36 GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE REGIONS EXAMINED. 



now divided into farms, the produce of which finds a ready market at Yreka and the mines. 

 The greater elevation above the sea renders the climate much colder than that of the valleys 

 further north. Frost has been known to occur here in every month of the year. 



Trinity river rises near Mount Shasta, and, after making a great bend to the south, discharges 

 itself into the Klamath river, of which it is the largest tributary. My party, starting from its 

 head waters, followed down the stream for about one quarter of its length. It flowed through 

 a deep ravine, bounded by high and timbered ridges. The bottom was so narrow that there 

 was very little arable land. A short distance below the point where we left the river, it enters 

 an immense canon, which extends without much interruption to its mouth. 



SHASTA BUTTE AND THE MOUNTAIN CHAINS OF NORTHERN CALIFORNIA. 



Shasta Butte, hy far the most striking topographical feature of northern California, rises 

 abruptly to a height generally estimated at 18,000 feet above the sea. The peak is double, and 

 both summits are rounded, massive, and loaded with eternal snow. Its white cloud-like form is 

 distinctly visible from points in the Sacramento valley, more than one hundred miles distant. 



This Butte is not only the largest and grandest peak of the long range which divides the 

 sterile interior of the country from the fertile valleys of the Pacific Slope, but it is also a great 

 centre, from which diverge the numerous chains that render northern California one mass of 

 mountains. In approaching it by tbe Oregon trail, both from the north and the south, there 

 is, independent of the high ridges, a gradual increase in the elevation of the country, for about 

 50 miles. The region near the base itself thus attains an altitude of about 4,000 feet above the 

 sea ; and it is an interesting fact, that most of the northern mines are found upon this vast 

 pedestal of the giant Butte. 



Great confusion exists in the nomenclature of the mountain ranges in the vicinity. The name, 

 Cascade mountains, ceases at Klamath river, but the range in reality divides. One branch, 

 called the Siskiyou mountains, bends westward nearly to the coast ; the other, under the name 

 of the Western Chain of the Sierra Nevada, winds to the southeast, and unites with the main 

 Sierra Nevada From the Butte, three steep and thickly wooded ridges called Little Scott's 

 mountains, Scott's mountains, and Trinity mountains, extend to the westward. The two latter 

 are branches of the Coast Range of California. Shasta Butte, although generally considered a 

 peak of the Western Chain of the Sierra Nevada, is, in truth, the great centre from which 

 radiate, besides several smaller ridges, the Cascade Range, the Coast Range, and the Western 

 Chain of the Sierra Nevada. 



