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diff --git a/12298-0.txt b/12298-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..7c8267e --- /dev/null +++ b/12298-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,726 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12298 *** + +THE GRAND CAÑON OF THE COLORADO + +by John Muir + +1902 + + + + +Happy nowadays is the tourist, with earth’s wonders, new and old, +spread invitingly open before him, and a host of able workers as his +slaves making everything easy, padding plush about him, grading roads +for him, boring tunnels, moving hills out of his way, eager, like the +devil, to show him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and +foolishness, spiritualizing travel for him with lightning and steam, +abolishing space and time and almost everything else. Little children +and tender, pulpy people, as well as storm-seasoned explorers, may now +go almost everywhere in smooth comfort, cross oceans and deserts scarce +accessible to fishes and birds, and, dragged by steel horses, go up +high mountains, riding gloriously beneath starry showers of sparks, +ascending like Elijah in a whirlwind and chariot of fire. + +First of the wonders of the great West to be brought within reach of +the tourist were the Yosemite and the Big Trees, on the completion of +the first transcontinental railway; next came the Yellowstone and icy +Alaska, by the Northern roads; and last the Grand Cañon of the +Colorado, which, naturally the hardest to reach, has now become, by a +branch of the Santa Fé, the most accessible of all. + +Of course with this wonderful extension of steel ways through our +wilderness there is loss as well as gain. Nearly all railroads are +bordered by belts of desolation. The finest wilderness perishes as if +stricken with pestilence. Bird and beast people, if not the dryads, are +frightened from the groves. Too often the groves also vanish, leaving +nothing but ashes. Fortunately, nature has a few big places beyond +man’s power to spoil—the ocean, the two icy ends of the globe, and the +Grand Cañon. + +When I first heard of the Santa Fé trains running to the edge of the +Grand Cañon of Arizona, I was troubled with thoughts of the +disenchantment likely to follow. But last winter, when I saw those +trains crawling along through the pines of the Cocanini Forest and +close up to the brink of the chasm at Bright Angel, I was glad to +discover that in the presence of such stupendous scenery they are +nothing. The locomotives and trains are mere beetles and caterpillars, +and the noise they make is as little disturbing as the hooting of an +owl in the lonely woods. + +In a dry, hot, monotonous forested plateau, seemingly boundless, you +come suddenly and without warning upon the abrupt edge of a gigantic +sunken landscape of the wildest, most multitudinous features, and those +features, sharp and angular, are made out of flat beds of limestone and +sandstone forming a spiry, jagged, gloriously colored mountain-range +countersunk in a level gray plain. It is a hard job to sketch it even +in scrawniest outline; and try as I may, not in the least sparing +myself, I cannot tell the hundredth part of the wonders of its +features—the side-cañons, gorges, alcoves, cloisters, and amphitheaters +of vast sweep and depth, carved in its magnificent walls; the throng of +great architectural rocks it contains resembling castles, cathedrals, +temples, and palaces, towered and spired and painted, some of them +nearly a mile high, yet beneath one’s feet. All this, however, is less +difficult than to give any idea of the impression of wild, primeval +beauty and power one receives in merely gazing from its brink. The view +down the gulf of color and over the rim of its wonderful wall, more +than any other view I know, leads us to think of our earth as a star +with stars swimming in light, every radiant spire pointing the way to +the heavens. + +But it is impossible to conceive what the cañon is, or what impression +it makes, from descriptions or pictures, however good. Naturally it is +untellable even to those who have seen something perhaps a little like +it on a small scale in this same plateau region. One’s most extravagant +expectations are indefinitely surpassed, though one expect much from +what is said of it as “the biggest chasm on earth”—“so big is it that +all other big things,—Yosemite, the Yellowstone, the Pyramids, +Chicago,—all would be lost if tumbled into it.” Naturally enough, +illustrations as to size are sought for among other cañons like or +unlike it, with the common result of worse confounding confusion. The +prudent keep silence. It was once said that the “Grand Cañon could put +a dozen Yosemites in its vest pocket.” + +The justly famous Grand Cañon of the Yellowstone is, like the Colorado, +gorgeously colored and abruptly countersunk in a plateau, and both are +mainly the work of water. But the Colorado’s cañon is more than a +thousand times larger, and as a score or two new buildings of ordinary +size would not appreciably change the general view of a great city, so +hundreds of Yellowstones might be eroded in the sides of the Colorado +Cañon without noticeably augmenting its size or the richness of its +sculpture. But it is not true that the great Yosemite rocks would be +thus lost or hidden. Nothing of their kind in the world, so far as I +know, rivals El Capitan and Tissiack, much less dwarfs or in any way +belittles them. None of the sandstone or limestone precipices of the +cañon that I have seen or heard of approaches in smooth, flawless +strength and grandeur the granite face of El Capitan or the Tenaya side +of Cloud’s Rest. These colossal