360 
GLACIAL BORDER OF SPOKANE 
Towards the western apex of the triangle mentioned, is a line of 
seven peaks, which form a range extending from Fish Lake north 
of Cheney, to Reardon. These elevations are surrounded at their 
bases by the level lava-plain, above which they rise 400 to 500 
feet. So well are they masked by a residual soil that they are 
easily mistaken for outlying buttes of the Palouse soil, which is 
closely adjacent to them on the south. 
In the southeast angle are Tekoa Mountain and a considerable 
hill at Fairfield. Steptoe Butte to the southward is an outlying 
island of granite rock. The two Mica Peaks, Moran Mountain, 
Silver Hill, and Brown Butte, form a range extending from the 
middle of the east side, westward, past the midpoint of the triangle 
just south of Spokane. Immediately north of this range is the 
valley of the Spokane River, crossing the triangle from east to 
northwest. From it the land rises to 5800 feet in Mount Spokane, 
the highest point in the triangle, eighteen miles north of the river. 
This mountain is apparently a granite batholith which may have 
arisen at the time of the uplift of the northern portion of the 
Pend Oreilles. From near Darford, northwestward, extends an¬ 
other ridge connecting with the other portion of the Pend Oreille 
Mountains near Loon Lake. 
Between the Darford range of hills and Mount Spokane lies the 
valley of the Little Spokane River. It extends from the northern 
edge of the triangle southward to the city of Spokane, as a broad 
basin with an average level of about 2000 feet above tide. The 
river itself occupies a narrow, post-glacial trench, and flows south¬ 
ward to within ten miles of the city of Spokane, where it makes 
an abrupt turn to the west and flows through a rock-walled gorge 
to the Spokane River. 
From the southwest, chiefly, but possibly from local vents also, 
there came during the Tertic Period, successive floods of lava. As 
these entered the valleys they obstructed the water-courses and 
formed lakes, in the bottoms of which were often deposited the 
fossil bearing beds, locally called “shales,” but better named by 
Russell “micaceous clay.” An abundance of fossil leaves and 
wood in various stages of preservation are here found but singular¬ 
ly the only animal fossils yet discovered are a bee and a cock¬ 
roach. The lowest level at which these beds are exposed is in 
