Creator

John Muir

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Circa Date

circa 1887

Transcription

100

quarters though the frost must bring them to mind. For my part I should like to camp her all winter or all my life.

26) Extra cloudy though still a bright day on the whole. Clouds .15 which in Switzerland would be considered extra clear. Probably more free sunshine falls on this majestic range than on any other in the world. It has the brightest weather brightest glacier polished rocks, the greatest abundance of irised spray from its glorious waterfalls, the brightest forests of silver firs & silver pines [with shining needles], more starshine, moonshine & perhaps crystal-shine than any other mountain chain I know of, & its countless mirror lakes having more light poured into them than those of other mountains are the most radiant[ce] & have the largest brightest spangles). The Sierra might well be called The Range of Light. How glorious the shining after the short summer showers & after frosty morning when [as] the sumbeams pour through the crystals on the grass! & the brightness of the sunbeaten bosses of cumulus clouds. & as to the stars seen through this high clear sky one may almost say that only on mountaintops [here] many stars be seen at all. The frost this morning made a brave show on the meadow & large picturesque [masses of] clouds, craggy like rocks were piled above Mt Dana & down on its sides reddish in color like the mountain itself, the sky purple

101

[sketch removed] for a few degrees around the horizon into which the myriad pines dip their [dark] spires with fine effect, the tallest beautifully relieved. Spent the day as usual looking about me. Watching the changing lights [on mountains] the ripening of Autumn colors, seeds, late blooming asters & goldenrods, parting the grass of the meadow & looking at the underworld of mosses & liverworts, & the busy ants, beetles & other small people pursuing their business, like [the] deer, bears, sheep, etc. beneath the protecting shade of the fine forests [of pine like grasses.] Studying the formation of meadows & lakes, moraines mountain sculpture etc. making small feeble beginnings in these directions but charmed by the serene beauty of everything. The air is fairly exhilarating.

27) Clouds only .05. mostly in the form of white purple rock piles [piled mountain-like masses, white & purple] over the [Mt] Hoffmann spur towards evening. Frost as usual. Frost crystals grow in marvelous beauty these still nights on the meadows countersunk in the woods everyone build as carefully as if intended to endure forever yet vanishing at the first glance of the

Date Occurred

1869

Resource Identifier

MuirReel31 Notebook 009 Img043.jpg

Contributing Institution

Holt-Atherton Special Collections, University of the Pacific Library

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