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# 2020-08-23 - Of Men and Mountains by William O. Douglas | |
Photo of William O. Douglas wearing a horseshoe pack | |
I found this book in a thrift store and was attracked to the cover, | |
which used a USFS topographic map for the background. I thoroughly | |
enjoyed reading the book. The author clearly expresses a love for | |
nature and the outdoors. At times he expresses philosophical | |
thoughts that i also find appealing. Another reviewer writes | |
"Written in the 50s, this book reflects the language of the day, and | |
omits women from the tales of adventure that help turn boys into | |
men." The author's attitudes and language are dated in other ways as | |
well. | |
I truly enjoyed his attention to detail. It was fascinating to read | |
methods used to organize gear, roll horseshoe packs, chop wood, camp | |
in snow, cook over a campfire, etc. Reading the chapter about | |
camping in a snow hole, i wondered how they climbed back out of the | |
hole? Did they tie some kind of rope to climb back out? | |
What follows below are notable excerpts from the book. | |
# Introduction | |
I learned early that the richness of life is found in adventure. | |
Adventure calls on all the faculties of mind and spirit. It develops | |
self-reliance and independence. Life then teems with excitement. | |
But man is not ready for adventure unless he is rid of fear. For | |
fear confines him and limits his scope. He stays tethered by strings | |
of doubt and indecision and has only a small and narrow world to | |
explore. | |
Discovery is adventure. ... When one moves through the forests, his | |
sense of discovery is quickened. ... He is free of the restraints of | |
society and free of its safeguards too. | |
# Chapter 1, The Cascades | |
Perhaps man was losing his freedom in a subtle manner. He was | |
becoming more and more dependent on other men. ... He looked to | |
[other] people rather than to himself and to the earth for his | |
salvation. He fixed his expectations on frowns or smiles or words of | |
men, not on the strength of his own soul, or the sunrise, or the | |
warming south wind, or the song of the warbler. | |
Once man leaned that heavily on people he was not wholly free to | |
live. ... He walked in an unreal world, for he did not know the | |
earth from which he came and to which he would return. He became a | |
captive of civilization rather than an adventurer... He lost the feel | |
of his own strength, the power of his own soul to master any | |
adversity. | |
After a long absence from my old home town of Yakima, Washington, I | |
have fairly raced by car down from Ellensburg or up from Pasco to see | |
Mount Adams before night dropped the curtain around it. At such a | |
time my heart has leaped at the first sight of it. ... At those | |
moments my spine has always tingled. There is a feeling of respect | |
and admiration and pride. One has the sensation of being part of | |
something bigger than himself, something great and majestic and | |
wholesome. | |
I felt jungle companionship in this old man of the stockyards. He | |
was only a vagabond. But he was not a bum. I later realized that he | |
had been a greater credit to his country than many of the more elite. | |
He made me see, in the dreary stockyards of America, some of the | |
country's greatness--kindness, sympathy, selflessness, understanding. | |
Finally, he [Dr. George Draper] turned to me and said, "You should | |
write a book some day about the influence of mountains on men. If | |
man could only get to know the mountains better, and let them become | |
a part of him, he would lose much of his aggression. The struggle of | |
man against man produces jealousy, deceit, frustration, bitterness, | |
hate. The struggle of man against mountains is different. Man then | |
bows before Something that is bigger than he. When he does that, he | |
finds serenity and humility and dignity too." | |
# Chapter 2, Yakima | |
Saturday nights the Indians would come into the stores for shopping. | |
They had some amusing habits. They never would place their whole | |
order at once. They would bargain for a single article at a time, | |
and when the bargain for that article was completed they would pay | |
the price and leave. They would be back in a jiffy, having left the | |
purchased article outside. Then the negotiation for the next article | |
on their list would start. And so the process continued until all | |
purchases were made. | |
It was at Father's funeral that Mount Adams made its deepest early | |
impression on me. Indeed, that day it became a symbol of great | |
importance. The service was held in Yakima. Inside the church it | |
was dark and cool; and the minister's voice rolled around like an | |
echo in a cavern. It was for me meaningless and melancholy. I | |
longed to escape. I remember the relief I felt in walking out onto a | |
dusty street in bright sunlight. There were horses and carriages; | |
and then a long, slow trek to the cemetery. Dust, the smell of the | |
horses, and more dust, filled my nostrils. | |
It was a young cemetery. The trees were saplings. There was but | |
little green grass. Dust seemed to be everywhere. I heard hard, dry | |
lumps of dirt strike the casket. The cemetery became at once a place | |
of desolation that I shunned for years. As I stood by the edge of | |
the grave a wave of lonesomeness swept over me. Then in my | |
lonesomeness I became afraid--afraid of being left alone, afraid | |
