glories of which it was the gate and of the good time i should have now i am at home in it every one in it and along the st addresses me in a friendly way by j xvi the rocky mountains name and the newspapers with their intolerable personality have made me and my riding exploits so notorious that travellers speak courteously to me when they meet me on the doubtless wishing to see what sort of monster i am i have met nothing but civility both of manner and speech except that pistol shot it looked beautiful the snow so pure and the sky such a bright sharp blue the snow was so deep and level that after a few miles i left the track and for storm peak rode sixteen miles over the without seeing man bird or beast � a solitude awful even in the bright the cold always great became piteous i increased the of yesterday by exposing my hand in mending the and when the sun sank in indescribable beauty behind the mountains and colour in the sky i got off and walked the last four miles and stole in here in the coloured twilight without any one seeing me the life of which i wrote before is scarcely less severe though lightened by a hope of change and this weather brings out some special the stove has to be in the living room the children cannot go but and good and delightful as they are it is hard for them to be shut up all day with four it is more of a trouble than you would think for a lady in precarious health that before each meal a lady s ufe ik egg butter milk preserves and have to be unless they are kept on the stove there is no part of the room in which they do not it is uninteresting down here in the i long for the rushing winds the piled up peaks the great pines the wild night noises the poetry and the of the free jolly life of my i can hardly that the river which lies ice bound outside this house is the same which flashes through park and which i saw snow born on long s peak park december yesterday morning the had disappeared bo it was below at least i lay awake from cold all night but such is the wonderful effect of the climate that when i got up at five to the household for my early start i felt quite refreshed we on beef and i left at eight to ride forty five miles before night dr and a gentleman who was staying there me the first miles i did like that ride racing with the other through the air in that indescribable sunshine the snow from the horses feet like dust i was soon warm we stopped at a s to feed and the old amused me by seeming to think park almost inaccessible in winter the distance the mountains greater than i had been told and he said that i could not get there before eleven at night and not at all if there was much drift i wanted the gentlemen to go on with me as far as the devil s gate but they could not because their horses were tired and when the heard that he exclaimed indignantly what that woman going into the mountains alone she ll lose the track or be to death but when i told him i had ridden the trail in the storm of tuesday and had ridden over six hundred miles alone in the mountains he treated me with great respect as a fellow and gave me some matches saying you ll have to camp out anyhow you d better make a fire than be to death the idea of my spending the night in the forest alone by a fire struck me as most grotesque we did not start again till one and the two gentlemen rode the first two miles with me on that track the little there a full stream has to be crossed eighteen times and they had been wood across it breaking it and it had broken and several times making thick and thin places � indeed there were which even i thought bad where the ice let us through and it was hard for the horses to struggle upon it again and one of the gentlemen who though a most accomplished man was not a was once or twice a lady s life in in the ludicrous position of hesitating on the with an anxious face not daring to spur his horse upon the ice after they left me i had eight more and then a ride of six miles before i reached the old trail but though there were several up to the saddle and no one had broken a track showed such pluck that instead of spending the night by a camp fire or not getting in till midnight i reached mr s cabin four miles from park only an hour after dark very cold and with the pony so tired that she could hardly put one foot before another indeed i walked the last three miles i saw light through the but hearing an earnest conversation within was just about to withdraw when and on his master coming to the door i found that the solitary man was talking to his dog he was looking out for me and had some coffee ready and a large fire which were very pleasant and i was very glad to get the latest news from the park he said that told him that it would be most difficult for any one of them to take me down to the plains but that he would go which is a great relief according to the scotch proverb better a finger off than aye and as i cannot live 