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# 2016-11-18 - John Muir, Saint of the American Wilderness | |
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John Muir was the archetypal free spirit. Following his own call of | |
the wild, he wandered throughout the Appalachians and the Sierra to | |
Alaska, Siberia, South America, and Africa. Both a dreamer and an | |
activist, he was a devoted father, successful farmer, ingenious | |
inventor, gifted writer, passionate lobbyist, and co-founder of the | |
Sierra Club. His eloquent words changed the way Americans saw their | |
mountains, forests, seashores, and deserts. [1] | |
At least one major religious denomination has actually posited a form | |
of "sainthood" on John Muir. [2] | |
Fasting was an intrinsic part of Muir's explorations, so much so that | |
he resented the necessity of eating. ... | |
> Can scarce command attention to my best studies, as if one | |
> couldn't take a few days' saunter in the Godful woods without | |
> maintaining a base on a wheat-field and grist-mill. Like caged | |
> parrots we want a cracker. [3] | |
> Weather does not happen. It is the visible manifestation of | |
> the Spirit moving itself in the void. It gathers itself together | |
> under the heavens; rains, snows, yearns mightily in wind, smiles; | |
> and the Weather Bureau, situated advantageously for that very | |
> business, taps the record on his instruments and going out on the | |
> streets denies his God, not having gathered the sense of what he | |
> has seen. Hardly anybody takes account of the fact that John Muir, | |
> who knows more of mountain storms than any other, is a devout man. | |
> [4] | |
"Amuse yourselves," said Captain Lane at lunch. "Here we stay till | |
two o'clock tomorrow morning. This gale, blowing from the sea, makes | |
safe steering through the Canyon impossible, unless we take the | |
morning's calm." | |
I saw Muir's eyes light up with a peculiar meaning as he glanced | |
quickly at me across the table. He knew the leading strings I was in; | |
how those well-meaning D.D.S. and their motherly wives thought they | |
had a special mission to suppress all my self-destructive | |
proclivities toward dangerous adventure, and especially to protect me | |
from "that wild Muir" and his hare-brained schemes of mountain | |
climbing. | |
"Where is it?" I asked, as we met behind the pilot house a moment | |
later. | |
He pointed to a little group of jagged peaks rising right up from | |
where we stood-a pulpit in the center of a vast rotunda of | |
magnificent mountains. "One of the finest viewpoints in the world," | |
he said. ... | |
Muir led, of course, picking with sure instinct the easiest way. | |
Three hours of steady work brought us suddenly beyond the | |
timber-line, and the real joy of the day began. Nowhere else have I | |
seen anything approaching the luxuriance and variety of delicate | |
blossoms shown by these high, mountain pastures of the North. "You | |
scarce could see the grass for flowers." Everything that was | |
marvelous in form, fair in color, or sweet in fragrance seemed to be | |
represented there, from daisies and campanulas to Muir's favorite, | |
the cassiope, with its exquisite little pink-white bells shaped like | |
lilies-of-the-valley and its subtle perfume. Muir at once went wild | |
when we reached this fairyland. From cluster to cluster of flowers he | |
ran, falling on his knees, babbling in unknown tongues, prattling a | |
curious mixture of scientific lingo and baby talk, worshiping his | |
little blue-and-pink goddesses. | |
"Ah! my blue-eyed darlin', little did I think to see you here. How | |
did you stray away from Shasta?" | |
"Well, well! Who'd 'a' thought that you'd have left that niche in the | |
Merced mountains to come here!" | |
"And who might you be, now, with your wonder look? Is it possible | |
that you can be (two Latin polysyllables)? You're lost, my dear; you | |
belong in Tennessee." | |
"Ah! I thought I'd find you, my homely little sweetheart," and so on | |
unceasingly. | |
So absorbed was he in this amatory botany that he seemed to forget my | |
existence. While I, as glad as he, tagged along, running up and down | |
with him, asking now and then a question, learning something of plant | |
life, but far more of that spiritual insight into Nature's lore which | |
is granted only to those who love and woo her in her great outdoor | |
palaces. But how I anathematized my short-sighted foolishness for | |
having as a student at old Wooster shirked botany for the "more | |
important" studies of language and metaphysics. For here was a man | |
whose natural science had a thorough technical basis, while the | |
super-structure was built of "lively stones," and was itself a living | |
temple of love! | |
With all his boyish enthusiasm, Muir was a most painstaking student; | |
