Sketches of the Cascade Mountains of Oregon. 999 
obtained 1,900 feet as the greatest depth, and 1,500 as the average, 
in 1886. (Plate XXI.) 
At the time of my visit Colonel Whipple was in command at 
Fort Klamath. He carried out a projected visit to Crater Lake at 
this time and kindly gave me the opportunity to accompany him. 
As we left the Post we were greeted by the clamor of the beautiful 
white-headed woodpeckers (Picus albolarvatus Cassin) which 
nested in the tall pines near the officers’ quarters. We soon 
seven-mile creek, which abounds in the red-spotted trout of the 
Pacific coast, or the “ dolly-varden ” (Salvelinus malma), and com- 
menced the ascent. We followed the course of a mountain torrent 
which often disclosed in its precipitous banks the friable volcanic 
material of which the mountain is composed. Sand and ashes, with 
here and there strata of fragments of scoria and lava were princi- 
pally visible. The soil was evidently good, for it supported a 
luxuriant forest of trees and undergrowth. Prominent among the 
former are two beautiful firs, whose foliage is elegant but broadly 
contrasted in character and appearance. These are the Abiés nobilis, 
and the A. pattoniana. The foliage of the former is rigid, and the 
disposition of the terminal branches almost rectangular. The 
green is of a rather dark shade. The second species is, on the other 
hand, feathery in foliage and gracefully drooping in branches, 
and the green is paler. Above both these species towers the 
monarch of the north-west, the Douglass fir (Abiés doug/assii), the 
largest species of its genus, forming the bulk of the forest. But it 
yields in height to the occasional sugar pine, Pinus lambertiana, with 
its graceful candelabra-like branches and long cones, the tallest of 
pines and a fit mate for the Douglass fir. 
On our ascent we passed a herd of blacktail deer, which were 
browsing in security on an open slope of the creek banks. By 
evening we were encamped on a babbling run under the shade of 
towering firs. The whisky-jacks, Perisoreus canadensis, flitted from 
branch to branch, and descended to inspect our proceedings with 
their usual familiarity. Half jay and half titmouse, this bird 
makes a home of every camp, and tends no little to relieve the 
Sense of savage wildness by its pretty and confiding ways. 
By early morning we were at the summit. This was simply 
an open grassy expanse on the eastern edge of the awful chasm, 
