Page:Life Amongst the Modocs.djvu/211



asleep. Still, ever and again, the doleful bird kept calling, and the woful answer came back like an echo of sorrow across the great black canon below.

The moon kept settling and settling to the west among the yellow stars, as broad and spangled as California lilies, and the morning was not far away.

Again the Doctor drew in his naked feet. I could see the muscles gather and contract, and I knew he was again preparing for a spring. All was still. He raised his head, and three pistol muzzles raised and met the man half way. He crept back far down in the blankets, hid his head in the folds, and shuddered and shivered as with an ague.

Dawn was descending and settling around the head of Shasta in a splendour and a glory that words will never touch.

There are some things that are so far beyond the reach of words that it seems like desecration to attempt description. It was not the red of Pekin, not the purple of Tyre or the yellow of the Barbary coast; but merge all these, mixed and made mellow in a far and tender light snow and sun, and sun and snow and stars, and blue and purple skies all blended, all these in a splendid, confused, and inde scribable glory, suffusing the hoary summit, centering there, gathering there, resting a moment then radiat ing, going on to the sea, to broad and burning plains of the south, to the boundless forests of fir in the north, even to the mining camps of Cariboo, and you have a sunrise on the summit of Shasta.