June, 1920] 



The Great Mageik Landslide 



331 



overturning tQ which glacial bowlders are usually subject. 

 These fragments of vegetation were evidently carried "right 

 side up with care" all the way down the mountain to their 

 present resting place. 



INDICATIONS OF THE DATE OF ITS OCCURRENCE. 



Along with indications of suddenness of formation is other 

 evidence which fixes rather closely the date at which this curious 

 mass of debris reached its present position. By all the criteria 

 of physiography it is very young — indeed, infantile. Two 

 streams traverse its surface for some miles, but have scarcely 



Photograph by Robert F. Griggs 



ORIGINAL VEGETATION PERSISTING ON A ROCK IN THE SLIDE. 



By some freak this grass, with the soil in which it grew, was transported, "right 



side up with care," for two miles down to the valley from its original 



position at the top of the cliff. 



begun to erode their beds. They spread out in most irregular 

 fashion over the uneven surface of the debris, without having 

 even so much as scooped out a channel for themselves. (See 

 page 332). The bowlders in their beds are still angular, like 

 the rest of the material, in sharp contrast to the rounded cobbles: 

 of typical streams. The surface is so fresh that, despite the 

 large content of soil in places, new vegetation has only just 

 begun to take hold. Considerable numbers of fragments of 

 the overwhelmed bushes lie embedded in the debris in such 

 fashion as to leave no doubt that they are contemporaneous 

 with it. Such pieces of wood must, of course, rot away in the 



