Hail! hoary guardian of yon Mountain's peace;
  Your couch a weathered slab of crumbling crag
O'erlooking glacial chasm, far beneath,
  Ice carved through cubic miles of Vulcan's slag.

High on your sunlit alpine throne you lie,
  Your grizzled coat by glacier's breath disturbed.
The rush and roar of distant avalanche,
  Or scream of eagle leaves you unperturbed.

About your castle clamber mountain goats;
&nbps; The scurrying cony piles his drying hay;
A jeweled hummer flashes by, and clouds
  Trail chilly shadows on their silent way.

Behind your cliff the glistening ice-fields rise
  To meet the mottled blue of fleece-flecked sky,
And echo out across the canyon void
  The clear, wild shrillness of your piercing cry.

Natt N. Dodge,
Ranger-Naturalist.