WINTER IN THE SIERRA NEVADA.

Press, Volume L, Issue 8583, 9 September 1893, Page 10

WINTER IN THE SIERRA NEVADA.

A great quietness falls alike upon mountain and valley, on the dark pines of the nigged hillsides and steep canons of the Sierra. Thick and fast falls the feathery snow on all alike, covering the ! sterile soil and sombre pines and changing the whole face of Nature. The mountain trails are totally obliterated, the stage road, dread fore-runner of Anglo-American civilisation, is abandoned- No longer is heard the merry sound of bells the long mule-teams were wont to jingle as they straggled sturdily up the rocky grade of Old Peavine. Down the mountain side comes the mail carrier, still to the fore ■with pack on shoulder and using great ten foot snow shoes. He leaves his budget of mail at the little mining town which to the gaze seems to cling to the mountain side. He tells of snow blockades in the Plumas country and on the Central Pacific, of elant snow plongha propelled by five sixty-ton engines tearing the great masses of snow out of cuts and defiles on the mountain division and throwing it far and wide, thus keeping the great transcontinental link from East to West unbroken. He tells of the last shooting scrape in Reno, of the Apache war in Arizona and the latest news from the East. And still the snow falls alike upon hamlet and hill. A great quietness reigns supreme over the land, quiet, so painfully and oppressively quiet you might even hear a cough drop. The miner and vaquero retire to their cabins on the hillsides and amid the murmuring pines and stately cedars, wait patiently for the snow to cease. Day after day they look forth, forth upon the white fells and enow laden mountains, on the dark sullen river that, still free and unfrozen, roars and leaj.9 through the rocky canon, and rushes onward to the Great Pacific. The hard summer toil is over, no more in the gulches is heard the heavy thudding of the Mexican arastra, the swish of water in the flumes and boxes, or the polyglot talk of the miners as they run through the pay-dirt or ply busily pick and shovel in the fierce race for wealth. But from those same cabins on the hillsides there come weird sounds on the clear mountain airPhrases suoh as camps may teach, , Sabre cats of Saxon speech. Such as " Two forty on a plank road," "the eternal cinch," "Pass," "I go you five better," Vhingaro, Esta, bueno, hornbre, and ever and anon is heard a strange but emphatic word, probably from some foreign tongue, which sounds like " Damtheluck." The heart of the mountaineer is light within him, but alas, the bottom of the bin is seen through the yellow coinmeal, and the saline American hog lurketh coyly in the bottom of ye cask. The enow comes swiftly down. Day after day nothing is seen but the same leaden sky, the same dreary expanse of snow-clad vales and mountains. Within the mountain huts, built in sheltered nooks and furnished with Spartan like simplicity, the mountaineers do congregate. Then are heard the results of the previous summer , * work and the hidden lore of each craftsman is revealed. The vaquero tells his tale of cattle lost on the ranges, of deadly snow-storms on the prairies, of ravages among stock by the übiquitous coyote and of the last bfg drive to Montana. The sawyer and river-driver talk of the last season's "cut" and the prospects of the Spring " drive" when the snows melt and millions of feet of lumber in the log will be run down the Truckee and Feather rivers. The miner grows garrulous as he converses of pockets, placer mines, dry-washing, &c., and regrets in mournf at numbers— The daye of old, the days of gold, And the days of Forty-nine. And still the snow falls steadily. It collects in huge masses on the pine boughs, ft drifts into the canons and barrancas, it chokes up and covers the running stream?, and falls twenty feet deep on the mountain peaks. All the well-known landmark* have disappeared, no road or trail is visible, and the few adventurous spirits who move abroad during the rigorous season hold their Course by the configuration of the country. Some few of the besieged Who may happen to be expert in the use of snow shoes, make expeditions in search of game, and frequently succeed in bringing down * deer, the freah venison being a welcome addition to the larder, and the exercise pf hunting in the cold bracing air an immense relief from hunkering over the log fires of the cabins. For, as week after week passes by, and no change is visible in the gloomy heavens, and the ever-falling snow is thick as ever, the spirits of the beleagured pioneer gradually assimilates with his cheerless J surroundings, and a great weariness falls J upon ' him. " His unsophisticated mind yearns for the simple pleasure of the frontier, che seductive faro lay-out, the blandishments of poker, keno or old I eledge, and the ever attractive elixir of i life from the far distant Blue Grass country. Thrice blessed are those who possess, not only a meek spirit, but distilled spirits also and with whom the succulent venison and toothsome jack-rabbit fail not, and J the last barrel of flour is as the widow's cruse. And yet the snow falleth. The tough pine boughsgive way beneath the heavy pressure of vast masses of snow which fall upon the ground below. The snow piles up on the primitive cabins until they resemble miniature snowcovered volcanoes with the smoke of subterranean fires rising from them. Far cjown the rugged mountains has Nature now spread her pure mantle of enow and the whole of this great Sierra region lies calm and silent as upon the morning of Creation. „ Rawiunu.