Birds of the RockiesKeyser, Leander S. (Leander Sylvester)
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Birds of the Rockies
Keyser, Leander S. (Leander Sylvester)
Birds; Birds -- Colorado
My pen falters when I think of describing the scene that broke upon our
vision. I sigh and wish the task were done. The summit itself is a
narrow ridge on which you may stand and look down the declivities on
both sides, scarcely having to step out of your tracks to do so. It is
quite different from the top of Pike's Peak, which is a comparatively
level plateau several acres in extent, carpeted, if one may so speak,
with immense granite rocks piled upon one another or laid side by side
in semi-systematic order; whereas Gray's, as has been said, is a narrow
ridge, composed chiefly of comparatively small stones, with a sprinkling
of good-sized boulders. The finer rocks give the impression of having
been ground down by crushing and attrition to their present dimensions
in the far-away, prehistoric ages.
A short distance to the northwest frowned Torrey's Peak, Gray's
companion-piece, the twain being connected by a ridge which dips in an
arc perhaps a hundred feet below the summits. The ridge was covered with
a deep drift of snow, looking as frigid and unyielding as a scene in the
arctic regions. Torrey's is only a few feet lower than Gray's--one of my
books says five. Mention has been made of its forbidding aspect. It is
indeed one of the most ferocious-looking mountains in the Rockies, its
crown pointed and grim, helmeted with snow, its sides, especially east
and north, seamed and ridged and jagged, the gorges filled with snow,
the beetling cliffs jutting dark and threatening, bearing huge drifts
upon their shoulders. Torrey's Peak actually seemed to be calling over
to us like some boastful Hercules, "Ah, ha! you have climbed my
mild-tempered brother, but I dare you to climb me!" For reasons of our
own we declined the challenge.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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