SUMMER DAYS AT MOUNT SHASTA 



remarkable as being the scene of the most 

 recent volcanic eruption in the range. It is 

 a symmetrical truncated cone covered with 

 gray cinders and ashes, with a regular crater 

 in which a few pines an inch or two in diameter 

 are growing. It stands between two small lakes 

 which previous to the last eruption, when the 

 cone was built, formed one lake. From near 

 the base of the cone a flood of extremely rough 

 black vesicular lava extends across what was 

 once a portion of the bottom of the lake into 

 the forest of yellow pine. 



This lava-flow seems to have been poured 

 out during the same eruption that gave birth 

 to the cone, cutting the lake in two, flowing a 

 little way into the woods and overwhelming 

 the trees in its way, the ends of some of the 

 charred tnmks still being visible, projecting 

 from beneath the advanced snout of the flow 

 where it came to rest; while the floor of the for- 

 est for miles around is so thickly strewn with 

 loose cinders that walking is very fatiguing. 

 The Pitt River Indians tell of a fearful time 

 of darkness, probably due to this eruption, 

 when the sky was filled with falUng cinders 

 which, as they thought, threatened every Uving 

 creature with destruction, and say that when 

 at length the sun appeared through the gloom 

 it was red like blood. 



55 



