A Canyon Voyage Part 7

All night the rain fell but our shelters kept us dry and every one had a good rest. When the morning of September 8th dawned clear and bracing we met it with good spirits, though the spirits of our party seldom varied no matter what the circ.u.mstances, and every man took as much personal interest in the success of the expedition as if he were entirely responsible for it.

In order that Beaman might take some pictures and the topographers get notes, no move was made. Prof. climbed out obtaining a wide view in all directions and securing valuable data. I also went up on the cliffs and made a pencil sketch, and in the afternoon we explored a peculiar three-mouthed side canyon across the river. Three canyons came together at their mouths and we called the place Trin Alcove. Prof. and the Major walked up it some distance and then sent for Beaman to come to photograph. At nightfall rain began once more, and the shelters were again erected over the oars. Another morning came fair and we went on leaving Beaman to finish up views and the _Nell_ crew for other work. As we proceeded we would occasionally halt to wait but it was noon before they overtook us. Rain had begun before this and continued at intervals during the dinner stop. As soon as we started we ran into a heavy downpour and while pulling along in the midst of this our boat ran on a sand-bar and got so far and fast aground that it required all ten men to get her off, the other crews walking in the water to where we were, as the shoal was very wide. While thus engaged a beautiful colour effect developed softly before us through an opalescent, vaporous shroud. The sun came forth with brilliant power upon the retreating mists creating a clear, luminous, prismatic bow ahead of us arching in perfect symmetry from foot to foot of the glistening walls, while high above it resting each end on the first terraces a second one equally distinct bridged the chasm; and, exactly where these gorgeous rainbows touched the rocks, roaring rain cascades leaped down to add their charm to the enchanting picture.

We were now at the beginning of a very long loop of the river, which we named Bow-knot Bend. Just at the start of this great turn we camped with a record for the whole day of 15-1/8 miles. Steward found some fragments of pottery. The next morning we remained here till ten for views, and then we left Beaman on the summit of the low dividing ridge, where one could look into the river on either side and see a point which we rowed more than five miles to reach.[15] On the right bank we stopped for dinner, and when it was about ready several of us crossed, and, helping Beaman down with his heavy boxes, ferried him to our side. The opposite bank was no more than one thousand feet in a straight line from our starting-place of the morning. Instead of now going on, a halt was made, because Steward, prowling around after his custom, had found some fossils that were important and he wanted more. The Major, with Jack, crossed the river for further geological investigations, while Prof. and Jones started to climb out, though the prospect was not encouraging.

They ascended over rock, strangely eroded by water into caverns and holes, then along a ledge till Jones, being a taller man than Prof., got up and pulled Prof. after him with his revolver belt. They obtained a remarkable view. b.u.t.tes, ridges, mountains stood all round, with the river so completely lost in the abruptness of its chasm that a mile from the brink the whole region was apparently solid, and the existence of the gorge with a river at bottom would not even be suspected. They could trace the line of Grand River by tower-like b.u.t.tes and long ridges, and just at the gap formed by the junction with the Green a blue mountain arose. The Sierra La Sal, too, could be seen lying on the horizon like blue clouds. "Weird and wild, barren and ghost-like, it seemed like an unknown world," said Prof. The country was a vast plateau similar to the one through which the Canyon of Desolation is carved, that is tilting northward and increasing in alt.i.tude towards the south, so that as the river runs on its canyon becomes deeper from this cause as well as its cutting. These great terraces sloping to the north were not before understood. They terminate on the south in vertical cliffs through which the river emerges abruptly. From such features as these the Major named this the Plateau Province. The cliffs terminating each plateau form intricate escarpments, meandering for many miles, and they might be likened to a series of irregular and complicated steps. Occasional high b.u.t.tes and mountain ma.s.ses break the surface, but in general the whole area forming the major part of the basin of the Colorado may be described as a plateau country--a land of mesas, cliffs, and canyons.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Labyrinth Canyon--Bowknot Bend.

The Great Loop Is behind the Spectator.

Photograph by E. O. Beaman, 1871.]

