g the crags of the summit peaks. The low bass, booming,
reverberating tones, heard under favorable circumstances five or six
miles away are formed by the dashing and exploding of heavy masses
mixed with air upon two projecting ledges on the face of the cliff, the
one on which we are standing and another about 200 feet above it. The
torrent of massive comets is continuous at time of high water, while
the explosive, booming notes are wildly intermittent, because, unless
influenced by the wind, most of the heavier masses shoot out from the
face of the precipice, and pass the ledges upon which at other times
they are exploded. Occasionally the whole fall is swayed away from the
front of the cliff, then suddenly dashed flat against it, or vibrated
from side to side like a pendulum, giving rise to endless variety of
forms and sounds.

The Nevada Fall

The Nevada Fall is 600 feet high and is usually ranked next to the
Yosemite in general interest among the five main falls of the Valley.
Coming through the Little Yosemite in tranquil reaches, the river is
first broken into rapids on a moraine boulder-bar that crosses the lower
end of the Valley. Thence it pursues its way to the head of the fall in
a rough, solid rock channel, dashing on side angles, heaving in heavy
surging masses against elbow knobs, and swirling and swashing in
pot-holes without a moment's rest. Thus, already chafed and dashed to
foam, overfolded and twisted, it plunges over the brink of the precipice
as if glad to escape into the open air. But before it reaches the bottom
it is pulverized yet finer by impinging upon a sloping portion of the
cliff about half-way down, thus making it the whitest of all the falls
of the Valley, and altogether one of the most wonderful in the world.

On the north side, close to its head, a slab of granite projects over the
brink, forming a fine point for a view, over its throng of streamers and
wild plunging, into its intensely white bosom, and through the broad
drifts of spray, to the river far below, gathering its spent waters and
rushing on again down the canyon in glad exultation into Emerald Pool,
where at length it grows calm and gets rest for what still lies before
it. All the features of the view correspond with the waters in grandeur
and wildness. The glacier sculptured walls of the canyon on either hand,
with the sublime mass of the Glacier Point Ridge in front, form a huge
triangular pit-like basin, which, fille