WESTERN INCIDENTS. 17

Brown and myself, he led off with “ Sherman’s March to
the Sea.” Mr. Brown followed with the “ Star Spangled
Banner,” and I closed the exercises with Moore’s seren-
ade “Come o’er the Sea,” etc., after the style of Major
Scholefield, of the “ North Woods Walton Club.” The
entire range, from Long’s to Pike’s Peak, seemed to catch
the inspiration, and join in the chorus.

After concluding that no improvised glee club had ever
performed before a more select and appreciative audi-
ence; and after refreshing ourselves, and cooling our
over-taxed throats with some coarsely granulated snow;
at least a century old, which lay at our feet, we com-
menced the descent at four in the afternoon.

By permission of Mr. Williams, I take pleasure in an-
nexing the following letter written by him from the sum-
mit of Berthoud Pass :-—

Bertooup Pass, Rocky Movnrarns,
September 18, 1866. t
Evlitor Fort Wayne Gazette :—

Having reached the summit of this grand mountain range, in com-
pany with Col. Seymour, the Consulting Engineer of the Union Pacific
Railroad, and Mr. Brown, Assistant Engineer, my first impulse is to
write to my friends at home.

One of the experimental surveys for the Union Pacific Railroad fol-
lows Clear Creek to this Pass. That valley was therefore our route
from Denver, fifty miles east, bringing us through a rich gold mining
district. Hight miles back we took saddle-horses, rising by a mule
trail sixteen hundred feet in the last one and a half miles. The point
on which I write is some six hundred feet above the Pass, about six
thousand seven hundred feet above Denver, and about twelve thou-
sand feet above the sea. It appears to be some two or three hundred
feet above the line of arborescence, or “ tree line,” above which no
timber or vegetation grows. Patches of last winter’s snow are lying
around us on northern slopes, and some of them two hundred feet
below. The proposed railroad tunnel pierces the mountain far be-