Our attention finally came to the quiet beauty of the surrounding vegetation, where among the scattered skirmishers of the forest are flowering shrubs, and in the more open grassy places forming the swampy borders of the lake, are many bright flowers. The white mountain anemones in several varieties, the familiar violets, the yellow columbine with beautiful pendent blossoms claiming relationship to its Eastern cousin with scarlet flowers, the fragrant spiranthes, and orchids with pale-green flowers, resembling insects on a leafy stem, may all be seen in profusion near the north side of the lake. These humble herbs, with their gaudy coloring, are the growth of a single season, but on all sides are copses of bushy plants which endure the long winter, some of them clad in a garb of evergreen and, like the annual plants, bearing elegant floral creations. The most conspicuous is the sheep laurel, a small bush adorned with a profusion of crimson-red flowers, each saucer-shaped, hanging in corymbs among the small green leaves. Various shrubs with white flowers, some small and numerous, others large and scattered, make a contrast to the ever present laurel, while the most beautiful of all is a species of mountain rhododendron, a large bush, the most elegant among the mountain heaths, with large white flowers in clustered umbels. In early July this bush may be found, here and there, scattered sparingly in the forest in full blossom at the level of Lake Louise, but after this one must seek ever higher on the mountain side as the advancing summer creeps to altitudes where spring is later.

The early morning visitor turns with sharpened appetite to the hotel, if we may call it such,—a little Swiss chalet of picturesque architecture built on an eminence in full view of the lake. Here the tourist may live in rustic comfort for a day, or for weeks, should he desire to prolong his visit.

Tourists come sparingly to Lake Louise. Unlike Banff with its varied attractions, there is little here outside of nature, and few have the power to appreciate nature alone. Of those who do come, only a small number really see the lake with its forests and mountains combined in exquisite attractiveness. They see the outlines of mountains, but know not whether they are near or distant, nor whether their scale is measured in yards or miles; they see the water of the lake, but not the reflections in it, the ever changing effects of light and shade, sun and shadow, ripple and calm. There are trees tall and slender, but whether they be spruce or pine, larch or hemlock, is all the same; and as to the flowers—some are differently colored from others.

A visitor to the lake once asked in good faith, apparently, if the mountains at the head of the lake were not white from chalk; another, why the water of the stream—which leads out from the lake and rushes in roaring cascades over its rocky channel toward the Bow River—runs so fast down hill.

Fortunately, however, those who are not blessed with that ever present source of pleasure, a love for nature, at least to a slight degree, are exceptional. Nevertheless, that most people lose much pleasure from a lack of close observation is often painfully evident. I have seen, altogether, several hundred tourists arrive at the lake, coming as they do in small parties, or singly, from day to day, and have found it a very interesting study to observe their first impressions as the lake bursts on their view. Some remain motionless studying the details of the scene, usually devoting their chief attention to the lake and forests, but less to the mountains, for mountains are the least appreciated of all the wonders of nature, and are not fully revealed except after years of experience. Others glance briefly and superficially towards the lake, and rush hastily into the chalet for breakfast, balancing their love for nature against hunger for material things in uneven scale. Some remain a week or ten days, but the great majority spend a single day and leave, feeling that they have exhausted the charms of the place in so short a time. A single day amid surroundings where there are such infinite possibilities of change in cloud and storm, heat and cold, the dazzling glare of noon, or the calm romantic light of a full moon, and the slow progress of the seasons, gives but one picture, a single mood from out a thousand, and it may perchance be the very worst of all.

Upon climbing the steps to the open porch of the chalet and entering the large spacious sitting-room, the eye falls at once on a fireplace of old-time proportions, and within its walls of brick, huge logs are burning, with more vigor indeed but hardly less constancy than the ancient fires of the Vestal Virgins. Round this spacious hearth visitors and guests gather, for the air at Lake Louise is always sharp at morning and evening. Indeed, frosts are not rare throughout the summer and may occur any week even in July and August. The high altitude of the lake, which is a little more than 5600 feet above sea-level, is in great part the cause of this bracing weather. On the hottest day that I have ever seen at the lake in the course of three summers the thermometer registered only 78°.

The visitors who come to Lake Louise are of the same cosmopolitan character and varied nationality as those at Banff. Often of a cold night have I sat by the large fire, our only source of light, and listened to tales of adventure told by those who have visited the most distant and unfrequented parts of the earth. Englishmen, who have spent the best years of their life in India, were among our entertainers, and while beverages varying in nature according to nationality or tastes of each were passed around, I have heard thrilling accounts of leopard and tiger hunts in the jungle, blood-curdling tales of treachery and massacre or daring exploits in the Indian wars, and rare experiences in unknown parts of Cashmere and Thibet.