The next day, September 11th, we were on the river at 7.30, and ran about seven miles on smooth water before we stopped for a mid-day rest and dinner on the right bank, as well as to enable Beaman to take some views he desired. Another three miles and we halted again for geologising and for photographs, while Prof., taking Andy in his boat, went ahead to establish a camp somewhere below for the night, in order that we would not be so late getting supper. The days were now growing short, and supper by firelight was a common thing. Rain soon began again and put a stop to the work, driving us forward between the scores of cascades which soon began to leap anew from every height to the river.

At one place a waterfall shot out from behind an arch set against the wall, making a singular but beautiful effect, and revealing to us one method by which some of the arches are formed. The place Prof. had selected for camp was reached almost the same time that he got there. It was on the left among the greasewood bushes, and there we put up our paulins for shelter on oars as before. We had made about fifteen miles.

The walls receded from the river, forming what the Major named the Orange Cliffs, and were much broken, while the back country could be seen in places from our boats. Scores, hundreds, mult.i.tudes of b.u.t.tes of bare rock of all shapes and sizes were in sight, and one was called the b.u.t.te of the Cross, because it suggested a cross lying down from one position, though from another it was seen to be in reality two distinct ma.s.ses. Here ended Labyrinth Canyon according to the Major's decision.

We credited it with a length of 62-1/2 miles. Although winding through an extremely arid country, it had for us been a place of rain and waterfalls, and even though rapids were absent we had been nevertheless kept rather wet.

There was not much change in structure between Labyrinth Canyon and the following one of the series, Stillwater. The interval was one of lowered, much broken walls, well back from the river, leaving wide bottom lands on the sides. We went ahead in the morning on quiet water for seven or eight miles, and stopped on a high bank for dinner and for examinations. Prof., Cap., Steward, and the Major climbed out. Steward got separated from the others by trying to reach a rather distant b.u.t.te, and when he tried to rejoin us he had considerable difficulty in doing so. For half an hour he searched for a place to get down, and we looked for one also from the bottom, and finally he was compelled to go down half a mile farther, where he made the descent only to find himself in a dense jungle of rose-bushes, willows, and other plants. We had to cut a way in to relieve him. The luxuriant growth of these plants seemed to indicate that the barrenness of the plateau was due not so much to aridity as to the peculiar rock formation, which, disintegrating easily under the frosts and rains, prevented the acc.u.mulation of soil. The soil was washed away by every rain and carried by thousands of cataracts into the river. Only when the country reaches the "base level of erosion," as the Major called it, would vegetation succeed in holding its place; that is when the declivity of the surrounding region became reduced till the rain torrents should lack the velocity necessary to transport any great load of detritus, and the disintegrated material would acc.u.mulate, give a footing to plants, and thus further protect itself and the rocks.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Stillwater Canyon.

Photograph by E. O. Beaman, 1871.]

The Major and Prof. now decided to use up all the photographic material between this point and the Dirty Devil, and leave one boat at the latter place till the next season, when a party would come in for it and take it down to the Paria. We would be obliged to examine the Dirty Devil region then in any event. Three miles below our dinner camp we arrived at a remarkably picturesque bend, and on the outer circ.u.mference we made our sixtieth camp, but so late that supper was eaten by firelight. The bend was named by Beaman "Bonito," and in the morning he made a number of views. The bottom lands along the river had evidently been utilised by the aboriginal inhabitants for farming, as fragments of pottery occasionally found indicated their presence here in former days. It was afternoon when we pushed off and left Bonito Bend behind. After a few miles the Major and Prof. tried to climb out, but they failed. A buff sandstone, resting on red shale, was vertical for about 140 feet everywhere and could not be surmounted. Above this stood another vertical wall of five hundred feet, an orange coloured sandstone, in which no break was apparent. These walls closed in on the river, leaving barely a margin in many places. There were few landings, the current, rather swift and smooth, swirling along the foot of the rocks, which rose vertically for 250 feet and were about four hundred feet apart. As the evening came on we could find no place to stop that offered room enough for a camp, and we drifted on and on till almost dark, when we discovered a patch of soil on the right that would give us sufficient s.p.a.ce. The 13th of September happened to be my birthday, and Andy had promised to stew a mess of dried apples in celebration. This does not sound like a tremendous treat, but circ.u.mstances give the test.