because the grave held my defender and protector. These feelings | |
were deepened by the realization that Mother was afraid and lonesome | |
too. My throat choked up, and I started to cry. I remember the | |
words of the minister who had said to me, "You must now be a man, | |
sonny." I tried to steel myself and control my emotions. | |
Then I happened to see Mount Adams, towering over us on the west. It | |
was dark purple and white in the August day. Its shoulders of basalt | |
were heavy with glacial snow. It was a giant whose head touched the | |
sky. | |
As I looked, I stopped sobbing. My eyes dried. Adams stool cool and | |
calm, unperturbed by an event that had stirred us so deeply that | |
Mother was crushed for years. Adams suddenly seemed to be a friend. | |
Adams subtly became a force for me to tie to, a symbol of stability | |
and strength. | |
# Chapter 3, Infantile Paralysis | |
I imagined I saw in the appraising eyes of everyone who looked at me | |
the thought, "Yes, he's a weakling." The idea festered. As I look | |
back on those early years, I think I became a rebel with a cause. My | |
cause was the disproof of the charge of inferiority that had been | |
leveled by the jury of my contemporaries. There was no one in whom I | |
could confide; no one whom I could express my inner turmoil and | |
tension. So my revolt grew and grew in my heart. | |
During my school studies I had read of the Spartans of ancient | |
Greece. They were rugged and hardy people, the kind that I aspired | |
to be. So I searched out the literature that described their habits | |
and capacities to see if I could get some clue to their toughness. | |
My research brought to light various staggering bits of information. | |
I found in Plato's Republic a passage that shattered my morale. | |
Plato talked of the dangers to the race through propagation of the | |
"inferior" type of person. By "inferior" he meant those who were | |
physical weaklings. There was no doubt about it, because he | |
described what should be done with children of that character. | |
"The proper officers will take the offspring of the good parents to | |
the pen or fold, and there they will deposit them with certain nurses | |
who dwell in a separate quarter, but the offspring of the inferior, | |
or of the better when they chance to be deformed, will be put away in | |
some mysterious, unknown place, as they should be." | |
These were the ideas that I struggled against. It was oppressive to | |
think that I would have been destroyed by the Spartans to make room | |
for some hardier boy. By boyhood standards I was a failure. If I | |
were to have happiness or success, I must get strong. And so I | |
searched for ways and means to do it. | |
One day I met another boy, whom I had known at Sunday school, coming | |
in on a fast walk from the country. He was a husky, long-legged | |
chap, to me a perfect physical specimen. I asked him where he'd | |
been, and he replied that he had been climbing the foothills north of | |
town. I asked him why he did it. He told me that his doctors had | |
advised it; that he was trying to correct certain difficulties | |
following an illness. He was climbing the foothills every day to | |
develop his lungs and legs. | |
An overwhelming light swept me. My resolution was instantaneous. I | |
would do the same. I would make my legs strong on the foothills. | |
# Chapter 4, Sagebrush and Lava Rock | |
It has been thought that the deification of Coyote was due to the | |
fact that Tyhee, the Spirit Chief of the Indians of the Pacific | |
Northwest, was a revengeful not a beneficent deity. He had no | |
kindness or compassion in his heart. The Indians observed that in | |
the woods the weaker animals survived only by cunning. That was | |
therefore the only route by which they could escape the vengeance of | |
their god. So they deified the weakest and craftiest of all major | |
animals, the coyote, to help them in their struggle for survival. | |
That night I felt at peace. I felt that I was a part of the | |
universe, a companion to the friendly chinook that brought the | |
promise of life and adventure. That night, I think, there first came | |
to me the germ of a philosophy of life: that man's best measure of | |
the universe is in his hopes and his dreams, not his fears; that man | |
is a part of a plan, only a fraction of which he, perhaps, can ever | |
comprehend. | |
# Chapter 5, Ahtanum | |
And on every hand along the road was the ever present yarrow. Some | |
Indians placed this plant inside salmon to promote the curing process | |
while the fish were being dried. | |
Then I became aware of the fragrance of the trees. The ponderosa | |
pine towered over all the others. But I began to see the scatterings | |
of other conifers: black pine and whitebark pine, white and red fir, | |
and the tamarack or larch. I stopped, looked up, and breathed deep. | |
Then I realized I was experiencing a great healing. | |
I had been hurrying, tense, and strained. I was alone and on my own | |
in unexplored land. I was conscious of being exposed to all the | |
dangers of the woods, a prey for any predator hunting man. But now, | |
strangely, that apprehension fell from me like ashes touched by a | |
wind. I suddenly felt that these pine and fir that greeted the | |
Fathers of the Ahtanum Mission in 1847 were here to welcome me, too. | |
These trees were friends--silent, dignified, and beneficent friends. | |
They were kindly like the chinook. They promised as much help and | |
