Three wonderlands of the American West; being the notes of a traveler, concerning the Yellowstone park, the Yosemite national park, and the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, with a chapter on other wonders of the great American West . ived a great mass of ice amile or more in depth ploughed its way towardthe sea, rounding and polishing the granite peaksinto the glittering domes which we see today andgrinding and cutting the deep fissure thatnow forms the valley. All of this is incompre-hensible to the laymans mind, but the geologistfinds conclusive proof of the theory. ProfessorLeConte, the
Three wonderlands of the American West; being the notes of a traveler, concerning the Yellowstone park, the Yosemite national park, and the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, with a chapter on other wonders of the great American West . ived a great mass of ice amile or more in depth ploughed its way towardthe sea, rounding and polishing the granite peaksinto the glittering domes which we see today andgrinding and cutting the deep fissure thatnow forms the valley. All of this is incompre-hensible to the laymans mind, but the geologistfinds conclusive proof of the theory. ProfessorLeConte, the greatest authority on this question,reminds us that a thousand years are as amoment in the history of geologic action; if timeenough be allowed we may account for the con-dition now existing in Yosemite. Clear evidenceof glacial action is found in many places in thevicinity, and the guide on Glacier Point Trailwill not fail to call your attention to polishedspots on a boulder at the head of Vernal strange rock is many times harder than thegranite in which it was embedded; so much sothat it now projects nearly six feet above thegranite rock around it. Evidences of glacialaction may also be seen on the summit of Half 100. THE YOSEMITE Dome, which John Muir declares must at onetime have lain beneath a mountain of ice a milein height. Glaciers, he asserts, have made everymountain form in the whole Sierran System,whose mountain peaks are only fragments oftheir pre-glacial selves. So much for its natural history, imposingindeed as compared with the half century sinceits discovery by the white man. Secluded as itis deep in the heart of trackless wilds, one maynot wonder that its existence was so long un-known even to the mountaineer; but when thethirst for gold aroused the energy and spirit ofadventure in the California pioneer, many of thestrange beauty spots of the Sierras were destinedto be opened to the world. The first glimpseof this valley came to Dr. Bunnell in 1849,
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