90 
THE GEAND CA??()N DI.STEIOT. 
grist-mill ; yet we know it is a stream three or four hundred feet wide. Its 
surface looks as motionless as a lake seen from a distant mountain-top. We 
know it is a rushing' torrent. The ear is strained to hear the roar of its 
waters and catches it faintly at intervals as the eddying breezes waft it up- 
wards; but the sound seems exhausted by the distance. We perceive dimly 
a mottling of light and shadow upon the surface of the stream, and the 
flecks move with a barely pei’ceptible cloud-like motion. They are the 
fields of white foam lashed up at the foot of some cataract and sailing 
swiftly onward. 
Perhaps the first notion of the reality is gained v^hen we look across 
the abyss to the opposite crest-line. It seems as if a strong, nervous arm 
could hurl a stone against the opposing wall-face ; but in a moment we 
catch sight of vegetation growing upon the very brink. There are trees in 
scattered groves which we might at first have mistaken for sage or desert 
furze. Here at length we have a stadium or standard of comparison which 
serves for the mind much the same purpose as a man standing at the base 
of one of the sequoias of the Mariposa grove. And now the real magni- 
tudes begin to unfold themselves, and as the attention is held firmW ihe 
mind grows restive under the increasing burden. Every time the eye 
ranges up or down its face it seems more distant and more vast. At length 
we recoil, overburdered with the perceptions already attained and yet half 
vexed at the inadequacy of our faculties to comprehend more. 
The magnitude of the chasm, however, is by no means the most im- 
pressive element of its character ; nor is the inner gorge the most impressive 
of its constituent parts. The thoughtful mind is far more deeply moved by 
the splendor and grace of Nature’s architecture. Forms so new to the 
culture of civilized races and so strongly contrasted Avith those which have 
been the ideals of tliirty generations of \Adiite men cannot indeed be appre- 
ciated after the study of a single hour or day. The first conception of them 
may not be a pleasing one. They ma)^ seem merely abnormal, curious, 
and even grotesque. But he who fancies that Nature has exhausted her 
wealth of beauty in other lands strangely underestimates her A^ersatility and 
power. In this far-off desert are forms Avhich surprise us b}^ their unaccus- 
tomed character. We find at first no place for them in the range of oui' 