solace to me as had the sagebrush and lava rock. | |
I felt a warm glow of peace spread over me. I was at ease in this | |
unknown wilderness. I, who had never set foot on this particular | |
trail, who had never crossed the high ridge where I was headed, felt | |
at home. One who is among friends, I thought, has no need to be | |
afraid. | |
Then there was a roar--subdued and muffled at first, and then as loud | |
as a great cataract. A wind had sprung up from the northwest. It | |
swept the mountainside and set up a steady vibration in the treetops. | |
I saw great pine and fir bowing before their master, swaying in the | |
high wind. And as they swayed, their groans and creaks swelled into | |
violence. A tremendous symphony had broken the quiet of the forest. | |
I leaned against the trunk of a yellow pine that reached 150 or 200 | |
feet into the sky. It towered over all the trees in the canyon. As | |
I watched its top weaving back and forth in the gale that swept off | |
Darling Mountain, it seemed to be a graceful partner of the wind. | |
Had not the pine in fact been mistress of Boreas the wind from | |
ancient days? The symphony that was being played was indeed the | |
first music of the universe. It had been carried on the wings of | |
this wind long before the Indians arrived from Asia, long before man | |
walked the earth. The music of the wind in the trees brought | |
messages floating down millions of years of time. It sang of the | |
eternity of the universe, of the transient nature of man. | |
# Chapter 7, Indian Flat | |
The basic secret on such climbs is the breathing. The professional | |
mountaineer is an expert. The lungs are the carburetor. As the air | |
thins out, and the oxygen decreases and the carbon dioxide | |
accumulates, inhalations and exhalations must increase unless the | |
motor is to drop to an idling speed. Above 10,000 feet some breath | |
five times or more for every step they take. The increase in | |
respiration varies with the individual. Once the required rate is | |
discovered, coordination between breathing and walking is possible. | |
This takes time, patience, and practice. But it turns out mileage | |
under pressure. | |
At this time I had not yet mastered the technique. I climbed the | |
hard way. I suspect I practically lunged at the hillside; at least I | |
went in spurts, taking a dozen steps or so and then stopping to pant. | |
We took great pride in these packs. We did not know about rucksacks | |
or pack baskets, so we never used them. Once I tried the pack board | |
with the forehead strap, and ones the Nelson pack. But I found the | |
horseshoe roll more to my liking. Each would take one-half of a | |
canvas pup tent which would serve as the outside cover of the roll. | |
Inside would be the blankets (two in each pack) and the food. And we | |
designed a method for carrying food that suited our needs. We took | |
the inside white cotton bag of a sugar sack, washed it, and then had | |
Mother, by stitching it lengthwise, make three bags out of one. We'd | |
fill these long, narrow, white bags with our food supplies. The | |
sacks, when filled, would roll neatly up with the blankets. Each end | |
of the roll would be tied with rope, later to be used for pitching | |
the pup tent. Then the roll could be slipped over the head onto the | |
shoulder. [1] | |
We could not pack fresh meat, not only because of its weight but | |
because it wouldn't keep. Canned goods, ham, and bacon were too | |
heavy to carry. We would, however, take along some bacon-rind for | |
grease. We'd substitute a vial of saccharin for sugar and thus save | |
several pounds. Into one white sack we would put powdered milk, into | |
another, beans. We'd fill one with flour already mixed with salt and | |
baking powder, and ready for hot cakes or bread. In another we would | |
put oatmeal, cream of wheat, or corn meal. One sack would be filled | |
with dried fruit--prunes or apples. Another would contain packages | |
of coffee, salt, and pepper. Usually we would take along some | |
powdered eggs. | |
On the outside of our packs would be tied a frying pan, coffee pot, | |
and kettle. One of us usually would strap on a revolver; the other | |
would carry a hatchet. Each would have a fishing rod and matches. | |
Thus equipped, each pack would weight between 30 and 60 pounds, | |
depending on the length of the trip planned. | |
We also took along a haversack which we alternated in carrying. In | |
it were our plates, knives, forks, spoons, lunch, and other items we | |
wished to keep readily available. It hung by a shoulder strap on the | |
hip opposite from the horseshoe pack. The one who carried it was | |
indeed well loaded. | |
It is easy to see the delicate handiwork of the Creator in any | |
meadow. But perhaps it takes these startling views to remind us of | |
His omnipotence. Perhaps it takes such a view to make us realize | |
that vain, cocky, aggressive, selfish man never conquers the | |
mountains in spite of all his boasting and bustling and exertion. He | |
conquers only himself. | |
# Chapter 8, Deep Water | |
The case of Warm Lake, below the Goat Rocks ridge, was different. It | |
was in the open, like a swimming pool in a lawn. Its water was so | |
clear that I could see the rocky, sandy bottom far out from shore. | |
No dark depths were there to warn me. And at no place did it appear | |
more than twenty feet deep. There was nothing ominous about it, and, | |
as I have said, its surface water was warm, although it lay close to | |