Though the great majority of visitors to the lake are strangers, there are some half-dozen whose familiar faces reappear each successive season; like pilgrims they make this region the termination of a long annual journey, and here worship in “temples not built by human hands.” Among these lovers of nature, far distant England and Ceylon are represented no less than the nearer cities of the United States. The peculiar charms of this locality present an inexhaustible treasurehouse of delightful experiences that grow by familiarity. One’s impressions of the beauty of the lake increase year by year as the full meaning of each detail becomes more thoroughly appreciated.

A fact of great importance, which goes far to make up the ensemble of the surroundings of Lake Louise, is the perfect condition of the forests, which rise in uniform, swelling slopes of dark-green verdure from the rocky shores of the lake far up the mountain sides to those high altitudes where the cold air suggests an eternal winter and dwarfs the struggling trees into mere bushes. The frequent forest fires, which have wrought so much destruction throughout the entire Canadian Rockies, have not as yet swept through this valley. The great spruces and balsams of this primeval forest indicate by their size that for hundreds of years no fire has been through this region. Some large tree stumps near the chalet show hundreds of rings, and one that I counted started to grow in the year 1492, when Columbus set forth to discover the western world.

Nevertheless, on hot days after a long period of dry weather, when the air is laden with the fragrant odor of the dripping balsam and of the dry resin hardened in yellow tears on the scarred trunks of the trees, and when the dead lower branches hung with long gray moss seem to offer all the most combustible materials, one feels certain that the slightest spark would result in a terrible conflagration. Apparently, however, the past history of this valley has never recorded a fire, whether started by careless Indian hunters or that frequent cause, lightning. So far as I am aware, there are no layers of buried charcoal or reddened soil under the present forest which would indicate an ancient fire.

Some years ago—apparently more than twenty,—a fire destroyed the forest near the station of Laggan, which is less than two miles from the lake in a straight line. The fire approached within a mile of the lake and then died out. There are two causes which will always tend to preserve these beautiful forests if the visitors are not careless and counteract them. The prevalent wind is out of the valley toward the Bow valley, so that a fire would naturally be swept away from the lake. Another cause is the natural moisture of this upland region. The very luxuriance of the vegetation indicates this, while in the early morning the whole forest often seems reeking with moisture, even when there has been no rain for weeks. The chill of night appears to condense a heavy dew under the trees and moistens all the vegetation, so that the forest rarely becomes so exceedingly dry as often happens in wide valleys at lower altitudes.

Though the scenery and climate at Lake Louise seem almost ideally perfect during the summer time, nature always renders compensation in some form or other, and never allows her creatures to enjoy complete happiness. The borders of the lake and the damp woods breed myriads of mosquitoes, which conspire to annoy and torture both man and beast. They appear early in spring and suddenly vanish about the 15th or 20th of August each year. The chill of night causes them to disappear about ten o’clock in the evening, not to be seen again until the atmosphere begins to grow warm in the morning sun.

Another insect pest is a species of fly called the “bull-dog,” a name suggested by its ferocious bite. These large insects are about an inch in length and are armed with a formidable set of saws with which they can rapidly cut a considerable hole through the skin of a man or the hide of a horse. The bull-dogs frequent the valleys of the Canadian Rockies, varying locally in their numbers, and seem to prefer low altitudes and a considerable degree of heat, for they are always most voracious and numerous on hot dry days. These flies, when numerous, will almost make a horse frantic. Their bite feels like a fiery cinder slowly burning through the skin, but fortunately they do not cause much trouble to man, for they are led by instinct to seek the rough surfaces of animals and almost invariably light on the clothes instead of the hands or face. They have a most blood-thirsty and cruel enemy in the wasp, and if it were not for the inexhaustible supply of the bull-dogs, the wasps would annihilate the species. Nothing in the habits of insects could be more interesting than the strange manner in which the wasps set out deliberately in pursuit of a bull-dog fly, to overtake and seize the clumsy victim in mid air. Both insects fall to the ground with a terrible buzzing and much circling about while the mad contest goes on. Meanwhile the wasp works with the rapidity of lightning, and with its sharp powerful jaws dis-severs legs and wings, which fall scattered in the melee, till the bull-dog is rendered helpless and immovable. Last of all, the wasp cuts off the head of its victim, then leaves the lifeless and limbless body in order to continue the chase.

I have seen a wasp thus dismember and kill one of these large flies in less than thirty seconds. They seem to perform their murderous acts out of pure pleasure, as they do not linger over their prey after the victim is dead.

The water of Lake Louise is too cold to admit of bathing except in a very brief manner. The temperature of the water near the first of August is about 56°.

The old chalet, built in rustic fashion with unhewn logs, was placed near the lake shore much closer than the present building. One day in 1893, when every one was absent, the building caught fire and burned to the ground. Remarkably enough the forest did not take fire, though some of the trees were close to the building.

