In an old notebook, under date of September 17, 1891, I found not long ago the following remark: "How would it do to start a movement to buy the St. Mary country, say thirty by thirty miles, from the Piegan Indians at a fair valuation, and turn it into a national reservation or park?"This idea, in the course of the next ten years, grew in my mind. It was, I think, the first suggestion, in words, of the Glacier National Park. About the year 1893 indications of copper were found in the foothills. It was believed that the country contained mines, and before long strong pressure was brought to bear on Congress to purchase the land from the Indians and throw it open to settlement. The mountain region was not used by the Indians. They lived on the plains. In 1895, Secretary of the Interior Hoke Smith sent out Commissioners W. C. Pollock, George Bird Grinnell, and W. M. Clements, to treat with the Blackfeet for this territory, and a majority of the commission went into the mountains and made a hasty inspection of the region. An agreement was made with the Indians, and was ratified by Congress, and about two years later the territory was thrown open to settlement....Soon after 1902 I spoke to Senator T. H. Carter about setting aside this recently purchased tract as a National Park, and found that he was disposed to favor the suggestion. I then took up the matter with friends in Montana, and induced them to write to Senator Carter about the project. The result was that a little later he introduced a bill, which passed the Senate once or twice, and at last, in 1910, passed both houses, and was signed by President Taft, May 12, 1910, and the Glacier National Park became a fact.
In an old notebook, under date of September 17, 1891, I found not long ago the following remark: "How would it do to start a movement to buy the St. Mary country, say thirty by thirty miles, from the Piegan Indians at a fair valuation, and turn it into a national reservation or park?"
This idea, in the course of the next ten years, grew in my mind. It was, I think, the first suggestion, in words, of the Glacier National Park. About the year 1893 indications of copper were found in the foothills. It was believed that the country contained mines, and before long strong pressure was brought to bear on Congress to purchase the land from the Indians and throw it open to settlement. The mountain region was not used by the Indians. They lived on the plains. In 1895, Secretary of the Interior Hoke Smith sent out Commissioners W. C. Pollock, George Bird Grinnell, and W. M. Clements, to treat with the Blackfeet for this territory, and a majority of the commission went into the mountains and made a hasty inspection of the region. An agreement was made with the Indians, and was ratified by Congress, and about two years later the territory was thrown open to settlement....
Soon after 1902 I spoke to Senator T. H. Carter about setting aside this recently purchased tract as a National Park, and found that he was disposed to favor the suggestion. I then took up the matter with friends in Montana, and induced them to write to Senator Carter about the project. The result was that a little later he introduced a bill, which passed the Senate once or twice, and at last, in 1910, passed both houses, and was signed by President Taft, May 12, 1910, and the Glacier National Park became a fact.
Certainly the most striking fact in the history of this Park is the rapidity with which it has been developed and opened to travelers. L. W. Hill has given this region a large share of his time, and in it has spent enormous sums of money. There is more than commercialism behind his work. It has been done with happy hands. He has made this a part of his life-work. He has endeavored to create on artistic lines. What he has done for this Park has stimulated interest in the other Parks and will greatly help to bring about their development.
Weirdness, romance, and mystery dominate the Mesa Verde National Park. Towering high and dry above the surrounding country, carrying in places squatty, scattered growths of piñon pines and cedars, it stands silently up in the sunlight. Combined with these things, the deserted prehistoric cliff dwellings give to the Mesa a strangeness and peculiar appeal. These monuments of a departed race tell but little of the story of their builders. They are the ruins of an ancient civilization that stood its day and vanished; that—
"Like snow upon the desert's dusty face,Lighting a little hour or two—is gone."
Who were the cliff dwellers? It is probable that they were Indians. No one knows where they came from, how long they remained on the Mesa, nor why they left;how long since they went away, where they went to, nor what has become of them. Several hundred ruins of the structures they reared still remain. These are mysterious and thought-compelling, but they tell little more than is told by the Sphinx.
The Mesa Verde National Park covers seventy-seven square miles in southwest Colorado, near the corners of four States. It is in the "Land of Little Rain." The table-like summit of this steep-walled Mesa is eight thousand feet above the sea, and nearly two thousand feet above the surrounding country. Looking from the summit, one sees strange "Ship Rock" far away in New Mexico. This appears to be an enormous ship in full sail upon the sea. It adds to the unreal and mysterious air of the region.
Numerous cañons are countersunk deeply into this sunny sky plain. Many of the cañons are corniced with a heavy overhanging stratum of rock. Beneath this, in cavelike hollows in the cañon walls, thecliff houses are found. Here ages ago the cliff dwellers lived in large communities and probably under organized government—the oldest and most fully realized civic-center scheme in America. Long before their mesa country was invaded by the men of recorded history, these people of the Southwest vanished, leaving buildings, tools, clothing, and pottery to tell of their odd and interesting Indian civilization.
