d
strips of meadow along the streams. Toward the middle of the afternoon I
came to another valley, strikingly wild and original in all its
features, and perhaps never before touched by human foot. As regards
area of level bottom-land, it is one of the very smallest of the
Yosemite type, but its walls are sublime, rising to a height of from
2000 to 4000 feet above the river. At the head of the valley the main
canon forks, as is found to be the case in all yosemites. The formation
of this one is due chiefly to the action of two great glaciers, whose
fountains lay to the eastward, on the flanks of Mounts Humphrey and
Emerson and a cluster of nameless peaks farther south.

[Illustration: HEAD OF ROCKY MOUNTAIN WILD SHEEP.]

The gray, boulder-chafed river was singing loudly through the valley,
but above its massy roar I heard the booming of a waterfall, which drew
me eagerly on; and just as I emerged from the tangled groves and
brier-thickets at the head of the valley, the main fork of the river
came in sight, falling fresh from its glacier fountains in a snowy
cascade, between granite walls 2000 feet high. The steep incline down
which the glad waters thundered seemed to bar all farther progress. It
was not long, however, before I discovered a crooked seam in the rock,
by which I was enabled to climb to the edge of a terrace that crosses
the canon, and divides the cataract nearly in the middle. Here I sat
down to take breath and make some entries in my note-book, taking
advantage, at the same time, of my elevated position above the trees to
gaze back over the valley into the heart of the noble landscape, little
knowing the while what neighbors were near.

After spending a few minutes in this way, I chanced to look across the
fall, and there stood three sheep quietly observing me. Never did the
sudden appearance of a mountain, or fall, or human friend more forcibly
seize and rivet my attention. Anxiety to observe accurately held me
perfectly still. Eagerly I marked the flowing undulations of their firm,
braided muscles, their strong legs, ears, eyes, heads, their graceful
rounded necks, the color of their hair, and the bold, upsweeping curves
of their noble horns. When they moved I watched every gesture, while
they, in no wise disconcerted either by my attention or by the
tumultuous roar of the water, advanced deliberately alongside the
rapids, between the two divisions of the cataract, turning now and then
to look at me.