Stirring and wild, wonderful scenes are encountered during storms on mountain-tops, by the lakeshore, and in cañons. The dangers in such times and places are fewer than in cities. Discomforts? Scarcely. To some persons life must be hardly worth living. If any normal person under fifty cannot enjoy being in a storm in the wilds, he ought to reform at once. In the intensity and clash of the elements there is a vigorous building environment. The storms furnish energy, inspiration, and resolution. There are no substitutes "just as good," no experiences just as great. One rainy June day I started up a dim steep trail toward the headwaters of the river St. Vrain, near timber-line in what is now the Rocky Mountain National Park. While enjoying the general downpour and its softened noise through the woods, I was caught in a storm-center of wrangling winds and waters, and was almost knocked down. Like a sapling, I bowed streaming in the storm. Later, as I sat on a sodden log, reveling in the elemental moods and sounds, a water-ouzel began to sing, but I heard little of his serene optimistic solo above the roar of the wind and stream. The storm raged louder as I approached timber-line. Clouds dragged among the trees. I could see nothing clearly. Every breath was like swallowing a wet sponge. Then a wind-surge rent the clouds and let me glimpse the blue sun-filled sky. I climbed an exceptionally tall spruce. A comic Frémont squirrel scolded in rattling, jerky chatter as I rose above the sea of clouds and trees. Astride the slender tree-top, I felt that the wind was trying hard to dislodge me, but I held on. The tree quivered and vibrated, shook and danced; we charged, circled, looped, and angled. Nowhere else have I experienced such wild, exhilarating joy. In the midst of this rare delight the clouds rose, the wind calmed, and the rain ceased. Then suddenly a blinding, explosive crash almost threw me from my observatory. Within fifty feet a tall fir was split to the ground. Quickly climbing back to earth, I eagerly examined the effects of the lightning-stroke. With one wild blow, in a second or less it had wrecked a century-old tree. Although I have rarely known lightning to strike the heights, I have frequently experienced peculiar electric shocks from the air. I have never known such electrical storms to prove fatal nor to leave ill effects; and they may be beneficial. The day before the famous Poudre Flood, in May, 1904, I was traveling along the Continental Divide above timber-line near Poudre Lakes. While resting I was startled by the pulsating hum, the intermittent _buzz-z-z-z_ and _zit-zit_ and the vigorous hair-pulling of electricity-laden atmosphere.