The Penn's Grove record., 1883-12-29
Awe-InspirIng Grandeur.

Following the uunnison River
through its wide and beautiful valley IN
Colorado for a few miles, the mountains
seem to close In upon the track. and it
enters one of the grandest gorges in
the world, known as the Black Canyon
of the Gunnison. Here are beautliul
cataracts, the water tumbling down
from the mountain crags into the Gun
nison River. over precipices from
!, 800 to 1000 feet high. In one place
it is a dainty little cascade like the bridal
veil at Niagara Falls-a slender thread
of water pouring over the rocks in fine
spray, and falling into a little basin
close to the track, which makes as
beautiful a picture as can be seen any
where.
And what a magnificent stream is the
Gunnisonl It's water is clear and cold,
and the dark shadows of the cliffs fall
ing upon it gives it a tint OF beautiful
green. Springing from a region white
with eternal SHOWS, like a thread of sill
yer it burrows through the walls OF
rock whose pinnacles rise 1900 and
5000 feet high on either side, and is
IOOlCd III ~ a billOW bbhiP vi uuoilli0A
blue sky-so narrow that one stardine
on the summit of one cliff could throw a
stone across to the summit OF the other.
Now the river frets, and spurnes, and
throws its foam. splashing in spray
against the black rocks; again it CUR
giles and giggles in glee, laughs and
roars at the triumph of having leaped
over natures carriers; then tumbles
headlong over a mighty rock, and with
placid dignity hows along between the
great mountains, taking a few NON en- y
rest in its mad rush to the sea.
For City miles we follow the narrow
chasm, STEPPED in the purple of a per
petuaI twilight. The solemn walls stand
up for 5000 feet both sides ofus, frown-
ing down upon the int uders into then
clustered solitude. For a mile or two
they are almost perpendicular, gray
with the antique lIchens that countlcss
summers have gathered upon their pur-
pie fronts; then they are massed in
broken columns standing upon a com
mon base. Here a solitary pinnacle
sos upward toward the sky like a
monstrous cathedral tower; there the
rocks are thrown together helfer-skelter
in piles half a mile high by some re-
mote geological commotion, and again
they close together and hug the current
of the river for uubroken miles, the
shadows becoming darker and gloomlei
In places the edges are hacked aud torn,
SCARED and split into great seams into
which tie earth has fallen, aud a few
sad and solitary spruce trees clin g in a
perilous existence.
1 Often at a height which the sul's
rays can sometimes reach, but the wind
is eve still, a tiny flower may be seer
with heroic fortitude, and a
few feet away in a Gift III the rocks
will be found an eagles nest.
When night approaches, The edges of
the rocks that, standing cut agains the
can catch the moonbeams, viii be
fringed with "a silvery phosphorescence.
Looking up one sees the narrow roof OF
with a fresco of stars; looking down
there in the blackneas Of darkne IS i'm
measurable.
An awe inspires one when he thinks
that all this architectural grandeur, all
these mighty chasms which would have
required /. 900, 600 men 1000 years to
have excayated, have been wrought by
the simple agencies Of water and wind
and dusti These canyons were not made
by volcanic eruptions, the biologists tell
us, but by agencies 80 simple al those.