CHAPTER I.

Just where the red track of the Los Gatos road streams on and upward
like the sinuous trail of a fiery rocket until it is extinguished in
the blue shadows of the Coast Range, there is an embayed terrace near
the summit, hedged by dwarf firs. At every bend of the heat-laden road
the eye rested upon it wistfully; all along the flank of the mountain,
which seemed to pant and quiver in the oven-like air, through rising
dust, the slow creaking of dragging wheels, the monotonous cry of tired
springs, and the muffled beat of plunging hoofs, it held out a promise
of sheltered coolness and green silences beyond. Sunburned and anxious
faces yearned toward it from the dizzy, swaying tops of stage-coaches,
from lagging teams far below, from the blinding white canvas covers of
"mountain schooners," and from scorching saddles that seemed to weigh
down the scrambling, sweating animals beneath. But it would seem that
the hope was vain, the promise illusive. When the terrace was reached
it appeared not only to have caught and gathered all the heat of the
valley below, but to have evolved a fire of its own from some hidden
crater-like source unknown. Nevertheless, instead of prostrating and
enervating man and beast, it was said to have induced the wildest
exaltation. The heated air was filled and stifling with resinous
exhalations. The delirious spices of balm, bay, spruce, juniper, yerba
buena, wild syringa, and strange aromatic herbs as yet unclassified,
distilled and evaporated in that mighty heat, and seemed to fire with a
midsummer madness all who breathed their fumes. They stung, smarted,
stimulated, intoxicated. It was said that the most jaded and foot-sore
horses became furious and ungovernable under their influence; wearied
teamsters and muleteers, who had exhausted their profanity in the
ascent, drank fresh draughts of inspiration in this fiery air, extended