Our supply of rations being limited and now running low, Andy for some time had been curbing our appet.i.tes. Stewed dried apples were granted about once a week, and boiled beans were an equal luxury. It was consequently a disappointment not to get the promised extra allowance of apples on this occasion. Not only was the hour late, but there was little wood to be had, though diligent raking around produced enough driftwood to cook our supper of bacon, coffee, and bread. Our camp was beneath an overhanging cliff about six hundred feet high, and the walls near us were so heavily coated with salt that it could be broken off in chunks anywhere. The quarters were not roomy, but we got a good sleep.

In the morning before he was fairly awake Steward discovered fossils in the rocks over his head, and we remained till one o'clock in order that an investigation could be made. He collected about a peck of fine specimens. When we started again the canyon was so interesting, particularly to the geologists, that we stopped several times in a run of five miles between vertical walls not over six hundred feet apart.

Camp was finally made on the right in a sort of alcove, with a level fertile bottom of several acres, where the ancients had grown corn.

Evidences of their former life here were numerous. Steward, climbing on the cliffs, suddenly gave a loud shout, announcing a discovery. He had found two small huts built into the rocks. Several of us went up to look at them. They were of great age and so small that they could have been only storage places. Withered and hardened corncobs were found within them.

On returning to camp we learned that the Major had found some larger house ruins on a terrace some distance up the river. Around the camp-fire that evening he told us something about the Shinumos, as he called them, who long ago had inhabited this region, and in imagination we now beheld them again climbing the cliffs or toiling at their agriculture in the small bottom land.

At daylight Steward, Clem, and I went up to the ruins, which stood on a terrace projecting in such a way that a clear view could be had up and down the river. There were two houses built of stone slabs, each about 13 15 feet, and about six feet of wall were still standing. Thirty feet or more below ran the river, and there were remains of an old stairway leading down through a crevice to the river, but too much disintegrated for us to descend. These were the first ruins of the kind I had ever seen, and I was as much interested in them as I afterwards was in the Colosseum.

Prof., being desirous of arriving as speedily as possible at the junction of the Grand with the Green, which was now not far off, for the purpose of getting an observation for time, left us at seven o'clock and proceeded in advance, while the remainder of the party turned their attention to the locality where we were. We could see traces of an old trail up the cliffs, and the Major, Jack, Andy, and Jones started to follow this out. With the aid of ropes taken along and stones piled up, as well as a cottonwood pole that had been placed as a ladder by the ancients, they succeeded in reaching the summit. Clem and I went back to the large house ruins for a re-examination, and looked over the quant.i.ties of broken arrowheads of jasper and the potsherds strewing the place in search of specimens of value. On the return trip of the climbers Andy discovered an earthen jar, fifteen inches high and about twelve inches in diameter, of the "pinched-coil" type, under a sheltering rock, covered by a piece of flat stone, where it had rested for many a decade if not for a century. It contained a small coil of split-willow, such as is used in basketry, tied with cord of aboriginal make. Some one had placed it there for a few moments.

After dinner we continued down the canyon, taking the pot with us. The walls were nearly vertical on both sides, or at any rate appeared so to us from the boats, and they often came straight into the water, with here and there a few willows. They were not more than 450 feet apart.

No rapids troubled us, and the current was less than three miles an hour, but we seemed to be going swiftly even without rowing. After about seven miles the trend of the chasm became easterly, and we saw the mouth of the Grand, the Junction, that hidden mystery which, unless we count D. Julien, only nine white men, the Major's first party, had ever seen before us. The Grand entered through a canyon similar to that of the Green, all the immediate walls being at least 800 feet and the summit of the plateau about 1500 feet above the river. On the right was a small bench, perhaps one-third of a mile long and several rods wide, fringed by a sand-bank, on which we found the crew of the _Nell_ established in Camp 62. Between the two rivers was another footing of about two acres, bearing several hackberry trees, and it was on this bank up the Grand River side that the first party camped. Across on the east sh.o.r.e we could see still another strip with some bushes, but there was no more horizontal land to be found here. The two rivers blended gracefully on nearly equal terms, and the doubled volume started down with reckless impetuosity. This was the end of Stillwater Canyon, with a length of 42-3/4 miles. At last we had finished the canyons of the Green, with every boat in good condition and not a man injured in any way, and now we stood before the grim jaws of the Colorado. Our descent from Gunnison Crossing was 215 feet, with not a rapid that was worth recording, and from the Union Pacific crossing in feet, 2215, and in miles, 539. The alt.i.tude of the Junction is 3860 feet above sea-level.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 13: In fact there was only one practicable place, El Vado de los Padres, and that was difficult. The alternative would have been to cross Arizona south of the Colorado. By this Gunnison Crossing route there were better wood, water, and gra.s.s to compensate for distance.]

