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 canons
of every color, sheer-walled and deep, all of which seem to be represented
in this one grand canon of canons.

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
canons 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-canons--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