a snow field. As boys we planned a night there whenever possible, | |
for there is nothing more attractive than a bath after a week's | |
exertion on the trails. And there is the same novelty about swimming | |
in comfort next to a snowbank as there is skating outdoors on | |
artificial ice at Sun Valley on a warm day in July. | |
[I have swum in a lake next to a snow bank with David.] | |
We would bathe and swim in this lake for a whole afternoon in July or | |
August. Our pattern was to take a dip, then lie naked in the heather | |
sunning ourselves, and then return to the water for more splashing | |
and shouting. | |
# Chapter 9, Fear Walks The Woods | |
The fears of forest fires and avalanches, the only mountain fears | |
that have any substantial basis of fact, are not the ones men usually | |
take with them into the wilderness. The things they fear in the | |
woods are in large part of the same kind of things they fear in the | |
city. The things they fear hold no intrinsic threat. They are as | |
harmless as a frown, a knife, a skyscraper, a great cliff, or | |
lightning. They are symbols of things that are terrifying. | |
Some of these mountain scenes of electrical storms can be either | |
beautiful or terrifying, depending on one's conditioning. A few | |
years ago I brought back a pack train out of the Minam in the | |
Wallowas up the Glacier Trail to Long Lake. A storm was rising from | |
the south as we started the steep climb out of the Minam. We were | |
perhaps 1500 feet above the river when the storm broke on the | |
opposite ridge, some five air miles away. For a while sheet | |
lightning played among the clouds. Then forked tongues struck at the | |
ridge. In rapid succession--almost as fast as one could | |
count--lightning hit three trees. And as each tree was hit it burst | |
into flames like a match. It was one of those rare and exquisitely | |
beautiful scenes that one could ride the trails 50 years or more and | |
never see. For some people, however, there would be in it no beauty | |
but only terror. | |
# Chapter 10, The Campfire | |
Our boyish shouts and shrieks echoed off the cliffs of the Cascades. | |
We pushed each other from logs into pools of water. We poured cold | |
water down unsuspecting necks. At dusk we stretched a rope or a vine | |
ankle high across the path to the creek, so that our pal would fall | |
flat on his face as he went to get water for cooking. When that | |
happened, bedlam broke loose in the woods. | |
This horseplay took even more robust forms. Once three or four of us | |
were camped on the edge of Goose Prairie a few miles below Bumping | |
Lake. It had been a miserable trip. We had rain for over a day and | |
the camp was soaked through. We dubbed the place Camp | |
Rain-in-the-Face, for we had no tent and our blankets had absorbed | |
all the drippings from the trees. Our bedrolls were soaked through. | |
In the morning when we crawled out of our doused blankets, we looked | |
as if we had been dragged in a lake behind a boat. | |
The consequence was a gloom over the camp which I decided to dispel. | |
While I cooked breakfast, I planned my strategy. I served my | |
companions, and while they were seated on the ground eating, I | |
brought them coffee in big tin cups. When cleaning the rainbow trout | |
cooked for this meal, I had reserved the heads, and when I poured the | |
coffee I had put one head in each cup. | |
I watched the faces as the boys ate their trout and pancake bread and | |
sipped their coffee. One boy finished his plate, put it on the | |
ground, took his tin cup of coffee in both hands, and slowly drank | |
it. Soon he took a deep draught. I saw his face turn white. The | |
expression was one of shock, nausea, and disgust. Peering out of the | |
coffee at the bottom of the cup were the cold, glassy eyes of a | |
trout. He let loose with terrible imprecations. At once the calm of | |
Goose Prairie was broken by a riot. The gloom that had settled over | |
the camp was gone. | |
Maybe some day I could take Gifford Pinchot's place. He helped | |
create the Forest Service. I often saw its men in the mountains, | |
riding the trails--strong, long-legged rangers, clear-eyed, robust | |
men. If I went to forestry school and learned all the knowledge of | |
the woods, I too could be a ranger and from there work up to | |
Pinchot's place. I could carry on his fight for conservation. He | |
loved the mountains; so did I. | |
The story was that Borah had saved a Negro from being lynched. The | |
man was in jail in a town not far from Boise. Borah got an engineer | |
to take a locomotive out of the roundhouse at Boise late one night | |
and run him over to this town. Borah barely got there in time. He | |
ran to the jail where the mob was tearing down the door. Standing on | |
a box, he talked. At first the rioters were sullen and threatening. | |
Then, meek and shamefaced, they melted away into the night. | |
There was a man, this Borah! A great lawyer, too! If I could only | |
talk like him! | |
These were the things we discussed around dozens of campfires on the | |
high ridges above Yakima. It seemed, in fact, that I had to escape | |
the town to see my personal problems more clearly. | |
There was time for reflection in the solitude of the mountains. The | |
roaring bonfire of the camp would draw out our innermost secrets and | |
longings. Sometimes we would talk until only a glow of coals | |
remained of a roaring fire. A crescent moon would appear above a | |
