Then, awaking suddenly, my eyes opened on one of the most beautiful
and sublime scenes I ever enjoyed. A boundless wilderness of storm
clouds of different degrees of ripeness were congregated over all the
lower landscape for thousands of square miles, colored gray, and
purple, and pearl, and deep-glowing white, amid which I seemed to be
floating; while the great white cone of the mountain above was all
aglow in the free, blazing sunshine. It seemed not so much an ocean
as a land of clouds--undulating hill and dale, smooth purple plains,
and silvery mountains of cumuli, range over range, diversified with
peak and dome and hollow fully brought out in light and shade.

I gazed enchanted, but cold gray masses, drifting like dust on a wind-
swept plain, began to shut out the light, forerunners of the coming
storm I had been so anxiously watching. I made haste to gather as
much wood as possible, snugging it as a shelter around my bed. The
storm side of my blankets was fastened down with stakes to reduce as
much as possible the sifting-in of drift and the danger of being blown
away. The precious bread sack was placed safely as a pillow, and when
at length the first flakes fell I was exultingly ready to welcome
them. Most of my firewood was more than half rosin and would blaze in
the face of the fiercest drifting; the winds could not demolish my
bed, and my bread could be made to last indefinitely; while in case of
need I had the means of making snowshoes and could retreat or hold my
ground as I pleased.

Presently the storm broke forth into full snowy bloom, and the
thronging crystals darkened the air. The wind swept past in hissing
floods, grinding the snow into meal and sweeping down into the hollows
in enormous drifts all the heavier particles, while the finer dust was
sifted through the sky, increasing the icy gloom. But my fire glowed