Usually in the early morning, before the sun has warmed the atmosphere and started the breezes of daytime into motion, the lake is tranquil and its surface resembles a great mirror. About nine o’clock, the first puffs of wind begin to make little cat’s-paws at the far end of the lake, which widen and extend until finally the whole water becomes rippled. A gentle breeze continues to sweep down the lake from the snow mountains toward the Bow valley all day long, and the water rarely becomes smooth till after sunset. This is the usual order of events in fair weather, a condition which may continue for several weeks without a drop of rain.

The approach and progress of a storm, the wonderful atmospheric changes attending it, and the ever moving clouds obscuring the mountain tops reveal the lake in the full grandeur of its surroundings. An approaching storm is first announced by scattered wisps of cirrus cloud, which move slowly and steadily from the west in an otherwise blue sky. In the course of twenty-four hours the cirrus clouds have become so thick that they often resemble a thin haze far above the highest mountains. The sun with paled light can no longer pierce this ever thickening hazy veil. The wind blows soft and warm from out the south or southwest, and generally brings up the smoke of forest fires from the Pacific coast, and renders the atmosphere still more obscure, till at length the sun appears like a great ball of brass set in a coppery sky. The trees and grass appear to change their color and assume a strange vivid shade of green in the weird light. Sometimes light feathery ashes are wafted over the high mountains south of the lake and settle down gently like flakes of snow. The falling barometer announces the coming storm, and presently another layer of clouds, the low-lying cumulus, form just above the highest peaks and settle gradually lower till they touch the mountain tops. Rain soon follows, the clouds settle till they almost rest on the water of the lake, and the wind increases in violence.

Sometimes thunder-storms of considerable fury sweep through the valley and among the mountains, one after another for several days. A violent thunder-storm at night among these lofty mountains is one of the grandest phenomena of nature. The battling of the elements, the unceasing roar of the wind in the forest, and the crash of thunder redoubled by echoes from the rocky cliffs,—all conspire to fill the imagination with a terrible picture of the majesty and sublimity of nature. From the lake there comes up a low, hoarse murmur, not the roar of ocean surf, but the lesser voice of a small mountain lake lashed to fury and beating with its small waves on a rocky shore. The noise of the forest, the sound of colliding branches as the tall trees sway to and fro in the furious wind, and the frequent crack and crash of dead forest giants overcome by the elements form the dull but fearful monotone, above which the loud rumble of thunder rises in awful grandeur. These are the sounds of a mountain storm.

The bright flashes of lightning reveal a companion picture, for in the momentary light succeeded by absolute darkness the lake is revealed covered with foamy white caps. The forests on the mountain side seem to yield to the blast like a field of wheat in a summer breeze, and the circling clouds sweep about the mountain slopes and conceal all but their bases.

Should the storm clear away during the daytime one may witness grand cloud effects. The low-hanging masses of clouds left behind by the battling elements slowly rise and occasionally reveal small areas of blue sky among the moving vapors. Gentle puffs of air sweep over the calm surface of the water, making little areas of ripples here and there, only to be succeeded by a tranquil calm, as if the storm spirit were sending forth his dying gasps intermittently. While the air is thus calm below, the circling wisps of vapor high up on the mountain, rising and descending, show that the battle between the sun and the clouds is still raging. From above the saturated forests, the rising vapors condense and increase in size till at length, caught in some counter-current, they are swept away or carried downward, while the dissolving cloud spreads out in wisps and streamers till suddenly it disappears into transparent air,—a veritable cloud ghost. At length the mountain tops appear once more, white in a light covering of new snow, and, as the great masses of cumulus rise and disappear the sky appears of that deep blue-black color peculiar to mountain altitudes, while the sun shines out with dazzling brilliancy through the clear atmosphere.

The last visit I made to Lake Louise was toward the middle of October, 1895. A very snowy, disagreeable September had been followed by a long period of milder weather with much bright sunshine. The new snow, which had been quite deep near the lake, had altogether disappeared except high up on the mountain side. It was the true Indian summer, a season with a certain mellow charm peculiar to it alone, characterized by clear sunny weather, a calm atmosphere, a low, riding sun, and short days. Most of the flowers were withered. The deciduous bushes, lately brilliant from frost, were rapidly losing their foliage, and the larches were decked in pale yellow, far up near the tree line. However, the greater part of the vegetation is evergreen, and the spruces, balsams, and pines, the heaths, ericaceous plants, and the mosses contrive to set winter at nought by wearing the garb of a perpetual summer in a region where snow covers the ground three fourths of the year.

