GLACIERS OF MOUNT RAINIER 



reaching a maximum width of a mile and a total length 

 of 4 miles. No doubt this is accounted for by the 

 heavy snowfalls that replenish it throughout its course. 



Its lower end consists of a tortuous ice lobe that 

 describes a beautiful curve, flanked on the north by 

 a vertical lava cliff. A lesser lobe splits off to the 

 south on a wedge of rock. 



Immediately south of the elevated amphitheater of 

 the Puyallup Glacier the crater rim of the volcano is 

 breached for a distance of half a mile. Through this 

 gap tumbles a voluminous cascade from the neve fields 

 about the summit, and this cascade, reenforced by a 

 flow from the Puyallup cirque, forms the great Tahoma 

 Glacier, the most impressive ice stream on the south- 

 west side. Separated from its northern neighbor by 

 a rock cleaver of remarkable length and straightness, 

 it flows in a direct course for a distance of 5 miles. Its 

 surface, more than a mile broad in places, is diversified 

 by countless ice falls and cataracts. 



A mere row of isolated pinnacles indicates its eastern 

 border, and across the gaps in this row its neves coalesce 

 with those of the South Tahoma Glacier. Farther 

 down the two ice streams abruptly part company 

 and flow in wide detours around a cliff-girt, castellated 

 rock mass Glacier Island it has been named. The 

 Tahoma Glacier, about a mile above its terminus, 

 spits upon a low, verdant wedge and sends a lobe south- 

 ward which skirts the walls of this island rock, and at 

 its base meets again the South Tahoma Glacier. From 

 here on the two ice streams merge and form a single 

 densely debris-laden mass, so chaotic in appearance 

 that one would scarcely take it for a glacier. Num- 

 erous rivulets course over its dark surface only to dis- 

 appear in mysterious holes and clefts. Profound, cir- 

 cular kettles filled with muddy water often develop on 

 it during the summer months, and after a brief exist- 

 ence empty themselves again by subglacial passages 

 or by a newly formed crevasse. So abundant is the 



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