My mother was a Spaniard, proud of descent from the old
Spanish families round San Francisco, yet accused for all that
of some admixture of Red Indian blood. I was well educated
and fond of music and books. But, like many other hybrids,
I was too good or too bad for the world; and after attempting
many things I was glad enough to get a sufficient though
a lonely living in this little cabaret in the mountains.
In my solitude I fell into many of the ways of a savage.
Like an Eskimo, I was shapeless in winter; like a Red Indian, I wore
in hot summers nothing but a pair of leather trousers, with a
great straw hat as big as a parasol to defend me from the sun.
I had a bowie knife at my belt and a long gun under my arm;
and I dare say I produced a pretty wild impression on the few
peaceable travellers that could climb up to my place.
But I promise you I never looked as mad as that man did.
Compared with him I was Fifth Avenue.
"I dare say that living under the very top of the Sierras has an odd
effect on the mind; one tends to think of those lonely rocks not as peaks
coming to a point, but rather as pillars holding up heaven itself.
Straight cliffs sail up and away beyond the hope of the eagles;
cliffs so tall that they seem to attract the stars and collect them as
sea-crags collect a mere glitter of phosphorous.
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