Geysers and Hot The Yellow stone Park is famous for its numerous geysers; it is one of the four regions in the world where there are groups of large geysers. There •are three geyser basins located in the valley of the Fire Hole River, at an average altitude of 7,000 feet above the sea-level; Upper Geyser, Middle Geyser and Lower Geyser. The Upper, or Great Geyser basin, is the most ac tive. Here are located the great spouters, con spicuous among which are the Giant, Giantess, Castle, Saw Mill, Bee Hive, Lion, Grand Cor net and Cub, and last, but by no means least, Old Faithful. They are all appropriately named. The Giant and Giantess are so called on account of the immense size of their craters and the force of their action; the Bee Hive and Castle because of the peculiar formation of their cones; the Saw Mill and Lion from the roaring noise they make when in a state of activity; and Old Faithful on account of the regular discharges of steam and water at in tervals of 64 minutes. One can rely absolutely on Old Faithful giving an exhibition every hour and four minutes. The stated intervals of activity have not varied in the memory of the oldest visitor to the park. Other geysers are variable in the time of their action; all are subject to changes. The Bee Hive is be coming more active every season. It gives an exhibition two or three times every 24 hours. The Giant and Giantess and Castle cannot al ways be relied upon, but they make a magnif icent display when in action. The Giant averages an exhibition about every six days and the Giantess about every 11 days. Near the maine cone of the Giant Geyser is a small fissure, which seems to do for the Giant what an escape pipe does for a large boiler. When the chambers of the main crater become fully charged, short puffs cf steam come hiss ing through this fissure. The grandeur of the spectacle which follows passes description. The interior forces seem to combine in mak ing a display of power,. Accompanying a stunning shock, caused by the volume of steam escaping, a column of water about 10. feet in circumference is thrown up to a considerable height, and emits a dense cloud of steam, so that it is difficult to see what appears in the centre to be a massive marble pillar. But the steam soon. floats away and a column of great beauty stands revealed in all its grandeur. In a few seconds comes another change, the col umn is shattered, the law of gravity asserts itself and the great body of water which went up in a grand column falls in showers of spray. The greater part of the water returns to the crater, and the overflow is carried off by Fire Hole River, a stream well named, as it flows rapidly through three basins fed by many boiling springs and numerous gey sers.
There are no cone geysers in the Middle Geyser basin. The great wonder of the Mid dle basin is "Hell's' Half-Acre." This is located on the bank of Fire Hole, and is a steaming abyss, about 30 feet deep, in a lime stone formation. Four or five times each day, at irregular intervals, it gives most astonish ing exhibitions. A short distance from "Hell's Half-Acre" is a boiling lake, the waters of which are a beautiful blue. The blue liquid overflow winds over formations which for years have been changing in form and color, making a sight the like of which is nowhere else in the world. The reflection of the trees and hills in the colored water adds to the picturesque beauty of the scene. The "Devil's Paint Pot" is a boiling caldron of many colored clays, which bubble and steam and change their colors in a way most interesting.
The Mammoth Hot Springs are in the north ern part of the park, not far from Cinnabar, the railroad station in Montana. They are somewhat similar to the springs in the Fire Hole basin. The deposits left by the water have built up scalloped terraces. Some of the results of their activity exist in a marked degree on the banks of the Gardiner River. There are places where the water from the geysers is no longer changing the terrace for mations, and which seem to be over caverns as indicated by the sound of footsteps. In some parts caverns have been explored, and found to contain many beautiful specimens of stalagmites and stalactites. The springs of this locality are as varied in color and form as in activities. The "Goddess of Liberty" is a mass of limestone, 40 or 50 feet high, and shaped like the cap of the Goddess of Liberty. The Mud Geysers, north of and near Yellow stone Lake, are what their name indicates. At irregular intervals mud and water are shot up quite a distance. The slimy substance falls on the dead cedars which have been killed by the hot substance; but that ever green cedars grew here shows that vegetation existed long before the present conditions. There are geysers near Heart Lake and in other parts of the park. There are nearly 100 active hot springs and geysers within the park. The geysers change, some becoming extinct and new ones appearing. In 1878 a large gey ser made its appearance in the Norris basin, near the headwaters of the Madison River. Hot springs are found everywhere in the park; on mountains, in valleys, in the beds of lakes and rivers, near canons and near cold water springs. They vary in size, some cover acres, others only inches of surface. There are also a large number of mineral springs and numerous springs of clear cold water. The whole park and much of the adjoining region are volcanic.
The climate is not as severely cold as in other parts of the Rocky Mountain region of the same altitude. The winter season practically begins with September or the last of August. The mean temperature in January is about 20°; occasionally the temperature falls to 40° below zero. The summers are short; vege tation begins to grow in May and in July has reached its most luxuriant state. In the last of August the change from summer to winter is usually sudden. In July the mean temperature is 62'; sometimes in summer the temperature rises to 96°. A hot day in summer may be fol lowed by a cold night, even frost appearing. On the plateau the average annual rainfall is 20 inches.
Nearly all the park area is covered with forests, chiefly composed of coniferm. The treeless regions are the summits of the high mountains, the marshy bottoms, and the steep rocky slopes. The black pine is the most com mon; in some places there are forests composed almost wholly of black pine (Pines Murrayana), nhich here do not attain any great size. The balsam is found on the high plateaus, and varie ties of fir and spruce are abundant. Forests exist at an elevation of 9,700 feet. Grasses are found on the plateaus and the herbaceous vege tation found in the Rocky Mountains. Above the timber line the vegetation is about as in other parts of the summits of the Rocky Moun tains. The gentian is one of the favorite flow ers of this section. Near the hot springs the vegetation is affected by the overflow and other causes; it is stunted and in some places has been killed entirely. Petrified trees are found in the northwest.