TACOMA AND THE INDIAN LEGEND OF HAMITCHOU 



No cloud, as my stare, no longer dreamy, presently 

 discovered, no cloud, but a cloud compeller. It 

 was a giant mountain dome of snow, swelling and 

 seeming to fill the aerial spheres as its image displaced 

 the blue deeps of tranquil water. The smoky haze 

 of an Oregon August hid all the length of its lesser 

 ridges, and left this mighty summit based upon uplifting 

 dimness. Only its splendid snows were visible, high 

 in the unearthly regions of clear blue noonday sky. 

 The shore line drew a cincture of pines across the broad 

 base, where it faded unreal into the mist. The same 

 dark girth separated the peak from its reflection, over 

 which my canoe was now pressing, and sending waver- 

 ing swells to shatter the beautiful vision before it. 



Kingly and alone stood this majesty, without any 

 visible comrade or consort, though far to the north 

 and the south its brethren and sisters dominated their 

 realms, each in isolated sovereignty, rising above the 

 pine-darkened sierra of the Cascade Mountains, 

 above the stern chasm where the Columbia, Achilles 

 of rivers, sweeps, short-lived and jubilant, to the sea, 

 above the lovely vales of the Willamette and Ump- 

 qua. Of all the peaks from California to Frazer's 

 River, this one before me was royalest. Mount 

 Regnier Christians have dubbed it, in stupid nomen- 

 clature perpetuating the name of somebody or nobody. 

 More melodiously the siwashes call it Tacoma, a 

 generic term also applied to all snow peaks. What- 

 ever keen crests and crags there may be in its rock 

 anatomy of basalt, snow covers softly with its bends 

 and sweeping curves. Tacoma, under its ermine, is 

 a crushed volcanic dome, or an ancient volcano fallen 

 in, and perhaps as yet not wholly lifeless. The domes 

 of snow are stateliest. There may be more of feminine 

 beauty in the cones, and more of masculine force and 

 hardihood in the rough pyramids, but the great domes 

 are calmer and more divine, and, even if they have 

 failed to attain absolute dignified grace of finish, and 



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