cliffs, types of permanence, are about +three thousand and six thousand feet high; those of the cañon that are +sheer are about half as high, and are types of fleeting change; while +glorious-domed Tissiack, noblest of mountain buildings, far from being +overshadowed or lost in this rosy, spiry cañon company, would draw +every eye, and, in serene majesty, “aboon them a’” she would take her +place—castle, temple, palace, or tower. Nevertheless a noted writer, +comparing the Grand Cañon in a general way with the glacial Yosemite, +says: “And the Yosemite—ah, the lovely Yosemite! Dumped down into the +wilderness of gorges and mountains, it would take a guide who knew of +its existence a long time to find it.” This is striking, and shows up +well above the levels of commonplace description; but it is confusing, +and has the fatal fault of not being true. As well try to describe an +eagle by putting a lark in it. “And the lark—ah, the lovely lark! +Dumped down the red, royal gorge of the eagle, it would be hard to +find.” Each in its own place is better, singing at heaven’s gate, and +sailing the sky with the clouds. + +Every feature of nature’s big face is beautiful,—height and hollow, +wrinkle, furrow, and line,—and this is the main master furrow of its +kind on our continent, incomparably greater and more impressive than +any other yet discovered, or likely to be discovered, now that all the +great rivers have been traced to their heads. + +The Colorado River rises in the heart of the continent on the dividing +ranges and ridges between the two oceans, drains thousands of snowy +mountains through narrow or spacious valleys, and thence through cañons +of every color, sheer-walled and deep, all of which seem to be +represented in this one grand cañon of cañons. + +It is very hard to give anything like an adequate conception of its +size, much more of its color, its vast wall-sculpture, the wealth of +ornate architectural buildings that fill it, or, most of all, the +tremendous impression it makes. According to Major Powell, it is about +two hundred and seventeen miles long, from five to fifteen miles wide +from rim to rim, and from about five thousand to six thousand feet +deep. So tremendous a chasm would be one of the world’s greatest +wonders even if, like ordinary cañons cut in sedimentary rocks, it were +empty and its walls were simple. But instead of being plain, the walls +are so deeply and elaborately carved into all sorts of +recesses—alcoves, cirques, amphitheaters, and side-cañons—that were you +to trace the rim closely around on both sides your journey would be +nearly a thousand miles long. Into all these recesses the level, +continuous beds of rock in ledges and benches, with their various +colors, run like broad ribbons, marvelously beautiful and effective +even at a distance of ten or twelve miles. And the vast space these +glorious walls inclose, instead of being empty, is crowded with +gigantic architectural rock forms gorgeously colored and adorned with +towers and spires like works of art. + +Looking down from this level plateau, we are more impressed with a +feeling of being on the top of everything than when looking from the +summit of a mountain. From side to side of the vast gulf, temples, +palaces, towers, and spires come soaring up in thick array half a mile +or nearly a mile above their sunken, hidden bases, some to a level with +our standpoint, but none higher. And in the inspiring morning light all +are so fresh and rosy-looking that they seem new-born; as if, like the +quick-growing crimson snow-plants of the California woods, they had +just sprung up, hatched by the warm, brooding, motherly weather. + +In trying to describe the great pines and sequoias of the Sierra, I +have often thought that if one of those trees could be set by itself in +some city park, its grandeur might there be impressively realized; +while in its home forests, where all magnitudes are great, the weary, +satiated traveler sees none of them truly. It is so with these majestic +rock structures. + +Though mere residual masses of the plateau, they are dowered with the +grandeur and repose of mountains, together with the finely chiseled +carving and modeling of man’s temples and palaces, and often, to a +considerable extent, with their symmetry. Some, closely observed, look +like ruins; but even these stand plumb and true, and show architectural +forms loaded with lines strictly regular and decorative, and all are +arrayed in colors that storms and time seem only to brighten. They are +not placed in regular rows in line with the river, but “a’ through +ither,” as the Scotch say, in lavish, exuberant crowds, as if nature in +wildest extravagance held her bravest structures as common as +gravel-piles. Yonder stands a spiry cathedral nearly five thousand feet +in height, nobly symmetrical, with sheer buttressed walls and arched +doors and windows, as richly finished and decorated with sculptures as +the great rock temples of India or Egypt. Beside it rises a huge castle +with arched gateway, turrets, watch-towers, ramparts, etc., and to +right and left palaces, obelisks, and pyramids fairly fill the gulf, +all colossal and all lavishly painted and carved. Here and there a +flat-topped structure may be seen, or one imperfectly domed; but the +prevailing style is ornate Gothic, with many hints of Egyptian and +Indian. + +Throughout this vast extent of wild architecture—nature’s own capital +city—there seem to be no ordinary dwellings. All look like grand and +important public structures, except perhaps some of the lower pyramids, +broad-based and sharp-pointed, covered with down-flowing talus like +loosely set tents with