When the name Indian is mentioned, the average individual usually thinks of a savage. But at the time Columbus discovered America, there were millions of civilized Indians in the Western world, living under organized government. It is true that their civilization was different from ours of to-day, and happily different from the European civilization of that time.
These early civilized Indians lived chiefly in well-built houses. Many of them traveled good roads. They possessed a keensense of right and wrong, and in ethics they may have averaged higher than the European. Among the tribes that were civilized were the Mayas, the Aztecs, and the Incas.
The cliff dwellers were an agricultural people, and they cultivated corn, beans, cotton, and squash. They appear to have grown crops by means of irrigation. They wove cloth of cotton and of the century-plant fibers. Probably they domesticated the turkey.
The finger-prints in their adobe mortar indicate that women built the stone walls. Among the Indian tribes of the Southwest, it was common for the men to quarry, dress, and carry the stones, while the women built them into walls. Women, too, appear to have made the pottery. The men probably were the weavers. The women ground the corn and most likely carried the water in jars from the springs. Were there more springs in the days of these people than now? Perhaps. Apparently they had numerous reservoirs.
These people did not possess a written language, and their ways of recording their thoughts or preserving their experiences were poor. They made pictographs on stone walls and placed symbols on their pottery and in their weaving. Much of their pottery is attractive in form and of ornamental pattern. There are food-bowls, water-jars, cooking-utensils, and numerous jugs and mugs.
They appreciated the beautiful. Their art, though mostly primitive, was art. It was generally symbolical. Although many of their pottery decorations were of geometric design, others represented objects of beauty in which flowing lines were required. Their basketry showed good taste. Their architecture was good. Although their buildings followed varied types, a number of them displayed lines of beauty and constructive skill.
Well-preserved mural paintings on many of the walls of their structures indicate that they had a good knowledge of dye-stuffs as well as a primitive skill in picturing. Remains of figures of men, animals, cacti, and rain-clouds form a kind of frieze visible on three sides of the so-called painted room in one of these houses. These paintings are believed to indicate that this room was used for a ceremony akin to the New Fire ceremony of the Hopi.
SPRUCE TREE HOUSE, MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARKSPRUCE TREE HOUSE, MESA VERDE NATIONAL PARK
Although nearly everything which they fashioned showed many elements of skill and beauty, they did not have many tools. Stone axes and hammers, scrapers, knives, and awls of bone were the common implements of use.
It may be that at one time the Mesa had a population of many thousands. It is possible that the Sun Temple was built jointly by the inhabitants of the Spruce Tree House, the Cliff Palace, and other houses of the region.
But few things which they left enable one to judge of their characteristics. They appear to have had the typical qualities of human beings. They had theirsuperstitions, their weaknesses, and their strong points. But they are gone.
"I came like Water, and like Wind I go."
"I came like Water, and like Wind I go."
It is true that we know but little of the people who formerly inhabited these buildings. Surely we can learn more through study. Thus far there has been almost no systematic study, and but little careful excavation or attempt to preserve the various objects found in the ruins. A school of archæology might well be established in this Park for the purpose of securing information about the cliff dwellers and giving it to the world.
In his report on his recent excavation and repair of the Sun Temple, Dr. Jesse Walter Fewkes, of the Smithsonian Institution, says:—
The Mesa Verde is unique in its educational importance. It is destined ultimately to be a Mecca for all students of the prehistoric of the Southwest and an object lesson to all visitors who wish to see the best preserved buildings of pre-Columbian times in our country. It is self-evident that the excavation and repair ofall the ruins in this park cannot be accomplished in a few years, even were it desirable to attempt it; the work means many years of arduous devotion, intelligently directed, and a large sum of money. It is desirable to open up these precious remains of antiquity carefully, following a definite plan, availing ourselves of methods acquired by experience. The work should be done with care, and it will be an additional attraction if visitors can see how the work is done. Work on the group will reveal important architectural features, and add much to our scientific information.
The Mesa Verde is unique in its educational importance. It is destined ultimately to be a Mecca for all students of the prehistoric of the Southwest and an object lesson to all visitors who wish to see the best preserved buildings of pre-Columbian times in our country. It is self-evident that the excavation and repair ofall the ruins in this park cannot be accomplished in a few years, even were it desirable to attempt it; the work means many years of arduous devotion, intelligently directed, and a large sum of money. It is desirable to open up these precious remains of antiquity carefully, following a definite plan, availing ourselves of methods acquired by experience. The work should be done with care, and it will be an additional attraction if visitors can see how the work is done. Work on the group will reveal important architectural features, and add much to our scientific information.
Prehistoric ruins abound throughout the Southwest. Many show considerable skill in construction and also suggest that the buildings were the work of a people who had organized government.
Mrs. Gilbert McClurg, who visited the Mesa Verde ruins years ago, appears to have been the first to conceive the idea of saving these prehistoric places for the public—of preserving them in a National Park. After a campaign of a few years, led chiefly by Mrs. McClurg, supplemented by the work of organizationsand individuals, the Park was established in 1906.
