420 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1921. 



lower stations where clouds and rain are not excessive. The guides 

 inform visitors that Rainier is accented on the first syllable, and 

 sometimes the visitor is inclined to reply that the mountain is rainier 

 than other places. 



In the course of his rambles the entomologist will take one of the 

 trails to the east leading up the valley of the Paradise River, past 

 the marvelous Sluiskin Falls, to Mazama Ridge. Sluiskin Falls is 

 named after the Indian guide who, in 1870, conducted the first white 

 explorers as far as this point and refused to desecrate the mountain 

 by advancing beyond the timberline on Mazama Ridge. The lower 

 part of this trip leads through grassy meadows furrowed by rills of 

 ice-cold water which course from the snow fields above. These rills 

 are the haunts of various cascade-loving insects. Several species of 

 rare craneflies and clinocerans and three undescribed genera of 

 empidine flics have been taken along the banks of these rivulets. 

 Two of the new genera were found in abundance during the middle 

 of August in 1917. At that time the writer was called away to an- 

 other part of the State and on returning a week later found the rills 

 dry and the flies gone. A visit to the same fields the past summer 

 failed to disclose a single specimen of the sought-for insects. In 

 common with the majority of mountain insects, the appearance of 

 these empids is ephemeral. One can not leisurely select his con- 

 venience to make their acquaintance, but must be guided by their 

 time for emergence. The soil on the mountain sides is shallow and 

 incapable of storing moisture. While the snow is going off the sod 

 is boggy and marsh-inhabiting insects abound. A week later might 

 witness a complete transformation. The ground has become parched, 

 lilies have progressed from flower to seed, and the former insects 

 have disappeared, their places being taken by a new set of autumnal 

 species, the tiger beetles (pi. 8, fig. 5) being among the few to remain 

 over. 



The slopes near Sluiskin are steep in the extreme, but are luxuriantly 

 overgrown with hellebore and other more brilliant flowers, and 

 crowned by a fringe of mountain ash trees. The crest is Mazama 

 Ridge and marks the highest extension of the forest trees. Here at 

 an elevation of about 6,300 feet are to be found distorted, prostrate 

 dwarfs of the trees that grow so nobly below, now but a few feet 

 in height, yet possibly centuries old. Submerged under snow all but 

 a few weeks of the year and growing out of the soil-bare rocks, it is 

 an inhospitable environment they find. No wonder that they are 

 stunted. Sharply marked are the last groups of trees, that have 

 encroached on the glaciers to the limits of possible endurance, and 

 beyond them stretch miles of ice, broken only where ridges or jum- 

 bles of volcanic rock jut through. 



