gs with a reserve in which was more than a tinge of distrust.
Still others patronized us. A very few overlooked our faded flannel
shirts, our soiled trousers, our floppy old hats with their rattlesnake
bands, the wear and tear of our equipment, to respond to us heartily.
Them in return we generally perceived to belong to our totem.

We found the floor of the Valley well sprinkled with campers. They had
pitched all kinds of tents; built all kinds of fancy permanent
conveniences; erected all kinds of banners and signs advertising their
identity, and were generally having a nice, easy, healthful, jolly kind
of a time up there in the mountains. Their outfits they had either
brought in with their own wagons, or had had freighted. The store near
the bend of the Merced supplied all their needs. It was truly a
pleasant sight to see so many people enjoying themselves, for they were
mostly those in moderate circumstances to whom a trip on tourist lines
would be impossible. We saw bakers' and grocers' and butchers' wagons
that had been pressed into service. A man, his wife, and little baby
had come in an ordinary buggy, the one horse of which, led by the man,
carried the woman and baby to the various points of interest.

We reported to the official in charge, were allotted a camping and
grazing place, and proceeded to make ourselves at home.

During the next two days we rode comfortably here and there and looked
at things. The things could not be spoiled, but their effect was very
materially marred by the swarms of tourists. Sometimes they were
silly, and cracked inane and obvious jokes in ridicule of the grandest
objects they had come so far to see; sometimes they were detestable and
left their insignificant calling-cards or their unimportant names where
nobody could ever have any object in reading them; sometimes they were
pathetic and helpless and had to have assistance; sometimes they were
amusing; hardly ever did they seem entirely human. I wonder what there
is about the traveling public that seems so to set it apart, to make of
it at least a sub-species of mankind?

Among other things, we were vastly interested in the guides. They were
typical of this sort of thing. Each morning one of these men took a
pleasantly awe-stricken band of tourists out, led them around in the
brush awhile, and brought them back in time for lunch. They wore broad
hats and leather bands and exotic raiment and fierce expressions, and
loo