Upon observing the topography, I saw that one bold spur advanced from Mount Whitney to the plain; on either side of it profound cañons opened back to the summit. I remembered the impossibility of making a climb up those northern precipices, and at once chose the more southern gorge.
Next morning we set out on horseback for the mountain base, twelve miles across plains and through an outlying range of hills. My companion for the trip was Paul Pinson, as tough and plucky a mountaineer as France ever sent us, who consented readily to follow me. José, the mild-mannered and grinning Mexican boy who rode with us, was to remain in care of our animals at the foot-hills while we made the climb.
I left a Green barometer to be observed at Lone Pine, and carried my short high-mountain instrument, by the same excellent maker.
Gauzy mists again enveloped the Sierra, leaving us free minds to enjoy a ride, of which the very first mile supplied me food for days of thought.
The American residents of Lone Pine outskirts live in a homeless fashion; sullen, almost arrogant, neglect stares out from the open doors. There is no attempt at grace, no memory of comfort, no suggested hope for improvement.
Not so the Spanish homes, their low, adobe, wide-roofed cabins neatly enclosed with even, basket-work fence, and lining hedge of blooming hollyhock.
We stopped to bow good-morning to my friend and stage companion, the doña. She sat in the threshold of her open door, sewing; beyond her stretched a bare floor, clean and white: the few chairs, the table spread with snowy linen, everything, shone with an air of religious spotlessness. Symmetry reigned in the precise, well-kept garden, arranged in rows of pepper-plants and crisp heads of vernal lettuce.
I longed for a painter to catch her brilliant smile, and surround her on canvas as she was here, with order and dignity. The same plain, black dress clad her ample figure, and about the neck heavy, barbaric gold beads served again as collar.
Under low eaves above her, and quite around the house, hung, in triple row, festoons of flaming red peppers, in delicious contrast with the rich adobe gray.
It was a study of order and true womanly repose, fitted to cheer us, and a grouping of such splendid color as might tempt a painter to cross the world.