In what is now this Park, a Spanish exploring party discovered cliff houses in 1541. At that time the buildings had been abandoned for generations. No one knows how many centuries or millenniums had then elapsed since the Mesa was deserted. The age of these cliff houses has been estimated from five hundred to five thousand years. Modern discovery of the region appears to have been made by a government geological party in 1874.
A few years later Baron Nordenskjöld, a Swedish explorer, spent many weeks with these ruins, and later wrote a volume concerning them. He carried away from them several carloads of pottery and other products.
The first white discoverers were either religious fanatics or people of the pot-hunter type who were looking for plunder. They were not interested in the preservation of any of the ruins discovered, nor ofany of the equipment that had no commercial value. For years some of the early settlers and adventurers made it a business to search for prehistoric buildings in order to obtain the pottery and other treasures which they sometimes contained. Often these pot-hunting treasure-seekers utterly wrecked the buildings which they found. In all probability many objects of interest or information concerning the Mesa Verde cliff dwellers have been lost.
In the autumn of 1904 I visited the ruins for the purpose of taking photographs and found a party of three pottery-hunters camped near the Balcony House. A part of their firewood that evening consisted of precious beams from this ancient house.
For many years the visitors to the Mesa Verde noticed a huge tree-grown mound on the rim of the cañon-wall, directly opposite the Cliff Palace. A few dressed stones, apparently the corner of a wall, thrust above the surface of this mound. Probably there was a building beneath it. Behind and enveloping it lay a forest of low-growing and limby piñon pines and cedars. Over all was the ever-present and brooding mystery of the deserted Mesa Verde.
In July, 1915, Dr. Fewkes put a crew of men to work excavating the mound. As a result of their labors, a prehistoric stone building now stands in the sunshine. It is the shape of the capital letter D. Its straight front, which faces southward, measures one hundred and thirty-two feet; its semicircular back, two hundred and forty-five feet.
Plainly, it was built to a preconceived plan. There was no patchwork, no inharmonious combination. Precisely midway in the south wall was a recess. In another recess near the southwest corner was a fossil palm leaf. This strikingly resembles the rays of the sun, and together with a figure of the sun in the floor, suggests that the building was a Sun Temple. There is nothing to indicate that it was used or intended to be used as a dwelling-place.
The masonry is the best thus far found on the Mesa. It was laid with mortar of tough, enduring clay. The stones of the walls and partitions were small and were cut, many polished, and a few decorated. The figures on a number of these decorated stones consist of triangles, and one is the outline of a typical cliff-house doorway. The outer walls are double. None have outside openings. Perhaps the entrances to the building were either through the roof or by means of subterranean passageways from the face of the cliff just in front and beneath.
In the mound upon the ruins of this building was found a living tree that was more than three hundred and sixty years old. A long period, perhaps several hundred years, must have been required for the earthen mound to accumulate upon the ruins, and then three hundred and sixty years for the tree to grow. Apparently the Sun Temple must have been abandoned several hundred years ago, perhaps aboutthe year 1300. It appears never to have been occupied, and probably was in process of being completed when it was abandoned.
The so-called Cliff Palace in Cliff Cañon is centrally located in the Mesa Verde National Park. This was a stone structure more than three hundred feet long and with more than two hundred rooms. It appears to have been built in sections or installments, not to any consecutive plan. As a result, in this one building there are a number of types of architecture. In one section there is a huge square tower four stories high; in an adjoining section, a large well-built round tower. This building probably was a home for scores of people. There were mill rooms in which corn was ground, storerooms, ceremonial rooms, probably rooms used in religious worship, and other rooms called "kivas," which appear to have been used much of the time by the men as lounging-places. Fireplaces were scattered throughout thebuilding. Many of the walls were of cut stone, and some were plastered and adorned with paintings. Paint still shows on a number of walls.
This park contains other large stone structures and hundreds of smaller cliff ruins. Among the buildings, besides the Cliff Palace, are the Spruce Tree House, the Balcony House, the Tunnel House, and numerous buildings upon the surface. Near Mummy Lake are a number of large, tree-grown mounds, similar to the recently excavated one that covered the Sun Temple. Beneath each of these is a buried stone structure. Here, apparently, is a buried city.
Magnificent mountains in the sky, peak after peak along the horizon,—an inspiring skyline,—such is the setting of the Rocky Mountain National Park. In this playground is a twenty-five-mile stretch of the most rugged section of the Continental Divide. Here are fifty peaks with summits more than two miles high. From one hundred miles distant, out on the plains of Colorado or Wyoming, these snowy, rugged mountain-tops give one a thrill as they appear to join with the clouds and form a horizon that seems to be a part of the scenery of the sky.
Splendidly grouped with these peaks and mountains are cañons, moorlands, waterfalls, glaciers, lakes, forests, meadows, and wild flowers—the Rocky Mountains are at their best.