I could not resist the temptation as the morning train rolled up to the station at Laggan to get off for the day and make another visit to the lake. The sunrise had been unusually brilliant and there was every promise of a fine day. There is rarely much color at sunrise or sunset in the mountains. The dry clear atmosphere has little power to break up the white light into rainbow colors and give the brilliancy of coloring to be seen near the sea-coast or in the lowlands. The tints are like the air itself—pure, cold, and clear. With more truth they might be called delicate shades or color suggestions. They recall those exquisite but faint hues seen in topaz or tourmaline crystals, or transparent quartz crystals, wherein the minutest trace of some foreign mineral has developed rare spectrum colors and imprisoned them forever. Oftimes the snow of the mountain tops is thus tinted a bright clear pink, beautifully contrasted against the intensely blue sky. I have never seen a deep red on the mountains or clouds at these altitudes. The effect of forest-fire smoke is to give muddy colors: the sun resembles a brazen globe, and the sky becomes coppery in appearance.

After breakfast at the station house, I set off over the hard frozen road toward the lake. I carried my camera and luncheon on my back, my only companion being a small dog which appeared ready for exercise. The air was frosty and cold; the low-riding sun had not as yet struck into the forest trees and removed the rime from the moss and leaves on the ground.

In somewhat less than an hour, I arrived at the lake. All was deserted; the chalet closed, the keeper gone, and the tents taken down. Even the boats, which usually rested near the shore, had been put under cover. The cold air was perfectly calm, and my vapory breath rose straight upwards. The mirror surface of the water was disturbed by some wild fowl—black ducks and divers—which swarm on the lake at this season. Their splashings, and the harsh cries of the divers came faintly over the water. It seemed strange that these familiar haunts could appear so fearfully wild and lonely merely because man had resigned his claim to the place and nature now ruled alone. All at once a wild unearthly wail from across the water, the cry of a loon, one of the most melancholy of all sounds, startled me, and gave warning that activity alone could counteract the effect of the imagination.

Accordingly I walked down the right shore of the lake with the intention of going several miles up the valley and taking some photographs of Mount Lefroy. The flat bushy meadows near the upper end of the lake were cold, and all the plants and reedy grass were white with the morning frost. The towering cliffs and castle-like battlements of the mountains on the south side of the valley shut out the sun, and promised to prevent its genial rays from warming this spot till late in the afternoon, if at all, for a period of several months. In the frozen ground, as I followed the trail, I saw the tracks of a bear, made probably the day before. Bruin had gone up the valley somewhere and had not returned as yet, so there was a possibility of making his acquaintance.

I was well repaid for my visit this day, as a magnificent avalanche fell from Mount Lefroy. Mount Lefroy is a rock mountain rising in vertical cliffs from between two branches of a glacier which sweep round its base. A hanging glacier rests on the highest slope of the mountain, and, ascending some distance, forms a vertical face of ice nearly three hundred feet thick at the top of a great precipice. The highest ridge of the mountain is covered with an overhanging cornice of snow, which the storm winds from the west have built out till it appears to reach full one hundred feet over the glacier below. At times, masses of ice break off from the hanging glacier and fall with thundering crashes to the valley far below.

I was standing at a point some two miles distant looking at this imposing mountain, when from the vertical ice wall a great fragment of the glacier, some three hundred feet thick and several times as long, broke away, and, slowly turning in mid-air, began to fall through the airy abyss. In a few seconds, amid continued silence, for the sound had not yet reached me, the great mass struck a projecting ledge of rock after a fall of some half thousand feet, and at the shock, as though by some inward explosion, the block was shivered into thousands of smaller fragments and clouds of white powdery ice. Simultaneously came the first thunder of the avalanche. The larger pieces led the way, some whirling around in mid-air, others gliding downward like meteors with long trains of snowy ice dust trailing behind. The finer powdered debris followed after, in a long succession of white streamers and curtains resembling cascades and waterfalls. The loud crash at the first great shock now developed into a prolonged thunder wherein were countless lesser sounds of the smaller pieces of ice. It was like the sound of a great battle in which the sharp crack of rifles mingles with the roar of artillery. Leaping from ledge to ledge with ever increasing velocity, the larger fragments at length reached the bottom of the precipice, while now a long white train extended nearly the whole height of the grand mountain wall 2500 feet from base to top.

Imagine a precipice sixteen times higher than Niagara, nearly perpendicular, and built out of hard flinty sandstone. At the top of this giant wall, picture a great glacier with blue ice three hundred feet thick, crevassed and rent into a thousand yawning caverns, and crowding downwards, ever threatening to launch masses of ice large as great buildings into the valley below. Such avalanches are among the most sublime and thrilling spectacles that nature affords. The eye alone is incapable of appreciating the vast scale of them. The long period of silence at first and the thunder of the falling ice reverberated among the mountain-walls produce a better impression of the distance and magnitude.