[Footnote 14: It is here that the Denver and Rio Grande railway crossed, bridging the river in 1883. From here also the Brown Expedition started in May, 1889, and the Best Expedition in 1891.]

[Footnote 15: Many years afterward on a rock face half-way round this bend the inscription, D. Julien 1836 3 Mai, was found. The same inscription was also found in two other places just below the mouth of Grand River and near the end of Cataract Canyon.]

CHAPTER IX

A Wonderland of Crags and Pinnacles--Poverty Rations--Fast and Furious Plunging Waters--Boulders Boom along the Bottom--Chilly Days and Shivering--A Wild Tumultuous Chasm--A Bad Pa.s.sage by Twilight and a Tornado with a Picture Moonrise--Out of one Canyon into Another--At the Mouth of the Dirty Devil at Last.

We were on the threshold of what the Major had previously named Cataract Canyon, because the declivity within it is so great and the water descends with such tremendous velocity and continuity that he thought the term rapid failed to interpret the conditions. The addition of the almost equal volume of the Grand--indeed it was now a little greater owing to extra heavy rains along its course--doubled the depth and velocity of the river till it swirled on into the new canyon before us with a fierce, threatening intensity, sapping the flat sand-bank on which our camp was laid and rapidly eating it away. Large ma.s.ses with a sudden splash would drop out of sight and dissolve like sugar in a cup of tea. We were obliged to be on the watch lest the moorings of the boats should be loosened, allowing them to sweep pell-mell before us down the gorge. The long ropes were carried back to their limit and made fast to stakes driven deep into the hard sand. Jack and I became dissatisfied with the position of our boat and dropped it down two or three hundred yards to a place where the conditions were better, and camped by it. There were a few small cottonwoods against the cliff behind the sand-bank, but they were too far off to be reached by our lines, and the ground beneath them was too irregular and rocky for a camp. These trees, with the hackberry trees across the river and numerous stramonium bushes in full blossom, composed the chief vegetation of this extraordinary locality. No more remote place existed at that time within the United States--no place more difficult of access. Macomb in his reconnaissance in 1859 had tried hard to arrive here, but he got no nearer than the edge of the plateau about thirty miles up Grand River.

It was necessary that we should secure topographic notes and observations from the summit, and we scanned the surroundings for the most promising place for exit. The Major was sure we could make a successful ascent to the upper regions by way of a narrow cleft on the right or west some distance back up the Green, which he had noted as we came along; so in the morning of Sat.u.r.day, September 16th, he and Jack, Beaman, Clem, Jones, and I rowed up in the _Canonita_, the current being slow along the west bank, and started up the crevice, dragging the c.u.mbrous photographic outfit along. Prof. remained below for observations for time. The cleft was filled with fallen rocks, and we had no trouble mounting, except that the photographic boxes were like lead and the straps across one's chest made breathing difficult. The climb was tiring, but there was no obstacle, and we presently emerged on the surface of the country 1300 feet above the river and 5160 above the sea. Here was revealed a wide cyclorama that was astounding. Nothing was in sight but barren sandstone, red, yellow, brown, grey, carved into an amazing mult.i.tude of towers, b.u.t.tes, spires, pinnacles, some of them several hundred feet high, and all shimmering under a dazzling sun. It was a marvellous mighty desert of bare rock, chiselled by the ages out of the foundations of the globe; fantastic, extraordinary, antediluvian, labyrinthian, and slashed in all directions by crevices; crevices wide, crevices narrow, crevices medium, some shallow, some dropping till a falling stone clanked resounding into the far hollow depths. Scarcely could we travel a hundred yards but we were compelled to leap some deep, dark crack. Often they were so wide a running jump was necessary, and at times the smooth rock sloped on both sides toward the crevice rather steeply. Once the Major came sliding down a bare slope till at a point where he caught sight of the edge of a sombre fissure just where he must land. He could not see its width; he could not return, and there he hung. Luckily I was where by another path I could quickly reach the rock below, and I saw that the crevice was not six inches wide, and I shouted the joyful news. Steward had not come up with us, but had succeeded in ascending through a narrow crevice below camp. He soon arrived within speaking distance, but there he was foiled by a crack too wide to jump, and he had to remain a stranger to us the rest of the day.

