The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1888-05-14
falling into the canyon, and an approach to
| the iea wall ia dapoarot,c

falling into the canyon, and an approach to
the Ice wall is dangerous.
As the glacier is fully exposed to the sun
for nine hours each summer day, streams OF
water are formed over parts OF its surface
which discharge over the ice precipice and
along the sides and unite in stream Of CON
siderable size in the canyon below. A lit
tie farther down, the whole volume OF
water falls over a precipice 400 feet IN
height. The stream diminishes very much
during the last half of the night, but In
creases again when the sun renews its in
tiuence upon the ice field. In winter 1t
quite disappears.
Just over the peak of Shasta, West Of the
glacier here generally described and illus
trated, and forming a secondary peak OF
itself, is an exposed crater of this extinct
volcano. Between this and the main peak
is glacier examined by Clarence King in
1870, and estimated by him to be four and
half miles long and from two to three miles
wide. The re der who becomes interested
in this subject will find in a little book by
Prof. Tyndall minute and most instruc-
tive description of glacial phenomena, as
studied by him in the Alps, and applicable
in most respects to our own ice rivers. The
descriptions are simple and better than
novel
1t is easily inferred that tho phenomena
herein presented with necessary brevity are
due to two great agents, heat and cold. But
sterile lava peaks and beds and great ice
fields and rivers, still slowly moving down
ward few feet per year, are not all the in
teresting features these agencies have
helped to form. Secondarily, upon the soil
from the ice ground and decomposed rocks
the forests grow, extending from the great
pines on the lower TANKS of the mountains
TO trees not larger than the palm Of the
hand of the upper timber line; and the
writer has pressed flowers of the most deli
cate and beautiful simple colors, which he
plucked from the alpine soil of these noun
tains while standing on the edge of glacier
as hard as snow-ice. Then, too, the melted
snow flows into lava-rimmed reservoirs,
which form together innumerable lakes,
some without any apparent outlet.
Nearly i'll sight of Shasta and the cones
which are here described, though upon an
other mountain, is a lake about eight miles
long and five wide, with walls of cliff about
it entire and from | 900 to 1000 feet nigh,
fringed around the top with pines and
evergreens. Near the centre is one little
conical island dotted over with trees. There
is an outlet to this lonely and mysterious
lake, to some extent audible, though invisi-
BILE; for much below it, where the party
camped one night among powders, q sub
terranean rumbling could be heard con
tinuously, with now and then a deeper
sound as of rock falling into muffied chasms
The side of the mountain, where this lake
lies hidden with hundred others, faces
the west. Across on the east sides are SINH
lar ones, to some Of which, close to the foot
hills and near the level of the plain, two of
the party found an outlet such as might
well inspire the terror of the Indians, and
was not without influence upon the visitors,
Capt. G. M.!Wheeer and the writer
This outlet consists of a series of huge
springs, covering considerable portions of
several acres, sending out rapidly boiling,
tumbling, noisy streams of clear, icy water,
and shaking the earth in places in their
efforts at liberation; SO that one feels, how
ever foolishly, that the ground and even the
forest about and among them is insecure
Some of these springs are more than forty
feet in diameter, and together they pour
out river POO feet wide and four feet or
more deep, which becomes tributary of
a larger mountain. born river, the Des chutes,
and contains trout in abundance, weighing
from four to fifteen pounds, and clearly
visible through the transparent water.