which tumbles the Merced, here a fleecy mass of foam.
Down the canon to the left flows the Yenaga, and
down the one to the right the Illilouette. Here, at
the upper end of the valley proper, where the river
branches with the branchino; chasm, in the outer anole
of Yenaga canon, we find the Washington Column,
and the Koyal Arches, and back of these the North
Dome, a rounded mass of overlapping, concentric,
granite plates. On the opposite side of Yenaga canon
are the Half Dome and Cloud's Rest, and in the canon,
Mirror lake.
Ascending the Merced through the middle canon, besides two miles of cascades in which the river de- scends over two thousand feet, we find two magnificent falls, surrounded by the grandest scenery, — Vernal fall, which makes up in volume and impressive beauty what it lacks in height, and the Nevada fall, with the Cap of Liberty near it. The Illilouette branch of the Merced also has a beautiful fall.
Thus, amid sentinels of granite, and mighty battle- ments, and musical cascades, and roaring cataracts, with its verdure-clad floor, and its time-worn walls curtained in orlistenino; g^ossamer, cold in its colors though they be of dazzling brightness, wrapped in veils of silvery mist round which in drapery of pris- matic hues Iris dances, or illuminated with airy clouds of frozen spray, Yosemite sits enthroned. Above and be3^ond, cold, silent, and white, stretches the great range on whose summit lies the snow that, melting, tunes the viols of a hundred cataracts. A fitting play-ground for the state, truly! A wonder worthy of California ! Travel the world over and you will find no counterpart; there is no wonder like our wonder. Even a Yosemite rivulet may boast its sheer half-mile of precipice. All here is grand and unique ; all of characteristic bigness except water, but Californians were never specially partial to water!
I say Yosemite has no counterpart — I should rather