ESTES PARK AND ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARKESTES PARK AND ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK
On approaching the Park by the east entrance, through the long-famed Estes Park region, even the dullest traveler is thrilled with the first glimpse, and those who frequently behold it find the scene as welcome as a favorite old song. From the entrance, one looks down on an irregular, undulating, green mountain meadow, miles in extent. This is Estes Park. Great pines are scattered over it, singly and in groves; rocky points and cliffs rise picturesquely in the midst; and the Big Thompson River, sweeping in great folds from side to side, goes majestically across. High, forest-walled mountains surround it, and the great jagged snowy range stands splendidly above.
The Rocky Mountain Park is glorified with transcendent forms of the beautiful and the sublime. In it bees hum and beavers build; birds give melody to the forest depth, and butterflies with painted wings circle the sunny air. Mountain sheep in classic poses watch from the cliffs,eagles soar in the blue, speckled trout sprinkle the clear streams, and the varied voice of the coyote echoes when the afterglow falls. From top to bottom the park is beautified with dainty, exquisite wild flowers of brightest hues; they crowd the streams, wave on the hills, shine in woodland vistas, and color snow-edges everywhere.
This Park has an area of about three hundred and sixty square miles. Its terraced alpine heights are about equally divided between the Atlantic and the Pacific slopes. It is twenty-five miles long, from twelve to twenty miles wide, and about one mile high from lowest to highest altitudes.
The greater part of the Park lies above the altitude of nine thousand feet. Its southeast corner is within forty miles of Denver; the northeast corner about the same distance from Cheyenne. A number of railroads run close to it, and the Lincoln Highway is about twenty miles away. The Parkis only thirty hours from Chicago, and its accessibility adds to its invitingness as a playground.
Side by side in it are two dominating peaks. These are Long's Peak, 14,255 feet high, and Mount Meeker, 14,000 feet above the sea. These great summits were a landmark for the primitive red man who saw them from the plains. For generations the plains Indians spoke of them as the "Two Guides."
Viewed as a whole from a neighboring mountain-top, either on the eastern or the western side, the Park presents an imposing appearance. My favorite near-by view-point is the summit of the Twin Sister Peaks.
In commenting on the appearance of the eastern slope Dr. Ferdinand V. Hayden, the celebrated geologist, wrote as follows:—
Not only has Nature amply supplied this with features of rare beauty and surroundings of admirable grandeur, but it has thus distributed them that the eye of an artist mayrest with perfect satisfaction on the complete picture represented. It may be said, perhaps, that the more minute details of the scenery are too decorative in their character, showing, as they do, the irregular picturesque groups of hills, buttes, products of erosion, and the finely moulded ridges—the effect is pleasing in the extreme.
Not only has Nature amply supplied this with features of rare beauty and surroundings of admirable grandeur, but it has thus distributed them that the eye of an artist mayrest with perfect satisfaction on the complete picture represented. It may be said, perhaps, that the more minute details of the scenery are too decorative in their character, showing, as they do, the irregular picturesque groups of hills, buttes, products of erosion, and the finely moulded ridges—the effect is pleasing in the extreme.
Mountain-climbers will find a number of towering view-points. Long's Peak is the superior one, and the most dominating single feature in the Park. It is a mountain of striking individuality and peculiar ruggedness, though not extremely difficult to climb. Standing a little apart from numbers of other peaks, it is placed so as to command rugged near-by views as well as wonderful far-reaching vistas that vanish in the light and shadow of distance. Among the other peaks that climbers would do well to stand upon are Mount Meeker, Hague's Peak, and Specimen Mountain. Among the lower peaks that command magnificent scenes, I would name Meadow Mountain, at the southern endof the Park, as one of the best. Among other excellent views are those from Flat-Top Mountain, Gem Lake, Echo Mountain, near Grand Lake, and a number of places along the summit of Trail Ridge.
LOCH VALELOCH VALEROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK
The topography of the Park is one big glacial story, which in places is of unusual interest. This fascinating story left by the Ice King is for the most part well preserved and forms one of the Park's chief attractions. Nowhere in America are glacial records of such prominence more numerous, accessible, and easily read.
A few small glaciers remain—one on the eastern slope of Long's Peak, and Andrews, Sprague's, and Hallet Glaciers in the north half of the eastern slope. These glaciers are mere remnants, but none the less interesting.
Altogether there are more than one hundred lakes and tarns in the Park. Most of these are small, but each has its peculiarly attractive setting. With few exceptions, these lakes repose in basins of solid rockthat were excavated for them by glacial action. In the Park are also many stupendous moraines.
Each year more than a thousand varieties of wild blossoms give color and charm to this favored spot. They are to be counted among the four chief attractions, the other three being Long's Peak, the glaciation, and the timber-line. Of the brilliantly colored wild flowers many take on large and vigorous form, while in the alpine moorlands numerous species are dwarfed and low-growing. A few bright blossoms jewel the summits of the highest peaks. Flowers grow wherever there is a bit of soil for them to live in.
