o a height of more than 3000 feet, a telling monument of the glacial
period.

Almost immediately opposite the Sentinel are the Three Brothers, an
immense mountain mass with three gables fronting the Valley, one above
another, the topmost gable nearly 4000 feet high. They were named for
three brothers, sons of old Tenaya, the Yosemite chief, captured here
during the Indian War, at the time of the discovery of the Valley in
1852.

Sauntering up the Valley through meadow and grove, in the company of
these majestic rocks, which seem to follow us as we advance, gazing,
admiring, looking for new wonders ahead where all about us is so
wonderful, the thunder of the Yosemite Fall is heard, and when we
arrive in front of the Sentinel Rock it is revealed in all its glory
from base to summit, half a mile in height, and seeming to spring out
into the Valley sunshine direct from the sky. But even this fall,
perhaps the most wonderful of its kind in the world, cannot at first
hold our attention, for now the wide upper portion of the Valley is
displayed to view, with the finely modeled North Dome, the Royal Arches
and Washington Column on our left; Glacier Point, with its massive,
magnificent sculpture on the right; and in the middle, directly in
front, looms Tissiack or Half Dome, the most beautiful and most sublime
of all the wonderful Yosemite rocks, rising in serene majesty from
flowery groves and meadows to a height of 4750 feet.

The Upper Canyons

Here the Valley divides into three branches, the Tenaya, Nevada, and
Illilouette Canyons, extending back into the fountains of the High
Sierra, with scenery every way worthy the relation they bear to
Yosemite.

In the south branch, a mile or two from the main Valley, is the
Illilouette Fall, 600 feet high, one of the most beautiful of all the
Yosemite choir, but to most people inaccessible as yet on account of its
rough, steep, boulder-choked canyon. Its principal fountains of ice and
snow lie in the beautiful and interesting mountains of the Merced group,
while its broad open basin between its fountain mountains and canyon is
noted for the beauty of its lakes and forests and magnificent moraines.

Returning to the Valley, and going up the north branch of Tenaya Canyon,
we pass between the North Dome and Half Dome, and in less than an hour
come to Mirror Lake, the Dome Cascade and Tenaya Fall. Beyond the Fall,
on the north side of the canyon is the sublime Ed Capitan-like ro