imself at all times and seasons.

BESIDE THE GREAT SALT LAKE.

Up!--If thou knew'st who calls
To twilight parks of beach and pine
High o'er the river intervals,
Above the plowman's highest line,
Over the owner's farthest walls!
Up! where the airy citadel
O'erlooks the surging landscape's swell!

EMERSON.

XVIII.

IN A PASTURE.

The word "pasture," as used on the shore of the Great Salt Lake, conveys
no true idea to one whose associations with that word have been formed
in States east of the Rocky Mountains. Imagine an extensive inclosure on
the side of a mountain, with its barren-looking soil strewn with rocks
of all sizes, from a pebble to a bowlder, cut across by an irrigating
ditch or a mountain brook, dotted here and there by sage bushes, and
patches of oak-brush, and wild roses, and one has a picture of a Salt
Lake pasture. Closely examined, it has other peculiarities. There is no
half way in its growths, no shading off, so to speak, as elsewhere; not
an isolated shrub, not a solitary tree, flourishes in the strange soil,
but trees and shrubs crowd together as if for protection, and the clump,
of whatever size or shape, ends abruptly, with the desert coming up to
its very edge. Yet the soil, though it seems to be the driest and most
unpromising of baked gray mud, needs nothing more than a little water,
to clothe itself luxuriantly; the course of a brook or even an
irrigating ditch, if permanent, is marked by a thick and varied border
of greenery. What the poor creatures who wandered over those dreary
wastes could find to eat was a problem to be solved only by close
observation of their ways.

"H. H." said some years ago that the magnificent yucca, the glory of the
Colorado mesas, was being exterminated by wandering cows, who ate the
buds as soon as they appeared. The cattle of Utah--or their owners--have
a like crime to answer for; not only do they constantly feed upon
rose-buds and leaves, notwithstanding the thorns, but they regale
themselves upon nearly every flower-plant that shows its head; lupines
were the chosen dainty of my friend's horse. The animals become expert
at getting this unnatural food; it is curious to watch the deftness with
which a cow will go through a currant or gooseberry bush, thrusting her
head far down among the branches, and carefully picking off the tender
leaves, while leaving the stems untouched, and the matter-of-course way
in which she will be