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Show BEAUTIFUL MOUNTAIN PEAKS. Ranier. ShRBta, IToort and Other Fin Mountains of the Far Northwest, About 50 miles south of Tacoma you get a view of the most beautiful mountain moun-tain peak on the earth's surface, Mount Tacoma, or Ranier, and carry it with you for three or four hours. It rises directly di-rectly from the tide level to a height of 14,444 feet, unhidden by intervening ranges or foothills, and stands squarely against tho sky, the perfection of mag-nificence, mag-nificence, dignity and power. It is two and one-half times as high as Mount Washington, and I boliovo the highest peak in the world that rises directly from a plain. It is known to ns in the east as Mount Ranier and was so called in honor of Admiral Ranier of the British Brit-ish navy, but here they call it Mount Tacoma, tho old title given by the Siwash Indians before tho white man came. Tho base is covered with a dense forest of ever living green. Above the timber lino the snow is white and smooth and perpetual, and it looks as if it were a solid block of the purest marble. mar-ble. Mount Tacoma is just two feet higher than Mount Shasta, 297 feet higher than Pike's peak and 400 feet higher than Gardiner's peak. The highest in the United States, Mount Crillon, Alaska, Alas-ka, is over 1 0, 000, but an exact measurement meas-urement has never been taken. Mount St Elias, Alaska, is 15,327; Mount Whitney, California, is 15,088, and Mount Williams, California, is 14,400. There are several other very beautiful peaks visible from the railway, including includ-ing St. Helen, 9,750 feet, tho patron paint of Portland, around whose head hangs a perpetual halo; Mount Hood, which is a shapely cone, 11,225 feet, j which was named in honor of Lord Hood of the British admiralty, and Mount Baker, 10.S00 feet, christened in honor of Joseph Baker, one of the lieutenants lieu-tenants of Peter Puget, who discovered the sound. Theodore Winthrop has written lovingly about them, and they are the subject of the purest and choicest descriptions that exist in the classic prose of Washington Irving, although I believe he was nover nearer them than his home on the Hudson river, 3,000 miles away. Chicago Record. |