man-fully, with abysmal
furtive yawns; but the skirmish between the conductor and their
fellow-passenger came as a sort of godsend, and when the transfer of
a dollar bill, incredibly dirty and greasy and tattered, had brought
warfare to a close, they still had the voluntary exile to stare at. He
was a welcome change from scenery, and they stared hard.

He was a city man to look at, and had the garb of cities--tall silk hat,
well worn, but well brushed; frock-coat in similar condition; dark-gray
trousers, a little trodden at the heels; patent-leather boots; high
collar; silken scarf. Everything he wore was slightly shabby, except his
linen; but a millionaire who was disposed to be careless about his dress
might have gone so attired. People had a habit of looking twice at this
passenger, for he bore an air of being somebody; but the universal stare
which fastened on him as the train steamed away was the result of his
intent to deliver himself (at evident caprice) at a place so lonely, and
so curiously out of accord with his own aspect. What was a clean-shaven
man of cities, with silk hat, and frock-coat, and patent leathers, doing
at Beaver Tail, in the heart of the Rocky Mountains? Why had he suddenly
decided to stay there, of all places in the world? And why had he made
up his mind without having so much as seen the place? These questions
kept the occupants of the observation car in better talk than scenery
long after the lonely passenger had landed, and long after the last wail
of the engine had sounded in his ears.

If he had come here in search of landscape splendours, he might have
had his fill at once. The railside shanty stood at a height of some four
thousand feet above sea-level, but the mountains heaved vast shoulders
and white heads about him.

Below, in the tremendous gorge, a torrent ran recklessly, tearing at its
rocky confines with raging hands, and crying out in many voices like a
multitude bent on some deed of vengeance--hurrying, delaying, turning
on itself, maddening itself. Its bellowing seemed a part of universal
silence. Silence brooded here, alone, with those wild voices for an
emphasis.

Right and left the gorge swept out into dreadful magnificences of height
and depth, and glow and shadow. Cliffs of black basalt, scarred and
riven by the accidents of thousands of years, frowned like eyeless giant
faces. One height, with a supernal leap, had risen from the highest,
and stood poised a mile alof