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Peak. I first visited the latter early last July. There were three 
of us in the party. We had left the stationary camp, the Palace 
as it is called, at seven in the morning and were glad enough, at 
the end of thirteen hours’ tramp with our packs on our backs, to 
light our camp fire on a grassy spot among the snow drifts by 
Tolmie’s Lake. The water was still covered with snow-ice, and 
the columnar clififs on the far side were topped by overhanging 
snow masses. We camped on the southern edge of the crater, 
between the lake and the precipices over which Meadow Brook 
falls 1300 feet into its lower valley. Across the valley were the 
slopes of Mt. Tacoma, while to the eastward we looked down 
into Carbon River canon from which mountain peaks rise in stu¬ 
pendous walls, crag upon crag. In chopping fire wood, we found 
trees cut by Dr. Tolmie, fifty years before, and Indian baskets left 
by his party. After enjoying our bread and bacon, we each rolled 
up tightly in a single blanket and tried to sleep. Toward mid¬ 
night, the full moon stood high in the clear heavens. Against the 
dark metallic sky, from which the stars stood out in relief, the 
black crags were dimly visible ; above them rose indistinct gleam¬ 
ing snow slopes, like the reflection of moonlight on rippling water, 
higher still and higher to Tacoma’s summit. The great shining 
peak hung like a phantom above the abyss of darkness ; the one, 
pure, bright, ethereal; the other, deep, immeasurable, a gulf of 
dread. Through the frosty air pulsated a roar like that of a great 
city, the mingled voices of a hundred waterfalls. The moon 
passed on and paled before the growing light of day. The moun¬ 
tain reached out great ribs of rock and snow and took its stand in 
the depths of the chasm. The morning star shone brilliant in the 
eastern sky. and a blush touched the beautiful summit. It spread 
and passed down, leaving a golden spire in the heavens; and, as 
the rosy zone descended over forbidding precipice and icy pinna¬ 
cle, they melted into fairy land. A veil of opalescent mist envel¬ 
oped the mountains, and the sun rose upon an enchanted world. 
