eed for us both and
further directions. The rest of the day's ride was awful enough. The
snow was thirteen inches deep, and grew deeper as I ascended in silence
and loneliness, but just as the sun sank behind a snowy peak I reached
the top of the Divide, 7,975 feet above the sea level. There, in
unspeakable solitude, lay a frozen lake. Owls hooted among the pines,
the trail was obscure, the country was not settled, the mercury was 9
degrees below zero, my feet had lost all sensation, and one of them was
frozen to the wooden stirrup. I found that owing to the depth of the
snow I had only ridden fifteen miles in eight and a half hours, and
must look about for a place to sleep in. The eastern sky was unlike
anything I ever saw before. It had been chrysoprase, then it turned to
aquamarine, and that to the bright full green of an emerald. Unless I
am color-blind, this is true. Then suddenly the whole changed, and
flushed with the pure, bright, rose color of the afterglow. Birdie was
sliding at every step, and I was nearly paralyzed with the cold when I
reached a cabin which had been mentioned to me, but they said that
seventeen snow-bound men were lying on the floor, and they advised me
to ride half a mile farther, which I did, and reached the house of a
German from Eisenau, with a sweet young wife and a venerable
mother-in-law. Though the house was very poor, it was made attractive
by ornaments, and the simple, loving, German ways gave it a sweet home
atmosphere. My room was reached by a ladder, but I had it to myself
and had the luxury of a basin to wash in. Under the kindly treatment
of the two women my feet came to themselves, but with an amount of pain
that almost deserved the name of torture.

The next morning was gray and sour, but brightened and warmed as the
day went on. After riding twelve miles I got bread and milk for myself
and a feed for Birdie at a large house where there were eight boarders,
each one looking nearer the grave than the other, and on remounting was
directed to leave the main road and diverge through Monument Park, a
ride of twelve miles among fantastic rocks, but I lost my way, and came
to an end of all tracks in a wild canyon. Returning about six miles, I
took another track, and rode about eight miles without seeing a
creature. I then came to strange gorges with wonderful upright rocks
of all shapes and colors, and turning through a gate of rock, came upon
what I knew must be Gl