The ground was deeply carpeted

The ground was deeply carpeted with dry pine needles, and the fire touched them off as if they were gunpowder. It was wonderful to see with what fierce speed the tall sheet of flame travelled ! My coffee pot was gone, and everything with it. In a minute and a half the fire seized upon a dense growth of dry manzanita chaparral six or eight feet high, and then the roaring and popping and crackling was something terrific. We were driven to the boat by the intense heat, and there we remained, spell- bound.
Within half an hour all before us was a tossing, binding tempest of flame! It went surging up adjacent ridges - surmounted them and disappeared in the canons beyond – burst into view upon higher and farther ridges, presently – shed a grander illumination abroad and dove again – flamed out again, directly higher and still higher up the mountain side –threw out skirmishing parties of fire here and there, and sent them trailing their crimson spirals away among remote ramparts and ribs and gorges, till as far as the eye could reach the lofty mountain fronts were webbed as it were with a tangle network of red lava streams. Away across the water the crags and domes were lit with a ruddy glare and the firmament above was a reflected hell!
Every feature of the spectacle was repeated in the glowing mirror of the lake! Both pictures were sublime, both were beautiful; but that in the lake had a bewildering richness about it that enchanted the eye and held it with the strongest fascination.
From the book “Roughing it” written by “Mark Twain.”

The station men wore pantaloons of coarse, country woven stuff

The station men wore pantaloons of coarse, country woven stuff and into the seat and the inside of the legs were sewed ample additions of buckskin, to do the duty in place of leggings, when the man rode horseback so the pants were half dull blue and half yellow, and unspeakably picturesque. The pants were stuffed into the tops of high boots, the heels whereof were armed with great Spanish spurs, whose little iron clogs and chains jingled every step . The man wore a huge beard and mustachios, and old slouch hat, a blue woolen shirt, no suspenders, no vest, no coat – in a leathern sheath in his belt, a great long “navy” revolver (slung on the right side, hammer to the front), and projecting from his boot a horn handled bowie knife. The furniture of the hut was neither gorgeous nor much in the way. The rocking chairs and sofas were not present, and never had been, but they were represented by two three legged stools, a pine board bench four feet long, and two empty candle boxes . the table was a greasy board on stilts and the tablecloth and napkins had not come – and they were not looking for them either. A battered tin platter, a knife and fork, and a tin pint cup, were at each man’s place, and the driver had a queens ware saucer that had seen better days. Of course this duke sat at the head of the table. There was one isolated piece of table furniture that bore about it a touching air of grandeur in misfortune. This was the caster. It was German silver, and crippled and rusty, but it was so preposterously out of place there that it was suggestive if a tattered exiled king among barbarians, and the majesty of its native position compelled respect even in its degradation. There was one cruet left, and that was a stopperless, fly speckled , broken necked thing, with two inches of vinegar in it, and a dozen preserved flies with their heels up and looking sorry they had invested there.
From the book “Roughing it” written by “Mark Twain.”