There was a fine rain falling. The undergrowth
was less riotous and had taken on the form of giant ferns, ten feet
high, which overhung the trail. Here were great cypress trees thirty-six
feet in circumference--a forest of them. We rode through green aisles
where even the death of the forest was covered by soft moss. Out of the
green and moss-covered trunks of dead giants, new growth had sprung, new
trees, hanging gardens of ferns.
There had been much talk of Mineral Park. It was our objective point for
camp that night, and I think I had gathered that it was to be a
settlement. I expected nothing less than a post-office and perhaps some
miners' cabins. When, at the end of that long, hard day, we reached
Mineral Park at twilight and in a heavy rain, I was doomed to
disappointment.
Mineral Park consists of a deserted shack in a clearing perhaps forty
feet square, on the bank of a mountain stream. All around it is
impenetrable forest. The mountains converge here so that the valley
becomes a canon. So dense was the growth that we put up our tents on the
trail itself.
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