At a little distance back from the brink these crevices were not so numerous nor so wide, and there we discovered a series of extremely pretty "parks" lost amidst the million turreted rocks. I made a pencil sketch looking out into this Sinav-to-weap, as the Major called it from information obtained from the Utes.[16] Beaman secured a number of photographs, but not all that were desired, and, as we did not have rations for stopping on the summit, we went back to camp and made the climb again the next day. Fortunately the recent rains had filled many hollows in the bare rock, forming pockets of delicious, pure water, where we could drink, but on a hot and dry summer's day travelling here would be intolerable, if not impossible. Fragments of arrow-heads, chips of chalcedony, and quant.i.ties of potsherds scattered around proved that our ancient Shinumos had known the region well. Doubtless some of their old trails would lead to large and deep water-pockets. There are pot-holes in this bare sandstone of enormous size, often several feet in depth and of similar diameter, which become filled with rain-water that lasts a long time. The Shinumos had numerous dwellings all through this country, with trails leading from place to place, highways and byways.

The following day the Major and Jones climbed out on the side opposite camp, that is on the east side, where they found an old trail and evidences of camping during the summer just closed, probably by the Utes. That night, Jones, in attempting to enter our boat in the moonlight, stepped on the corner of the hatch of the middle cabin, which was not on securely; it tipped, and he was thrown in such a way as to severely injure his leg below the knee. This was the first mishap thus far to any one of the party.

The Major entertained some idea of making a boat trip up the Grand, but he abandoned it, and we prepared for the work ahead. The rations, which were now fallen to poverty bulk, were carefully overhauled and evenly distributed among the boats, so that the wrecking of any one would not deprive us of more than a portion of each article. The amount for daily use was also determined; of the bacon we were to have at a meal only half the usual quant.i.ty. We knew Cataract Canyon was rough, but by this time we were in excellent training and thoroughly competent for the kind of navigation required; ready for anything that strong boats like ours could live through. At ten o'clock on Tuesday, September 19th, the cabins were all packed, the life preservers were inflated, and casting off from Camp 62 we were borne down with the swift current. The water was muddy, of a coffee-and-cream colour, and the river was falling. Not far below our camp we saw a beaten trail coming down a singular canyon on the left or east side, showing again that the natives understood the way in to the Junction.[17] We knew it was not far to rapids, as we had seen two heavy ones from the brink above, and we soon heard the familiar roar of plunging water, a sound which had been absent since the end of Gray Canyon. Presently we were bearing down on the first one, looking for the way to pa.s.s it. On landing at the head it was seen to be a rather rough place, and it was deemed advisable to avoid running it. The boats were carefully let down by lines and we went on. In a short distance we reached a second rapid, where we decided to repeat the operation that took us past the other, but these two let-downs consumed much time and gave us hard work. The water was cold, we were wet and hungry, and when we arrived at a third that was more forbidding than the ones above we halted for dinner at its beginning. The muddy water boomed and plunged over innumerable rocks--a mad, irresistible flood. So great was the declivity of the river bed that boulders were rolled along under water with a sound like distant thunder. We had noticed this also in Lodore, but in Cataract it was more common. The rumbling was particularly noticeable if one were standing in the water, as we so continually were. After dinner the boats were lowered past the rapid, but we had no respite, for presently we came upon another big one, then another, and another, and then still another, all following quickly and giving us plenty of extremely hard work, for we would not risk the boats in any of them. When these were behind us we went on a distance and came to one that we ran, and then, wet through and shivering till our teeth chattered, as well as being hungry and tired, every one was glad to hear the decision to go into camp when we arrived at the top of another very ugly pair of them. The canyon having a north and south trend and it being autumn, the sun disappeared early so far as we were concerned; the shadows were deep, the mountain air was penetrating. As soon as possible our soaking river garments were thrown off, the dry clothing from the rubber bags was put on, the limited bacon was sending its fragrance into the troubled air, the bread took on a nice deep brown in the Dutch oven, the coffee's aromatic steam drifted from the fire, and warm and comfortable we sat down to the welcome though meagre meal. The rule was three little strips of bacon, a chunk of bread about the size of one's fist, and coffee without stint for each man three times a day. Sugar was a scarce article, and I learned to like coffee without it so well that I have never taken it with sugar since. The "Tirtaan Aigles" needed now all the muscle and energy they could command, and an early hour found every man sound asleep. The record for the first day in Cataract Canyon was nine miles, with eight bad rapids or cataracts, as they might properly be called, and out of the eight we ran but one.[18] The river was about 250 feet wide.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Clement Powell

Cataract Canyon.

