Ill 



SUMMER DAYS AT MOUNT SHASTA 



MOUNT SHASTA rises in solitary grandeur 

 from the edge of a comparatively low and 

 lightly sculptured lava plain near the northern 

 extremity of the Sierra, and maintains a far 

 more impressive and commanding individual 

 ity than any other mountain within the limits 

 of California. Go where you may, within a 

 radius of from fifty to a hundred miles or more, 

 there stands before you the colossal cone of 

 Shasta, clad in ice and snow, the one grand, 

 unmistakable landmark the pole-star of the 

 landscape. Far to the southward Mount 

 Whitney lifts its granite summit four or five 

 hundred feet higher than Shasta, but it is 

 nearly snowless during the late summer, and 

 is so feebly individualized that the traveler 

 may search for it in vain among the many 

 rival peaks crowded along the axis of the range 

 to north and south of it, which all alike are 

 crumbling residual masses brought into relief 

 in the degradation of the general mass of the 

 range. The highest point on Mount Shasta, 

 as determined by the State Geological Survey, 

 is 14,440 feet above mean tide. That of Whit- 



29 



