Page:The heart of Monadnock (IA heartofmonadnock00timl).pdf/62

 ing cairns, leading across to where the Upper Trail to the Great Pasture dipped again into the woods, the path which drops with romantic abruptness down ledge after ledge, till it reaches at last the Great Pasture lying far below, tapestried with its blueberry bushes and grassy tufts. But the climber kept to the upland, twisting his way up and up, scrambling across the rock-faces as best he might. He could not now see the Giant for he was hidden for the moment behind the nearer height of Monte Rosa, but it was beyond and ever beckoning.

At a high point he dropped again on a mossy spot, leaning back against a rock. He often said that his wanderings on the mountain consisted of progressive sitting-down. Not that he was tired but simply to absorb the beauty and the wonder that flowed from the everlasting heights, and to think out his thoughts. For this reason he was more often than not, alone in his idle roaming, for to grow intimate with the mountain-spirit one must seek him in solitude and