Photograph by E. O. Beaman, 1871]

The Major decided the next morning that he would try to get out on the right, and he took me with him. We had no great trouble in reaching the plateau at an elevation of eighteen hundred feet above the river, where we could see an immense area of unknown country. The broken and pinnacled character was not so marked as it had been at the Junction, but it was still a strange, barren land. We expected to find water-pockets on the top, and we had carried with us only one quart canteen of water. While the Major was taking notes from the summit of a b.u.t.te, I made a zealous search for water, but not a drop could I find; every hole was dry. The sun burned down from a clear sky that melted black into eternal s.p.a.ce. The yellow sand threw the hot rays upward, and so also did the smooth bare rock. No bird, no bee, no thing of life could be seen. I came to a whitish cliff upon which I thought there might be water-pockets, and I mounted by a steep slope of broken stones.

Suddenly, almost within touch, I saw before me a golden yellow rattlesnake gliding upward in the direction I was going along the cliff wall. I killed it with a stone, and cut off the rattles and continued my reconnaissance. At length I gave up the search. By the time I had returned to the foot of the b.u.t.te on which the Major was making his observations, the heat had exhausted me till I was obliged to rest a few moments before ascending the sixty feet to where he was. I had carried the canteen all the time, and the water in it was hot from exposure to the sun. The Major bade me rest while he made a little fire, and by the aid of a can and ground coffee we had brought he made a strong decoction with the whole quart. This gave us two cups apiece, and we had some bread to go with it. The effect was magical. My fatigue vanished. I felt equal to anything, and we began the return.

The Major having no right arm, he sometimes got in a difficult situation when climbing, if his right side came against a smooth surface where there was nothing opposite. We had learned to go down by the same route followed up, because otherwise one is never sure of arriving at the bottom, as a ledge half-way down might compel a return to the summit. We remembered that at one point there was no way for him to hold on, the cliff being smooth on the right, while on the left was empty air, with a sheer drop of several hundred feet. The footing too was narrow. I climbed down first, and, bracing myself below with my back to the abyss, I was able to plant my right foot securely in such a manner that my right knee formed a solid step for him at the critical moment. On this improvised step he placed his left foot, and in a twinkling had made the pa.s.sage in safety.

During our absence the men below had been at work. Camp was moved down the river some three quarters of a mile, while the boats had been lowered past the ugly pair of rapids, and were moored at the camp below the second. In one the current had "got the bulge," as we called it, on the men on the line; that is, the powerful current had hit the bow in such a way that the boat took the diagonal of forces and travelled up and out into the river. For the men it was either let go or be pulled in. They let go, and the boat dashed down with her cargo on board.

Fortune was on our side. She went through without injury and shot into an eddy below. With all speed the men rushed down, and Jack, plunging in, swam to her and got on before she could take a fresh start. It was a narrow escape, but it taught a lesson that was not forgotten. Prof. had succeeded in getting some observations, and all was well. It was bean day, too, according to our calendar, and all hands had a treat.

By eight o'clock the next morning, Thursday, September 21st, we were on the way again, with the boats "close reefed," as it were, for trouble, but one, two, three and one half miles slid easily behind. Then, as if to make up for this bit of leniency, six rapids came in close succession, though they were of a kind that we could safely run, and all the boats went flying through them without a mishap of any kind. The next was a plunger so mixed up with rocks that we made a let-down and again proceeded a short distance before we were halted by one more of the same sort, though we were able to run the lower portion of it. A little below this we met a friendly drop, and whizzed through its rush and roar in triumph. But there was nothing triumphant about the one which followed, so far as our work was concerned. We manoeuvred past it with much difficulty only to find ourselves upon two more bad ones.