distant peak. The long dark fingers of the pine and fir reached | |
higher and higher in the sky as the fire died down, and the stars | |
drew closer to the high shoulders of the Cascades. A brisk breeze | |
would come down off some glacier of Adams or Ranier. A chill would | |
sweep over the camp. Then we would know that we had put off sleep | |
too long. | |
# Chapter 11, Indian Philosopher | |
The flies were bad, and the squaw had built a smudge of green willow. | |
[Ah, this is one way that smudging could represent purification: by | |
repelling disease-bearing insects.] | |
After another pause, he said, "It takes many different trees and | |
shrubs and grass to make a forest. It takes many kinds of animals to | |
fill the woods. The bear, goat, cougar, coyote, deer, and elk are | |
all different. Wouldn't it be bad if all the animals were alike? It | |
takes many races to make the world. Wouldn't it be bad if all people | |
were the same? My skin is brown; yours is white. You can do things | |
I can't do. I can do things you can't do. Some of my people think | |
we're better than the whites. They say that the white man gets | |
strong when he has Indian blood in him. Some of your people think | |
they are better than us Indians. Maybe so. But no white man can | |
spear salmon better." | |
This Indian was justly proud of his race; he had discovered an | |
important secret of success. He knew that as a Douglas fir cannot | |
possibly become a cedar or a sugar pine, similarly he could not be | |
recast into another image. He could be only himself. Once a man | |
accepts that fact, his yearnings become geared to his capacities. He | |
knows his strength as well as his limitations. He may be unknown and | |
unsung; but being wise, he has found the road to contentment. Like a | |
mountain laurel, or snowberry, or sage, he pretends to be no more | |
than he is. By being just what he is, and no more, he contributes a | |
unique and distinct flavor to his community. He is not likely to | |
have a neurosis that produces physical ailment or social | |
maladjustment. Thus did I have a lesson in philosophy. | |
# Chapter 12, Sheepherders | |
"One summer nicht John Duncan McRae, a freen o' mine, and I went into | |
Spokane, dirty and thirsty, from a weary job a'loading sheep. We | |
went into a pub and had a drink. As we come oot we met up with a | |
Salvation Army street corner meetin'. As we paused there a moment, a | |
Salvation Army lassie with a tamboreene walked up to Jock for a | |
donation. 'What dae ye want, lassie?' Jock asked. 'Some money for | |
the Lord,' she replied. With a twinkle in his eyes, Jock countered, | |
'How old are ye, lassie?' 'Eighteen,' was her answer. Jock said, | |
'Well, I am eighty-seven and will be seein' the Lord lang afore ye | |
and I'll just gie him the penney mysel'.'" | |
There was a pause and then Jack said, "It all goes to show that the | |
Scotchman isn't stingy; he's just cautious." | |
Visitors were welcome in the sheep camps because the herders were | |
lonely men. From June to October they would see few outsiders. They | |
longed for news of the outside world; they usually longed for | |
companionship. We would sit and talk to them far into the night. | |
Our talk ran not so much to the mountains and their mysteries as to | |
the affairs of men in Yakima, Chicago, Washington D.C., London, and | |
Berlin. | |
I think we told the sheepherders more about the mountains than we | |
learned from them. And we also conducted seminars in current events | |
around their camp fires. | |
As I was rolling up my horseshoe pack, I had an idea. I would be | |
gone a week or more. I planned to enter the Cascades through the | |
Naches and the Tieton and go back into the lake country beyond | |
Cowlitz Pass. I would most likely run into a sheepherder in that | |
region, for sheep by this time would be getting close to the highest | |
ridges. The papers carried big news--news of war in Europe. So i | |
decided to take recent issues of the Takoma Daily Republic with me. | |
I put several in my blankets and also a recent issue of the weekly | |
magazine, The Outlook. | |
The sheepherder who greeted me was a middle-aged man with a full | |
brown beard. His eyes were blue and kindly. He looked a little as I | |
imagined Walt Whitman must have looked. | |
"I haven't seen a paper for four months," he said. "So you will have | |
to bring me up to date." | |
By that time he had his pots on the fire. I handed him the Yakima | |
newspapers and the copy of The Outlook. He thanked me, and after a | |
pause said, "Will you do me a favor? Read me the paper while it is | |
still light." | |
My heart was filled. There was hard work in the valley. There was | |
freedom in the mountains. There seemed to be endless opportunities | |
ahead. I saw my future shaping up in vague outline. I had some | |
family responsibilities, but I had no worries or doubts or fears. I | |
felt a place awaited me in America. I felt I belonged here and that | |
I was part of something exciting and important. | |
The war in Europe? It was as remote as the typhoon that swept bare | |
an island in the South Pacific whose name I could not even pronounce. | |
War in Europe? That should not concern any one here. Hasn't Europe | |
always had wars? | |
That is why, I think, the evening in the meadow below Cowlitz Pass | |
remains so vivid in my mind. For as I sat in silence thinking of the | |
war as something wholly removed and apart from our world, the | |
