e streams are refreshed as if only
a warm shower had fallen. The snow-storms that load the mountains to
form the main fountain supply for the year seldom set in before the
middle or end of November.

Winter Beauty Of The Valley

When the first heavy storms stopped work on the high mountains, I made
haste down to my Yosemite den, not to "hole up" and sleep the white
months away; I was out every day, and often all night, sleeping but
little, studying the so-called wonders and common things ever on show,
wading, climbing, sauntering among the blessed storms and calms,
rejoicing in almost everything alike that I could see or hear: the
glorious brightness of frosty mornings; the sunbeams pouring over the
white domes and crags into the groves end waterfalls, kindling marvelous
iris fires in the hoarfrost and spray; the great forests and mountains
in their deep noon sleep; the good-night alpenglow; the stars; the
solemn gazing moon, drawing the huge domes and headlands one by one
glowing white out of the shadows hushed and breathless like an audience
in awful enthusiasm, while the meadows at their feet sparkle with
frost-stars like the sky; the sublime darkness of storm-nights, when all
the lights are out; the clouds in whose depths the frail snow-flowers
grow; the behavior and many voices of the different kinds of storms,
trees, birds, waterfalls, and snow-avalanches in the ever-changing
weather.

Every clear, frosty morning loud sounds are heard booming and
reverberating from side to side of the Valley at intervals of a few
minutes, beginning soon after sunrise and continuing an hour or two like
a thunder-storm. In my first winter in the Valley I could not make out
the source of this noise. I thought of falling boulders, rock-blasting,
etc. Not till I saw what looked like hoarfrost dropping from the side of
the Fall was the problem explained. The strange thunder is made by the
fall of sections of ice formed of spray that is frozen on the face of
the cliff along the sides of the Upper Yosemite Fan--a sort of crystal
plaster, a foot or two thick, racked off by the sunbeams, awakening all
the Valley like cock-crowing, announcing the finest weather, shouting
aloud Nature's infinite industry and love of hard work in creating
beauty.

Exploring An Ice Cone

This frozen spray gives rise to one of the most interesting winter
features of the Valley--a cone of ice at the foot of the fall, four or
five hundred feet high.