Our national parks . ounds. Of all the fire-mountains which, like beacons,once blazed along the Pacific Coast, MountRainier is the noblest in form, has the most in-teresting forest cover, and, with perhaps the ex-ception of Shasta, is the highest and mostflowery. Its massive white dome rises out of itsforests, like a world by itself, to a height of four-teen thousand to fifteen thousand feet. The for-ests reach to a height of a little over six thousandfeet, and above the forests there is a zone of theloveliest flowers, fifty miles in circuit and nearly ^ This was done shortly after the above w
Our national parks . ounds. Of all the fire-mountains which, like beacons,once blazed along the Pacific Coast, MountRainier is the noblest in form, has the most in-teresting forest cover, and, with perhaps the ex-ception of Shasta, is the highest and mostflowery. Its massive white dome rises out of itsforests, like a world by itself, to a height of four-teen thousand to fifteen thousand feet. The for-ests reach to a height of a little over six thousandfeet, and above the forests there is a zone of theloveliest flowers, fifty miles in circuit and nearly ^ This was done shortly after the above was written. One of themost important measures taken during the past year in connectionwith forest reservations was the action of Congress in withdrawingfrom the Movint Rainier Forest Reserve a portion of the region imme-diately surrounding Mount Rainier and setting it apart as a nationalpark. {Report of Commissioner of General Land Office^ for the yearended June, 1899.) But the park as it now stands is far too MT. RAINIER AND ALPINE FIKS (Ahes/as/ocarjia) WILD PARKS OF THE WEST 31 two miles wide, so closely planted and luxuriantthat it seems as if Nature, glad to make an openspace between woods so dense and ice so deep,were economizing the precious ground, and try-ing to see how many of her darlings she can gettogether in one mountain wreath, — daisies,anemones, geraniums, columbines, erythroniums, ,larkspurs, etc., among which we wade knee-deepand waist-deep, the bright corollas in myriadstouching petal to petal. Picturesque detachedgroups of the spiry Abies lasiocarpa stand likeislands along the lower margin of the gardenzone, while on the upper margin there are exten-sive beds of bryanthus, Cassiope, Kalmia, and otherheathworts, and higher still saxifrages and drabas,more and more lowly, reach up to the edge of theice. Altogether this is the richest subalpinegarden I ever found, a perfect floral icy dome needs none of mans care, but un-less the reserve
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