hollow, sagging sides. The roofs often have +disintegrated rocks heaped and draggled over them, but in the main the +masonry is firm and laid in regular courses, as if done by square and +rule. + +Nevertheless they are ever changing: their tops are now a dome, now a +flat table or a spire, as harder or softer strata are reached in their +slow degradation, while the sides, with all their fine moldings, are +being steadily undermined and eaten away. But no essential change in +style or color is thus effected. From century to century they stand the +same. What seems confusion among the rough earthquake-shaken crags +nearest one comes to order as soon as the main plan of the various +structures appears. Every building, however complicated and laden with +ornamental lines, is at one with itself and every one of its neighbors, +for the same characteristic controlling belts of color and solid strata +extend with wonderful constancy for very great distances, and pass +through and give style to thousands of separate structures, however +their smaller characters may vary. + +Of all the various kinds of ornamental work displayed,—carving, tracery +on cliff-faces, moldings, arches, pinnacles,—none is more admirably +effective or charms more than the webs of rain-channeled taluses. +Marvelously extensive, without the slightest appearance of waste or +excess, they cover roofs and dome-tops and the base of every cliff, +belt each spire and pyramid and massy, towering temple, and in +beautiful continuous lines go sweeping along the great walls in and out +around all the intricate system of side-cañons, amphitheaters, cirques, +and scallops into which they are sculptured. From one point hundreds of +miles of this fairy embroidery may be traced. It is all so fine and +orderly that it would seem that not only had the clouds and streams +been kept harmoniously busy in the making of it, but that every +raindrop sent like a bullet to a mark had been the subject of a +separate thought, so sure is the outcome of beauty through the stormy +centuries. Surely nowhere else are there illustrations so striking of +the natural beauty of desolation and death, so many of nature’s own +mountain buildings wasting in glory of high desert air—going to dust. +See how steadfast in beauty they all are in their going. Look again and +again how the rough, dusty boulders and sand of disintegration from the +upper ledges wreathe in beauty the next and next below with these +wonderful taluses, and how the colors are finer the faster the waste. +We oftentimes see nature giving beauty for ashes,—as in the flowers of +a prairie after fire,—but here the very dust and ashes are beautiful. + +Gazing across the mighty chasm, we at last discover that it is not its +great depth nor length, nor yet these wonderful buildings, that most +impresses us. It is its immense width, sharply defined by precipitous +walls plunging suddenly down from a flat plain, declaring in terms +instantly apprehended that the vast gulf is a gash in the once unbroken +plateau, made by slow, orderly erosion and removal of huge beds of +rocks. Other valleys of erosion are as great,—in all their dimensions +some are greater,—but none of these produces an effect on the +imagination at once so quick and profound, coming without study, given +at a glance. Therefore by far the greatest and most influential feature +of this view from Bright Angel or any other of the cañon views is the +opposite wall. Of the one beneath our feet we see only fragmentary +sections in cirques and amphitheaters and on the sides of the +outjutting promontories between them, while the other, though far +distant, is beheld in all its glory of color and noble proportions—the +one supreme beauty and wonder to which the eye is ever turning. For +while charming with its beauty it tells the story of the stupendous +erosion of the cañon—the foundation of the unspeakable impression made +on everybody. It seems a gigantic statement for even nature to make, +all in one mighty stone word, apprehended at once like a burst of +light, celestial color its natural vesture, coming in glory to mind and +heart as to a home prepared for it from the very beginning. Wildness so +godful, cosmic, primeval, bestows a new sense of earth’s beauty and +size. Not even from high mountains does the world seem so wide, so like +a star in glory of light on its way through the heavens. + +I have observed scenery-hunters of all sorts getting first views of +yosemites, glaciers. While Mountain ranges, etc. Mixed with the +enthusiasm which such scenery naturally excites, there is often weak +gushing, and many splutter aloud like little waterfalls. Here, for a +few moments at least, there is silence, and all are in dead earnest, as +if awed and hushed by an earthquake—perhaps until the cook cries +“Breakfast!” or the stable-boy “Horses are ready!” Then the poor +unfortunates, slaves of regular habits, turn quickly away, gasping and +muttering as if wondering where they had been and what had enchanted +them. + +Roads have been made from Bright Angel Hotel through the Cocanini +Forest to the ends of outstanding promontories, commanding extensive +views up and down the cañon. The nearest of them, three or four miles +east and west, are McNeil’s Point and Rowe’s Point; the latter, besides +commanding the eternally interesting cañon, gives wide-sweeping views +southeast and west over the dark forest roof to the San Francisco and +Mount Trumbull volcanoes—the bluest of mountains over the blackest of +level woods. + +Instead of thus riding in dust with the crowd, more will be gained by +going quietly afoot along the rim at different times of day and night, +free to observe the