Preview
Circa Date
circa 1887
Transcription
104
Mr. Delaney arrived this evening. Felt not a trace of loneliness while he was gone. On the contrary I never enjoyed a grander company. All the wilderness seems to be alive & familiar, full of humanity. The very stones seem talkative sympathetic brotherly. No wonder when we consider that we all have the same Father & Mother.
31) Clouds .05 silky wisps & fringes ever changing yet & so fine they almost escape notice (description) Frost enough for another crop of crystals on the meadows but none in the forests. The gentians, goldenrods, asters, etc. don’t seem to feel it, neither petals or leaves are touched though they seem so tender. Everyday opens & closes like a flower [without] noiseless [or] effortless. Deep serenity glows on all the majestic landscape like silent peaceful joy on a noble human face.
September 1) Clouds as usual .05 motionless, of no particular form[less], tinting bits of the sky, [painting] pure ornament with no [more] hint of rain or snow in them [than in the blush of a girl’s face] The day was all calm. Another grand throb sunny & solemn of Nature’s warm heart, ripening [the] late flowers & seeds for next summer, full of life & the thoughts & plans of life to come, full of [beautiful] ripe & ready death [beautiful] [as cheery] as life telling divine wisdom & goodness & immortality. I [‘ve have] Have been up [making a good telling excursion to] Mt Dana today making haste to see as much
105
[sketch removed] can now [ ] the time of our departure is drawing nigh. The views from the summit reach [were noble and] far & wide [reaching] [ ] Mono Lake & Desert looking strangely barren & grey & bare. The mountain ranges of the great basin look like heaps of ashes dumped from the sky, absolutely lifeless for all I can [could] see as the mountains of the Moon the lake looked like a [bright shiny] disc of [burnished] silver burnished & shining motionless as if made of metal, no trees about its gray ashy cindery shores. Gray volcanoes & mountains westward over forests & & [rock] waves & domes & to north & south along the axis of the range a glorious array of high mountains crags & peaks & [snow fountains] heads of the rivers, flowing west to the sea through the famous Golden Gate. East to dry up in [desert sinks] & go back to the sky. But looking westward the ridges & hills, girding smooth massive domes & subordinate mountains, fringing in long curving lines the dividing ridges & filling every hollow where the glaciers spread soil beds however rocky [and rough] or smooth [deposited rich beds of soil]. Innumerable lakes [were] are seen shining like eyes beneath massive rock brows bare or tree fringed or embedded
Date Occurred
1869
Resource Identifier
MuirReel31 Notebook 009 Img045.jpg
Contributing Institution
Holt-Atherton Special Collections, University of the Pacific Library
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