sheepherder spoke, "Well, you boys may have to finish this." | |
I was startled. I plied him with questions. Why should a war in | |
Europe affect us? How could fifteen-year-old boys finish a war? Why | |
would America want to fight in Europe? | |
We talked into the night by the campfire on the edge of the lonely | |
meadow in the high Cascades. My host did not have much formal | |
education, but he was informed and highly intelligent. He could make | |
complicated things seem simple; he had the capacity of putting | |
seemingly irrelevant things into a pattern. Or perhaps it was an | |
ability on his part to make one see things this way. He was indeed | |
exciting. He gave me my first seminar on war. He told me why it was | |
that this war would soon be "our war." | |
# Chapter 16, Goat Rocks | |
I said those things to Elon and went on to say that nature was a | |
great leveler. Men fighting a blizzard on the plains or an angry | |
storm at sea at once became equal. The same was true when they walk | |
the trails or climb mountains. The fact that a person lived on one | |
side of the railroad tracks rather than on the other made no | |
difference. Poverty, wealth, accidents of birth, social standing, | |
race were immaterial. When a man is on his own, mother's accent, | |
father's prestige, grandma's wealth don't count. Neither does the | |
turn of a phrase or a perfect voice. Tricks and boasting are of no | |
account in surviving the adversities of nature. | |
# Chapter 18, Roy Schaeffer | |
Roy was preparing breakfast, and as he cooked, Mac, a wise, old mule, | |
age 35, came up and muzzled him. | |
This morning Roy turned to Mac and said, "Want a hot cake? Well, go | |
away and come back pretty soon and I'll give you one." | |
This happened over and again. Finally he fed Mac a few. | |
"Now don't bother us any more," said Roy. "Go on." And with that he | |
gave Mac a push. Mac stood for a minute and then went over to the | |
trail that ran close by camp and started downstream. | |
When Roy saw Mac go downstream, he was puzzled. The horses were | |
upstream. Lapover was upstream, up the North Minam and across a high | |
range ruled by the jagged finger of Flagstaff Point. Downstream was | |
the winter range and the town of Minam on the paved highway coming up | |
from La Grande. Roy sometimes went out that way, but only in an | |
emergency; for when he got out, he would be 30 miles by road from | |
Lapover. That was the long way around. | |
"Let's see where Mac goes," said Roy. | |
So we followed him down the trail a mile or so. Roy finally stopped | |
and said, "We're breaking camp and following Mac. We're moving down | |
the Big Minam and will go out by the town of Minam. Looks to me like | |
a big snow is coming. Mac usually knows it before I do." | |
We broke camp and moved downstream. Before morning a heavy snow | |
fell, almost 18 inches, which meant there were at least 4 feet on the | |
ridges. And 4 feet are far too much for any pack train. | |
The next night beside the campfire Roy chuckled as he said, "Mac knew | |
more than all the rest of us put together, didn't he?" | |
Roy would leave Lapover on snowshoes every week or so for a five-day | |
inspection of his marten traps. | |
Roy's pack weighed 40 pounds or more. He always took an axe for wood | |
and a shovel to dig a hole in the snow for lodging. He carried a | |
frying pan, kettle, coffee pot, and a cup, plate, and spoon. He took | |
20 pounds of rabbit meat for bait, and a half-dozen extra traps. For | |
food he had coffee, sugar, bacon, whole wheat cereal, potatoes, and | |
bread. Roy never took blankets or a bedroll on these winter trips, | |
because the weight of the pack did not permit it. At night he slept | |
like a bear in a hole in the snow. He cut off the top of a snag and | |
with that wood built a fire next to the snag. | |
Those who have built fires in deep snow know, as Gifford Pinchot | |
observed (Breaking New Ground), that it promptly melts itself down | |
out of sight, leaving only a hole with a little steam coming out. | |
That's why Roy always carried a shovel on these snowshoe trips. He | |
dug a pit in the snow as he followed the fire down. Since the fire | |
was next to the snag, Roy ways able to take his wood supply down with | |
him to the bottom of the pit. In the morning he might be 15 feet or | |
more beneath the surface. His bed was fir boughs. If it rained or | |
snowed, he would dig an alcove in the side of the pit and crawl into | |
it. There he could ride out a blizzard for several days. | |
One day, when Roy was reminiscing about these trap-line trips, he | |
said to me, "People think snow is cold, but it isn't. It's a blanket | |
that has a lot of warmth in it. ..." | |
Roy's first principles of winter travel are: | |
* Always take along a shovel and an ax; | |
* get under the snow when weather is bad; and | |
* go slowly at the beginning of the day, saving energy for the last | |
few hours of the evening, for a blizzard or rainstorm may come up | |
and change the character of the travel. Then a man's life may | |
depend on his reserve of energy. | |
[Roy paid a visit in Washington D.C.] He slept in a bed with white, | |
clean sheets and commented, "Never slept inside but what I caught a | |
cold. Wish I had brought my sleeping bag. Then I'd sleep on the | |
back porch. It's much healthier outdoors." | |
# Chapter 19, Food | |
Bread was important to us on our early pack trips. As I related in a | |
previous chapter, we carried ready-mix flour in long, thin cotton | |
