MOUNT ADAMS.

Going up the White Salmon Valley toward Mount Adams, the visitor quickly realizes that he is in a different geological district from that around Mount Hood. The Oregon peak is mainly a pile of volcanic rocks and cinders ejected from its crater. Little hard basalt is found, and in all its circumference I know of only one large surface area of new lava. This is a few miles north of Cloud Cap, and so recent that no trees grow on it. But north of the Columbia, one meets evidences of comparatively recent lava sheets in many parts of the valley. Some obviously have no connection with Mount Adams; they flowed out of fissures on the ridges. But these beds of volcanic rock become more apparent, and are less covered with soil, as we approach the mountain, until, long before timber line is reached, dikes and streams of basalt, as yet hardly beginning to disintegrate, are found on all sides of the peak.

Dawn on Mount Adams, telephotographed from Guler, at 4 a. m., showing the three summit peaks, of which the middle one is the highest. The route of the climbers is up the south slope, seen on right.

Foraging in the snow. The Mount Adams country supports hundreds of large flocks of sheep.

The form and slope of Mount Adams tell of an age far greater than Mount Hood's, but its story is not, like that of Hood, the legible record of a simple volcanic cone. It wholly lacks the symmetry of such a pile. Viewed from a distance, it sits very majestically upon the summit of one of the eastern ranges of the Cascades. As we approach, however, it is seen to have little of the conical shape of Hood, still less that of graceful St. Helens, which is young and as yet practically unbroken. Its summit has been much worn down by ice or perhaps by explosions. Some of its sides are deeply indented, and all are vastly irregular in angle and markings—here a face now too steeply cut to hold a glacier, but showing old glacial scorings far down its slope; there another terraced and ribbed with waves and dikes of lava. The mountain is a long ridge rather than a round peak, and close inspection shows it to be a composite of several great cones, leaning one upon another,—the product of many craters acting in successive ages. On its ancient, scarred slopes, a hundred modern vents have added to the ruggedness and interest of the peak. Many of these blowholes built parasitic cones, from which the snows of later centuries have eroded the loose external mass, leaving only the hard lava cores upstanding like obelisks. Other vents belched out vast sheets of rock that will require a century more of weathering to make hospitable even to the sub-alpine trees most humble in their demands for soil.

"Touched by a light that hath no name,
A glory never sung,
Aloft on sky and mountain wall
Are God's great pictures hung."—Whittier.

Mazamas climbing a 40° stairway of shattered basalt, north side of Mount Adams.

Mount Adams from one of the many lakes on its southeast slope. On ridge above, near the end of Mazama glacier, a hotel is to be erected.

Mount Adams therefore presents a greater variety of history, a more complex and fascinating problem for the student to unravel, than any of its neighbors. This interest extends to the district about it, a country of new lava flows covering much of the older surface. The same conditions mark the region surrounding the newer peak, St. Helens, thirty miles west. In each district, sheets of molten rock have been poured across an ancient and heavily forested land. Thus as we travel up the rich valleys leading from the Columbia to either peak, we meet everywhere the phenomena of vulcanism.

Climbers ascending from South Peak to Middle Peak on Mount Adams, with the "bergschrund" above Klickitat glacier on right. This central dome is about 500 feet higher than South Peak.

Mount Adams, seen from Happy Valley, south side. Elevation about 7,000 feet. Mazama glacier is on right.

The lava sheet flowing around or over a standing or fallen tree took a perfect impression of its trunk and bark. Thousands of these old tree casts are found near both Adams and St. Helens. Where the lava reached a watercourse, it flowed down in a deeper stream, a river of liquid rock. Lava is a poor conductor of heat; hence the stream cooled more quickly on the surface than below. Soon a crust was formed, like the ice over a creek in winter. Under it the lava flowed on and out, as the flood stopped, leaving a gallery or flume. Later flows filled the great drain again and again, adding new strata to its roof, floor and sides, and lessening its bore. Long after the outflows ceased, weathering by heat and frost broke openings here and there. Many of the flumes were choked with drift. But others, in the newer lava beds, may be explored for miles. It was from the lava caves of northern California that the Modoc Indians waged their famous war in the Seventies.

