" T Were Worth Ten Years Of Peaceful Life,
One Glance At This Array."
The snow that falls in the lowland woods is usually soft, and makes a
fine show coming through the trees
In large, feathery tufts, loading
the branches of the firs and spruces and cedars and weighing them down
against the trunks until they look slender and sharp as arrows, while
a strange, muffled silence prevails, giving a peculiar solemnity to
everything. But these lowland snowstorms and their effects quickly
vanish; every crystal melts in a day or two, the bent branches rise
again, and the rain resumes its sway.
While these gracious rains are searching the roots of the lowlands,
corresponding snows are busy along the heights of the Cascade
Mountains. Month after month, day and night the heavens shed their
icy bloom in stormy, measureless abundance, filling the grand upper
fountains of the rivers to last through the summer. Awful then is the
silence that presses down over the mountain forests. All the smaller
streams vanish from sight, hushed and obliterated. Young groves of
spruce and pine are bowed down as by a gentle hand and put to rest,
not again to see the light or move leaf or limb until the grand
awakening of the springtime, while the larger animals and most of the
birds seek food and shelter in the foothills on the borders of the
valleys and plains.
The lofty volcanic peaks are yet more heavily snow-laden. To their
upper zones no summer comes. They are white always. From the steep
slopes of the summit the new-fallen snow, while yet dry and loose,
descends in magnificent avalanches to feed the glaciers, making
meanwhile the most glorious manifestations of power. Happy is the man
who may get near them to see and hear. In some sheltered camp nest on
the edge of the timberline one may lie snug and warm, but after the
long shuffle on snowshoes we may have to wait more than a month ere
the heavens open and the grand show is unveiled. In the mean time,
bread may be scarce, unless with careful forecast a sufficient supply
has been provided and securely placed during the summer.
Nevertheless, to be thus deeply snowbound high in the sky is not
without generous compensation for all the cost. And when we at length
go down the long white slopes to the levels of civilization, the pains
vanish like snow in sunshine, while the noble and exalting pleasures
we have gained remain with us to enrich our lives forever.
The fate of the high-flying mountain snow-flowers is a fascinating
study, though little may we see of their works and ways while their
storms go on. The glinting, swirling swarms fairly thicken the blast,
and all the air, as well as the rocks and trees, is as one smothering
mass of bloom, through the midst of which at close intervals come the
low, intense thunder-tones of the avalanches as they speed on their
way to fill the vast fountain hollows.
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