Creator
John Muir
Recipient
[John Bidwell]
Preview
Transcription
[6][in margin: I am ever cordially yours John Muir.]peaks were quickly clad in close unbroken whites. I was terribly hungry ere I got out of this wild canon. – had less then sufficient for one meal in the last four days, this coupled with very hard nerve trying cliff work was sufficiently exhausting for any mountaineer. Yet, strange to say, I did not suffer much. Crystal water, & air, & honey sucked from the scarlet flowers of Zanchneria, about one tenth as much as would suffice for a hummingbird was my last breakfast - a very temperate meal, was it not? Wholly ungross & very nearly spiritual. Thy last effort before reaching food was a climb up out of the Main Canon of 5000 feet, still I made it in fair time – only a little faint, no giddiness, want of spirit, or incapacity to observe & enjoy, or any nonsense of this kind. How I should have liked to have then tumbled into your care for a day or two. My sail down the Merced & San Joaquin was about 250 miles in length & took two weeks, a far more difficult & less interesting as far as scenery is concerned than my memorable first voyage down the Sacramento. Sandbars & gravelly ripples as well as snags gave me much trouble, & in the Tule wilderness I had to [illegible] my tiny craft to a bunch of rushes & sleep cold in her bottom with the seat for a pillow. I have gotten past most of the weariness but am hungry yet notwithstanding friends have been stuffing me here ever since, I may go hungry thro life & into the very grave & beyond unless you effect a cure, & Im sure I should like to try Rancho Chico. Would have tried it ere this were you not so far off. I slept in your quilt all thru the excursion, & brought it here tolerably clean & whole. The flag I left [in margin: tied to a bush top in the bottom of the Mid F Canon. I have not yet written to Gray, have you? Remember me to your Sister. I mean to write to her soon. I must close. With lively remembrance of your rare Kindness]
Location
1419 Taylor St. San Francisco, [Calif]
Date Original
1877 Dec 3
Source
Original letter dimensions unknown.
Resource Identifier
muir03_0641-let.tif
File Identifier
Reel 03, Image 0641
Copyright Status
Copyrighted
Copyright Statement
The unpublished works of John Muir are copyrighted by the Muir-Hanna Trust. To purchase copies of images and/or obtain permission to publish or exhibit them, see http://www.pacific.edu/Library/Find/Holt-Atherton-Special-Collections/Fees-and-Forms-.html
Owning Institution
The Bancroft Library, University of California at Berkeley. Please contact this institution directly to obtain copies of the images or permission to publish or use them beyond educational purposes.
Copyright Holder
Muir-Hanna Trust
Copyright Date
1984
Page Number
Page 6
Keywords
John Muir, correspondence, letters, author, writing, naturalist, California, correspondent, mail, message, post, exchange of letters, missive, notes, epistle
