(IS) 
Mt. Tacoma. At 10,000 feet, it is a narrow comb between the 
heads of the Carbon and Puyallup glaciers. Up this mountain 
spur we built our trail. It leaves the main trail at an elevation of 
3000 feet and follows for several miles a narrow ridge above the 
Puyallup River ; then this joins a higher spur and the trail is 
forced to wind along the steep side hill, supported often by the 
trees whose roots firmly clutch the jutting rocks. After riding 
seven miles from the main trail, through the uninterrupted forest, 
we pass close beside the sparkling cascade of a mountain brook 
and enter a little meadow ; an emerald set deep among the forest 
trees, under rugged precipices. The brooklet, that hurries by 
chattering u over stony ways in little sharps and trebles,” leaps 
from the lake in the crater of Tolmie’s Peak, 1300 feet into this 
valley ; we named its source Tolmie’s Lake and the stream itself 
Meadow Brook, with the thought that it loves these sunny pas¬ 
tures in the valley, with the memory of its Alpine home, where 
flowers deck the rock ledges in scarlet, purple and white. 
Passing through two more of these meadow gems, the trail leaves 
the cascades of the brook on the left and vvinds up the southern side 
of the valley about 700 feet. Here, a mile south of Tolmie’s Lake, 
another sheet of water ripples under dark precipices in the throat 
of one of the old volcanic vents. Under the nearer bank, the light 
green rocky bottom is visible, shading away to impenetrable dark¬ 
ness toward the centre. The dark surface reflects in perfect 
detail the sky and clouds, the trees on the farther shore, and the 
rocky needle that rises 1500 feet from the southern margin. Over 
the trees near the outlet, just to the right of this pinnacle, a pure 
white peak towers up into the heavens ; it is the northern sum¬ 
mit of Mt. Tacoma, the Liberty Cap. We sought for a name for 
this sheet of water in the origin of its basin and called it Crater 
Lake. It was once a lake of fire. Gaze down into its depths of 
a summer’s day ; they are dark and cold ; the clear water laps upon 
the rocky bank, on the snow-drift dipping into it, while countless 
flowers rejoice in the warm sunshine ; what a change since the 
fiery floods poured forth, devouring the valleys and mountains, 
out over the rich Tertiary forest, levelling all in the great slope 
from which the peaks and canons of to-day are carved ! 
From Crater Lake, our trail passes on toward the glacier at the head 
of the Puyallup Riverand, after winding through the forest for a mile 