vegetation, the fossils in the rocks, the seams +beneath overhanging ledges once inhabited by Indians, and to watch the +stupendous scenery in the changing lights and shadows, clouds, showers, +and storms. One need not go hunting the so-called “points of interest.” +The verge anywhere, everywhere, is a point of interest beyond one’s +wildest dreams. + +As yet, few of the promontories or throng of mountain buildings in the +cañon are named. Nor among such exuberance of forms are names thought +of by the bewildered, hurried tourist. He would be as likely to think +of names for waves in a storm. The Eastern and Western Cloisters, Hindu +Amphitheater, Cape Royal, Powell’s Plateau, and Grand View Point, Point +Sublime, Bissell and Moran points, the Temple of Set, Vishnu’s Temple, +Shiva’s Temple, Twin Temples, Tower of Babel, Hance’s Column—these +fairly good names given by Dutton, Holmes, Moran, and others are +scattered over a large stretch of the cañon wilderness. + +All the cañon rock-beds are lavishly painted, except a few neutral bars +and the granite notch at the bottom occupied by the river, which makes +but little sign. It is a vast wilderness of rocks in a sea of light, +colored and glowing like oak and maple woods in autumn, when the +sun-gold is richest. I have just said that it is impossible to learn +what the cañon is like from descriptions and pictures. Powell’s and +Dutton’s descriptions present magnificent views not only of the cañon +but of all the grand region round about it; and Holmes’s drawings, +accompanying Dutton’s report, are wonderfully good. Surely faithful and +loving skill can go no further in putting the multitudinous decorated +forms on paper. But the _colors_, the living, rejoicing _colors_, +chanting morning and evening in chorus to heaven! Whose brush or +pencil, however lovingly inspired, can give us these? And if paint is +of no effect, what hope lies in pen-work? Only this: some may be +incited by it to go and see for themselves. + +No other range of mountainous rock-work of anything like the same +extent have I seen that is so strangely, boldly, lavishly colored. The +famous Yellowstone Cañon below the falls comes to mind, but, wonderful +as it is, and well deserved as is its fame, compared with this it is +only a bright rainbow ribbon at the roots of the pines. Each of the +series of level, continuous beds of carboniferous rocks of the cañon +has, as we have seen, its own characteristic color. The summit +limestone-beds are pale yellow; next below these are the beautiful +rose-colored cross-bedded sandstones; next there are a thousand feet of +brilliant red sandstones; and below these the red wall limestones, over +two thousand feet thick, rich massy red, the greatest and most +influential of the series, and forming the main color-fountain. Between +these are many neutral-tinted beds. The prevailing colors are +wonderfully deep and clear, changing and blending with varying +intensity from hour to hour, day to day, season to season; throbbing, +wavering, glowing, responding to every passing cloud or storm, a world +of color in itself, now burning in separate rainbow bars streaked and +blotched with shade, now glowing in one smooth, all-pervading ethereal +radiance like the alpenglow, uniting the rocky world with the heavens. + +The dawn, as in all the pure, dry desert country, is ineffably +beautiful; and when the first level sunbeams sting the domes and +spires, with what a burst of power the big, wild days begin! The dead +and the living, rocks and hearts alike, awake and sing the new-old song +of creation. All the massy headlands and salient angles of the walls, +and the multitudinous temples and palaces, seem to catch the light at +once, and cast thick black shadows athwart hollow and gorge, bringing +out details as well as the main massive features of the architecture; +while all the rocks, as if wild with life, throb and quiver and glow in +the glorious sunburst, rejoicing. Every rock temple then becomes a +temple of music; every spire and pinnacle an angel of light and song, +shouting color halleluiahs. + +As the day draws to a close, shadows, wondrous, black, and thick, like +those of the morning, fill up the wall hollows, while the glowing +rocks, their rough angles burned off, seem soft and hot to the heart as +they stand submerged in purple haze, which now fills the cañon like a +sea. Still deeper, richer, more divine grow the great walls and +temples, until in the supreme flaming glory of sunset the whole cañon +is transfigured, as if all the life and light of centuries of sunshine +stored up and condensed in the rocks was now being poured forth as from +one glorious fountain, flooding both earth and sky. + +Strange to say, in the full white effulgence of the midday hours the +bright colors grow dim and terrestrial in common gray haze; and the +rocks, after the manner of mountains, seem to crouch and drowse and +shrink to less than half their real stature, and have nothing to say to +one, as if not at home. But it is fine to see how quickly they come to +life and grow radiant and communicative as soon as a band of white +clouds come floating by. As if shouting for joy, they seem to spring up +to meet them in hearty salutation, eager to touch them and beg their +blessings. It is just in the midst of these dull midday hours that the +cañon clouds are born. + +A good storm-cloud full of lightning and rain on its way to its work on +a sunny desert day is a glorious object. Across the cañon, opposite the +hotel, is a little tributary of the Colorado called Bright Angel Creek. +A fountain-cloud still better deserves the name “Angel of the Desert +Wells”—clad in bright plumage, carrying