32 
THE GHAND (JAST(JN DISTRICT. 
from 4,000 to 5,000 feet in thickness. Around the western and southern 
flanks of the Markdgunt, and just beneath the summit platform, they oc- 
cupy a belt varying in width from 4 to 10 miles. Around the Paunsdgunt 
their relative positions and relations are quite the same. But as we pass 
eastward into the great amphitheater of the Paria Valley they at length 
take the form of cliffs of very striking aspect. The numerous ledges rise 
in quick succession, step by step, from the valley bottom to the base of the 
Eocene mass of Table Cliff, which stands as a glorious Parthenon upon 
the summit of a vast Acropolis. The many superposed cliflPs which consti- 
tute this stairway are severally of moderate dimensions, but their cumula- 
tive altitude is more than 4,000 feet, tier above tier, and their composite or 
multiple effect, intensified by the exceeding sharpness of the infinite details 
of repetitive sculpture, places it among the grander spectacles of the Pla- 
teau country. In their coloring, these cliffs are quite peculiar. There are 
no red, purple, orange, and chocolate hues, such as prevail in other forma- 
tions, but pale yellow and light brown in the sandstones and blue-gra}^ to 
dark iron-gray in the heavy belts of shale. The tones are very light and 
brilliant on the whole, the darker belts playing the part of a foil which aug- 
ments rather than diminishes their luminosity. 
In the region which lies west of the Markdgunt the Cretaceous occurs in 
much the same manner as the Eocene. Like the latter formation, it is here 
a marginal belt skirting the Mesozoic mainland of the Great Basin. Only 
remnants of it have been spared. The country where they occur is a part 
of the sierra region, and it has been greatly shattered and distorted by 
movements of the same character as those which hoisted the Basin ranges 
and which warped and tilted their strata. Erosion, acting upon these 
masses, wasted them enormously, and wherever we find the Cretaceous we 
perceive that its preservation has been due to a mere accident of the posi- 
tion in which tliese displacements have left it or to the protection of some 
great volcanic overflow. 
In the terraces of the High Plateaus the entire Cretaceous system is 
preserved as a step in the stairway; but it has no outliers. It projects 
southward from beneath the Eocene Cliffs and is in its turn cut off. Beyond 