Mount Adams, from Snow-Plow Mountain, three miles southeast of the snow line; elevation 5,070 feet, overlooking the broad "park" country west of Hellroaring Canyon.

The disintegration of the lava galleries in the Mount Adams field has of course produced caves of all sorts and sizes. Where one of these is closed at one end with debris, so that the summer air cannot circulate to displace the heavier cold remaining from winter, the cave, if it has a water supply, becomes an ice factory. The Trout Lake district has several interesting examples of such glacieres, as they have been named, where one may take refuge from July or August heat above ground, and, forty feet below, in a cave well protected from sun and summer breeze, find great masses of ice, with more perhaps still forming as water filters in from a surface lake or an underground spring. The Columbia River towns as far away as Portland and The Dalles formerly obtained ice from the Trout Lake caves, but at present they supply only some near-by farmers.

Mount Adams is ascended without difficulty by either its north or south slope. On the east and west faces, the cliffs and ice cascades appall even the expert alpinist. As yet, so far as I can learn, no ascents have been made over these slopes. The southern route is the more popular one. It leads by well-marked trails up from Guler or Glenwood, over a succession of terraces clad in fine, open forest; ascends McDonald Ridge, amid increasing barriers of lava; passes South Butte, a decaying pillar of red silhouetted against the black rocks and white snow-fields; crosses many a caldron of twisted and broken basalt,—"Devil's Half Acres" that once were the hot, vomiting mouths of drains from the fiery heart of the peak; scales a giants' stairway tilted to forty degrees, overlooking the west branch of Mazama glacier on one side and a small unnamed glacier on the other; and at last gains the broad shoulder which projects far on the south slope. (See illustrations, pp. [89] and [93].)

Nearing the summit, south side.

Here, from a height of nine thousand feet, we look down on the low, wide reservoir of Mazama glacier on the east, and up to the ice-falls above Klickitat glacier on the higher slopes beyond. The great platform on which we stand was built up by a crater, three thousand feet below the summit. The climb to it has disclosed the fact that the mountain is composed mostly of lava. Some of the ravine cuttings have shown lapilli and cinders, but these are rarer than on the other Northwestern peaks. The harder structure has resisted the erosion which is cutting so deeply into the lower slopes of Hood. On Mount Adams, not only do the glaciers, with one or two notable exceptions, lie up on the general surface of the mountain, banked by their moraines; but their streams have cut few deep ravines.

An Upland "Park," west of Hellroaring Canyon.

Mount Adams, from the Ridge of Wonders, showing the great amphitheater or "cirque" of Klickitat glacier, fed by avalanches from the summit plateau. This is the most important example of glacial sculpture on the mountain. Beyond, on the right, is seen the head of Rusk glacier, while on the left is Mazama glacier. Note the stunted sub-alpine trees scattered thinly over this ridge, even up to an altitude of 7,000 feet.

From this point, the route becomes steeper, but is still over talus, until the first of the three summit elevations, known as South Peak, is reached. This is only five hundred feet below the actual summit, Middle Peak, which is gained by a short, hard pull, generally over snow. (See p. [94].) The north-side route is up a long, sharp ridge between Lava and Adams glaciers (p. [104]). Like the other path, its grade is at first easy; but its last half mile of elevation is achieved over a slope even steeper, and ending in a longer climb over the snow. Neither route, however, offers so hard a finish as that which ends the Mount Hood climb. From the timber-line on either side, the ascent requires six or seven hours.

Storm on Klickitat Glacier, seen from the Ridge of Wonders.

The summit ridge is nearly a mile long and two-thirds as wide. It is the gathering ground of the snows that feed Klickitat, Lyman, Adams and White Salmon glaciers. (See map, p. [87].) Mazama, Rusk, Lava, Pinnacle and Avalanche glaciers lie beneath cliffs too steep to carry ice-streams. Their income is mainly collected from the slopes, and if they receive snow from the broad summit at all, it is chiefly in the avalanches of early summer. Nearly all the glaciers, however, are thus fed in part, the steep east and west faces making Mount Adams famous for its avalanches.

