PERHAPS the most sublime sweep of view within the entire Range is gained from the summit of Mount Lincoln. To accomplish this ascent it is necessary to leave the tortuous "switch-back" trail in full view of Gunsight Pass and strike out over a trackless mass of shattered rock, upward toward the peak. The way is steep and difficult, the footing slippery and insecure. The muscles strain to quivering tension, the breath comes in gusty sighs and still the mighty heap of dull rose and green rock rears its jagged crest against the throbbing sky. But even if the climb were tenfold longer and the goal tenfold harder to win, it would be a faint-hearted seeker after the beautiful who would hesitate to make the sacrifice of toil for the magnificent reward that awaits him.

The rugged pedestal of stone that crowns the peak, drops almost precipitately three thousand six hundred feet, and directly below, in a gorge formed by this and a second chain of lofty mountains, lie two jade-green lakes, the Little Saint Mary's, joined by a slender, far-leaping waterfall. So immense is the distance, that this fall, spanning the seventeen hundred feet between the upper and lower lakes, does not break the brooding quiet with the whisper of an echo. The slim, white column parts upon the rocks into a diamond shape, and when, happily, the sunshine catches in its spray, it becomes a tangle of rainbows. But now, it unfolds its silver scarf silently, colourlessly as a ghost, and the green lake, so far below, receives the pouring tide with never a ripple to mar its smooth surface. The shadow gathers in the gorge and along the mountains, the pines are darkly green and in sharp contrast, the unmelted snow fields lie pale and gray-white to the very rim of the lakes forming a setting as of old silver. After the first shock of that sublimity has left the senses free of its thrall, a vast panorama unfolds, dominated by the majesty of mountain-lords flanked and crowded by range upon range of others, rising in lessening undulations to the horizon's rim, as though a sea whose giant billows strove to smite the sky in the throes of an awful storm, were suddenly transformed to stone.

In the crushing might of these great spaces, peering over the brink of the mountain top into the bosom of the smooth, still lakes as coldly beautiful as an emerald's heart, that half-mad idea of self-annihilation clutches at the mind. Perhaps it is the exhilarating leap of the waterfall that tempts one, or perhaps the hypnotic charm of the deep-set, jewel-bright pools, or perhaps some unguessed secret of gravity which impels the tottering atom into the depths of life-absorbing space. It is the same terrible, savage joy, the magnetism of elemental force which we feel as we stand on the brink of the Grand CaÑon of the Yellowstone, with the glorious, brave call to death crying from the water voices, while the whisper of life sounds sweetly from the vocal winds of heaven.

And even as we gaze, the sun's light dies and the world is ashen pale. Suddenly over the distant ranges, storm clouds come trooping in black hosts. A heavy silence falls, broken now and again by the boom of thunder and the frightened cry of shelter-seeking birds. Perched upon a point of rock, silhouetted against the sky, a bighorn sheep watches the gathering tempest, unmindful of the muttering thunder and the ominous glow of lightning kindling in the sable-winged array. There is something noble about him as he turns his crest upward to bear the onslaught of the blast. The purple of the mountains overhanging the lake deepens to black—the blue-black of a clear, night sky—and the snow filling the ravines lies passionless and white as death. Beneath the driving storm-banners, a luridly vivid light casts its reflection upon the earth in a gilded path, revealing the smallest detail of valley and height before the darkness wraps them in its mantle. The Kootenais for one brief instant shine like towers of brass and a pallid mist overhanging an arm of the remote Flathead Lake becomes a golden fleece, then the garish glare passes and mystery and shadow settle down. Violet tongues of lightning dart from the trailing clouds, the martial fifing of the wind makes shrill music through the bleak cairns and empty wastes, and great, splashes of rain fall fragrantly, refreshingly upon the warm ground. But in all the tumult, the cold, jade-green lakes lie unshaken, calm. So truly are they the mountains' brides, held securely in their embrace of stone, that not even the wild riding of the gale nor the shivering thunderbolt disturbs their untroubled depths, while their champions, the peaks, in helmets of pale ice do battle with the elements.

The deafening cannonade becomes fainter, the sword-thrust of lightning strikes at other quarry, and the storm, with torn banners dragging low down the mountain sides, like routed hosts in retreat, follow the wake of the thunder, the lightning and the tempest-ridden wind. And as the sun shines forth from the heavens a transformation beams like a blessing from every crag and rock. Still wet with the summer rain, they take on strangely beautiful hues of sparkling rose colour, and green like that of the mother ocean, and the naked, glacier-ground escarpments reveal the exquisite illuminations wrought in flowing, multi-colored bands, in subtle shade and wordless rune, of the record book wherein is writ the history of Æons.

Through the dazzle of the sun the sea of mountains re-appears, a flowing tide of purple billows growing more ethereally blue in the distance until they seem but the azure shadow of heaven. And far beneath in the deep, dark gorge, cool with perpetual shade, flanked by mighty mountain walls, are the polished jade-green lakes and the fall, spinning its endless silver skein into the untroubled waters below.