pyright, 1900, By A. H. Waite. Basaltic Columns, part
of the "Colonnade" on south side of South Mowich Glacier. These
curious six-sided columns of volcanic rock are similar to those
bordering the Cowlitz Glacier.]

[Illustration: Mountain Goat, an accidental snap-shot of the fleet and
wary Mazama; godfather of the famous Portland mountain club.]

And when even that apparition had faded, and the Mountain appeared
only as an uncertain bulk shadowed upon the night, then came the
miracle. Gradually, the east, beyond the great hills, showed a faint
silver glow. Silhouetted against this dim background, the profile of
the peak grew definite. With no other warning, suddenly from its
summit the full moon shot forth, huge, majestic and gracious, flooding
the lower world with brightness. Clouds and mountain ranges alike
shone with its glory. But the great peak loomed blacker and more
sullen. Only, on its head, the wide crown of snow gleamed white under
the cold rays of the moon.

[Illustration {p.024}: West Side of the summit, seen from Tahoma Fork
of the Nisqually, on road to Longmire Springs. Note the whiteness of
the glacial water. This stream is fed by the united Tahoma glaciers.
See pp. 32 and 37.]

{p.025}
[Illustration: Iron and Copper Mountains (right) in Indian Henry's.
The top of Pyramid Peak shows in the saddle beyond with Peak Success
towering far above.]

No wonder that this mountain of changing moods, overtopping every
other eminence in the Northwest, answered the idea of God to the
simple, imaginative mind of the Indians who hunted in the forest on
its slopes or fished in the waters of Whulge that ebbed and flowed at
its base. Primitive peoples in every land have deified superlative
manifestations of nature--the sun, the wind, great rivers, and
waterfalls, the high mountains. By all the tribes within sight of its
summit, this pre-eminent peak, variously called by them Tacoma
(Tach-ho'ma), Tahoma or Tacob, as who should say "The Great Snow," was
deemed a power to be feared and conciliated. Even when the
missionaries taught them a better faith, they continued to hold the
Mountain in superstitious reverence--an awe that still has power to
silence their "civilized" and very unromantic descendants.

[Illustration: Cutting steps up Paradise Glacier.]

The Puget Sound tribes, with the Yakimas, Klickitats and others living
just beyond the Cascades, had substantially the same language and
beliefs, though differing