On the summit of Long's Peak, nearly three miles up, in a number of places I have seen bright primroses and polemonium, blue mertensia and lavender-colored phlox. There are ragged wild gardens of alpine flowers nearly thirteen thousand feet above the sea. More than one hundred varieties of flowers brighten the ledges of the cliffs,fringe the snow-piles, and color the moorlands of the heights above the limits of tree growth. The alpine blooms that live in dry or wind-swept places are dwarfed and flattened. They keep their beauty close to the earth. Many of these little flowering people are so greatly dwarfed that the plant with its leaf and blossom does not rise a quarter of an inch above the earth. Among these are the phlox, harebell, and the columbine.
The Mariposa lily's, perhaps, is the most classic petal in the Park. Among its conspicuous neighbors are the fringed gentian, the silver-and-blue columbine, the elaborate calypso orchid, and the graceful harebell. Among the other abundant and beautiful blossoms are violets, daisies, asters, black-eyed Susans, paint-brushes, rock-roses, pasque-flowers, which Helen Hunt called Maltese kittens, tiger lilies, golden pond-lilies, and anemones. Many of these flowers are perfectly formed and carry petals of cleanest, deepest color.
There are many kinds of wild life in the Park. Mountain sheep probably number several hundreds. Elk are increasing in number; so, too, are deer, which are already common. There are a number of black bears, possibly a few remaining grizzlies, and a few foxes, wolves, lions, and coyotes. The beaver population is numerous, and in many places are extensive beaver colonies with dams, ponds, and houses.
Among about one hundred and fifty species of birds are found a few golden eagles. These nest in the heights. The rose-finch and the ptarmigan live the year round near the snow-line above the limits of tree growth. Among the common birds most frequently seen are the robin, bluebird, blackbird, hummingbird, pine siskin, goldfinch, magpie, white-crowned sparrow, house wren, and Rocky Mountain jay.
During the flower-filled, sun-flooded days of June, while the evening shadows arecrossing the openings, the song of the hermit thrush is often heard, its beautiful silvery notes mingling strangely with the wild surroundings. In June, too, the ever-cheerful water-ouzel carols most intensely by his chosen home along the alpine streams. Likewise in this month the marvelous solitaire sings among the crags far up the slopes, close to where the forest ends and the alpine moorlands begin.
Here are primeval forests, torn by cañons and pierced by crags and rock ridges. Among the more common trees are the lodge-pole pine and the Engelmann spruce. Other species are the alpine fir, Douglas spruce, limber pine, and Western yellow pine. The aspen is found in groves, groups, and scattered growths in the moister places all over the woodland.
The timber-line in the Park is one of the most picturesque and interesting in the world. It is strangely appealing and thought-compelling. This is the forest-frontier. Its average altitude is abouteleven thousand five hundred feet above the sea. Timber-line in the Alps is only about sixty-five hundred feet. Thus it will be seen that the climate of this Rocky Mountain section is far more friendly to wood growth than that of the Alps.
The trees persistently try to climb upward, and their struggle for existence becomes deadly. The wind blows off their arms, and cuts them with flying sand. The cold dwarfs them, and for nine months in the year the snow tries to twist and crush the life out of them. Many have limbs and bark on one side only; others are completely stripped of bark. They seldom grow over eight feet high, and numbers grow along the ground like vines. In the drier places at timber-line the limber pine has sole possession, while in the moister places the Engelmann spruce predominates, and is sometimes accompanied by dwarfed aspen, birch, subalpine fir, and willow. Above the timber-line are crags, snow-piles, and alpine-flower meadows.
Traveling along the eastern slope of the Park, one encounters a number of prominent attractions.
In the south, Wild Basin, a splendidly glaciated realm of several square miles, almost completely surrounded with high peaks, contains lakes, forests, moraines, and gorges. It retains many wild glacial records of peculiar interest. North of it is the Long's Peak group, consisting of Long's Peak, Mount Meeker, Mount Lady Washington, Chasm Lake and Gorge, and Mills Moraine. This moraine is one of the most interesting in the park. Chasm Lake, at the foot of the precipitous eastern slope of Long's Peak, has the wildest setting of all the many Park lakes.
To the east of Long's Peak lies Tahosa Valley, and just beyond this rise the Twin Sister Peaks. Between Long's Peak and the Range is Glacier Gorge, a deep glaciated cañon. At the end of this, in the Continental Divide, is the Loch Vale region. Here the terraced floor is varied with tarns,waterfalls, flowery meadows, grassy spaces, and storm-battered trees. Around it and rising above it are stupendous cliffs and precipices of glaciated rock. Above it to the west is Andrews Glacier. Eastward from it lies the Bierstadt Moraine, named after Albert Bierstadt, whose pictures gave fame to the region. A trail crosses the Continental Divide from Flat-Top Mountain, which is approximately in the center of the Park.