cool shade and living water to +countless animals and plants ready to perish, noble in form and +gesture, seeming able for anything, pouring life-giving, wonder-working +floods from its alabaster fountains, as if some sky-lake had broken. To +every gulch and gorge on its favorite ground is given a passionate +torrent, roaring, replying to the rejoicing lightning—stones, tons in +weight, hurrying away as if frightened, showing something of the way +Grand Cañon work is done. Most of the fertile summer clouds of the +cañon are of this sort, massive, swelling cumuli, growing rapidly, +displaying delicious tones of purple and gray in the hollows of their +sun-beaten bosses, showering favored areas of the heated landscape, and +vanishing in an hour or two. Some, busy and thoughtful-looking, glide +with beautiful motion along the middle of the cañon in flocks, turning +aside here and there, lingering as if studying the needs of particular +spots, exploring side-cañons, peering into hollows like birds seeking +nest-places, or hovering aloft on outspread wings. They scan all the +red wilderness, dispensing their blessings of cool shadows and rain +where the need is the greatest, refreshing the rocks, their offspring +as well as the vegetation, continuing their sculpture, deepening gorges +and sharpening peaks. Sometimes, blending all together, they weave a +ceiling from rim to rim, perhaps opening a window here and there for +sunshine to stream through, suddenly lighting some palace or temple and +making it flare in the rain as if on fire. + +Sometimes, as one sits gazing from a high, jutting promontory, the sky +all clear, showing not the slightest wisp or penciling, a bright band +of cumuli will appear suddenly, coming up the cañon in single file, as +if tracing a well-known trail, passing in review, each in turn darting +its lances and dropping its shower, making a row of little vertical +rivers in the air above the big brown one. Others seem to grow from +mere points, and fly high above the cañon, yet following its course for +a long time, noiseless, as if hunting, then suddenly darting lightning +at unseen marks, and hurrying on. Or they loiter here and there as if +idle, like laborers out of work, waiting to be hired. + +Half a dozen or more showers may oftentimes be seen falling at once, +while far the greater part of the sky is in sunshine, and not a +raindrop comes nigh one. These thunder-showers from as many separate +clouds, looking like wisps of long hair, may vary greatly in effects. +The pale, faint streaks are showers that fail to reach the ground, +being evaporated on the way down through the dry, thirsty air, like +streams in deserts. Many, on the other hand, which in the distance seem +insignificant, are really heavy rain, however local; these are the gray +wisps well zigzagged with lightning. The darker ones are torrent rain, +which on broad, steep slopes of favorable conformation give rise to +so-called “cloudbursts”; and wonderful is the commotion they cause. The +gorges and gulches below them, usually dry, break out in loud uproar, +with a sudden downrush of muddy, boulder-laden floods. Down they all go +in one simultaneous gush, roaring like lions rudely awakened, each of +the tawny brood actually kicking up a dust at the first onset. + +During the winter months snow falls over all the high plateau, usually +to a considerable depth, whitening the rim and the roofs of the cañon +buildings. But last winter, when I arrived at Bright Angel in the +middle of January, there was no snow in sight, and the ground was dry, +greatly to my disappointment, for I had made the trip mainly to see the +cañon in its winter garb. Soothingly I was informed that this was an +exceptional season, and that the good snow might arrive at any time. +After waiting a few days, I gladly hailed a broad-browed cloud coming +grandly on from the west in big promising blackness, very unlike the +white sailors of the summer skies. Under the lee of a rim-ledge, with +another snow-lover, I watched its movements as it took possession of +the cañon and all the adjacent region in sight. Trailing its gray +fringes over the spiry tops of the great temples and towers, it +gradually settled lower, embracing them all with ineffable kindness and +gentleness of touch, and fondled the little cedars and pines as they +quivered eagerly in the wind like young birds begging their mothers to +feed them. The first flakes and crystals began to fly about noon, +sweeping straight up the middle of the cañon, and swirling in +magnificent eddies along the sides. Gradually the hearty swarms closed +their ranks, and all the cañon was lost in gray gloom except a short +section of the wall and a few trees beside us, which looked glad with +snow in their needles and about their feet as they leaned out over the +gulf. Suddenly the storm opened with magical effect to the north over +the cañon of Bright Angel Creek, inclosing a sunlit mass of the cañon +architecture, spanned by great white concentric arches of cloud like +the bows of a silvery aurora. Above these and a little back of them was +a series of upboiling purple clouds, and high above all, in the +background, a range of noble cumuli towered aloft like snow-laden +mountains, their pure pearl bosses flooded with sunshine. The whole +noble picture, calmly glowing, was framed in thick gray gloom, which +soon closed over it; and the storm went on, opening and closing until +night covered all. + +Two days later, when we were on a jutting point about eighteen miles +east of Bright Angel and one thousand feet higher, we enjoyed another +storm of equal glory as to cloud effects, though only a few inches of +snow