Transcription:
where, her and there, a ragged pinnacle of rock thrust itself through. On one side of the volcano could be seen the glistening
blue color of a glacier the crevasses and moraines of which could be dimly seen through our glasses. At the same time behind
us on another island was the volcano of Akutan, the cone of which was hidden from view, though the smoke rolling out from
its crater was plainly visible. Meantime the wind and rain were coming down in heavy squalls.All these things I had anticipated,
but now comes a feature which I had not expected in Lat. 53 51' and in the latter part of September. The hills and mountains
were clothed in bright green and even from the schooner's deck at the distance of a mile or two, we could see abundance of
flowers. The coat of green covered everything except the summits of the mountains and an occasional precipice too steep for
anything to stick to, and around the patches of snow the emerald color was still brighter. but it was the green of grasses
and small plants. Not a tree was to be seen. In fact there is not a tree on the Aleutian Is. except 15 or 20 which were planted
near her in 1805 as an experiment. This country is evidently in igneous origin. Old volcanic craters and cones are numerous,
though there are now less than a dozen active volcanoes in Alaska. The islands are nothing but mountains, jumbled together
in almost inextricable confusion though a general trend of about NE by SW can be recognized about her. On climbing one of
the higher peaks you see innumerable others all around you with bare, ragged and forbidding summits and between them numerous