First we hardly notice that the road ascends; but soon, as the foot-hills leave an open space, we can see a vast plain lying beneath us, and then the climb begins in good earnest. "Round and round" the hill it seems to go--a narrow road cut out of the long-resisting rock--the wounds which the pick and shovel have made overgrown by tender, pitying vines, that seek to hide the scars on the face of their fostering mother. Trees high above us shake their leafy heads, and the wild doves who have their nests in the green undergrowth, croon sadly over the invasion of their quiet mountain home. Vain complainings of tree and bird! When the eyes of man have once lighted on nature in her wild, fresh beauty, they are never withdrawn, and they spare not the bird on her nest, nor the tree in its pride. Here opens a mountain valley before us, and, nestled in the shadow of sycamore and alder, a cosy, home-like cot. The peach and grape-vine cluster by the door; and where a rude tumble-down fence encloses the fields, the Rose of Castile, the native child of California, creeps picturesquely over the crumbling rails, and fills the air with its own matchless fragrance. Bees are drawing honey from geranium and gilli-pink, and the humming-bird, darting through space like a flash one moment, hangs the next, with a quivering, rapturous kiss, in the petals of the sweet-breathed honeysuckle. Then the road winds higher, and the hills and rocks above grow steeper, bearing aloft the laurel tree and manzanite bush, the madrone tree and the poison ivy. There is not an inch of ground between the wheels of the stage and the steep declivity; and once in a while a nervous passenger of the male gender turns away with a shudder, while the female hides her eyes in her veil or handkerchief, never heeding the sight of the bare, bald crags, and the pine-covered heights far above and in the dreamy distance. As we enter the heart of the _cañon_, the rocky, vine-clad walls on either side seem to reassure the nervous passenger and the half-fainting lady; and the grade being very easy for quite a while, there is no more lamentation heard till the horses dash full-speed through a laughing, glittering mountain stream, the head-waters of the Cayote, throwing its spray merrily in at the open window. Again and again the brook is crossed, as it makes its quick, flashing way through blackberry clumps and wild grape-vines, glancing up at sycamore and buckeye tree as it hastens along. Suddenly the driver strikes one of the shining white rocks on which the water breaks into foam, and then a general commotion ensues in the stage, and before the passengers have settled back in their original places, a soft, sad music seems to float toward us on the air--the rustling of the gray-green pines that overhang the last rise in the road, and shade so romantically the white cottages clinging to the mountain-side, and built on the plateau that is crowned by the hotel and gardens of the Gilroy Hot Springs.