To the north of Flat-Top Mountain lie Fern and Odessa Lakes. They are the best-known and most popular lakes in the Park, but there are a number of others of somewhat similar character and with equally scenic surroundings. Beyond these is Sprague's Glacier; also Forest Cañon, above which extends the scene-commanding Trail Ridge. Again beyond, the Fall River automobile road crosses the Continental Divide.
In the northeast corner of the Park lies the Mummy Range, the highest peak being Hague's. On its northern slope is Hallet Glacier. A bill now (1917) before Congress provides that Deer Mountain, Gem Lake, and the Twin Sister Peaks be added to the Park.[1]
[1]This bill passed after the above was in type. See map of the Park.
[1]This bill passed after the above was in type. See map of the Park.
FERN LAKEFERN LAKEROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK
On the western slope, at the south end, is a combination of lovely and magnificent scenes. The great feature on the west side is Grand Lake, the largest lake in Colorado. It is the source of the Grand River, and furnishes a part of the water that roars through the Grand Cañon of the Colorado in Arizona. The North Inlet and the East Inlet are scenic gorges through which streams rush from the heights down into Grand Lake. The East Inlet region, between Shoshone Peak and Grand Lake, has a remarkable glacial story of its own.
In the northwest corner of the Park stands Specimen Mountain, an excellent view-point. This is probably a sleeping volcano. It is the most famous mountain-sheeprange in the Park. Its grassy slopes and summit contain spaces of salty ooze that attracts them. Many times I have seen a flock of one hundred or more in the crater.
John Muir strongly urged that a National Park be made of the Grand Cañon of the Colorado. In commenting on this Titan of cañons, he said:—
No matter how far you have wandered hitherto, or how many famous valleys and gorges you have seen, this one, the Grand Cañon of the Colorado, will seem as novel to you, as unearthly in the color and grandeur and quantity of its architecture, as if you had found it after death, on some other star; so incomparably lovely and grand and supreme is it above all the other cañons.
No matter how far you have wandered hitherto, or how many famous valleys and gorges you have seen, this one, the Grand Cañon of the Colorado, will seem as novel to you, as unearthly in the color and grandeur and quantity of its architecture, as if you had found it after death, on some other star; so incomparably lovely and grand and supreme is it above all the other cañons.
It is hoped that Congress will early create a Grand Cañon National Park. The territory most seriously considered embraces a hundred-mile stretch of the cañon with a narrow bit of each rim. This would extend about fifty miles up and an equal distance down the river from Grand CañonStation. It would thus include only about half the length of the Grand Cañon, and no part of any other cañon. I should like to see it extended another hundred miles up the river. It would then embrace not less than two hundred miles of the river, and would include Marble Cañon and a part of Glen Cañon. But, whatever its length, it should include a broad forest border all the way, on both rims of the cañon.
To enable the public to see this titanic gorge in the most comfortable manner and from the best points of view, it is necessary to have more public roads and trails. There is great need that this unmatched wonder have National Park protection and development. At present the main trail to the bottom of the cañon is a private toll trail!
Visitors to almost any great scene are wont to compare it with some other scene; it reminds them of this place or that place. But when one first views Crater Lake, or while one is in the presence of the Big Treesfor the first time, memory is suspended; and when one first beholds the Grand Cañon, it does not remind him of this or that—it completely possesses the observer, sweeps other scenes and places out of mind. Presently comes desire for a thousandfold capacity of feeling and comprehension. The thing is too vast and splendid for ordinary faculties.
LOOKING WEST FROM NORTH SIDE OF GRAND CAÑONBy permission of the National Park Service, Department of the InteriorLOOKING WEST FROM NORTH SIDE OF GRAND CAÑONPoint Sublime to right in distance. Isis Temple on left.
By permission of the National Park Service, Department of the Interior
I have boated in many of the cañons of the Colorado and have camped and tramped along their rims. Often I have looked down into them when they were filled with mists; when broken clouds hung over them; when sunshine or moonlight illumined their depths, from which I have looked forth under like conditions. But to me, whether in summer or when snow piles the rim, the Grand Cañon never loses its intense impressiveness.
The Walhalla Plateau is an extraordinary cañon view-point and is likely to become one of the most famous places on the earth. This narrow plateau thrusts tenmiles out into the vast, deep, airy Grand Cañon. It extends from the north rim, between Bright Angel Cañon and the inside bend of the main cañon opposite the Cañon of the Little Colorado. A most commanding peninsula it is, with wide and enormous depths sweeping almost entirely around it. Other commanding view-points on the north rim are Point Sublime and Bright Angel Point. Three excellent view-points on the south rim are Grand View, Hopi Point, and the El Tovar. Grand View is a few miles up the river from the El Tovar Hotel, and opposite Cape Royal of the Walhalla Plateau.