sacks and rolled them in our horseshoe packs. The recipe was Brad's: | |
* 2 cups flour | |
* 4 teaspoons baking powder | |
* 1/4 teaspoon salt | |
Sometimes we stirred powdered milk into it, and added fat if we had | |
some. | |
The dough was mixed fairly thick, as it would be for biscuits. The | |
cooking was done in the frying pan. When the pan was hot and | |
greased, the dough was poured to fill it. That meant it was about an | |
inch thick. We first held it over the fire for a few minutes in | |
order to cook the bottom. Then we propped it up in front of the fire | |
to finish by radiation. | |
It was the main part of our diet. We dunked it in coffee. We | |
carried it in our haversack for a noon meal. We picked the low-bush | |
huckleberry, made a sauce, and poured it over the bread. | |
As boys we made either a mush or a form of bread in the same way with | |
corn meal. In frying it, we invariable did what no good cook would | |
do--we let a scorched crust form, which was to us perhaps the | |
outstanding delicacy on the early pack trips. | |
There is no bread in the mountains like sourdough. ... The Lookout | |
Cookbook, Region One, of the Forest Service says of sourdough: | |
"Sourdough bread is much more healthful as a steady diet than baking | |
powder bread or biscuits." And it recommends sourdough for hot | |
cakes... [2] | |
There is a lot of Labrador-tea in the Wallowas and Cascades. I have | |
found it from 4000 to 7000 feet. It is usually found in damp or | |
boggy places such as are common in the North Miniam Meadows, though I | |
have seen it in spots less conspicuously wet. It is a leafy | |
evergreen shrub from one to four feet tall. Its oblong, leathery, | |
resinous dotted leaves are alternate, with small white flowers in | |
clusters at the ends of branches. There are five spreading petals. | |
At the elevation of a mile in the Wallowas it usually blooms in early | |
July. | |
This tea has long been known along the eastern seaboard. The Indians | |
used it. Settlers took it up, and it received fame in the Revolution | |
when the British product was banned because of the tax. It makes a | |
mild, pleasant tea that suffices in a pinch on a pack trip. It is | |
also a good seasoner for soups or mulligans. A handful of the | |
leaves, put in a pot for the last five or ten minutes of the cooking, | |
contributes a delicate aromatic flavor. | |
On a fishing trip in North Carolina I learned that potatoes can be | |
boiled so as to have a roasted or baked effect. To every quart of | |
water add a half-cup of salt. When the potatoes are cooked and | |
allowed to drain for a few minutes, they will have the mealy taste of | |
baked potatoes. | |
# Chapter 20, Snow Hole | |
They soon came racing down from Crystal Pass, the light snow whirling | |
in clouds from their skis, to report that a blinding blizzard was | |
raging above. We decided to make camp and get under the snow. | |
We found a snag 12 inches in diameter on the edge of a clump of | |
alpine fir. The snow was at least 15 feet deep. The snag looked | |
like the chimney of an old shack. When we chopped off its top, we | |
had a log about 25 or 30 feet long. The outside wood was wet from | |
snow and rain, but when we split out the core the wood was dry. The | |
snag had collected none of the moisture from the ground in its long | |
decay. We started a fire with small shavings from the core, using | |
what are known as fire flames--a petroleum by-product made by an oil | |
company. They look like small flat cakes of paraffin or beeswax. | |
They burn for about ten minutes, and are quite an asset in wet or | |
wintry weather. | |
We soon had a good fire burning not far from the trunk of the snag. | |
As it burned the snow melted, and we followed the fire down by | |
shoveling away the snow. As we shoveled, we kept our wood supply | |
with us, since we followed the snag down. Our snow hole was some six | |
feet square. The fire melted about a foot of snow an hour. By the | |
time we went to bed and let the fire go out, we were eight feet down | |
in the snow. | |
Cooking under such circumstances has special problems. The fire is | |
constantly sinking into the snow, causing pots and pans to tip and | |
food to spill. | |
At last we had soup, made from dried vegetables and meat. We cooked | |
dried beef and made a gravy of flour and dried milk. We made mashed | |
potatoes of dried potatoes. We had bread and butter and cups of hot | |
chocolate. It was a wonderful meal for the snow hole. We ate it in | |
a snowstorm, driven by a bitter cold wind. We huddled close to the | |
fire, and took turns shoveling out the pit. | |
Craig and Bob slept in a two-man tent they pitched in a near-by | |
grove. Elon and I dug an alcove into one wall of the snow hole. | |
Here we placed fir boughs. We put a nylon tarp over the boughs and | |
our sleeping bags on the tarp. Pulling the tarp over us. we lay in | |
our alcove as bears would in a hole. About 10 o'clock we let the | |
fire die. Though it stormed all night, we were warm and comfortable. | |
One has to lie deep in snow to learn how warm and protective it is. | |
A den in the snow confines the body heat like a blanket or overcoat. | |
It is a snug place, no matter how the wind may howl. One who holes | |
up in the snow understands better the mysteries of the woods in the | |
winter. He knows why in severe weather grouse squirm their way under | |
soft snow and lie quiet. He understands why deer bury themselves in | |
