GLACIERS OF MOUNT RAINIER 



50 miles distant, respectively, it appears to rise directly 

 from sea level, so insignificant seem the ridges about 

 its base. Yet these ridges themselves are of no mean 

 height. They rise 3,000 to 4,000 feet above the val- 

 leys that cut through them, and their crests average 

 6,000 feet in altitude. Thus at the southwest en- 

 trance of the park, in the Nisqually Valley, the eleva- 

 tion above sea level, as determined by accurate spirit 

 leveling, is 2,003 feet, while Mount Wow (Goat Moun- 

 tain), immediately to the north, rises to an altitude 

 of 6,045 feet. But so colossal are the proportions of 

 the great volcano that they dwarf even mountains of 

 this size and give them the appearance of mere foot- 

 hills. In the Tatoosh Range Pinnacle Peak is one 

 of the higher summits, 6,562 feet in altitude. That 

 peak rises nearly 4,000 feet above the Nisqually 

 River, which at Longmire has an elevation of 2,700 

 feet, yet it will be seen that Mount Rainier towers 

 still 7,846 feet higher than Pinnacle Peak. 



From the top of the volcano one fairly looks down 

 upon the Tatoosh Range, to the south ; upon Mount 

 Wow, to the southwest ; upon the Mother Mountains, 

 to the northwest, indeed, upon all the ridges of the 

 Cascade Range. Only Mount Adams, Mount St. 

 Helens, and Mount Hood loom like solitary peaks 

 above the even sky line, while the ridges below this 

 line seem to melt together in one vast, continuous 

 mountain platform. And such a platform, indeed, 

 one should conceive the Cascade Range once to have 

 been. Only it is now thoroughly dissected by pro- 

 found, ramifying valleys, and has been resolved into 

 a sea of wavelike crests and peaks. 



Mount Rainier stands, in round numbers, 10,000 

 feet high above its immediate base, and covers 100 

 square miles of territory, or one-third of the area of 

 Mount Rainier National Park. In shape it is not a 

 simple cone tapering to a slender, pointed summit 

 like Fuji Yama, the great volcano of Japan. It is, 



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