and any unsolved question lay upon his mind like a personal grievance | |
until it was settled to his full understanding. One plant after | |
another, with its sand-covered roots, went into his pockets, his | |
handkerchief, and the "full" of his shirt until he was bulbing and | |
sprouting all over, and could carry no more. He was taking them to | |
the boat to analyze and compare at leisure. Then he began to | |
requisition my receptacles. I stood it while he stuffed my pockets, | |
but rebelled when he tried to poke the prickly, scratchy things | |
inside my shirt. I had not yet attained that sublime indifference to | |
physical discomfort ... that Muir had found. ... | |
"Man!" he said, "I was forgetting. We'll have to hurry now or we'll | |
miss it, we'll miss it." | |
"Miss what?" I asked. | |
"The jewel of the day," he answered; "the sight of the sunset from | |
the top." | |
Then Muir began to SLIDE up that mountain. I had been with mountain | |
climbers before, but never one like him. A deer-lope over the | |
smoother slopes, a sure instinct for the easiest way into a rocky | |
fortress, so instant and unerring attack, a serpent-glide up the | |
steep; eye, hand and foot all connected dynamically; with no | |
appearance of weight to his body-as though he had Stockton's negative | |
gravity machine strapped on his back. ... It was only for exerting | |
myself to the limits of my strength that I was able to keep near him. | |
... and the wall of rock towered threateningly above us, leaning | |
out in places, a thousand feet or so above the glacier. ... A quick | |
glance to the right and left, and Muir, who had steered his course | |
wisely across the glacier, attacked the cliff, simply saying, "We | |
must climb cautiously here." | |
Now came the most wonderful display of his mountain-craft. Had I been | |
alone at the feet of these crags I should have said, "It can't be | |
done," and have turned back down the mountain. But Muir was my | |
"control," as the spiritists say, and I never thought of doing | |
anything else but following him. He thought he could climb up there | |
and that settled it. He would do what he thought he could. And such | |
climbing! There was never an instant when both feet and hands were | |
not in play, and often elbows, knees, thighs, upper arms, and even | |
chin must grip and hold. Clambering up a steep slope, crawling under | |
an overhanging rock, spreading out like a flying squirrel and edging | |
along an inch-wide projection while fingers clasped knobs above the | |
head, bending about sharp angles, pulling up smooth rock-faces by | |
sheer strength of arm and chinning over the edge, leaping fissures, | |
sliding flat around a dangerous rock-breast, testing crumbly spurs | |
before risking his weight, always going up, up, no hesitation, no | |
pause-that was Muir! My task was the lighter one; he did the | |
head-work, I had but to imitate. ... As far as possible I did as he | |
did, took his handholds, and stepped in his steps. | |
But I was handicapped in a way that Muir was ignorant of, and I would | |
not tell him for fear of his veto upon my climbing. My legs were all | |
right-hard and sinewy; my body light and supple, my wind good, my | |
nerves steady (heights did not make me dizzy); but my arms-there lay | |
the trouble. Ten years before I had been fond of breaking colts-till | |
the colts broke me. On successive summers in West Virginia, two colts | |
had fallen with me and dislocated first my left shoulder, then my | |
right. Since then both arms had been out of joint more than once. My | |
left was especially weak. It would not sustain my weight, and I had | |
to favor it constantly. Now and again, as I pulled myself up some | |
difficult reach I could feel the head of the humerous move from its | |
socket. ... | |
Then he started running along the ledge like a mountain goat, working | |
to get around the vertical cliff above us to find an ascent on the | |
other side. He was soon out of sight, although I followed as fast as | |
I could. I heard him shout something, but could not make out his | |
words. I know now that he was warning me of a dangerous place. Then | |
I came to a sharp-cut fissure which lay across my path... It sloped | |
very steeply for some twelve feet below, opening on the face of the | |
precipice above the glacier, and was filled to within about four feet | |
of the surface with flat, slatey gravel. It was only four or five | |
feet across, and I could easily have leaped it had I not been so | |
tired. But a rock the size of my head projected from the slippery | |
stream of gravel. In my haste to overtake Muir I did not stop to make | |
sure this stone was part of the cliff, but stepped with springing | |
force upon it to cross the fissure. Instantly the stone melted away | |
beneath my feet, and I shot with it down towards the precipice. With | |
my peril sharp upon me I cried out as I whirled on my face, and | |
