Author: A. J. Wells

Publisher: Forgotten Books

Published: 2017-10-19

Total Pages: 38

ISBN-13: 9780265503737

Excerpt from Kings and Kern Canyons and the Giant Forest of California Then the ride up the floor of the canyon - that splendid fur row plowed by the glacier - through flowers and meadows, by lines of lateral moraines, among incense cedars and sugar pines, and beside smooth, hard granite walls lifted defiantly to the heavens to feet high, while the river, three times the volume of the Merced, shouts as if glad of its escape into sun shine out of the dark canyons where it was born - what sur prises the ride has, and what enjoyment! You must be a veteran of the mountains if you can make that journey for the fi.sr time without a tumult of emotion - or a crick in your neck from looking up. It is part of the spurious culture of today to be, or affect to be, proof against surprise, and to stifle emotion as a mark of crudeness, but happy the man who keeps fresh the founts of feeling in the presence of great Nature. He will enjoy these vast solitudes, and not be ashamed if the very greatness and splendor of what he sees wrings a cry of admiring wonder from his lips. Dr. Le Conte, critical, scholarly, inured to scenes of grandeur in the mountains, says of his experiences in this re gion: The trail becomes steeper and rougher, cascades and falls more frequent and more beautiful, and the scenery grander and more impressive, until finally as we approached the summit I could not refrain from screaming with delight. Standing on the narrow shelf at the summit of Mt. Stan ford overlooking the canyon, and feet above the sea, Dr. Jordan once said: I have never seen a more magnificent mountain panorama. I have seen the mountains of this continent from Alaska to Mexico, and I have tramped many mountain miles in the Alps, but such a comprehensive view of mountain masses and peaks and amphitheaters and can yons, of all the details of mountain sculpture on the tremendous scale that we are looking on now, I have never before seen. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.