his friend with a torrent of banter; all of which was listened to, with his usual imperturbability, he meanwhile deciding whether or no to take his friend immediately into his confidence. His decision was in the affirmative; partly that the knowledge would be almost inevitable on the morrow, and partly that he knew his friend's sympathy with his new happiness would at heart be as true as if it were not concealed by a veil of fun. "Calhoun," he said, "be good enough to stop this nonsense, and be rational for once. I've something to tell you." And he told him.

"My dear boy!" ejaculated Calhoun when he had ended, at the same time seizing his friend's hand with a hearty grip, "My dear boy, I give you joy-but really-for a fellow to 'go in all over' commend me, after this, to one who didn't intend to go in at all. I hope you don't intend to 'make love to both of them', as you suggested to me, for I have my own designs upon Miss Margaret-I have indeed, my dear fellow," he repeated, growing grave. "Do you suppose there is any chance for a rattlepate like me with the old gentleman? You must say a word for You must say a word for me, now you are in favor at court."

"I will indeed if you need it, old boy," responded Dunckley cordially; "but I'm quite sure you will need no help from me."

Calhoun's fun had quite spent itself by this time, and the two friends talked together, as only true-hearted young men can, till late into the night.

I shall attempt no account of the ascent of the mountain. For those who have never seen nor climbed a snow mountain, any description would be inadequate to give a true idea; and for those who have, it would seem still more so. Suffice it to say, it was made in safety, and thoroughly enjoyed by all; though, if the truth were told, Richard and Phoebe would have as truly trod the Delectable Mountains, during those two days,

if their steps had lain in the lowest valley that ever hid itself from the light. It was interesting to note how much less competent to "take care of herself" Phoebe had suddenly become, and how entirely Richard. had forgotten his vow to "wash his hands of her."

The last day before breaking camp was a bright, still, never-to-be-forgotten Sundaythe anniversary of which has been, in a sort, held sacred by Richard and Phoebe in the years that have passed since. All' through its sunny hours-all through its long twilight, and late into the evening, they walked or sat together in the wild mountain solitudes, comparing experiences and hopes, making those wonderful "forced marches" into the territory of each other's confidence, in which new-made lovers delight.

In the evening Cyrus came over to offer his help for the morning. The boys had gone to bed early, Calhoun and Margaret were strolling back and forth by the brookside, and Mr. and Mrs. Strong were alone.

"T seems ter me," he said, grinning goodnaturedly, and advancing with the slouching stride peculiar to him, "'t seems ter me thet them young folks is oncommon consid'rate of you and yer wife lately I reckin mebbe they think yer hev somethin' ter say thet you don't want lis'ners to."

There was a good-natured laugh at this clumsy attempt at satire, and Mr. Strong proceeded to tell Cyrus of Phoebe's engagement. The announcement was received coolly.

"Mebbe yer wor lookin' fer me ter take on,” he said, "but I knowed from the fust what was comin'. Ez soon ez ever I seen them two young fellers, I says to myself,. 'Ef them young folks ain't paired off a'ready, they will be, afore the month's out, jest ez sure ez preachin'!"

Henrietta R. Eliot.

"You should go up into the mountains; that's the place for you." Everybody said it, but still we hesitated; for how could two "lone women," one an invalid, and the other not very strong," go off by themselves into the wilderness of a strange country? How would they get food? It would be so lonesome! O, they never could do it! But the little town in the valley grew hotter and hotter. It was one hundred and three in the shade, then one hundred and five, then one hundred and eight. They grew thin and weak. Something must be done. They were in this southern country for the Invalid's health. They must not go home yet. So they said "We will go up to the cañon and see what it is like."

The Doctor had a nephew camping out up there and had sent his two small boys to "vegetate" and be company for the young man. Now he was going to take his daughter to join them, and we went along too to see what it was like.

us.

The wonder and the beauty of it charmed The Invalid in a burst of enthusiasm said she "would like to stay there forever." So the Housekeeper busied herself for the next week in preparations. She saw the man who made tent frames, and ordered a large one; she stitched yards of muslin sheeting together to cover the frame; she bought sugar and flour, potatoes and lemons, butter and eggs, canned fruits and meats. People told us we wanted bacon, but we did not believe it. We never had eaten it, and we knew we should not be hungry enough for that, even up in the mountains.

One morning at seven o'clock the trunk, three boxes and a basket, the tent and the hammock, with a table, two chairs, and a cot bed, which we had borrowed, were

loaded on a wagon, securely tied, for the road was rough. We climbed to the seat in front and were off for the cañon.

This cañon of San Antonio is a great cleft in the Sierra Madre range. We are told that seventeen years ago it was "as pretty a cañon as you'd find anywhere. A man could gallop his horse clear up to the saw-mill. Some mighty storm, perhaps a cloud-burst in the mountains, aided in its work of destruction by the felling of trees for the mill, has swept down the cañon, carrying in its flood rocks and trees from the mountain sides, making for itself a path, and leaving huge boulders and immense tree-trunks in its course.