Bad as they were, they were nevertheless runable, and away we dashed with breakneck speed, certainly not less than twenty miles an hour, down both of them, to land on the left immediately at the beginning of a great and forbidding descent. These let-downs were difficult, often requiring all hands to each boat, except the Major, whose one-armed condition made it too hard for him to a.s.sist in the midst of rocks and rushing water, where one had to be very nimble and leap and balance with exactness. Two good arms were barely sufficient. Sometimes, in order to pa.s.s the gigantic boulders that stretched far off from the sh.o.r.e, the boat had to be shot around and hauled in below, an operation requiring skill, strength, and celerity.

The walls, very craggy at the top, increased in alt.i.tude till they were now about sixteen hundred feet, separated from each other by one third of a mile. The flaring character of the upper miles of the canyon began to change to a narrower gorge, the cliffs showing a nearer approach to verticality. At the head of the forbidding plunge we had our slice of bacon, with bread and coffee, and then we fought our way down alongside amongst immense boulders and roaring water. It was an exceedingly hard place to vanquish, and required two and a half hours of the most violent exertion to accomplish it. All were necessary to handle each boat.

Hardly had we pa.s.sed beyond the turmoil of its fierce opposition than we fell upon another scarcely less antagonistic, but yet apparently so free from rocks that the Major concluded it could be run. At the outset our boat struck on a concealed rock, and for a moment it seemed that we might capsize, but luckily she righted, swung free, and swept down with no further trouble. The _Nell_ struck the same rock and so did the _Canonita_, but neither was injured or even halted. These boats were somewhat lighter than ours, having one man less in each, and therefore did not hit the rock so hard. The boats were now heavy from being water-soaked, for the paint was gone from the bottoms. This would have made no difference in any ordinary waters, but it did here, where we were obliged to lift them so constantly.

This was an extremely rough and wet day's work, and the moment the great cliffs cut off the warmth of the direct sun we were thrown suddenly from summer to winter, and our saturated clothing, uncomfortably cool in sunlight, became icy with the evaporation and the cold shadow-air. We turned blue, and no matter how firmly I tried to shut my teeth they rattled like a pair of castanets. Though it was only half-past three, the Major decided to camp as soon as he saw this effect, much as we had need to push on. We landed on the right, and were soon revived by dry clothes and a big fire of driftwood. We had made during the day a total distance of a trifle less than seven miles, one and three quarters since dinner. There were fourteen rapids and cataracts, nine of which we ran, on a river about two hundred feet wide. We had sand to sleep on, but all around us were rocks, rocks, rocks, with the mighty bounding cliffs lifting up to the sky. Our books for the time being were not disturbed, but Whittier's lines, read further up, seemed here exactly appropriate to the Colorado:

"Hurrying down to its grave, the sea, And slow through the rock its pathway hewing!

Far down, through the mist of the falling river, Which rises up like an incense ever, The splintered points of the crags are seen, With water howling and vexed between, While the scooping whirl of the pool beneath Seems an open throat, with its granite teeth!"

It was not long before the blankets were taken from the rubber bags and spread on the sand, and the rapids, the rocks, and all our troubles were forgotten.

The next day was almost a repet.i.tion of the preceding one. We began by running a graceful little rapid, just beyond which we came to a very bad place. The river was narrow and deep, with a high velocity, and the channel was filled with enormous rocks. Two hours of the hardest kind of work in and out of the water, climbing over gigantic boulders along the bank, lifting the boats and sliding them on driftwood skids, tugging, pulling, shoving every minute with might and main put us at the bottom.

