maps designate this pass as Frémont Pass, others as San Emidio
Canyon), the snow deepened to about a foot as we neared the
summit. Beyond, a defile between the mountains descended
rapidly about two thousand feet; and, filling up all the lower
space, was a sheet of green water, some twenty miles broad
(Pyramid Lake). It broke upon our eyes like the ocean. The
neighboring peaks rose high above us. One peak, on the eastern
side of the lake, rises nearly forty-four hundred feet above
the lake, and on the side (toward which Frémont was looking)
one peak rises 4925 feet above the lake; and we ascended one
of them to obtain a better view.

The waves were curling in the breeze, and their dark-green color
showed it to be a body of deep water. For a long time we sat
enjoying the view, for we had become fatigued with mountains,
and the free expanse of moving waves was very grateful. It was
set like a gem in the mountains, which, from our position,
seemed to inclose it almost entirely. At the western end it
communicated with the line of basins we had left a few days
since; and on the opposite side it swept a ridge of snowy
mountains, the foot of the great Sierra. Its position at first
inclined us to believe it Mary's Lake, but the rugged mountains
were so entirely discordant with descriptions of its low rushy
shores and open country, that we concluded it some unknown body
of water, which it afterwards proved to be.

On January 13th we followed again a broad Indian trail along
the shore of the lake to the southward. For a short space we
had room enough in the bottom; but, after traveling a
short distance, the water swept the foot of the precipitous