The saw-mill is in ruins now--whether picturesque or not we did not learn, for it is nearly at the head of the cañon, too far away for a visit. The river is now but a small creek, probably from fifteen to twenty feet wide most of the way. It winds its way here and there and has to be forded nine times by all travelers coming up the cañon with teams. It is by no means a quiet stream-its voice is loud enough to drown human voices near its banks, and when one wakes in the night the roar seems like that of a storm of wind and rain. Great alders, willows, and live oaks grow beside it, apparently fighting for a foothold in the rocks, and liable at any time during the winter rains to be torn from their places and laid prostrate across the water.

Our camp was very near the end of the wagon road, five miles from the mouth of the cañon, where the high hills draw so near together that we seemed to be quite shut in by them, and the morning sun did not look down on us until two hours or more after he had shown himself to the dwellers on the

plains. Then he left us before five o'clock in the afternoon; but his light lingered long on the peaks, and it was one of the Invalid's pleasures to lie in the hammock and watch. the sunset glow on a certain topmost ledge of reddish rock, which shone out long after all else was dark.

Our tent was pitched about a rod from the noisy little stream-the treacherous stream, the Housekeeper said it was, after a few weeks' experience in using it for a pantry. Some large tin cans, well weighted with stones and set in the edge of the water, served finely for a refrigerator, but there were some objections to that kind of a pantry. One evening a pail full of fresh crullers-"fortyfive of them," the Housekeeper said mournfully-floated provokingly away when the stone for weight was not quite heavy enough. One of the boys found the cover, and several weeks later a battered and somewhat rusty pail was brought into camp; but the forty-five crullers made food for the fishes. Another time some of the fruit bought of 'Vegetable John," who made us weekly visits for a while, went floating down stream in the night, when the water is higher than in the daytime-a fact we were slow to realize.

Some beefsteak in a loosely covered vessel got well water-soaked and had to be served as stewed steak instead of broiled. But these were "trifles light as air."

66

Proudly we looked around our domain when we were settled." The tent was used only for a sleeping room. The table stood outside, against its western wall, onehalf of it holding books, writing materials, and work-box, making the parlor table; while the other half served for dining and kitchen table. Nearer the water, a box nailed between two alders made a cupboard, below which, on a pile of rocks and stones, artistically arranged by the Housekeeper, stood the oil stove. Various cooking and toilet utensils were hung on convenient branches or nails driven into the trees. the cool evenings a camp fire gave the charm

In

that open fires always have, and drew a bright company around it. But the mountain air made us sleepy and we retired early, the Invalid to her cot in the tent, the Housekeeper to the hammock swung from two trees near the water's edge.

"How do you spend the time?"—"Isn't it dreadfully lonesome?" our town friends asked. Of course, people who depend upon the life and busy ways of town for all their interests did think it lonesome, and such people usually stayed but a few days; but most of us found much of interest in the place and the novelty of out-door life. The Housekeeper found that it took no small part of every day to prepare the food and wash the dishes for two. Then the washing and ironing-though we learned that much. less of the latter is necessary than in "civilized" life-must be done once a week, for "Washee John" had not found his way into the cañon yet. There were papers and magazines to be read, and letters to be written. The mail came up twice a week from the town fifteen miles away. The Invalid went fern-hunting; and though it was late in the season for ferns, she was rewarded with some fine maiden-hair and a few specimens of other kinds, as well as wet feet, and many hurts and bruises in scrambling over the rocks.

Fishing was quite the fashion. The stream abounds in small trout which, fried to a brown crispness, make a good addition to the fare. The Invalid, feeling it her duty to go fishing as the rest did, borrowed a rod and line and went forth with the small boys. They dug the earthworms for bait, and a boy of larger growth whom she met, put one of the wriggling things on the hook for her, saying, as he pointed to a deep looking pool on the lower side of a big rock, "That's the kind of a place to get fish; I'm going farther up stream," and left her. The small boys went, too, and she sat patiently and obediently holding the rod over that pool and looking-everywhere else. By-and-by

she tried another place, and another, and finally, feeling a pull on the line, brought her wandering attention back in time to see that she had had a bite, but had not a fish. Then she went back to camp, the little ambition she had had completely destroyed. The Housekeeper was more successful and caught ten and fifteen trout at a time.

We exchanged visits with other camps, of which there were from twenty to thirty some of the time in the accessible parts of the cañon, and thus made some very pleasant acquaintances. Two classes of people, I may say, come to the cañon: residents of the towns, who take their summer's outing in this way, and invalids who hope for benefit from the mountain air. There is not game enough to tempt sportsmen, as in some of the neighboring cañons. In one camp we found five young men from "the States," as old residents here say, suffering with affections of the lungs; in another an elderly maiden from New England and a Kansas woman, each alone among strangers, seeking to get rid of a cough. A young physician with nervous prostration was here, the only one of the invalids not troubled with lungs or throat, and his gain in health was the most evident of any.

