June, 1920] 



The Great Mageik Landslide 



345 



the slide itself has this same consistency so that we had to 

 pick our way over it with some care. 



But the greater part is composed of no such material. In 

 places it is made up exclusively of angular bowlders. (See page 

 347.) It is this portion of the slide whose "liquidity" is so 

 difficult to understand. Indeed, that a mass composed of solids 

 of such heterogenous sizes and angular shapes could, by any 

 means, have been made to behave like a liquid seems 

 incomprehensible. 



Photograph by Robert F. Griggs 



PART OF THE TERMINUS. THE TWO BRANCHES SHOWN INDICATE 

 THE TENDENCY OF THE SLIDE TO "SPLAY" OUT AT THE TIP. 



The standing bushes beyond the reach of the slide contrast with the broken sticks 

 protruding from the debris here and there. 



If we might be permitted to suppose that these rocks rode 

 down on top of the mud which continued to flow on down the 

 valley after the rocks stranded, explanation would be easier. 

 But such a supposition seems to involve difficulties as great as 

 that which it would explain. (1) It is difficult to see how so 

 much of the mud could have thus flowed on, leaving so little in 

 the interstices between the stones which it carried. (2) Being 

 derived supposedly from the soil on top of the cliff, it is difficult 

 to see how it could get beneath the flowing mass. That much of 

 it did not do so, but remained on top, is shown by the per- 

 sistence of fragments of vegetation which survived the 