The Colorado River in Arizona flows through a series of twenty vast cañons that have a length of about one thousand miles. Most of them are end to end with only a mere break between. Of these, the Grand Cañon is the cañon of cañons. Counting downstream, it is the eighteenth of the series; counting upstream, the third. The cañon is from seven to fifteen miles wide,and from four thousand to six thousand feet deep. It is an enormous gulf two hundred miles long, in solid rock. Less than one thousand feet across at the bottom, and eight to ten miles across at the top, it may be called a rough V-shaped gorge; or, together with its tributary cañons, it might be called an inverted hollow mountain-range. This range, if turned out upon the plateau, would measure in places more than two hundred miles in length and nearly forty miles in width, with summits rising nearly seven thousand feet; and it would be diversified with ridges, gorges, plateaus, spurs, and peaks.
The Grand Cañon of the Colorado is a masterpiece of erosion—a wonderful story carved in rock. It was excavated and washed out by the river. It is not an ordinary mountain cañon, for it lies in a comparatively level plain or plateau. During the ages, the débris-laden water sliding over its inclined bed of solid rock dug, sawed, and cut the cañon to the bottom. The rivernot only carried away all the material worn from the bottom, but the thousandfold more that tumbled into it from the ever-caving walls.
Here is color in magnificent array. Most of the strata are perfectly horizontal and of great thickness, and each has an individual color. Many of the walls are brown or red, and there are strata of gray, yellow, grayish brown, and grayish green. All these are massed and arranged in vast and broken color pictures and landscapes, some of which are a mile high and several miles in length.
The top, or rim, of the cañon is in an extensive arid region. Water is extremely scarce; in a number of places not a drop is available within miles. If a boatman is wrecked in the cañon, he has little opportunity of escaping. If he should manage to climb out on the desolate, almost uninhabited plateau, he would be likely to perish for lack of water.
The cañon has a climate of its own. Inthe bottom, the temperature frequently shows a range of one hundred degrees inside of twenty-four hours. Its great depth and peculiar wall exposure give it a climatic variety. The walls that face the north are much cooler than those facing the south. The temperature at the top differs from that at the bottom, and midway on the walls is a temperature distinct from either of the others. On the rim at El Tovar it may be a winter day; you descend to the river and there find a mild climate, with birds singing and flowers in bloom. The six thousand feet of descent to the river gives a climatic change that approximates a southern journey of two thousand miles. This plateau is forested and on the northern rim of the cañon the tree-growth is heavy.
Flowers bloom in the cañon every month in the year. In the niches and on the terraces are the columbine, lupine, stonecrop, kinnikinnick, dandelion, thistle, and paintbrush. Sagebrush and greasewood occurin many places. The Douglas spruce is found upon the southern wall, the cottonwood and willow in the bottom. Beavers, a few deer, many rabbits, wildcats, and wolves are found in a few places in the bottom of the cañon, and sheep and lions upon the terraces. But the larger part of the unbroken and terraced walls is barren and lifeless.
Among the birds that gladden this gorge are the mockingbird, piñon jay, robin, quail, hummingbird, kingfisher, swallow, and owl. Here, too, you will hear that melodious and hopeful singer the cañon wren. Over this vast gulf butterflies with daintily colored wings float in lovely laziness.
In a number of the cañons, ruined cliff houses are numerous, and a few of these are found far north in Glen Cañon. The walls, in places, are marked with picture writing. This probably was the work of the cliff dwellers or of the Indians.
Much of the cañon region may well be called the "No Man's Land" of the continent. In it are a numerous and assorted lot of men with unknown histories. Mingling with these are Indians, miners, health-seekers, and strange and interesting characters, among whom are aged trappers and prospectors and real cowboys who have survived the days of adventures.
Water is the great sculptor of the face of nature. The gentle raindrop grapples with mountains of solid rock, and with never-ending persistence drags them piecemeal into the sea. Here the material is redeposited in sedimentary strata, and this may emerge into the light in the ages yet to be.
A narrow ditch in the earth will widen by the caving-in of its sides. If the ditch be deepened, the caved-in matter being removed, it will continue to widen. And so it is with this cañon; the weathering or the caving-in of these walls goes ever on. The sharpness of the walls, and many of their striking features, are due to the peculiar climatic conditions that exist in this region—the short rainy seasons and long dryperiods. Had there been a more even and abundant precipitation, it is probable that more vegetation would have been produced, which would have had a marked influence upon the walls, giving them a more rounded and less interesting form.
The cañon broadens with the years. Cut narrow by the river, it has gradually widened by the caving-in of the walls. If it had remained as the river cut it, it would now be as narrow at the top as it is in the bottom—a cañon about a mile deep, only a few hundred feet wide, and with perpendicular walls. As it is, the walls rise through a series of shattered inclines, precipitous slopes and terraces, with here and there a vertical section.
