Page:The Tourist's California by Wood, Ruth Kedzie.djvu/255

 THE YOSEMITE 213 ner streams. A cascade comparable to it in height and impeccable beauty is the one recently discov- ered to the tourist in Glacier National Park, Mon- tana. Many days may be spent on Yosemite floor, roaming bosky paths, learning the wiles of se- cluded dells, seeking out the favoured haunts of shy gentians and woodwardia, lingering where the oriole and tanager come to drink, pausing by some nameless cascade to watch the joyous ouzel drench- ing his wings, strolling down the road to Bridal Veil in time for the rainbow in the late afternoon to Bridal Veil, that six hundred-foot waft of lace which we come to love most of all. Early in the morning we make haste to Mirror Lake, perhaps with our breakfast in our pocket, a la Muir. If we are wise we gain its shores by half past eight if it is summer, a little later in other seasons, to see the sun reach his rosy fingers above Half Dome and thrust them into the sleek pool at our feet. The silhouettes of Mt. Watkins and Cloud's Rest, of North and Half Dome interlace so clearly upon this green fringed crystal that their lines are revealed in duplicate. In a photograph of Mirror Lake turned top-side down the reflection is even sharper than the presentment of the crags themselves.