Thence he
reached Punta de Vacas, procured mules and a guide, and prepared for
the ascent over the mountains.
At two o'clock the next morning he began to climb out of hell. The
tortured plains settled below him. A divine freshness breathed upon him
with a new hope of life. He left the burning conflict of summer and
passed into the aroma of spring.
Then the air grew intense, a new suffocation pressed about his
temples--the suffocation of too much life. In an hour he had run the
gamut of the seasons. The cold of everlasting winter descended and stung
his senses. Up and up and up they went--then suddenly down, with the
half-breed guide and the tireless mule always at the same distance
before him; and again began the insistent mechanical toiling upward. He
grew listless and indifferent, acquiescent in these steep efforts that
the next moment must throw away. The horror of immense distance rose
about him. From time to time a stone dislodged by their passage rushed
from under him, struck the brink, and spun into the void, to fall
endlessly.
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