with Lee to Kanab, and two days later
we were relieved to see some of our men arrive with a large amount of
supplies and mail. We then waited for the coming of Powell and Thompson
with the others, when we were to cast off and run the gauntlet of the
Grand Canyon.

CHAPTER XIII

A Canyon through Marble--Multitudinous Rapids--Running the
Sockdologer--A Difficult Portage, Rising Water, and a Trap--The Dean
Upside Down--A Close Shave--Whirlpools and Fountains--The Kanab Canyon
and the End of the Voyage.

By referring to the relief map opposite page 41, the mouth of the Paria
is seen a trifle more than half-way up the right-hand side. The walls of
Glen Canyon here recede from the river and become on the south the Echo
Cliffs, taking the name from the Echo Peaks which form their beginning,
and on the north the Vermilion Cliffs, so called by Powell because of
their bright red colour. The latter, and the canyon of the Paria, make
the edges of the great mesa called the Paria Plateau, and, running on
north to the very head of the Kaibab uplift, strike off south-westerly
to near Pipe Spring, where they turn and run in a north-west direction
to the Virgen River. Between the receding lines of these cliffs, at the
Paria, is practically the head of the Grand Canyon. The river at once
begins an attack on the underlying strata, and the resulting canyon,
while at first not more than two hundred feet deep, rapidly increases
this depth, as the strata run up and the river runs down. The canyon
is narrow, and seen from a height resembles, as previously mentioned, a
dark serpent lying across a plain. As the formation down to the Little
Colorado is mainly a fine-grained grey marble, Powell concluded to call
this division by a separate name, and gave it the title it now bears,
Marble Canyon. There is no separation between Marble Canyon and the
following one, the Grand Canyon, except the narrow gorge of the Little
Colorado, so that topographically the chasm which begins at the Paria,
ends at the Grand Wash, a distance of 283 miles, as the river runs, the
longest, deepest, and altogether most magnificent example of the canyon
formation to be found on the globe. With an average depth of about four
thousand feet, it reaches for long stretches between five thousand and
six thousand. At the Paria (Lee's Ferry) the altitude above the sea is
3170 feet, while at the end of the canyon, the Grand Wash, the elevation
is only 840 feet. The declivity