fell. Before the storm began we had a magnificent view of this +grander upper part of the cañon and also of the Cocanini Forest and +Painted Desert. The march of the clouds with their storm-banners flying +over this sublime landscape was unspeakably glorious, and so also was +the breaking up of the storm next morning—the mingling of silver-capped +rock, sunshine, and cloud. + +Most tourists make out to be in a hurry even here; therefore their few +days or hours would be best spent on the promontories nearest the +hotel. Yet a surprising number go down the Bright Angel trail to the +brink of the inner gloomy granite gorge overlooking the river. Deep +cañons attract like high mountains; the deeper they are, the more +surely are we drawn into them. On foot, of course, there is no danger +whatever, and, with ordinary precautions, but little on animals. In +comfortable tourist faith, unthinking, unfearing, down go men, women, +and children on whatever is offered, horse, mule, or burro, as if +saying with Jean Paul, “fear nothing but fear”—not without reason, for +these cañon trails down the stairways of the gods are less dangerous +than they seem, less dangerous than home stairs. The guides are +cautious, and so are the experienced, much-enduring beasts. The +scrawniest Rosinantes and wizened-rat mules cling hard to the rocks +endwise or sidewise, like lizards or ants. From terrace to terrace, +climate to climate, down one creeps in sun and shade, through gorge and +gully and grassy ravine, and, after a long scramble on foot, at last +beneath the mighty cliffs one comes to the grand, roaring river. + +To the mountaineer the depth of the cañon, from five thousand to six +thousand feet, will not seem so very wonderful, for he has often +explored others that are about as deep. But the most experienced will +be awe-struck but the vast extent of strange, countersunk scenery, the +multitude of huge rock monuments of painted masonry built up in regular +courses towering above, beneath, and round about him. By the Bright +Angel trail the last fifteen hundred feet of the descent to the river +has to be made afoot down the gorge of Indian Garden Creek. Most of the +visitors do not like this part, and are content to stop at the end of +the horse-trail and look down on the dull-brown flood from the edge of +the Indian Garden Plateau. By the new Hance trail, excepting a few +daringly steep spots, you can ride all the way to the river, where +there is a good spacious camp-ground in a mesquit-grove. This trail, +built by brave Hance, begins on the highest part of the rim, eight +thousand feet above the sea, a thousand feet higher than the head of +Bright Angel trail, and the descent is a little over six thousand feet, +through a wonderful variety of climate and life. Often late in the +fall, when frosty winds are blowing and snow is flying at one end of +the trail, tender plants are blooming in balmy summer weather at the +other. The trip down and up can be made afoot easily in a day. In this +way one is free to observe the scenery and vegetation, instead of +merely clinging to his animal and watching its steps. But all who have +time should go prepared to camp awhile on the riverbank, to rest and +learn something about the plants and animals and the mighty flood +roaring past. In cool, shady amphitheaters at the head of the trail +there are groves of white silver fir and Douglas spruce, with ferns and +saxifrages that recall snowy mountains; below these, yellow pine, +nut-pine, juniper, hop-hornbeam, ash, maple, holly-leaved berberis, +cowania, spiraea, dwarf oak, and other small shrubs and trees. In dry +gulches and on taluses and sun-beaten crags are sparsely scattered +yuccas, cactuses, agave, etc. Where springs gush from the rocks there +are willow thickets, grassy flats, and bright flowery gardens, and in +the hottest recesses the delicate abronia, mesquit, woody compositae, +and arborescent cactuses. + +The most striking and characteristic part of this widely varied +vegetation are the cactaceae—strange, leafless, old-fashioned plants +with beautiful flowers and fruit, in every way able and admirable. +While grimly defending themselves with innumerable barbed spears, they +offer both food and drink to man and beast. Their juicy globes and +disks and fluted cylindrical columns are almost the only desert wells +that never go dry, and they always seem to rejoice the more and grow +plumper and juicier the hotter the sunshine and sand. Some are +spherical, like rolled-up porcupines, crouching in rock hollows beneath +a mist of gray lances, unmoved by the wildest winds. Others, standing +as erect as bushes and trees or tall branchless pillars crowned with +magnificent flowers, their prickly armor sparkling, look boldly abroad +over the glaring desert, making the strangest forests ever seen or +dreamed of. _Cereus giganteus_, the grim chief of the desert tribe, is +often thirty or forty feet high in southern Arizona. Several species of +tree yuccas in the same deserts, laden in early spring with superb +while lilies, form forests hardly less wonderful, though here they grow +singly or in small lonely groves. The low, almost stemless _Yucca +baccata_, with beautiful lily-flowers and sweet banana-like fruit, +prized by the Indians, is common along the cañon rim, growing on lean, +rocky soil beneath mountain-mahogany, nut-pines, and junipers, beside +dense flowery mats of _Spiraea caespitosa_ and the beautiful +pinnate-leaved _Spiraea millefolium_. The nut-pine, _Pinus edulis_, +scattered along the upper slopes and roofs of the cañon buildings, is +the principal tree of the strange Dwarf Cocanini Forest. It is a +picturesque stub of a pine about