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Show 260 GEOLOGY OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS. terminal moraines, of which more will be said hereafter. A fine stream runs along the valley, and at the southern end is joined by a still larger one, issuing from Fish Lake, a few miles to the south-west. FISH LAKE PLATEAU. An easy way of reaching the top of this plateau is by ascending its northeastern angle from Summit Valley. If the route be well chosen, we may reach the highest point without once dismounting. The summit is about 12 miles in length and 2 miles in width; is nearly level, or very slightly undulated; and stands about 11,600 feet above sea-level. On every side it is bounded by precipitous cliffs, except along a part of its southwestern flank, but here and there the walls are broken and notched. Along the side facing west-northwest runs a cliff of vast proportions, second only to the western front of the Sevier Plateau in magnitude and grandeur. Upon the very brink of this wall is the highest point of the plateau, from which, in a clear day, we may easily discern the peaks of the Wasatch around Salt Lake City and beyond. These are more than 150 miles distant. Mount Nebo, 70 miles northward, seems like a near neighbor, and the gray peaks of the Tushar are seen towering beyond the heights of the Sevier Plateau. To the southward looms up the grandest of all the plateausâ€"the Aquariusâ€"its long straight crest-line stretched across the whole southern horizon, and seeming but a few hours' ride away from us. Here we do not feel that sense of being upon a plain which impresses us while traveling upon the other plateaus, but we realize that this summit is at a great elevation; for we may look afar off in every direction to valleys and plains which lie thousands of feet below us, and beyond which we perceive other summits rising to altitudes nearly or quite equal to our own. But perhaps the most impressive feature of the scenery lies almost beneath our feet. It is a grand amphitheater, eroded deep into the plateau mass. Its dimensions and grandeur are surpassed only in the great amphitheater in the Sevier table near Monroe. It is less rugged and diversified than the latter, but is more picturesque, chiefly because the eye can command the whole of it at once. The summit upon which we stand is upon the edge of a straight unbroken wall 4 miles long and nearly vertical for 1,200 feet, then descend- |