"That's so," exclaimed George, "I should never have thought of it again. It's the queerest place I ever saw in my life, except this very great valley which we are in now. Papa says it is over three hundred miles from the Rocky Mountains to the Sierra Nevadas, yet although we haven't been out of sight of the first for more than a week, we shall see the tops of the others in a few days, and then, hurrah! we've only to cross them and we shall be in California! Won't that be glorious?"