twenty-five feet high, usually-with +dead, lichened limbs thrust through its rounded head, and grows on +crags and fissured rock tables, braving heat and frost, snow and +drought, and continues patiently, faithfully fruitful for centuries. +Indians and insects and almost every desert bird and beast come to it +to be fed. + +To civilized people from corn and cattle and wheat-field countries the +cañon at first sight seems as uninhabitable as a glacier crevasse, +utterly silent and barren. Nevertheless it is the home of a multitude +of our fellow-mortals, men as well as animals and plants. Centuries ago +it was inhabited by tribes of Indians, who, long before Columbus saw +America, built thousands of stone houses in its crags, and large ones, +some of them several stories high, with hundreds of rooms, on the mesas +of the adjacent regions. Their cliff-dwellings, almost numberless, are +still to be seen in the cañon, scattered along both sides from top to +bottom and throughout its entire length, built of stone and mortar in +seams and fissures like swallows’ nests, or on isolated ridges and +peaks. The ruins of larger buildings are found on open spots by the +river, but most of them aloft on the brink of the wildest, giddiest +precipices, sites evidently chosen for safety from enemies, and +seemingly accessible only to the birds of the air. Many caves were also +used as dwelling-places, as were mere seams on cliff-fronts formed by +unequal weathering and with or without outer or side walls; and some of +them were covered with colored pictures of animals. The most +interesting of these cliff-dwellings had pathetic little ribbon-like +strips of garden on narrow terraces, where irrigating-water could be +carried to them—most romantic of sky-gardens, but eloquent of hard +times. + +In recesses along the river and on the first plateau flats above its +gorge were fields and gardens of considerable size, where +irrigating-ditches may still be traced. Some of these ancient gardens +are still cultivated by Indians, descendants of cliff dwellers, who +raise corn, squashes, melons, potatoes, etc., to reinforce the produce +of the many wild food-furnishing plants, nuts, beans, berries, yucca +and cactus fruits, grass and sunflower seeds, etc., and the flesh of +animals, deer, rabbits, lizards, etc. The cañon Indians I have met here +seem to be living much as did their ancestors, though not now driven +into rock dens. They are able, erect men, with commanding eyes, which +nothing that they wish to see can escape. They are never in a hurry, +have a strikingly measured, deliberate, bearish manner of moving the +limbs and turning the head, are capable of enduring weather, thirst, +hunger, and over-abundance, and are blessed with stomachs which triumph +over everything the wilderness may offer. Evidently their lives are not +bitter. + +The largest of the cañon animals one is likely to see is the wild +sheep, or Rocky Mountain bighorn, a most admirable beast, with limbs +that never fail, at home on the most nerve-trying precipices, +acquainted with all the springs and passes and broken-down jumpable +places in the sheer ribbon cliffs, bounding from crag to crag in easy +grace and confidence of strength, his great horns held high above his +shoulders, wild red blood beating and hissing through every fiber of +him like the wind through a quivering mountain pine. + +Deer also are occasionally met in the cañon, making their way to the +river when the wells of the plateau are dry. Along the short spring +streams beavers are still busy, as is shown by the cotton-wood and +willow timber they have cut and peeled, found in all the river +drift-heaps. In the most barren cliffs and gulches there dwell a +multitude of lesser animals, well-dressed, clear-eyed, happy little +beasts—wood-rats, kangaroo-rats, gophers, wood-mice, skunks, rabbits, +bob cats, and many others, gathering food, or dozing in their +sun-warmed dens. Lizards, too, of every kind and color are here +enjoying life on the hot cliffs, and making the brightest of them +brighter. + +Nor is there any lack of feathered people. The golden eagle may be +seen, and the osprey, hawks, jays, humming-birds, the mourning-dove, +and cheery familiar singers—the black-headed grosbeak, robin, bluebird, +Townsend’s thrush, and many warblers, sailing the sky and enlivening +the rocks and bushes through all the cañon wilderness. + +Here at Hance’s river camp or a few miles above it brave Powell and his +brave men passed their first night in the cañon on their adventurous +voyage of discovery thirty-three years ago. They faced a thousand +dangers, open or hidden, now in their boats gladly sliding down swift, +smooth reaches, now rolled over and over in back-combing surges of +rough, roaring cataracts, sucked under in eddies, swimming like +beavers, tossed and beaten like castaway drift—stout-hearted, +undaunted, doing their work through it all. After a month of this they +floated smoothly out of the dark, gloomy, roaring abyss into light and +safety two hundred miles below. As the flood rushes past us, +heavy-laden with desert mud, we naturally think of its sources, its +countless silvery branches outspread on thousands of snowy mountains +along the crest of the continent, and the life of them, the beauty of +them, their history and romance. Its topmost springs are far north and +east in Wyoming and Colorado, on the snowy Wind River, Front, Park, and +Sawatch ranges, dividing the two ocean waters, and the Elk, Wasatch, +Uinta, and innumerable spurs streaked with streams, made famous by +early explorers and hunters. It is a river of rivers—the Du Chesne, San +Rafael, Yampa, Dolores, Gunnison, Cotchetopa, Uncompahgre, Eagle, and +Roaring rivers, the Green and the Grand, and scores of others with +branches innumerable, as mad and glad a band as ever sang on mountains, +descending in glory of foam and spray from snow-banks and glaciers +through their rocky moraine-dammed, beaver-dammed channels. Then, all +emerging from dark balsam and pine woods and coming together, they +meander through wide, sunny park valleys, and at length enter the great +plateau and flow in deep cañons, the beginning of the system +culminating in this grand cañon of cañons. + +Our warm cañon camp is also a good place to give a thought to the +glaciers which still exist at the heads of the highest tributaries. +Some of them are of considerable size, especially those on the Wind +River and Sawatch ranges in Wyoming and Colorado. They are remnants of +a vast system of glaciers which recently covered the upper part of the +Colorado basin, sculptured its peaks, ridges, and valleys to their +present forms, and extended far out over the plateau region—how far I +cannot now say. It appears, therefore, that, however old the main trunk +of the Colorado may be, all its wide-spread upper branches and the +landscapes they flow through are new-born, scarce at all changed as yet +in any important feature since they first came to light at the close of +the glacial period. + +The so-called Grand Colorado Plateau, of which the Grand Cañon is only +one of its well-proportioned features, extends with a breadth of +hundreds of miles from the flanks of the Wasatch and Park Mountains to +the south of the San Francisco Peaks. Immediately to the north of the +deepest part of the cañon it rises in a series of subordinate plateaus, +diversified with green meadows, marshes, bogs, ponds, forests, and +grovy park valleys, a favorite Indian hunting-ground, inhabited by elk, +deer, beaver, etc. But far the greater part of the plateau is good +sound desert, rocky, sandy, or fluffy with loose ashes and dust, +dissected in some places into a labyrinth of stream-channel chasms like +cracks in a dry clay-bed, or the narrow slit crevasses of +glaciers,—blackened with lava-flows, dotted with volcanoes and +beautiful buttes, and lined with long continuous escarpments,—a vast +bed of sediments of an ancient sea-bottom, still nearly as level as +when first laid down after being heaved into the sky a mile or two +high. + +Walking quietly about in the alleys and byways of the Grand Cañon City, +we learn something of the way it was made; and all must admire effects +so great from means apparently so simple: rain striking light +hammer-blows or heavier in streams, with many rest Sundays; soft air +and light, gentle sappers and miners, toiling forever; the big river +sawing the plateau asunder, carrying away the eroded and ground waste, +and exposing the edges of the strata to the weather; rain torrents +sawing cross-streets and alleys, exposing the strata in the same way in +hundreds of sections, the softer, less resisting beds weathering and +receding faster, thus undermining the harder beds, which fall, not only +in small weathered particles, but in heavy sheer-cleaving masses, +assisted down from time to time by kindly earthquakes, rain torrents +rushing the fallen material to the river, keeping the wall rocks +constantly exposed. Thus the cañon grows wider and deeper. So also do +the side-cañons and amphitheaters, while secondary gorges and cirques +gradually isolate masses of the promontories, forming new buildings, +all of which are being weathered and pulled and shaken down while being +built, showing destruction and creation as one. We see the proudest +temples and palaces in stateliest attitudes, wearing their sheets of +detritus as royal robes, shedding off showers of red and yellow stones +like trees in autumn shedding their leaves, going to dust like +beautiful days to night, proclaiming as with the tongues of angels the +natural beauty of death. + +Every building is seen to be a remnant of once continuous beds of +sediments—sand and slime on the floor of an ancient sea, and filled +with the remains of animals, and that every particle of the sandstones +and limestones of these wonderful structures was derived from other +landscapes, weathered and rolled and ground in the storms and streams +of other ages. And when we examine the escarpments, hills, buttes, and +other monumental masses of the plateau on either side of the cañon, we +discover that an amount of material has been carried off in the general +denudation of the region compared with which even that carried away in +the making of the Grand Cañon is as nothing. Thus each wonder in sight +becomes a window through which other wonders come to view. In no other +part of this continent are the wonders of geology, the records of the +world’s auld lang syne, more widely opened, or displayed in higher +piles. The whole cañon is a mine of fossils, in which five thousand +feet of horizontal strata are exposed in regular succession over more +than a thousand square miles of wall-space, and on the adjacent plateau +region there is another series of beds twice as thick, forming a grand +geological library—a collection of stone books covering thousands of +miles of shelving tier on tier conveniently arranged for the student. +And with what wonderful scriptures are their pages filled—myriad forms +of successive floras and faunas, lavishly illustrated with colored +drawings, carrying us back into the midst of the life of a past +infinitely remote. And as we go on and on, studying this old, old life +in the light of the life beating warmly about us, we enrich and +lengthen our own. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 12298 *** |