struck out both hands to grasp the rock on either side. | |
Falling forward hard, my hands struck the walls of the chasm, my arms | |
were twisted behind me, and instantly both shoulders were dislocated. | |
With my paralyzed arms flopping helplessly above my head, I slid | |
swiftly down the narrow chasm. Instinctively I flattened down on the | |
sliding gravel, digging my chin and toes into it to check my descent; | |
but not until my feet hung out over the edge of the cliff did I feel | |
that I had stopped. Even then I dared not breathe or stir, so | |
precarious was my hold on that treacherous shale. Every moment I | |
seemed to be slipping inch by inch to the point when all would give | |
way and I would go whirling down to the glacier. ... | |
I had no hope of escape at all. The gravel was rattling past me and | |
piling up against my head. The jar of a little rock, and all would be | |
over. The situation was too desperate for actual fear. Dull wonder as | |
to how long I would be in the air, and the hope that death would be | |
instant-that was all. Then came the wish that Muir would come before | |
I fell, and take a message to my wife. | |
Suddenly, I heard his voice right above me. "My God!" he cried. Then | |
he added, "Grab that rock, man, just by your right hand." | |
I gurgled from my throat, not daring to inflate my lungs, "My arms | |
are out." | |
There was a pause. Then his voice rang again, cheery, confident, | |
unexcited, "Hold fast; I'm going to get you out of this. I can't get | |
to you on this side; the rock is sheer. I'll have to leave you now | |
and cross the rift high up and come down to you on the other side by | |
which we came. Keep cool." | |
Then I heard him going away, whistling "The Blue Bells of Scotland," | |
singing snatches of Scotch songs, calling to me, his voice now | |
receding, as the rocks intervened, then sounding louder as he came | |
out on the face of the cliff. But in me hope surged at full tide. I | |
entertained no more thoughts of last messages. I did not see how he | |
could possibly do it, but he was John Muir, and I had seen his | |
wonderful rock-work. So I determined not to fall and made myself as | |
flat and heavy as possible, not daring to twitch a muscle or wink an | |
eyelid, for I still felt myself slipping, slipping down the greasy | |
slate. And now a new peril threatened. A chill ran through me of cold | |
and nervousness, and I slid an inch. I suppressed the growing shivers | |
with all my will. I would keep perfectly still till it was torture, | |
and I could not ease it. | |
It seemed like hours, but it was really only about ten minutes before | |
he got back to me. By that time I hung so far over the edge of the | |
precipice that it seemed impossible that I could last another second. | |
Now, I heard Muir's voice, low and steady, close to me, and it | |
seemed a little below. | |
"Hold steady," he said, "I'll have to swing you out over the cliff." | |
Then I felt a careful hand on my back, fumbling with the waistband of | |
my pants, my vest and shirt, gathering all in a firm grip. I could | |
see only with one eye and that looked upon but a foot or two of | |
gravel on the other side. | |
"Now!" he said, and I slid out of the cleft with a rattling shower of | |
stones and gravel. My head swung down, my impotent arms dangling, and | |
I stared straight at the glacier, a thousand feet below. Then my feet | |
came against the cliff. | |
"Work downwards with your feet." | |
I obeyed. He drew me close to him by crooking his arm and as my head | |
came up past his level he caught me by my collar with his teeth! My | |
feet struck the little two-inch shelf on which he was standing, and I | |
could see Muir, flattened against the face of the rock and facing it, | |
his right hand stretched up and clasping a little spur, his left | |
holding me with an iron grip, his head bent sideways, as my weight | |
drew it. I felt as alert and cool as he. | |
"I've got to let go of you," he hissed through his clenched teeth. "I | |
need both hands here. Climb upward with your feet." | |
How he did it, I know not. The miracle grows as I ponder it. The wall | |
was almost perpendicular and smooth. My weight on his jaws dragged | |
him outwards. And yet, holding me by his teeth as a panther her cub | |
and clinging like a squirrel to a tree, he climbed with me straight | |
up ten or twelve feet, with only help of my iron-shod feet scrambling | |
on the rock. It was utterly impossible, yet he did it! [5] | |
Footnotes: | |
[1] | |
John Muir: Nature's Visionary by Gretel Ehrlich | |
[2] | |
Saint John Muir by Harold Wood | |
[3] | |
John Muir's Menu by J. Parker Huber | |
[4] | |
The Land of Little Rain by Mary Hunter Austin, 1868-1934 | |
[5] | |
Alaska Days with John Muir by Samuel Hall Young, 1847-1927 | |
tags: outdoor,spirit | |
# Tags | |
outdoor | |
spirit |