Mount Adams, seen from the northeast, with the Lyman glaciers in center, Rusk glacier on extreme left, and Lava glacier, right. The ridge beyond Lava glacier is the north-side route to the summit. The Lyman glaciers, like Adams glacier on the northwest side, are noteworthy for their cascades of ice.

From the summit on either side, the climber may look down sheer for half a mile to the reservoirs and great ice cascades of the glaciers below. It is seen that with the exception of the Rusk and Klickitat, which are deeply embedded in canyons, the glaciers spread out, fan-like, on the lower slopes, and are held up by their moraines. Most of them end at elevations considerably above six thousand five hundred feet. The difference in this respect between Adams and Hood is due, no doubt, to lighter rainfall.

Crevasse in Lava glacier, north side of Mount Adams.

Of the two glaciers just mentioned the Klickitat is the larger and more typical. The Rusk, however, is of interest because it flows, greatly crevassed, down a narrow flume or couloir on the east slope. Its bed, Reid suggests, may have been the channel of "a former lava flow, which, hardening on the surface, allowed the liquid lava inside to flow out; and later the top broke in." The Klickitat glacier lies in a much larger canyon, which it has evidently cut for itself. This is one of the most characteristic glacial amphitheaters in America, resembling, though on a smaller scale, the vast Carbon glacier cirque which is the crowning glory of the Rainier National Park. The Klickitat basin is a mile wide. Into it two steep ice-streams cascade from the summit, and avalanches fall from a cliff which rises two thousand feet between them. (See pp. [98] and [99].)

North Peak of Mount Adams, with The Mountaineers beginning their ascent, in 1911. Their route led up the ridge seen here, which divides Lava glacier, on the left, from Adams glacier, on extreme right.

The glacier is more than two miles long. It ends at an elevation of less than six thousand feet, covered with debris from a large medial moraine formed by the junction of the two tributary glaciers. Like the other Mount Adams glaciers, and indeed nearly all glaciers in the northern hemisphere, it is shrinking, and has built several moraines on each side. These extend half a mile below its present snout, and the inner moraines are underlaid with ice, showing the retreat has been recent.

South of the Klickitat glacier, a part of the original surface of the peak remains in the great Ridge of Wonders. Rising a thousand feet above the floor of Hellroaring Canyon, which was formerly occupied by Mazama glacier, now withdrawn to the slope above, this is the finest observation point on the mountain. "The wonderful views of the eastern precipices and glaciers," says Reid, "the numerous dikes, the well preserved parasitic cone of Little Mount Adams, and the curious forms of volcanic bombs scattered over its surface entirely justify the name Mr. Rusk has given to this ridge."

Snow Bridge over Killing Creek, north of Mount Adams.

Adams glacier, upon the northwest slope, with a length of three miles, is the largest on the mountain. This and the two beautiful ice streams on the northeast, named after Prof. W. D. Lyman, are notable for their ice-falls, half-mile drops of tumbling, frozen rivers.

The naming of the mountain was a result of the movement started by Hall J. Kelley, the Oregon enthusiast, in 1839. The northwestern snow-peaks, so far as shown in maps of the period, bore the names given by Vancouver as part of his annexation for George III. The utility, beauty and historic fitness of the significant Indian place names did not occur to a generation busy in ousting the Indian from his land; but our grandfathers remembered George III. Kelley and other patriotic men of the time proposed to call the Cascades the "Presidents' Range," and to christen the several snow-peaks for individual ex-presidents of the United States. But the second quarter of the last century knew little about Oregon, and cared less. The well-meant but premature effort failed, and the only names of the presidents which have stuck are Adams and Jefferson. Lewis and Clark mistook Mount Adams for St. Helens, and estimated it "perhaps the highest pinnacle in America." The Geological Survey has found its height to be 12,307 feet. Mount Adams was first climbed in 1854 by a party in which were Col. B. F. Shaw, Glenn Aiken and Edward J. Allen.

North-side Cleaver, with Lava glacier on left. This sharp spine was climbed by The Mountaineers and the North Yakima Y. M. C. A. party in 1911.

Looking across Adams glacier, northwest side of Mount Adams, from ridge shown above.