I arrived at the lower end of the lake toward one o’clock. The lake was only disturbed in one long narrow strip toward the middle by a gentle breeze while all the rest was perfectly calm. This was one of those rare days of which each year only affords two or three, when the lake is calm at midday under a clear sky. The mirror surface of the water presented an inverted image of the mountains, the trees on the shore, and the blue sky. The true water surface and the sunken logs on the bottom of the lake joined with the reflected objects in forming a puzzling composite picture.

The brilliant sun had taken away the chill of morning and coaxed forth a few forest birds, but there were no flowers or butterflies to recall real summer. It seemed as though this were the last expiring effort of autumn before the cold of winter should descend into the valley and with its finger on the lips of nature cover the landscape with a deep mantle of snow and bind the lake in a rigid layer of ice. Even at this warmest period of the day the sun’s rays seemed inefficient to heat the atmosphere, while from the cold shadows of the forest came a warning that winter was lurking near at hand, soon to sweep down and rule uninterrupted for a period of nine long months.

CHAPTER III.

Surroundings of the Lake—Position of Mountains and Valleys—The Spruce and Balsam Firs—The Lyall’s Larch—Alpine Flowers—The Trail among the Cliffs—The Beehive, a Monument of the Past—Lake Agnes, a Lake of Solitude—Summit of the Beehive—Lake Louise in the Distant Future.

Among the mountains on all sides of Lake Louise are many scenes of unusual beauty and grandeur. While the lake itself must be considered the focal point of this region, and is indeed wonderfully attractive by reason of its rare setting, the encircling mountains are so rough and high, the valleys separating them so deep and gloomy, yet withal so beautiful, that the scenery approaches perfection. The forces of nature have here wrought to their utmost and thrown together in apparently wild confusion some of the highest mountains in Canada and carved out gloomy gorge and rocky precipice till the eye becomes lost in the complexity of it all. Lakes and waterfalls reveal themselves among the rich dark forests of the valleys, and afford beautiful foregrounds to the distant snow mountains which seem to tower ever higher as one ascends.

A brief description of the topography in the vicinity of Lake Louise would be now in place. Southwestward from the lake is a range of very high and rugged mountains covered with snow and glaciers. This range is the crest of the continent of North America, in fact the great water-shed which divides the Atlantic and Pacific drainage. In this range are many peaks over 11,000 feet above sea level, an altitude which is near the greatest that the Rocky Mountains attain in this latitude. While farther south in Colorado there are scores of mountains 13,000 or 14,000 feet high, it must be remembered that no mountains in Canada between the International boundary and the railroad have yet been discovered that reach 12,000 feet. Nevertheless, these mountains of lesser altitude are far more impressive and apparently much higher because of their steep sides and extensive fields of perpetual snow.

This great range, forming the continental water-shed runs parallel to the general trend of the Rocky Mountains of Canada, or about northwest and southeast. Several spur ranges branch off at right angles from the central mass and run northeast five or six miles. Between these spur ranges are short valleys which all enter into the wide valley of the Bow. Lake Louise occupies one of these lesser valleys.

The several lateral valleys are all comparatively near Lake Louise and differ remarkably in the character of the scenery and vegetation. One is beautiful and richly covered with forests; another desolate and fearfully wild. The valley of Lake Louise contains in all three lakes, of which the smallest is but a mere pool, some seventy-five yards across.

Far up on the mountain side to the north of Lake Louise two little lakes were discovered many years ago. They are now to the visitor who spends but one day, almost the chief point of interest in this region. The trail thither leads into the dense forest from near the chalet and proceeds forthwith to indicate its nature by rising steadily and constantly. The tall coniferous trees cast a deep cool shade even on a warm day. So closely do the trees grow one to another that the climber is entirely shut out from the world of mountains and surrounded by a primeval forest as he follows the winding path. Among the forest giants there are two principal trees, the spruce and the balsam fir. Each is very tall and slender and at a distance the appearance of the two trees is closely similar. The spruce is the characteristic tree of the Rockies and is found everywhere. It reaches a height of 75 or 100 feet in a single tapering bole, closely beset with small short branches bent slightly downward, as though better to withstand the burden of snow in winter. In open places the lower branches spread out and touch the ground, but in forests they die and leave a free passage between the trees. The balsam tree is quite similar but may be discerned by its smoother bark which is raised from underneath by countless blisters each containing a drop of transparent balsam. Here and there are a few tall pines rivalling the spruces and firs in height but affording a strong contrast to them in their scattered branches and larger needles.

The ground is covered with underbrush tangled in a dense luxuriance of vegetable life and partly concealing the ancient trunks of fallen trees long since covered with moss and now slowly decaying into a red vegetable mold.

