102 



( 0h, Ranger!" 



But about the only thing that can save the situation is another volcano 

 and the only national park in which we have a steadily working volcano, 

 Mauna Loa, is in the Hawaiian Islands. We have a live volcano in 

 Lassen Volcanic National Park, but it doesn't work very steadily. 



"While we are on the subject of mountains, I want to call your at 

 tention to Crater Lake. Where the lake now stands, there was once a 

 great mountain which a volcano was piling higher and higher. It 

 finally was piled up so high that it collapsed into itself. The sides 

 of the mountain were not strong enough to sustain the weight of the 

 peak. You never think of a mountain as being hollow, do you? Well, 

 this one was. Mount Mazama, it is called. Nobody ever saw it, of 

 course, because this all happened a million years ago, more or less. It 

 must have been a whopping big mountain, for when that whole peak 

 caved in it left a hole many thousand feet deep. The great depth ac 

 counts for the remarkable deep blue color of Crater Lake. A curious 

 feature of Crater Lake is that, though there is no outlet for the water, 

 it is fresh. That is probably because no streams flow into it, the lake 

 being located on a mountain top. Its waters come from rainfall and 

 melting snows that fall into the lake. There is just about enough of this 

 water to counteract the sun's evaporation. 



"But we started to talk about mountains, didn't we ? It is difficult to 

 stick to the subject. The mountains seem to be connected in some way 

 with everything. Either they supply the water, or the wood, or the coal, 

 or the mineral, or the scenery, or the plants, or the animals. When you 

 stop to think about it, you can understand why we rangers feel there is 

 nothing like the mountains anywhere in the world. And for nice, 

 friendly, busy, obliging mountains, the kind you want to live with day 

 in and day out, there are none like the mountains of the national parks. 

 Every superintendent and every ranger feels that the mountains of his 

 particular park are the best in the world. He would stack his mountains 

 up against any other mountains any day of the year. 

 They might not be so high or so broad or so hard as 

 certain others, but they are superior in some way, and 

 that is what counts." 



Build a mountain and then tear it down ! 

 That seems to be Nature's whimsical way 

 of working. The Rocky Mountains were 

 once the bottom of a shallow sea. The 

 rangers can take the visitor out in the Yel 

 lowstone and show him fossil sea fish and 

 shells. On top of the sea shells he will find 

 a sandstone deposit, the remains of deposits 

 of an ancient lake. On top of that he may 



