CALIFORNIA by John Muir: My First Summer in the Sierra, Picturesque California, The Mountains of California, The Yosemite & Our National Parks (Illustrated Edition). John Muir

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СКАЧАТЬ Every dome, ridge, and mountain in the fore and middle grounds are seen to have rounded outlines, while those of the summit peaks are sharp, the former having been overflowed by the heavy grinding folds of the ice-sheet while the latter were downflowed, thus grinding them into sharp peaks and crests. Here you see the tributary valleys or canyons of the main Yosemite Valley branching far and wide into the fountains of perpetual ice and snow. Adown these wide polished valleys once poured the ancient glaciers that united here to form the main Yosemite Glacier that eroded the valley out of the solid, wearing its channel gradually deeper, crawling on, unhalting, unresting, throughout the countless centuries of the Ice Period.

      The distant views from the summit of Sentinel Dome are still more extensive and telling, and many charming Alpine plants--phlox, telinum, eriogonae, rock-ferns, etc. are found there.

      On the way to Little Yosemite a view of the Illilouette Fall may be obtained from its head, though it is much inferior to the view obtained at the foot of the fall by scrambling up its rocky canyon from the valley. The fall in general appearance most resembles the Nevada. Before coming to the brink of the precipice its waters are severely dashed and tossed by steps and jutting angles on the bottom and sides of its channel, therefore it is a very white and finely textured fall. When in full play it is columnar and richly fluted from the partial division of its waters on the roughened lip of the precipice. It is not nearly so grand a fall as the Upper Yosemite, so symmetrical as the Vernal, or so nobly simple as the Bridal Veil; nor does it present so overwhelming an outgush of snowy magnificence as the Nevada, but in the richness and exquisite fineness of texture of its flowing folds it surpasses them all. After crossing the Illilouette Valley the trail descends into the Little Yosemite near the lower end, and thence down past the Nevada and Vernal falls to the main valley. But before returning, a visit should be made through the Little Yosemite. It is about four miles long, half a mile wide, and its walls are from 1,500 to 2,500 feet in height, bold and sheer and sculptured in true Yosemite style. And, since its rocks have not been so long exposed to post-glacial weathering, they are less blurred than those of the lower valley, large areas of the wall surfaces showing a beautiful glacial polishing that reflect the sunshine like glass.

      The bottom of the valley is flat and covered with showy gardens, meadows, rose and azalia thickets, and beautiful groves of silver-fir and pine; while the river, charmingly embowered, flows through the midst of them, softly gliding over smooth, shining sands in peaceful, restful beauty. At the head of the valley there is a showy cascade where the river flows over a bar of granite so moderately inclined that one may enjoy a climb close alongside the glad dancing flood, with but little danger of being washed away.

      This used to be a favorite hunting ground of the Indians, where they found abundance of game--mountain quail, grouse, deer, and the cinnamon bear--gathered together as if enclosed in a high-walled park with gates easily guarded. But the noisy, destructive methods of tourist sportsmen have driven most of the game away.

      As the river approaches the Nevada Fall after its tranquil flow through the valley levels, its channel is roughened with projecting rock-ribs and elbows, the object of which seems to be to fret the stream into foam and fit it for its grand display. And with what eager enthusiasm it accepts its fate, dashing on side angles, surging against round, bossy knobs, swirling in pot holes, upglancing in shallow, curved basins, then bounding out over the brink and down the grand descent, more air than water, glowing like a sun beaten cloud. Into the heart of it all any one with good nerve and good conscience may gaze from the end of a granite slab that juts out over the giddy precipice and is brushed by the flood as it bounds over the brink.

      Blinding drifts of scud and spray prevent a near approach from below until autumn. Then, its thunder hushed, the fall shrinks to a whispering web of embroidery clinging to the face of the cliff, more interesting and beautiful to most observers than the passionate flood-fall of spring.

