Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1878-01-31
wALHALLA SOUTH CAROLINA, THURSDAY JANUARY 81 1873
hook, as declared by tho United States
Geologist, Professor Il. v. Hayden.


10 this region are the oataraots aud canons
of tho Yellowstone, with the spouting
geysers in the valley Of tho Fire Hole River.
Neither language nor the painters genius
aud skill are adequate to describe either.
The lower falls are more than 800 feet high.
The walls of tho grand canon are somo
$500 feet in depth, and are colored by hues
80 various and brilliant that human art
despairs of any attempt to reproduce them
"Thc wealth Of red aud yellow, brown and
orange, pink and green, black, gray and
white fasoiua:es and bcwilders every be-
HOLDER" according to Professor Marshal,
@sceming to reproduce before his admiriug
gaze all tho ravished splendors of very
gorgeous sunset, whose charms, no longer
cvaucscent, arc hero not painted but dyed
through and through these mighty cliffs,
and made as eternal as the everlasting
mountains they buttress." The geysers are
even more grand and magnificent, because
accompanied by much of the pomp and cir.
cumstanoo Of elemental war 10 tho spouting
of immense columns Of hot water to the
height of 80 to $50 feet or more, in the
| shooting up of vast volumes of steam to an
occasional altitude of 1000 or 1900 feet,
and ia the rumbliug sound and vibrating
motions that accompany tho earthquake
shock. There arc three known gcyser
basins, but two Of which have, however,
been explored. These are in the valley Of
the Fire Hole already referred to, and lio
to the Westward of Yellowstone Lake, from
which they are reached by tolerably we'll
worn trail. Some Of tho ori6oes Of tho
geyser cones are twenty feet in diameter,
nd RI rIr IL IL
water, filling this orifce, rushes outward
aud upward with terrific force, and to
attitudes varying from Is to 275 feet in
some cases. The cones. rims aud basins
formed by the deposits frou, the springs and
geysers are among the most magnificent of
their attractions. Many Of them have all
tho beauty Of finish and brilianoy of color.
Ing of the finest porcelain, while the wators
within the rims and busins of many Of tho
springs are so perfectly transparent that the
smallest objects may be seen at tho depth of
forty or City feet.
Our purpose in referring to the park wac
not 80 much 20 attempt description of its
really indesoribablo wooders, as to call
attention to the work of vandalism already
inaugurated within it by tourists md visi-
tors Many of the magnificent structures
built up by the action of the hot springs
and gcysers are being disfgurcd aud de-.
stroyed by trophy hunters and others, actu-
atcd, too often it is to be fenrcd, by pure
love Of destruction. This shameless raid
upon the varied glorics of the wonderland"
should at once be stopped by the strong
arm of the law Congress ought promptly
to take such action as will protect and pre-
serve the decorations that Nature for,ages
past has treasured up among these "ever-
lasting hills" and in the radiant valleys of
the upper Yellowstone. a resolution was
passed at the recent meeting of the Amori-
can Association for tho Advancement OF
Science, calling upon our National authori--
ties to aot in this matter 1t is subject of
quite as much interest to educators as to
men Of science, inasmuch as the park may
be justly regarded as vast museum whose
unlimited resources arc capable Of illustra-
ting almost every object of thought OF
subject of study within the rargo of created
existences. Let our educators and friends
of education, therefore, add their voices and
votes to those of the scientists 10 the effort
to preserve from dcsecratiou, and for the
high purposes of instruction, the grandest
heritage of natural sublimity, beauty and
utility ever bestowed upon man.
The Educational Weekly.