So filled, indeed, is it with this precious light, at favorable times it seems to take the place of common air.

Laurel bushes shed fragrance into it from above and live-oaks, those fearless mountaineers, hold fast to angular seams and lean out over it with their fringing sprays and bright mirror leaves.
One bird, the ouzel, loves this gorge and flies through it merrily, or cheerily, rather, stopping to sing on foam-washed bosses where other birds could find no rest for their feet.

I have even seen a gray squirrel down in the heart of it beside the wild rejoicing water.
One of my favorite night walks was along the rim of this wild gorge in times of high water when the moon was full, to see the lunar bows in the spray.
For about a mile above Mirror Lake the Tenaya Canyon is level, and richly planted with fir, Douglas spruce and libocedrus, forming a remarkably fine grove, at the head of which is the Tenaya Fall.

Though seldom seen or described, this is, I think, the most picturesque of all the small falls.

A considerable distance above it, Tenaya Creek comes hurrying down, white and foamy, over a flat pavement inclined at an angle of about eighteen degrees.