      The view down the canyon is one of the most wonderful about the valley--the river, gathering its shattered waters, rushing in wild exultation down the Emerald Pool and over the Vernal Fall; the sublime walls on either hand, with the stupendous mass of the Glacier Point Ridge blocking the view in front, forming an immense three sided, hopper-shaped basin 3,000 feet deep, resounding with the roar of winds and waters, as if it were some grand mill in which the mountains were being ground to dust. A short distance above the head of the fall the river gives off a small part of its waters, which, descending a narrow canyon to the north of the fall, along the base of the Liberty Cap, forms a beautiful cascade, and finally joins the main stream again a few yards below the fall. Sometime ago the officer in charge of the valley seemed to regard the cascades as so much waste water, inasmuch as they employed an enterprising and ingenious gentleman to "fix the falls," as he said, by building a dam across the cascade stream where it leaves the river, so as to make all the water tumble and sing together. No great damage was done, however, by this dam or any other improvement. Mending the Yosemite waterfalls would seem to be about the last branch of industry that even unsentimental Yankees seeking new outlets for enterprise would be likely to engage in. As well whitewash the storm-stained face of El Capitan or gild the domes.

      The Vernal Fall is a general favorite among the visitors to the valley, doubtless because it is better seen and heard than any of the others, on account of its being more accessible. A good stairway leads up the cliffs alongside of it, and the open level plateau over the edge of which it enables one to saunter in safety close to its brow and watch its falling waters as they gradually change from green to purplish grey and white, until broken into spray at the bottom. It is the most staid and orderly of all the great falls, and never shows any marked originality of form or behavior. After resting in Emerald Pool, the river glides calmly over the smooth lip of a perfectly plain and sheer precipice, and descends in a regular sheet about 80 feet wide, striking upon a rough talus with a steady, continuous roar that is but little influenced by the winds that sweep the cliffs. Thus it offers in every way a striking contrast to the impetuous Nevada, which so crowds and hurries its chafed and twisted waters over the verge, which seemingly are glad to escape, as they plunge free in the air, while their deep, booming tones go sounding far out over the listening landscape.

      From the foot of the Vernal the river descends to its confluence with the Illilouette Creek in a tumultuous rush and roar of cascades, and emerges from its shadowy, boulder-choked canyon in a beautiful reach of rapids, stately spaces forming a wall on either side; while the flowering dogwood, rubus nutkanus, azalea, and tall, plumy ferns, well watered and cool, make beautiful borders. Through the open, sunny levels of the meadows it flows with a clear, foamless current, swelled by its Tenaya and Yosemite Creek tributaries, keeping calm and transparent until nearly opposite the Bridal Veil Fall, where it breaks into grey rapids in crossing a moraine dam. In taking leave of the valley, the river makes another magnificent stretch of cascades and rapids on its way down its lower canyon, a fine view of which may be had from the Coulterville road that runs across the bottom of a rough talus close alongside the massy surging flood, and past the beautiful Cascade Fall.

      Climbing the great Half Dome is fine Yosemite exercise. With the exception of a few minor spires and pinnacles, the Dome is the only rock about the valley that is strictly inaccessible without artificial means, and its inaccessibility is expressed in very severe and simple terms. But longing eyes were nonetheless fixed on its noble brow, until at length, in the year 1875, George Anderson, an indomitable Scotchman, succeeded in making a way to the summit. The side facing the Tenaya Canyon is an absolutely vertical precipice from the summit to a depth of about 1,600 feet, and on the opposite side it is nearly vertical for about as great a depth. The southwest side presents a very steep and finely drawn curve from the top down a thousand feet or more, while on the northeast where it is united with the Clouds Rest Ridge, one may easily reach the Saddle, within 700 feet of the summit, where it rises in a smooth, graceful curve a few degrees too steep for unaided climbing.

      A year or two before Anderson gained the summit, John Conway, a resident of the valley, and his son, excellent mountaineers, attempted to reach the top from the Saddle by climbing barefooted up the grand curve with a rope which they fastened at irregular intervals by means of eye-bolts driven СКАЧАТЬ