The rock fell under us in one sheer sweep of thirty-two hundred feet; upon its face we could trace the lines of fracture and all prominent lithological changes. Directly beneath, outspread like a delicately tinted chart, lay the lovely park of Yosemite, winding in and out about the solid white feet of precipices which sank into it on either side; its sunlit surface invaded by the shadow of the south wall; its spires of pine, open expanses of buff and drab meadow, and families of umber oaks rising as background for the vivid green river-margin and flaming orange masses of frosted cottonwood foliage.
Deep in front the Bridal Veil brook made its way through the bottom of an open gorge, and plunged off the edge of a thousand-foot cliff, falling in white water-dust and drifting in pale, translucent clouds out over the tree-tops of the valley.
Directly opposite us, and forming the other gatepost of the valley’s entrance, rose the great mass of Cathedral Rocks,—a group quite suggestive of the Florence Duomo.
But our grandest view was eastward, above the deep, sheltered valley and over the tops of those terrible granite walls, out upon rolling ridges of stone and wonderful granite domes. Nothing in the whole list of irruptive products, except volcanoes themselves, is so wonderful as these domed mountains. They are of every variety of conoidal form, having horizontal sections accurately elliptical, ovoid, or circular, and profiles varying from such semi-circles as the cap behind the Sentinel to the graceful, infinite curves of the North Dome. Above and beyond these stretch back long, bare ridges connecting with sunny summit peaks. The whole region is one solid granite mass, with here and there shallow soil layers, and a thin, variable forest which grows in picturesque mode, defining the leading lines of erosion as an artist deepens here and there a line to hint at some structural peculiarity.
A complete physical exposure of the range, from summit to base, lay before us. At one extreme stand sharpened peaks, white in fretwork of glistening icebank, or black where tower straight bolts of snowless rock; at the other stretch away plains smiling with a broad, honest brown under autumn sunlight. They are not quite lovable, even in distant tranquillity of hue, and just escape being interesting, in spite of their familiar rivers and associated belts of oaks. Nothing can ever render them quite charming, for in the startling splendor of flower-clad April you are surfeited with an embarrassment of beauty; at all other times stunned by their poverty. Not so the summits; forever new, full of individuality, rich in detail, and coloring themselves anew under every cloud change or hue of heaven, they lay you under their spell.
From them the eye comes back over granite waves and domes to the sharp precipice-edges overhanging Yosemite. We look down those vast, hard, granite fronts, cracked and splintered, scarred and stained, down over gorges crammed with débris, or dark with files of climbing pines. Lower the precipice-feet are wrapped in meadow and grove, and beyond, level and sunlit, lies the floor,—that smooth, river-cut park, with exquisite perfection of finish.
The dome-like cap of Capitan is formed of concentric layers like the peels of an onion, each one about two or three feet thick. Upon the precipice itself, either from our station on an overhanging crevice, or from any point of opposite cliff or valley bottom, this structure is seen to be superficial, never descending more than a hundred feet.
In returning to camp we followed a main ridge, smooth and white under foot, but shaded by groves of alpine firs. Trees which here reach mature stature, and in apparent health, stand rooted in white gravel, resulting from surface decomposition. I am sure their foliage is darker than can be accounted for by effect of white contrasting earth. Wherever, in deep depressions, enough wash soil and vegetable mould have accumulated, there the trees gather in thicker groups, lift themselves higher, spread out more and finer-feathered branches; sometimes, however, richness of soil and perfection of condition prove fatal through overcrowding. They are wonderfully like human communities. One may trace in an hour’s walk nearly all the laws which govern the physical life of men.
Upon reaching camp we found Longhurst in a deep, religious calm, happy in his mind, happy, too, in the posture of his body, which was reclining at ease upon a comfortable blanket-pile before the fire; a verse of the hymn “Coronation” escaped murmurously from his lips, rising at times in shaky crescendos, accompanied by a waving and desultory movement of the forefinger. He had found among our medicines a black bottle of brandy, contrived to induce a mule to break it, and, just to save as much as possible while it was leaking, drank with freedom. Anticipating any possible displeasure of ours, Longhurst had collected his wits and arrived at a most excellent dinner, crowning the repast with a duff, accurately globular, neatly brecciated with abundant raisins, and drowned with a foaming sauce, to which the last of the brandy imparted an almost pathetic flavor.
The evening closed with moral remark and spiritual song from Longhurst, and the morning introduced us to our prosaic labor of running the boundary line,—a task which consumed several weeks, and occupied nearly all of our days. I once or twice found time to go down to the cliff-edges again for the purpose of making my geological studies.