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Show THE HUNT. 275 ing that ten by thirty miles in extent, it seemed like a tall range of mountains, from which the tops had been cut off, leaving a beautiful rolling mesa 5,000 feet above the surrounding country, and from the edge of which the grandest and most beautiful view is obtained. "Far below, on the steep side of the mountains up which we had threaded our way, we could see the effects of the autumn frost and sun on the foliage. The colors were in great patches. There were the dark green of the spruce, then .the red and green of the oak, further on a long belt of cedar, and patches of the brightest crimson- a mountain shrub-and mingled with the whole, large clumps of yellow quaking-asps. " Far below us was Tongue creek, fringed with a beautiful patchwork of variously colored Colorado trees. Farther away, thirty miles from where we stood, through the centre of a dark, dust-colored valley about twenty miles in width, flowed the Gunnison river, and to us, with its fringe of yellow trees/it looked like a winding thread of gold, with an occasional flush of silver, when the sunlight was reflected from some part of it. " Far beyond the river rose the Elk mountains, whose dark shadows and perpetual snows, told us they were part of one of the highest ranges in the country. We pushed on through a succession of parks, each surrounded with trees, and generally a mountain stream or lake added to the beauty of the scene. " We camped in a dark clump of spruce, near us a little stream, and in front a large lake of the coldest and clearest water, fairly alive with trout. At the peep of day we were up and prepared for a tramp before breakfast; there was a splash far off in the lake, the sharp ring of a rifle, |