THE AMPHITHEATEES OF THE KAIBAB. 
175 
OTTOMAN AMPHITHEATER. 
It is one of the first order of magnitude with several branches, and 
about as grand as any. It is notable for its magnificent display of buttes. 
These wonderful structures seem to grow more picturesque, more ornate, 
and more numerous as we approach the head of the Grand Canon, and, 
though none of them are of such vast dimensions as Shiva’s Temple, they 
are still of enormous magnitude and much more elaborately designed and 
more sumptuously carved. Perhaps the butte-work has it climax here, 
though it is well developed everywhere in the Kaibab division. The 
faqades are exceedingly tortuous and full of great alcoves. The lavish 
wealth of this kind of display is its most remarkable feature. Very im- 
pressive, too, are the branch amphitheaters. These features are more simple 
and concentrated when considered by themselves than the panoramic spec- 
tacles in the principal amphitheaters or in the central chasm. In truth it is 
difficult to suggest anything which appeals more strongly to the sense of 
magnitude and at the same time satisfies it more completely than the down- 
ward look into one of these vast chambers of the second or third order. 
The Transept is perhaps the most perfect and pleasing of them all, but 
there are many others which fall short of it only in an immaterial degree. 
There are several fine ones in the Ottoman Amphitheater, and one especially 
which is even larger than the Transept and only a little less perfect in exe- 
cution. The simplicity of the work, its symmetry, the definiteness of pro- 
file, the sustained character, arouse the mind at once, and the magnitude 
of it can be appreciated the more fully because the attention is not dis- 
tracted by an endless number of objects, all of which are about equally 
impressive. 
We can easily spend a whole day skirting the branches of the Ottoman 
Amphitheater without halting to contenqolate anj^thing in detail, but merely 
viewing them as we pass It is much smaller than the Tapeats or Shinumo, 
and a little smaller than the Hindoo or Bright Angel, but larger than several 
others of which no mention can here be made. The circuit of any one of 
these mighty recesses is a long, arduous day’s journey by the shortest pos- 