At length, after half an hour of constant climbing, a certain indefinable change takes place in the forest. The air is cooler, the trees grow wider apart, and the view is extended through long vistas of forest trees. Presently a new species of tree, like our Eastern tamarack, makes its appearance. It is the Lyall’s larch, a tree that endures the rigors of a subalpine climate better than the spruces and balsam firs, so that it soon becomes to the climber among these mountains an almost certain indication of proximity to the tree-line.

It is not far from the truth to say that the Lyall’s larch is the most characteristic tree of the Canadian Rockies. It is not found in the Selkirk Range just west of the main range, and while it has indeed been found as far south as the International boundary, it has not been discovered in the Peace River valley to the north. Restricted in latitude, it grows on the main range of the Rockies only at a great altitude. Here on the borderland between the vegetable and mineral kingdoms it forms a narrow fringe at the tree-line and in autumn its needles turn bright yellow and mark a conspicuous band around all the cliffs and mountain slopes at about 7000 feet above sea level. Its soft needles, gathered in scattered fascicles, are set along the rough and tortuous branches, affording a scanty shade but permitting of charming glimpses of distant mountains, clouds, and sky among its gray branches and light-green foliage. It seems incapable of sending up a tall slender stem but branches out irregularly and presents an infinite variety of forms. Possibly for this reason the larch cannot contest with the slender spruces and firs of the valley, where it would be crowded out of light and sun among its taller rivals.

Presently the trail leads from out the forest and crosses an open slope where some years ago a great snow-slide swept down and stripped the trees from the mountain side. Here, 1200 feet above Lake Louise, the air feels sensibly cooler and indicates an Alpine climate. The mountains now reveal themselves in far grander proportions than from below, as they burst suddenly on the view. Nature has already made compensation for the destroyed forest by clothing this slope with a profusion of wild flowers, though much different in character from those at Lake Louise. Alpine plants and several varieties of heather, in varying shades of red or pink and even white, cover the ground with their elegant coloring. One form of heath resembles almost perfectly the true heather of Scotland, and by its abundance recalls the rolling hills and flowery highlands of that historic land. The retreating snow-banks of June and July are closely followed by the advancing column of mountain flowers which must needs blossom, bear fruit, and die in the short summer of two months duration. One may thus often find plants in full blossom within a yard of some retreating snow-drift.

On reaching the farther side of the bare track of the avalanche, the trail begins to lead along the face of craggy cliffs like some llama path of the Andes. The mossy ledges are in some places damp and glistening with trickling springs, where the climber may quench his thirst with the purest and coldest water. Wherever there is the slightest possible foothold the trees have established themselves, sometimes on the very verge of the precipice so that their spreading branches lean out over the airy abyss while their bare roots are flattened in the joints and fractures of the cliff or knit around the rocky projections like writhing serpents.

More than four hundred feet below is a small circular pond of clear water, blue and brilliant like a sapphire crystal. Its calm surface, rarely disturbed by mountain breezes, reflects the surrounding trees and rocks sharp and distinct as it nestles in peace at the very base of a great rock tower—the Beehive. Carved out from flinty sandstone, this tapering cone, if such a thing there be, with horizontal strata clearly marked resembles indeed a giant beehive. Round its base are green forests and its summit is adorned by larches, while between are the smooth precipices of its sides too steep for any tree or clinging plant. What suggestions may not this ancient pile afford! Antiquity is of man; but these cliffs partake more of the eternal—existing forever. Their nearly horizontal strata were formed in the Cambrian Age, which geologists tell us was fifty or sixty millions of years ago. Far back in those dim ages when the sea swarmed with only the lower forms of life, the fine sand was slowly and constantly settling to the bottom of the ocean and building up vast deposits which now are represented by the strata of this mountain. Solidified and made into flinty rock, after the lapse of ages these deposits were lifted above the ocean level by the irresistible crushing force of the contracting earth crust. Rain and frost and moving ice have sculptured out from this vast block monuments of varied form and aspect which we call mountains.

Just to one side of the Beehive a graceful waterfall dashes over a series of ledges and in many a leap and cascade finds its way into Mirror Lake. This stream flows out from Lake Agnes, whither the trail leads by a short steep descent through the forest. Lake Agnes is a wild mountain tarn imprisoned between gloomy cliffs, bare and cheerless. Destitute of trees and nearly unrelieved by any vegetation whatsoever, these mountain walls present a stern monotony of color. The lake, however, affords one view that is more pleasant. One should walk down the right shore a few hundred feet and look to the north. Here the shores formed of large angular blocks of stone are pleasantly contrasted with the fringe of trees in the distance.

