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Show 414. communion with her. The riches of Yosemite, magnified by the r e f l e c t i n g lens of the Merced, were the best evidence that the real beauty of the Park was part and parcel with the flow of waters through it. The temple was open a t both ends, and was only a special part of a larger whole. If the reader focused with Muir on the flow of Yosemite, then he began to see that contrasts were the soul of Yosemite, "things f r a i l and f l e e t i n g and types of endurance meeting." Muir t r i e d to show a l l scenes in this manner, blending f o r e s t s , flowers, and rocks into a harmonious landscape. Meanwhile, Century did i t s part by interdispersing the essay with i l l u s t r a t i o n s using f o r e s ts and r e f l e c t i n g pools as foreground. By i r o n i c c o n t r a s t , Johnson carefully included pictures of plowed meadows, trimmed t r e e s , and a stump forest. So too, Muir undercut the edenic vision which might be in yosemite with sad comments on the actual s t a t e of affairs under California's administration. But no t e r r e s t r i a l beauty may endure forever. The glory of wildness has already departed from the great central plain. Its bloom i s shed, and so in part is the bloom of the mountains. In Yosemite, even under the protection of the Government, a l l that i s perishable is vanishing apace. The question of endurance was c e n t r a l to his argument, because it pinpointed the real "treasures" of Yosemite. From a distance, the whole Sierra looked l i k e a c e l e s t i a l c i t y , surrounded by |