drifts, lying a half-day or more with just their heads sticking out. | |
He learns something of the comfort of the bear in hibernation. | |
I felt closer perhaps than ever before to my friends. We were buried | |
deep in the snow together, sharing the threat of the blizzard. Lying | |
there in the alcove I felt a new relationship to the wilderness--an | |
affinity even closer than when one lies on the shore of a mountain | |
lake in August or in the heather of a high basin, or on a bed among | |
Indian paintbrush and cinquefoil in a mountain meadow. It was a | |
closer tie than is given by the night music of the treetops under the | |
shoulder of a snow-capped range. | |
It came to me why this is true. When man holes up in the snow, he | |
returns to the earth in a subtle way. He does not return in the | |
manner of a man or a tree or a bird who dies, for them the body is | |
reclaimed by mold and transformed into the dust from which it came. | |
In a deep hollow of the snow, man returns to the womb of the earth to | |
live. Lying in the warm darkness he captures a fleeting sense of the | |
security of that part of his life that existed before his own | |
consciousness. He escapes the reality of the world and lowers the | |
tempo of his own life. He lies relaxed and peaceful, safe in a warm | |
embrace. Death and danger may stalk abroad, but in his retreat there | |
is no risk. | |
# Chapter 21, Klickitat | |
Man's greatest experience--the one that brings supreme exultation--is | |
spiritual, not physical. It is the catching of some vision of the | |
universe and translating it into a poem or work of art, into a Sermon | |
on the Mount, into a Gettysburg Address, into a mathematical formula | |
the unlocks the doors of atomic energy. | |
In adult life the same kind of experiences can be seen in Thoreau's | |
Walden and in Peattie's The Road of the Naturalist and Almanac for | |
Moderns. They can indeed be seen in every laboratory where the | |
scales of ignorance are being removed and new tissues of knowledge | |
revealed. The satisfaction is the same. | |
Sound heart and lungs are not enough for mastery of the peaks. It | |
takes the power of the spirit too, a resolve and determination that | |
knows no limit even when the feet are too heavy to lift. It is | |
spirit against matter, the power of the soul to drive the legs above | |
fatigue and to push an exhausted body without whimper. It is more | |
than what we call guts. It is the positive force that requires a man | |
to go forward even when every muscle rebels. It is man against the | |
mountain--finite man against the universe. | |
In these moments man discovers himself: what the limits of his | |
endurance are, how far the spirit will enable him to go. Then he | |
discovers the power of his soul to carry him on. | |
When he wins, there comes an exquisite moment, a feeling that | |
anything is possible. There comes a sense of austerity, a feeling of | |
peace. All the tensions are gone. Man stands powerful and | |
unconquered atop the world. He has destroyed nothing to get there, | |
except the doubts and fears that sought to prevent him from | |
discovering his true worth. | |
If there is failure, no bitterness follows. His respect for the | |
mountain increases. He has not failed; he has only discovered the | |
limits of his own strength and the power of the universe. He stands | |
proud and erect, not broken or sad. He has found a force greater | |
than himself. | |
# Chapter 22, Kloochman | |
These are powerful challenges. The fact that many of them are subtle | |
and invisible makes them no less potent. A prejudice can be as | |
ominous and threatening as a man with a bayonet. The issues that | |
challenge this generation call for bold and daring action. They | |
demand men who live dangerously--men who place adventure ahead of | |
security, men who would trade the comfort of today for the chance of | |
scaling a new peak of progress tomorrow. That activity requires men | |
who neither fear men nor ideas. For it is only when fear is cast out | |
that the full creative energies are unleashed. Then one is | |
unhampered by hesitation and indecision. One's energies are not | |
diverted into the making of some futile or hideous sacrifice at the | |
altar of a sick ego. | |
Man's age-long effort has been to be free. Throughout time he has | |
struggled against some form of tyranny that would enslave his mind or | |
his body. So far in this century three epidemics of it have been let | |
loose in the world. | |
We can keep our freedom through the increasing crises of history only | |
if we are self-reliant enough to be free. We cannot become | |
self-reliant if our dominant desire is to be safe and secure; under | |
that influence we could never face and overcome the adversities of | |
this competitive age. We will be self-reliant only if we have a real | |
appetite for independence. | |
Dollars, guns, and all the wondrous products of science and the | |
machine will not be enough: "This night thy soul shall be required of | |
thee." | |
[1] | |
Shelter-half @Wikipedia | |
How to make a horseshoe pack | |
[2] | |
USFS Lookout Cookbook, Region 1 | |
author: Douglas, William O. | |
detail: gopher://gopherpedia.com/0/William_O._Douglas | |
LOC: F851.7 .D68 | |
source: gopher://tilde.pink/1/~bencollver/ia/details/ofmenandmountain000038mbp | |
tags: ebook,biography,history,non-fiction,outdoor,vagabond | |
title: Of Men and Mountains | |
# Tags | |
ebook | |
biography | |
history | |
non-fiction | |
outdoor | |
vagabond |