MOUNTAIN EXPLORATION, RECENT. 



539 



Geographic d'Anvers"; and the "Verein fur 

 Erdkunde zu Leipsig." 



Having been invited to take part in the for- 

 mation of a union of the principal Alpine clubs 

 of Europe and America, the Appalachian Club 

 has replied " that, inasmuch as, if the union 

 were established, the meetings would probably 

 be continued year by year, it would not be con- 

 venient for this club to send delegates regularly 

 on account of distance ; but we should be glad 

 to open relations with the union by correspond- 

 ence, and to be represented occasionally by dele- 

 gates, as opportunity might offer." 



Prof. Langley's Observations on Mount Whitney. 

 Prof. S. P. Langley, of Allegheny Observatory, 

 spent two months in the summer of 1881 on 

 the slope of Mount Whitney, in California, 

 about 3,000 feet below its summit, in making 

 observations on solar heat. At this height, 

 on screening the sun with a near object, he 

 perceived that the sky did not maintain the 

 same violet blue up to the sun, but that a fine 

 coma was to be seen about it of about forty 

 diameters. This was found by telescopic ob- 

 servation to be composed of motes in the sun- 

 beam, between the diffracting edge and the 

 observer's eye. This result was considered 

 interesting, as showing that the dust -shell, 

 which is supposed to encircle our planet, ex- 

 ists at an altitude of at least 13,000 feet, and 

 under favorable conditions for the purity of 

 the atmosphere. Mr. Clarence King believes 

 that the dust above the Sierra Nevadas has 

 been borne across the Pacific, and owes its 

 origin to the loess of China. The Peak of 

 Mount Whitney would be wholly inaccessible 

 on account of the precipitous character of its 

 sides, were it not that earthquakes have rent 

 the cliffs into fissures, through which bowlders 

 and rocks from above have poured in past 

 times to form couloirs. Through one of these 

 couloirs, called " the Devil's Ladder," Prof. 

 Langley ascended for half or three quarters 

 of an hour to the mountain-slope, which he 

 found still extremely steep, with the surface 

 presenting an appearance as though stones had 

 been hailed down upon it and covered it to an 

 unknown depth. After nearly three hours, he 

 reached the snow-field, which was about a 

 quarter of a mile in length. The view from 

 the summit " was of a horizon of tumbled 

 mountains on the north, west, and south, not 

 continuously white as in the Alps, for, though at 

 a more than Alpine height, I saw only scat- 

 tered snow-fields here and there. The air was 

 cold, but not very chilly, and the sky of a 

 deeper violet overhead than in the camp be- 

 low. On the east side, the mountains de- 

 scended in a series of precipices between 3,000 

 and 4,000 feet, to a little lake surrounded by 

 a snow-field." Between the observer and the 

 neighboring mountain-ranges was a "reddish 

 sea of desert dust, 4,000 or 5,000 feet above 

 the valley-floor, and almost covering the lower 

 summits of the mountains." He must have 

 been observing through this dust-ocean when 



at Lone Pine ; yet even then the sky was con- 

 sidered of unaccustomed purity, and, Prof. 

 Langley adds, "probably we observe under 

 still worse conditions habitually when at 

 home." Though the nearest wood was 3,000 

 feet below the summit of the mountain, or at 

 the level of the observing-camp, Prof. Lang- 

 ley, in descending, noticed here and there 

 parts of great tree-trunks, some eight or ten 

 feet long, evidently very old, lying on the 

 naked bowlders, without the slightest trace of 

 vegetation anywhere, or any sign to show how 

 they came there. He afterward found these 

 isolated trunks elsewhere, and it seems clear 

 to him that they are relics of a remote day 

 when the forest grew 2,000 feet higher than 

 it does at present, and are evidence of changed 

 climatic conditions. 



Attempts to explore Mount Roraima. R or aim a 

 and its companion, Kukenam, are two mount- 

 ains near the boundary -line between British 

 Guiana and Venezuela, a few miles north of 

 latitude 5 N., and near the sixty-first meridi- 

 an west from Greenwich, of unique forms, and 

 are regarded as among the most remarkable 

 mountains in the world. They are described 

 as being great tables of pink and white and 

 red sandstone, interbedded with red shale, 

 rising from a height of 5,100 feet above the 

 sea-level, sheer 2,000 feet higher. Both are 

 crowned with forests; from the summit of 

 Roraima tumbles the highest waterfall in the 

 world, 2,000 feet at one leap, and 3,000 feet 

 more on a slope of 45 down to the bottom of 

 the valley. The streams that issue from the 

 summits of the mountains run to the Amazon, 

 Orinoco, and Essequibo rivers. The plateau 

 on the summit of either mountain has never 

 been trodden by man ; as all attempts to climb 

 them have been prevented by the perpendicu- 

 lar elevation of the cliff that forms the last 

 thousand feet of their height. The Indians 

 have woven curious fancies of strange creatures 

 that they imagine inhabit their elevated plains ; 

 and travelers believe that, isolated as their tops 

 are, and have been, for an undetermined period 

 in their history from all the rest of the earth, 

 they may contain peculiar fauna and flora, per- 

 haps identical with those of one of the past 

 geological ages. Roraima was discovered and 

 its base was first visited by Sir Robert Schorn- 

 berg. Its base was again visited in 1869 by 

 Mr. Barrington Brown, who has described his 

 journey in his "Canoe and Camp-Life in Brit- 

 ish Guiana " ; and a few years later by Mr. J. 

 W. Boddam Whetham, author of " Roraima and 

 British Guiana." Mr. Brown believed that the 

 summit of Roraima was inaccessible except by 

 balloon. Another attempt to explore Roraima 

 and Kukenam has been made by Mr. James 

 Whiteley, who, being engaged in the study of 

 the birds of Guiana, made two excursions to 

 the region in 1881-'82 and 1883. His route 

 lay from the Bartica Grove mission on the Es- 

 seqnibo river up the Mazaruni and Carimang 

 rivers and the Atapuran tributary of the latter, 