Well may the Cañon of the Colorado be called the greatest inanimate wonder in the world. Written in the exposed and remaining rock-strata through which the river has cut its way is a wonderful story of the past, a marvelous and splendid romance. At an enormously remote time the Grand Cañonplateau rose from the primeval sea. After long exposure and great weathering it sank back, remained submerged for ages, and thousands of feet of strata were deposited upon it. Again it emerged, was exposed "a million years and a day," during which æon thousands of feet of strata were eroded away. Again it went down into the sea, and upon it were piled thousands of feet of additional strata. A fourth time it rose slowly above the water. As this plateau was rising, its surface was acted upon by the elements. The part of the plateau surrounding the Grand Cañon proper was the scene of repeated volcanic action and earthquake disturbance. Here the strata have been subjected to repeated faultings, heavings, tiltings, and lava-flows. This uplift imprisoned an enormous Eocene lake that occupied much of what is now the Colorado River basin. This lake the river drained. The drainage was quite probably caused by the fact that the eastern part of the territory was uplifted higher than thewestern. The drainage-system of the Colorado River, as we now know it, began at that time to take on form and its waters started to cut the cañon. This crude outline covers cycling ages, and probably represents millions of years.
Through several thousand years the plateau slowly rose, and all this time the river was gradually cutting its way down into it. Finally the plateau ceased to rise and long remained at a standstill. After cutting down to its first base level, the river had so little fall that its waters, overladen with débris, ceased deepening the channel. The widening of the cañon went steadily on. Again the plateau slowly rose, perhaps two thousand feet. This uplift increased the fall of the river and again set it to deepening its channel, a work it is still doing.
The waters of the Colorado River are heavily laden with sediment. During the ages it has transported an inconceivable bulk of eroded material to the ocean. Muchof this has come from its three hundred thousand square miles of mountainous drainage basin and all the material which formerly occupied the vast spaces of its numerous cañons. Continual caving of the walls compels the river to spend most of its time and energy in breaking up this débris and carrying it forward to the sea. This condition has existed for thousands of years.
It should be borne in mind that the transporting capacity of running water varies as the sixth power of its velocity. Therefore when a stream doubles its velocity it is competent to move particles sixty-four times greater than before. If its rate of flow is trebled, its transporting power is increased seven hundred and twenty-nine times. This goes to explain the frightful havoc of streams at times of flood.
The tributary streams of the Colorado come from arid regions and from the deserts, and are subject to sudden violent cloud-bursts and enormous floods. Thoughthese are of short duration, they are of tremendous force. Earthy matter, rocky débris, and ofttimes hundreds of trees are swept along by the waters that rush in from side cañons like an awful avalanche. Lodged driftwood over one hundred feet above normal river-level tells of the magnitude of these wild floods.
Where a stream has all the load of any given degree of fineness that it is capable of carrying, the entire energy of the descending water is consumed by the transportation of the water and its burden, so that none is applied to erosion. If it has an excess of load, its velocity is thereby lessened and its power to transport is diminished; consequently a part of its load is dropped. If it has less than a full load, it is in a condition to receive more, which it eagerly does. Thereby its bed is swept clean, and then only does erosion become possible. Thus it is seen that the work of transportation may at times monopolize the entire energy of a stream to the exclusion of erosion; or the two works may be carried forward at the same time.
The rapidity of erosion depends upon the hardness, size, and number of the fragments in the flowing water, upon the durability of the stream-bed, and upon the velocity of the current, the element of velocity being of double importance, since it determines not only the size but the speed of the particle with which it works. Transportation is favored by an increased water-supply as much as by increased declivity, because when a stream increases in volume the increase in its velocity outruns the increase in volume, and its transporting power is correspondingly augmented. It is due to this that a stream which is subject to floods—periodical or otherwise—has a much greater transporting power than it could possess were its total water-supply evenly distributed throughout the year.
During one period of volcanic activity the focus of lava-flows into the cañon was at Lava Falls. A number of lava-streamsburst directly into the cañon through the walls, while several flows poured their fiery floods over the brink. What a wild and spectacular condition existed while the river, deep in the cañon, received these tributaries of liquid fire! When the flow ceased, the cañon for sixty miles was filled with lava to the depth of about five hundred feet. The lava cooled, and in time was eroded away. The records of this spectacular story are still easily read.
Through these thousand miles of cañon, more than one fifth of which is the Grand Cañon, the river has a fall of about five thousand feet, unevenly divided. There are long stretches of quiet water, but in the Lodore, Cataract, Marble, and Grand Cañons are numerous and turbulent currents flowing amid masses of wild, rocky débris. There are about five hundred bad rapids and many others of lesser power. Most of these rapids are caused by rock-jams—dams formed by masses of rocky débris that have fallen from the walls aboveor have been swept into the main cañon by tributary streams. A few rapids are caused by ribs of hard, resistant rock that have not been worn down to the level of the softer rock.
The cañon was discovered by Spaniards in 1540. A government expedition visited it in 1859. The report of this expedition, printed in 1861, is accompanied with a picture of an ideal cañon. It is shown as narrow, with appallingly high vertical walls. Lieutenant Ives, who was in charge, thus closes his account:—