The solitary visitor to the lake is soon oppressed with a terrible sensation of utter loneliness. Everything in the surroundings is gloomy and silent save for the sound of a trickling rivulet which falls over some rocky ledges on the right of the lake. The faint pattering sound is echoed back by the opposite cliffs and seems to fill the air with a murmur so faint, and yet so distinct, that it suggests something supernatural. The occasional shrill whistle of a marmot breaks the silence in a startling and sudden manner. A visitor to this lake once cut short his stay most unexpectedly and hastened back to the chalet upon hearing one of these loud whistles which he thought was the signal of bandits or Indians who were about to attack him.

Lake Agnes is a narrow sheet of water said to be unfathomable, as indeed is the case with all lakes before they are sounded. It is about one third of a mile in length and occupies a typical rock basin, a kind of formation that has been the theme of heated discussion among geologists. The water is cold, of a green color, and so pellucid that the rough rocky bottom may be seen at great depths. The lake is most beautiful in early July before the snowbanks around its edge have disappeared. Then the double picture, made by the irregular patches of snow on the bare rocks and their reflected image in the water, gives most artistic effects.

From the lake shore one may ascend the Beehive in about a quarter of an hour. The pitch is very steep but the ascent is easy and exhilarating, for the outcropping ledges of sandstone seem to afford a natural staircase, though with irregular steps. Everywhere are bushes and smaller woody plants of various heaths, the tough strong branches of which, grasped in the hand, serve to assist the climber, while occasional trees with roots looped and knotted over the rocks still further facilitate the ascent.

Arrived on the flat summit, the climber is rewarded for his toil. One finds himself in a light grove of the characteristic Lyall’s larch, while underneath the trees, various ericaceous plants suggest the Alpine climate of the place.

Though the climber may come here unattended by friends, he never feels the loneliness as at Lake Agnes. There the gloomy mountains and dark cliffs seem to surround one and threaten some unseen danger, but here the broader prospect of mountains and the brilliancy of the light afford most excellent company. I have visited this little upland park very many times, sometimes with friends, sometimes with the occasional visitors to Lake Louise, and often alone. The temptation to select a soft heathery seat under a fine larch tree and admire the scenery is irresistible. One may remain here for hours in silent contemplation, till at length the rumble of an avalanche from the cliffs of Mount Lefroy awakens one from reverie.

The altitude is about 7350 feet above sea level and in general this is far above the tree line, and it is only that this place is unusually favorable to tree growth that such a fine little grove of larches exists here. Nevertheless, the summer is very brief—only half as long as at Lake Louise, 1700 feet below. The retreating snow-banks of winter disappear toward the end of July and new snow often covers the ground by the middle of September. How could we expect it to be otherwise at this great height and in the latitude of Southern Labrador? On the hottest days, when down in the valley of the Bow the thermometer may reach eighty degrees or more, the sun is here never oppressively hot, but rather genially warm, while the air is crisp and cool. Should a storm pass over and drench the lower valleys with rain, the air would be full of hail or snow at this altitude. The view is too grand to describe, for while there is a more extensive prospect than at Lake Louise the mountains appear to rise far higher than they do at that level. The valleys are deep as the mountains high, and in fact this altitude is the level of maximum grandeur. The often extolled glories of high mountain scenery is much overstated by climbers. What they gain in extent they lose in intent. The widened horizon and countless array of distant peaks are enjoyed at the expense of a much decreased interest in the details of the scene. In my opinion one obtains in general the best view in the Canadian Rockies at the tree line or slightly below. Nevertheless every one to his own taste.

The most thrilling experience to be had on the summit of the Beehive is to stand at the verge of the precipice on the east and north sides. One should approach cautiously, preferably on hands and knees, even if dizziness is unknown to the climber, for from the very edge the cliff drops sheer more than 600 feet. A stone may be tossed from this place into the placid waters of Mirror Lake, where after a long flight of 720 feet, its journey’s end is announced by a ring of ripples far below.

Lake Louise appears like a long milky-green sheet of water, with none of that purity which appears nearer at hand. The stream from the glacier has formed a fan-shaped delta, and its muddy current may be seen extending far out into the lake, polluting its crystal water and helping to fill its basin with sand and gravel till in the course of ages a flat meadow only will mark the place of an ancient lake.

There are even now many level meadows and swampy tracts in these mountains which mark the filled-up bed of some old lake. These places are called “muskegs,” and though they are usually safe to traverse, occasionally the whole surface trembles like a bowl of jelly and quakes under the tread of men and horses. In such places let the traveller beware the treacherous nature of these sloughs, for on many an occasion horses have been suddenly engulfed by breaking through the surface, below which deep water or oozy mud offers no foothold to the struggling animal.

At the present rate of filling, however, the deep basin of Lake Louise will require a length of time to become obliterated that is measured by thousands of years rather than by centuries,—a conception that should relieve our anxiety in some measure.