A Methodist preacher traveling with the G. A. R. excursion made a little side trip to the cañon one Saturday evening. The next morning the children brought the message to our camp of "preaching at McFindlay's camp, in fifteen minutes." As we were already wearing our cleanest gowns there was not much "dressing up" possible, though we had to wait a little while for the young man to give an extra brush to his boots. When we reached McFindlay's we found the congregation, thirty in number, seated on boards, boxes, and rocks, except the older women and the young mother with a baby, who had chairs. Campers generally do not indulge in many chairs, unless the men of the party are skillful enough to make some of rustic style, and

seats are plenty, but even if quite comfortable at first, they become extremely hard after a while, and some of us heard with relief the preacher's remark that he would not "dilute" upon his subject. The hymns from Moody and Sankey were sung with a will. After the service the preacher shook hands all around, then came to our camp with the Universalist young man to help eat the big watermelon sent up from town the day before. We had no more preaching, but later in the season a Sunday School class, conducted by a white-haired Methodist sister, helped to make the first day of the week more like Sunday.

The more sturdy and ambitious ones think the season not complete unless they climb "Old Baldy," the highest peak in this part of the range. Few women undertake it, for it is a very rough, hard climb. The men generally make a three-days' trip of it, going the ten or twelve miles up the cañon the first day, staying over night at a mining camp at the foot of the mountain, making the ascent the second day, and returning to the camp at night; though some go to the summit the first day to have the pleasure of making a huge bonfire there at night and of seeing the sun rise the next morning. Those who went in August could not stay long, for they could get no water; but in July there was still snow enough to quench their thirst and give them a chance. at snowballing, too. Old Baldy is snowcrowned for nine or ten months of the year.

There are several mines or tunnels in the hillsides where years ago somebody was digging for gold, and at intervals all the way up the cañon we saw the miners' cabins. Our first climb was to one of these tunnels, stopping to rest at the little log cabin below it on the hillside, then occupied by two campers-men who had traveled all over this country of the far West and whose talk reminded us of Bret Harte's tales. A stream of water had found its way into the tunnel,

making it too wet for exploration with comfort. It is hardy six feet in height, and the earth has caved in on the sides in several places; but the men took the candle and penetrated to the end, calling back with echoing voices that it was about fifty feet in length. Farther up the cañon is another mine, reached by a very steep trail, where the over-hanging rock is covered with moss and maiden-hair fern, kept always bright and luxuriant by hidden springs. This green wall is one of the prettiest sights and a favorite resort for good climbers. The cabin near it was a whitewashed shanty known as the White House, and in an especially favored spot for a camping ground. One Sunday a company of young roughs from the town, up in the cañon on a spree, recklessly set it on fire, and now nothing remains to show the place but some blackened logs and the dead branches of the sycamores above it.

Spring Hill is the most accessible point from which a view can be obtained of Old Baldy above, the cañon and valley below, and the hills and ocean away to the south. Half way to the summit is the spring that gives it the name, welling up from the earth in a bed of water cress. A company, of sixteen made this climb one morning. They went up by the easiest trail, but even then the feebler ones, as they strove to get back the breath that seemed almost gone, were reminded of the remark of a girl who said, when asked about the view from one of the higher peaks. "O yes, we could see ever so far, but we were too tired to look at the view!" This girl belonged to a party of indefatigable young people who went for a climb nearly every day, starting early and coming back so late that we could only faintly see their forms as they came singing and shouting down the hills.

A report came to us from the Frying-pan Camp that the shriek of a puma, or mountain lion, had been heard at night, but in our rambles we saw no four-footed animal

more formidable than a gray squirrel. Rattlesnakes sometimes appear, and many harmless snakes of various kinds may be seen about the rocks. Lizards, too, come out of the crevices to sun themselves, and will grow quite tame if one will take the trouble to catch flies and other insects to feed them. Many of them are very pretty, striped and spotted in browns and reds, with patches of light blue on their throats. A longer, yellower, more snake-like kind sometimes appears, but these are more shy. The pretty little harmless things had an enemy in the white cat that a town friend sent up to amuse the Doctor's nephew after his cousins had gone home. She busied herself hunting lizards about the rocks much of the time, playing with one when it was caught as she would with a mouse. The young man petted her, caught fish for her, and seemed to find her presence a great pleasure.

Ants were numerous, especially about the live oak trees-as the Invalid learned to her sorrow on the day of her arrival in camp. Spreading her shawl under a tree, she lay down to rest; but soon, feeling some disturbing element about her head, started up to find her hair full of little brown ants. They found the way to the honey jar, but did not get into other food. Spiders were numerous. Even big, black tarantulas might be found. The last few weeks of our stay, there were gnats and flies in great numbers, and we occasionally saw a mosquito, though so small as to be hardly recognizable by one who has lived in New Jersey. Centipedes were not unknown.

To get acquainted with the birds no better place could be found than in the shade of a live oak tree. Sitting there in the morning we heard their chirps and tseeps-they do not sing at this season-with occasionally a sharper note as some bird discovered the intruder. They had not learned that a human being is to be feared and would come quite within arm's length, if we were very quiet.