as appropriately as its neighbor, for truly it was rock-ribbed.  But the stones on its slopes, unlike those of Stone Mountain, contained a small percentage of iron.  Hence its name.  The nearer slope of this hill was as dry as it was stony.  Not a spring or the tiniest trickle of water wet its rocky side for miles.  But part way down the farther slope a splendid stream gushed forth among the rocks.  It was this spring, or the stream issuing from it, that Charley and Lew hoped to reach before they made their camp for the night.

Thanks to the work of the forest rangers in clearing the fire trail, it looked as though the two boys would reach their goal before dark.  Could they have gone straight up the slope of Old Ironsides, they would have come almost directly to the spring itself.  But the grade was far too steep to permit that.  They would have to zigzag up the hill and find the stream after they topped the crest.  Because of the peculiar formation of the land below this spring, the water did not run directly down the hill toward the bottom, but flowed off to one side and made its way diagonally down the slope.

At the bottom of the fire trail Lew and Charley sat down and rested for five minutes.  Then they began their difficult climb upward.  And difficult it was.  There was no semblance of a path.  The way led over jagged masses of rock, through dense little stands of trees, and among growths that were hard to penetrate because of their very thinness; for where the stand was sparse the trees had many low limbs to catch and trip and pull at those who sought to pass through.

There were great areas of bare stones to be crossed—­stones rounded and weathered by the elements through thousands of years, and finally heaped together like flattish piles of pumpkins on a barn floor.  Acres and acres were covered by these great deposits of rounded, lichened rocks.

In crossing these rocky areas it was necessary to use the greatest caution.  Many of the stones rested so insecurely that the slightest pressure would send them rolling downward.  If one stone started, others might follow, and great numbers of rocks might go rushing down the hill as coal pours down a chute into a cellar.  Serious injury was certain to result if either of the lads got caught in such a slide; for some of the stones in these piles weighed hundreds of pounds.

Rattlesnakes constituted a second danger.  The mountains hereabout were full of them.  One never could tell at what instant a rattler might be found lying among the stones, or coiled on a flat rock that had been warmed by the sun.  So like the rocks themselves in color were these snakes that in the dull light it would have been easily possible to step on one of them without seeing it.  So the two boys advanced slowly and cautiously across these barren stretches, stepping gingerly on stones that looked insecure and ever keeping a sharp watch for anything that might suggest snakes.