THE VARIATION OF GLACIERS. IV 223 



On the north side of Mt. Stuart, about one thousand feet 

 below its summit, which rises 9470 feet above the sea, there are 

 three small glaciers, situated in steep gorges or clefts in the 

 granite, and sheltered by outstanding cliffs ; combined, they 

 would probably make an ice body less in mass than the one 

 described above. These glaciers are narrow, and extend down 

 the gorges where they occur for some two thousand feet. Below 

 each there is a small and fresh-looking moraine. 



The glaciers just described derive their main interest from 

 the fact that they are isolated, being some twenty-five or thirty 

 miles to the east of the main divide of the Cascade Mountains. 



Glaciers on the Cascade Mountains. — The glaciers of the Cas- 

 cade Mountains south of the United States-Canadian boundary 

 probably number several hundred, and of these about 100 or 150 

 have been seen by the writer ; but only a few, in the immediate 

 vicinity of Glacier Peak, have actually been traversed. All of 

 them are small ; of those seen, probably the largest is not over 

 two miles in length, and by far the greater number are consid- 

 erably below this measure. Nearly all lie in amphitheaters or 

 cirques. Their principal interest centers in their distribution, 

 their relation to climatic conditions, and the fact that all of those 

 seen are accompanied by evidences of recent recession. 



There is one small glacier, however, that is worthy of spe- 

 cial study in reference to the manner in which an ice-stream 

 expands when not confined by walls of rock, and in expanding, 

 forms longitudinal, or perhaps more properly, radial crevasses in 

 its fan-shaped terminus. The glacier referred to is at the head 

 of White Chuck Creek at the immediate south base of Glacier 

 Peak, but on the south side of the deep canyon in which flows 

 the branch of the creek nearest to the base of the peak. This 

 glacier flows northward, and is in full view from Glacier Peak. 

 The periphery of its broadly expanded extremity is not over 

 1000 or 1500 feet by estimate, and is broken by some four or 

 five radial crevasses which are widest on the outer margin of the 

 fan-shaped expansion and contract to narrow clefts which become 

 still smaller, and disappear when traced toward the feeding neve. 



