun¬ 
light; changeable and intermittent, sparkling 
and supplemented by the roar and crash. One 
seems to have suddenly left the shores of this 
country; he seems to be in the midst of the 
Switzerland country, for one cannot conceive 
of such equally beautiful scenes in this, the 
chain of the Rockies, where the usual order is 
lack-luster hills, lacking so much in that 
wonder one can find only here. With the first 
day filled out to the fullest extent, homeward 
you go at twilight, when the purple veil of night 
is lowering over the eternal quietudes, serene 
with the restfulness of evening, and lying there 
as though graced by the kiss of one who left 
them there as in the beginning. 
The trip to Sperry Glacier occupies the next 
day, and by the time the rising sun has gilded 
the mountains in colorful lights, the order is 
given to up and out for the day’s journey. One 
is first of all struck by the wonderful array of 
colorings, as seen in the early morning, when 
the silence is profound and the solemnity of the 
scene is intense. Steady climbing soon brings 
one to Crystal Ford, and thereafter the terri¬ 
tory covered being of such a nature as to make 
riding in the saddle an inconvenience, the sight¬ 
seers dismount, and with some difficulty reach 
the easier height of ground. From this promi¬ 
nent situation one is able to overlook the coun¬ 
try below and witness for the first time the 
beauties of the upper world. Close to the water¬ 
falls one is able to fully appreciate their won¬ 
derful views, but at a distance they also appeal 
in some distinct manner that is inexplainable, 
but of a such a nature as to be marked down in 
the heart for the closest attention. Perhaps it 
is the height; the realization that you are closer 
to the face of the skies. Who can tell? The 
scene is one of joy, and as the horses forge 
ahead, the eyes are busy taking toll of the 
scenery, and wondering if it is possible to say 
something fitting to the occasion about it to 
HEAD OF ST. MARY’S LAKE—GLACIER NATIONAL PARK. 
Copyright by Kiser Photo Co., for Great Northern Ry. 
his comrade, but hesitates, for he has nothing 
to say. It is one of those times when human 
speech is needless to convey meaning to the 
kindred. Sperry Camp is duly reached and 
there the hunger that has steadily been attain¬ 
ing an indomitable proportion in the interven¬ 
ing hours is appeased and thereafter the climb 
is continued on foot to the top, there to be¬ 
hold the wonders of the Sperry Glacier. The 
scribe has said of it: 
“The glacier comes to an end a mile from 
the rim rock that the party gazed at when on 
the shores of Avalanche Lake the day before. 
The intervening mile is one of geological 
wonders, riven rocks the size of a bungalow 
that look as if they were split by a mighty 
wedge. Great hollows sculptured by the ice of 
ages, show twisted strata in whirls and spirals, 
and sharp angles. Here one may read of some 
vast convulsion when the world was young, ere 
it froze solid in its horror. Reds, greens and 
yellow are splashed with pink, violet and gold 
on the jagged pinnacles, around which cower 
pitiful little pines as if still fearful of the last of 
the winter winds. Some of them lie abject on 
the rocks like creeping things, all distorted and 
awry. On every side the waters squirm their 
way to the rim-rock that overhangs Avalanche 
Lake, and a half hour’s stumbling brings the 
sightseer to that point to gaze downward in 
silenced awe at a scene of beauty beyond words 
and retrospect. He is 9,000 feet above sea level. 
There lies the lake on whose shores we stood 
the day before. Yesterday it was agate-gray, 
but to-day it is of a milky-white, in a setting of 
dark green pines that from that height look like 
soft, lustrous fur. To the right and left the 
water is leaping down, as white as the lake, 
with a roar that drowns out words. All around 
are the sharp, jagged crags, clothed in many 
colors, grim sentinels of the gem over which 
they stand jealous guard. It is far from the 
world of men and cities, of tilled fields and 
twentieth-century activities. The setting is of 
another age—before man took dominion over 
the earth. The throaty whistle of the wind is 
a dirge, and a chill falls on body and spirit, as 
the clouds mass in front of the sun, and the 
white fire dies on the lake below. The green 
carpet of the pines turns to funeral black, and 
a longing springs up for the association of one's 
fellow-man, with horses or any of the common¬ 
place living things.” 
What an aspect the glacier reveals itself in 
with its grinding flood of ice and snow lying 
there open to the vision; the hoary offerings of 
the gods, the cruel, menacing flood that carries 
the burden of the hills into the basin below, 
truly the cup of the mighty held in terrible 
hands that clutch at the crevices of those gaunt 
sides for a hold and seems to cling there in 
sheer desperation, frothing in his madness to 
gain the wild ascendency. One looks and be¬ 
holds with picturing eyes the terrible, awe-in¬ 
spiring waste and feels within him something of 
that changeful, mute and ever constant passing. 
But the scene shifts and again night waits upon 
the hills, shutting out the menace of the height 
and flooding the garden of the gods in a dusky, 
luminous shroud, with the snow-clad peaks 
standing out aggressive and prominent, and the 
pine tips touched with the last dying rays of the 
setting sun, if such it be, presenting to the eye 
something of the art of the wild and free. And 
then, as the camp is made, one listens to the 
requiem of the heights, with the vesper notes 
throbbing musically through the boughs of the 
pines; slowly sleep touches the eyelids, and be¬ 
fore one has the intimation of its presence, rest 
in all its glory bids the tired muscles relax into 
peacefulness. There are no dreams to vex one; 
just that solid, soothing, profound sleep that 
heralds the oncoming array of health and joy. 
With the dawn of another morning the 
sightseers are up and doing. How pleasant is 
a morning in the mountains! It is as though 
the sins of the previous day, if any such exist, 
had been washed from the soul of the past, and 
now fresh, and new. soft and appealing, and 
colored with the blessings of the mighty sun, 
