Presidential Range of the White Mountains. 455 



least expected. The earliest printed description of the White 

 Mountains, by Josselyn, referring to the Presidential Range, 

 says that " upon the top of the highest of these mountains is a 

 large level or plain . . . whereon nothing grows but 

 moss. At the further end of this plain is another hill . . . 

 to outward appearance a rude heap of massive stones piled one 

 upon another."" Similar descriptions of the flat upland sur- 

 face, not only here at Bigelow's Lawn but at other points on 

 the top of the range, are found in the writings of later 

 explorers and visitors, including particularly Starr King, the 

 author of the classic volume on " The White Hills."f In his 

 " Geology of New Hampshire," Professor C. H. Hitchcock^ 

 repeatedly draws attention to the importance of this smooth 

 highland. " On descending from the top of Mount Washing- 

 ton to the Lake of the Clouds," he says, "the explorer will 

 find a very flat region, running easterly into Boott's Spur and 

 northerly along the east side of Washington. . . . The 

 abyss in front is Tuckerman's Ravine, with tributary scallop- 

 ings on the northwest sides. The erosion has been vertical, 

 just as in a gorge worn out of a level plain. . . . Oakes 

 Gulf, Huntington's Ravine [and the Great Gulf] are other 

 deep gorges excavated out of this plateau, . . . This table 

 land is less than ten miles in length and somewhat over 5000 

 feet in elevation. "§ Several illustrations, some of them copied 

 from Starr King's " White Hills," and others, as for instance, 

 the heliograph opposite page 618, which are new productions, 

 show the smoothly graded forms of the cones and bordering 

 lawns, in contrast to the great re-entrant headwalls of the 

 cirques or " ravines." 



Although these upland lawns or pastures are most conspicu- 

 ous on the south and east sides of Mount Washington, they can 

 be traced all along the line of the Northern Peaks. From 

 Boott's Spur the broad plateau known as Bigelow's lawn finds 

 continuation between the 5000 and 5500-foot contours around 

 the base of the great cone in a wide shelf that is known locally 



* John Josselyn, New England varieties discovered, 1672. 

 + T. S. King : The White Hills. 



%C H. Hitchcock : Geology of New Hampshire. Final report of the State 

 Geological Survev of New Hampshire, 3 vols., Concord, 1874-1878. 

 §Op. cit., vol. i, pp. 609-610. 



Fig. 2. Contour map of the Northern Peaks of the Presidential Range of 

 the White Mountains. Copied with additions and slight alterations from 

 the map published by the Appalachian Mountain Club. 



R C, Ravine of the Castles ; K R, King's Ravine ; B B, Bumpus Basin ; 

 M R, Madison Ravine ; J R, Jefferson Ravine ; G G, Great Gulf ; C R, 

 Chandler Ridge : N C, Nelson's Crag ; A G, Alpine Garden ; H R, Hunting- 

 ton's Ravine ; T R, Tuckerman's Ravine ; B S, Boott Spur ; B L, Bigelow's 

 Lawn : L C. Lake of the Clouds. 



