by the edge of the
river to look at the water and listen to its roar. Heavy shadows settled
in the canon as the sun passed behind the cliffs, and no glint of light
remained on the crags above, but the waves were crested with a white
that seemed luminous. A great fall broke at the foot of a block of
limestone fifty feet high, and rolled back in immense billows. Over the
sunken rocks the flood was heaped up into mounds and even cones. The
tumult was extraordinary. At a point where the rocks were very near the
surface the water was thrown up ten or fifteen feet, and fell back in
gentle curves as in a fountain.

On August 3d the party traversed a canon of diversified features. The
walls were still vertical in places, especially near the bends, and the
river sweeping round the capes had undermined the cliffs. Sometimes the
rocks overarched: again curious narrow glens were found. The men
explored the glens, in one of which they discovered a natural stairway
several hundred feet high leading to a spring which burst out from an
overhanging cliff among aspens and willows, while along the edges of the
brooklet there were oaks and other rich vegetation. There were also many
side-canons with walls nearer to each other above than below, giving
them the character of grottoes; and there were carved walls, arches,
alcoves and monuments, to all of which the collective name of Glen Canon
was given.

One morning the surveyors came to a point where the river filled the
entire channel and the walls were sheer to the water's edge. They saw a
fall below, and in order to inspect it they pulled up against one of the
cliffs, in which was a little shelf or crevice a few feet above their
heads. One man stood on the deck of the boat while another climbed over
his shoulders into this insecure foothold, along which they passed until
it became a shelf which was broken by a chasm some yards farther on.
They then returned to the boat and pulled across the stream for some
logs which had lodged on the opposite shore, and with which it was
intended to bridge the gulf. It was no easy work hauling the wood along
the fissure, but with care and patience they accomplished it, and
reached a point in the cliffs from which the falls could be seen. It
seemed practicable to lower the boats over the stormy waters by holding
them with ropes from the cliffs; and this was done successfully, the
incident illustrating how laborious their progress sometimes became.

The