Mt. Macoun stands up, like an arched horse's neck, eight or nine miles south from Glacier House, near the summit of the Selkirk range. It is a unique and separate peak, the corner mountain on the southeast of the great Illecillewaet névé, overlooking the Beaver valley, the Prairie hills, the Spillimacheen river, Grizzly creek, and Bald mountain.
The massif was named "Macoun" in 1888 by the Rev. W. S. Green, whose charming book, "Among the Selkirk Glaciers," was published in 1890, in honor of the distinguished Professor, Dominion Naturalist and Botanist, who had spent many summers in the West in the study of science.
In the month of August, 1902, I made the first ascent of this mountain with Edouard Feuz, Sr., one of the most capable of the guides brought out from Switzerland by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company. Not only romantic, but in every way enchanting, was the day's tour. We left the hotel at 5:20 a.m., took the east side of the great glacier, and as we climbed, the mists were suddenly swept out of the valley by the triumphant sunlight. We passed little streams and cascades, and, at 8 o'clock, gained Perley rock, an island of stones surrounded by snow-banks and ice-tongues. In order to reach it we had to cut steps like a staircase up a steep snow-slope. So delightful was the view from this platform of rock, that we spent ten minutes looking at the mountains and the scenery. Around us were Mt. Abbott, Glacier crest,