CHAPTER IV.

Organizing a Party for the Mountains—Our Plans for the Summer—William Twin and Tom Chiniquy—Nature, Habits, and Dress of the Stoney Indians—An Excursion on the Glacier—The Surface Debris and its Origin—Snow Line—Ascent of the Couloir—A Terrible Accident—Getting Down—An Exhausting Return for Aid—Hasty Organization of a Rescue Party—Cold and Miserable Wait on the Glacier—Unpleasant Surmises—“I Think You Die”—A Fortunate Termination.

Previous to the summer of 1894 my experiences in the Canadian Rockies had made me acquainted with but little more of their general features and scenery than has been already described. This was sufficient, however, to prove that a most delightful summer could be spent among these mountains if a party of young men were organized with some definite object in view to hold the party together. Several of us accordingly assembled at one of our eastern colleges and discussed plans for the summer. Four men were persuaded to go on this excursion after the glories of the region had been duly set forth and the evidence corroborated so far as possible by the use of photographs. We were to meet at Lake Louise, where our headquarters were to be at the chalet, as near the first of July as possible.

Though the individual inclinations of the various members of our party might seem unlikely to harmonize together, we had nevertheless agreed on carrying out a certain plan. One of the party was an enthusiastic hunter, another eager for the glories of mountain ascents, one a geologist, another carried away by the charms of photography, while the fifth and last was ready to join in almost any undertaking or enterprise whatsoever.

However, our common purpose joined us all together to a certain degree. This was to explore and survey the region immediately around Lake Louise, to ascend several of the highest peaks, to get photographs of the best scenery, and in general to learn all we could about the environment of the lake.

Three of us arrived at the lake one fine morning early in July. The beauty of the scenery seemed to make a deep impression on my friends, and fortunately the clouds which at first concealed the mountain tops lifted soon after our arrival and produced very grand effects. At that time there were two Stoney Indians at the lake, who were engaged in cutting a trail to a lately discovered point of interest. One of these was named William Twin; his surname was probably derived from the fact that he had a twin brother, whose name was Joshua. A Stoney Indian who once acted as my guide was named Enoch; and upon being asked his surname he replied, “Wildman.” These curious cases afford good examples of the origin of names. William was a fine-looking Indian. He came nearer to a realization of the ideal Indian features such as one sees on coins, or in allegorical figures, than almost any savage I have ever seen.

Tom Chiniquy was the other of the two Indians, and indeed the more important, as he is the eldest son of Chief Chiniquy, who in turn is under Bears’ Paw, the head chief of all the Stoneys. An air of settled gravity, stern and almost bordering on an appearance of gloom, betokened his serious nature. I cannot but admire these Stoney Indians, free as they are from the vices of civilization, while still retaining many of the simple virtues of savage life.

As we saw the Indians every day we soon became acquainted with them, especially as William could talk quite intelligibly in English. The very first day of our arrival at the chalet the sharp eyes of the Indians, which seemed to be ever roving about in search of game, discovered a herd of goats on the mountain side. In vain did we try to see them, and at length, by means of a pair of powerful field glasses, they appeared as small white spots without definite forms, whereas to the Indians they were plainly visible. William was disgusted with us, and said, “White man no good eyes,” in evident scorn.

With practice, our race can excel the Indians in every undertaking requiring skill, patience, or physical endurance, with the exception of two things in which they are infinitely our superiors. These are their ability to discover minute objects at great distances, and to read those faint and indefinite signs made by the passage of man or game through the forests or on the hard plains, where a white man would be completely baffled. A turned leaf, a bent blade of grass, a broken twig, or even the sheen on the grass, leads the swarthy savage unerringly and rapidly along, where the more intelligent but less observant white man can see absolutely nothing.

The Indian is said to be stolid and indifferent, while the hard labor which the squaws are compelled to undergo is always laid up against them as an evidence of their brutal character. But on the contrary this is their method of dividing labor, and a squaw whose husband is compelled to work about their camps is the subject of ridicule among the rest. The squaws do all the work which rationally centres around the camp-fire, just as our wives preside over our hearths and homes. The bucks provide the food, and should privation occur they will cheerfully share their last morsel with their wives and children, and, the more honor to them, they will do the same by a white man. The long and arduous labors of the chase, requiring the severest physical exertion, exhaust the strength, often while exposed to cold and rain for long periods of time. The bucks rightly consider their labor ended when they reach their camp, or “teepee” as they call them. Here the squaws preside and perform all the labor of cutting and cooking the meat, preserving and dressing the hides, and even gathering the firewood. They cut the teepee poles and set up their tents; and when not occupied with these more severe labors, they spend their time in making moccasins, weaving baskets, or fancy sewing and bead-work.