ILEY

n Transcontinental Survey. The article is entitled "Canyons and Glaciers. A Journey to the Ice Fields of Mount Tacoma." Mr. Willis was born at Idlewild-o

orld. He is now Professor of Geology at Stanford University. He has kindly revised for this publication the product of h

untain become familiar with the Bailey Willis trail and from Moraine

th mud from the glaciers and carries a large amount of sediment out to Commencement Bay. If the Coast Survey charts are correct, soundings near the centre of the bay have changed from one hundred fathoms and "no b

eighteen miles above its mouth the river forks, and the northern portion takes the name of Carbon River; the southern was formerly called the South Fork, but it should retain the name of Puyallup to its next division far up in the mountains. A short distance above their junction both Carbon River and the Puyallup escape from narrow, crooked ca?ons, whose vertical sides, one hundred to three hundred feet high,

of the fir forest. No break in the evergreen surface indicates the place of the river ca?ons; but far out among the foot-hills a line of mist hangs over the upper valley of Carbon River, which winds away eastward, behind the rising ground, to the northern side of Mount Tacoma. Milk Creek, one

ng the autumn it was extended to the head of the Puyallup. Wilkeson is reached by a branch railroad from New Tacoma. It is on a small tributary of Carbon River, called Fletts Creek, at a point where the brook runs from a narrow gorge into a valley about a quarter of a mile wide. Coal mines are opened at this point. The horse trail climbs at once from Wilkeson to the first terrace, four hundred feet above the valley; then winds a quarter of a mile back through the forest to the second ascent of a hundred feet, and then a mile over t

oot out a thick mat of foliage and the trunk in a few feet diminishes to a point. One such was measured; it stands like a huge obelisk 180 feet, without a limb, supporting a crown of but forty feet more. The more slender trees are, curiously enough, the taller; straight, clear shafts rise 100 to 150 feet, topped with foliage whose highest needles

of the smaller growth. The great tree trunks stand immovable. The more awful is it when a gale roars through the timber; when the huge columns sway in unison and groan with voices strangely human. It is fearful to lie in the utter darkness of a stormy night, listening to the pulsating rush of the wind, the moan of the forest and the crash of uprooted giants upon the ground-listening with bated breath for the report which may foretell the fall of yonder tall decaying shaft, whose thick, deep cleft bark blazed so brightly on the now dying camp fire. The effect of one such storm

nnels among the stones. About six miles above the bridge Milk Creek dashes down from its narrow gorge into the river. The high pinnacles of the spur from which it springs are hidden by the nearer fir-clad ridges. Between their outlines shines the northern peak of Mount Tacoma, frame

volcanic fires, while twilight deepens in the valley. The next turn of the river brings Mount Tacoma again in view. Close on the right a huge buttress towers up, cliff upon cliff, 2,500 feet, a single one of the many imposing rock masses that form t

mers' accumulations of earth and rock. From a dark cavern, whose depths have none of the intense blue color so beautiful in crevasses in clear ice, Carbon River pours out, a muddy torrent. The top of the glacier is covered with earth about six inches deep, contributed to its mass by the clif

h a long shrill whistle that would make a schoolboy envious, but trots quickly away on nearer approach. The crest of the southwest rim of the amphitheater is easily gained, and the grandeur of the view bursts upon you suddenly. Eastward are the cliffs and ca?ons of the Cascade Range. Northward forest-covered hill and valley reach to Mount Baker and the snow peaks that break the horizon line. Westward are the blue waters of the Sound, the snow-clad Olympics and a faint soft line beyond; it may be the ocean or a fog bank above it. Southward,

ridge divides it, and part descends into the deep unexplored ca?on of White River, probably the deepest chasm in the flanks of Mount Tacoma. The other part comes straight on toward the southern side of Crescent Mount

other side. Snow lies upon part of this slope; stones, started from the edge, leap in lengthening bounds over its firm surface and plunge with a splash into the throat of the

ard, might occupy him for weeks. Across the snow fields, where Milk Creek rises, is the glacier of the North Fork of the Puyallup, and the end of the horse trail we left at Carbon River is within six miles of its base. When a

rd Sturgis