I Wandered Away On A Glorious Botanical

I Never Have Held Death In Contempt, Though In The Course Of My Explorations I Have Oftentimes Felt That To Meet One's Fate On A Noble Mountain, Or In The Heart Of A Glacier, Would Be Blessed As Compared With Death From Disease, Or From Some Shabby Lowland Accident. But The Best Death, Quick And Crystal-pure, Set So Glaringly Open Before Us, Is Hard Enough To Face, Even Though We Feel Gratefully Sure That We Have Already Had Happiness Enough For A Dozen Lives.

No Wonder The Hills And Groves Were God's First Temples, And The More They Are Cut Down And Hewn Into Cathedrals And Churches, The Farther Off And Dimmer Seems The Lord Himself.

Going To The Mountains Is Going Home.

Oh, These Vast, Calm, Measureless Mountain Days, Inciting At Once To Work And Rest!

In Every Country The Mountains Are Fountains, Not Only Of Rivers But Of Men. Therefore We All Are Born Mountaineers, The Offspring Of Rock And Sunshine.