No sooner were we past this one than we engaged in a similar battle with another of the same nature, and below it we stopped for dinner, amidst some huge boulders under a hackberry tree, near another roarer. One of these cataracts had a fall of not less than twenty feet in six hundred, which gave the water terrific force and violence. The canyon walls closed in more and more and ran up to two thousand feet, apparently nearly vertical as one looked up at them, but there was always plenty of s.p.a.ce for landings and camps. Opposite the noon camp we could see to a height beyond of at least three thousand feet. We were in the heart of another great plateau. After noon we attacked the very bad rapid beside whose head we had eaten, and it was half-past three when we had finished it. The boats had been considerably pounded and there was a hole in the _Dean_, and a plank sprung in the _Nell_ so that her middle cabin was half full of water. The iron strip on the _Dean's_ keel was breaking off. Repairs were imperative, and on the right, near the beginning of one of the worst falls we had yet seen, we went into camp for the rest of the day. With false ribs made from oars we strengthened the boats and put them in condition for another day's hammering. It seemed as if we must have gone this day quite a long distance, but on footing up it was found to be no more than a mile and a quarter. Darkness now fell early and big driftwood fires made the evenings cheerful. There was a vast amount of driftwood in tremendous piles, trees, limbs, boughs, railroad ties; a great mixture of all kinds, some of it lying full fifty feet above the present level of the river. There were large and small tree-trunks battered and limbless, the ends pounded to a spongy ma.s.s of splinters. Our bright fires enabled us to read, or to write up notes and diaries. I think each one but the Major and Andy kept a diary and faithfully wrote it up. Jack occasionally gave us a song or two from the repertory already described, and Steward did not forget the mouth-organ, but through the hardest part of Cataract Canyon we were usually tired enough to take to our blankets early.

In the morning we began the day by running a little rapid between our camp and the big one that we saw from there, and then we had to exert some careful engineering to pa.s.s below by means of the lines. This accomplished we found a repet.i.tion of the same kind of work necessary almost immediately, at the next rapid. In places we had to lift the boats out and slide them along on driftwood skids. These rapids were largely formed by enormous rocks which had fallen from the cliffs, and over, around, and between these it was necessary to manoeuvre the boats by lines to avoid the furious waters of the outer river. After dinner we arrived at a descent which at first glance seemed as bad as anything we had met in the morning but an examination showed a prospect of a successful run through it. The fall was nearly twenty feet in about as many yards. The Major and Prof. examined it long and carefully. A successful run would take two minutes, while a let-down would occupy us for at least two hours and it had some difficult points. They hesitated about running the place, for they would not take a risk that was not necessary, but finally they concluded it could be safely accomplished, and we pulled the _Dean_ as quickly as possible into the middle of the river and swung down into it. On both sides the water was hammered to foam amidst great boulders and the roar as usual was deafening. Just through the centre was a clean, clear chute followed by a long tail of waves breaking and snapping like some demon's jaws. As we struck into them they swept over us like combers on the beach in a great storm. It seemed to me here and at other similar places that we went through some of the waves like a needle and jumped to the top of others, to balance half-length out of water for an instant before diving to another trough.

Being in the very bow the waves, it appeared to me, sometimes completely submerged me and almost took my breath away with the sudden impact. At any rate it was lively work, with a current of fifteen or eighteen miles an hour. Beaman had stationed himself where he could get a negative of us ploughing through these breakers, but his wet-plates were too slow and he had no success. After this came a place which permitted no such jaunty treatment. It was in fact three or four rapids following each other so closely that, though some might be successfully run, the last was not safe, and no landing could be made at its head, so a very long let-down was obligatory; but it was an easy one, for each crew could take its own boat down without help from the others. Then, tired, wet, and cold as usual, we landed on the left in a little cove where there was a sandy beach for our Camp 67. We had made less than four miles, in which distance there were six rapids, only two of which we ran. At another stage of water the number and character of these rapids would be changed; some would be easier at higher water, some harder, and the same would be true of lower water. Rapids also change their character from time to time as rocks are shifted along the bottom and more rocks fall from the cliffs or are brought in by side floods. The walls were now about two thousand feet, of limestone, with a reddish stain, and they were so near together that the sun shone to the bottom only during the middle hours of the day in September.

It was now September 24th; a bright and beautiful Sunday broke, the sky above clear and tranquil, the river below foaming and fuming between the ragged walls in one continuous rapid with merely variations of descent.

In three quarters of a mile we arrived before the greatest portion of the declivity, where, though there seemed to be a clear chute, we did not consider it advisable to make the run because of conditions following; neither could we make a regular let-down or a portage. The least risky method was to carry a line down and when all was ready start the boat in at the top alone. In this way when she had gone through, the men on the line below were able to bring her up and haul her in before reaching the next bad plunge. There was no quiet river anywhere; nothing but rushing, swirling, plunging water and rocks. We got past the bad spot successfully and went on making one let-down after another for about four miles, when we halted at noon for the rest of the day, well satisfied with our progress though in distance it appeared so slight.