I climb on, through the exposed roots of an immense redwood stump, a relic of the forest primeval, driving a wood-rat scampering from his haunts as I do so, and come out on a slope of soft leaf-mold. Here the broad green leaves of the trillium are already above ground, the buds beginning to show a small green spike. The Solomon’s seal is peeping up to give Christmas greeting, but everything is wet. The trillium lies prostrate, its leaves on the ground; blackberry, huckleberry and wild currant are soaked and wind-blown; the redwoods droop and drip, with here and there a branch broken by its own wet weight. Nevertheless, the scene is not cheerless. There is so much of hope in the quiescent greenery, and the fresh, wet scent of the earth is full of promise. It is surprising how much rain finds its way into the cañon. It might be supposed that such a narrow cleft between two lines of high hills would escape notice; but the water pours in from above; it sweeps through on the searching wind; it flows down the wooded banks, from the hilltops, and the little stream becomes a river. The rain whips and patters and plays musically among the trees, and roars along with the creek until everything is wetter than the proverbial drowned rat; but it does not make mud-puddles; it does not bring the same dirt and discomfort in its wake that it does where man makes his abode. The soft, fragrant, brown mold receives it gladly; the mosses soak it up; the trees catch it in their outstretched hands and turn it gently down upon their own thirsty roots; the broad-leaved plants lie down before it and arise, refreshed, when it has passed. It comes, the rain from heaven, as cleanser and life-giver, and even I, soaked by its downpour, bewildered by the rush and sweep of wind and storm, touched by a little mortal fear at the strangeness of it all, am the better for such a wetting. Let but a single sunbeam sift through the branches and the woods will smile like a happy child after its bath.