198 EXPLORATION OF THE CANONS OF THE COLOEADO. 
who first studied tliis region, in his report on the geology of the country 
which he visited, says: " Having this question constantly in mind, and 
examining, with all possible care, the structure of the great canons which 
we entered, I everywhere found evidence of the exclusive action of water 
in their formation. The opposite sides of the deepest chasm showed perfect 
correspondence of stratification, conforming to the general dip, and nowhere 
displacement; and the bottom rock, so often dry and bare, was perhaps 
deeply eroded, but continuous, from side to side, a portion of the yet 
undivided series lying below." 
Professor Newberry saw the great canon region which I have described 
only on its southern border, but where the canon features are developed on 
the grandest scale. My own observations overlap his, and extend to the 
north many hundreds of miles; and during the last six years I have 
explored many thousands of miles of canons, and everywhere the facts 
observed confirm Professor Newberry's conclusions, as stated above. 
Though the entire region has been folded and faulted on a grand scale, 
these displacements have never determined the course of the streams. The 
canons are seen to cut across them, either directly or obliquely, here and 
there, and in a few instances, I have observed canons to follow the course 
of faults for a short distance. They have also been observed to run back 
and forth across a fault; but such instances are surprisingly rare. In all 
the canons where the streams are not so large as to cover the bottom, 
the continuity of the strata below has been apparent; and in the canons 
traversed by the larger streams, the beds on either side have been found at 
the same altitude; and if it is supposed that these water-ways were deter 
mined by fissures, then such fissures were made without displacement, and 
did not extend to the depths now reached by the streams. If it is possible 
to conceive of such fissures, they must have been quite narrow; in fact, the 
whole supposition is evidently absurd. All the facts concerning the relation 
of the water-ways of this region to the mountains, hills, canons, and cliffs, 
lead to the inevitable conclusion that the system of drainage was determined 
antecedent to the faulting, and folding, and erosion, which are observed, and 
antecedent, also, to the formation of the eruptive beds and cones. 
