Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-12-07
AN UNKNOWN WONDER.
Black Canyon in the Summit of the Big
Horn Mountains.


Horn Mountains.
Over the hills ard far away. sixty or
seventy miles beyond Fort Custer, Mon
tame, and to the southwest. says the St.
Paul Pioneer Press, Mother Earth has
two enormous gashes in her face. Ten
miles beyond old Fort Smith, with its
well-kept cemetery, wherein repose the
bones of a gallant band of regulars who
fellvictims to the Sioux in '67, these gashes
meet at a somewhat acute angle, and
beyond their conveyance spreads and
winds the valley Of the Big Horn. OF the
longer of these wounds in the counten-
ance of the world a good deal has been
written, and for years the Big Horn
canyon has been regarded as one of the
wonders CT a wonderful region. But of
canyons the west has a plethora, and the
more striking marYels Of the adjacent
Yellowstone Park have claimed attention
TO the exclusion of other typographical
phenomena. Striking, even grand, in any
land, however, would be that other cash
which joins the Big Horn and is known
in the vicinity as the Black canyon.
Crow and Sioux have known the mighty
assure for years, and. of course, rumOrS
of it reached the settlements through the
hardy trappers and hunters of the later
sixties. Hardy and utterly devoid Of fear
must those same trappers have been. for
Black canyon yawns where, up to 1871 or
1872, the hercest of fierce Indians could
be founder would find the intruder-at
almost any day in the year. To Gen.
Sheridan ard party belong the hOnOrs of
first exploration, which occurred in 1871
during one of the long plain and noun
tain trips of that officer, and it is under
stood that he gave the cash the name it
bears.
Black canyon is reft in the very summit
of the Hig Horn mountains, and yawns
for somewhat tOrtuOus length of thirty
miles, stretching from its junction with
the canyon, through which the waters of
the Big Horn river force their way, south
eastward into Wyoming. and almost to
the boundaries of the National Park. 1t
has never been thoroughly explored, but
except at the sOuthernmost extremity,
maintains nearly uniform depth of 1000
feet. As WesteFners well know, noun
tains in these parts are treeless and rise
to snow line beyond in gradual and
rounded slopes. There is not the slightest
indication of the Black canyon until one
reaches its very verge, and the effect of
the contrast between its densely-woOded
sides, where ''the tall pines, like funereal
plumes," wave to and fro and sing cease
lessly, and the treeless activities behind,
is as unique as can he imagined. Vel is
It named "Black," for these same pines.
massed as they are with naught but the
denser foliage displayed, give an air of
Erebus itself to the whole huge assure.
Bringing into more marked effect the SOM
breness of the greater portion of the can
yOn are huge white cliffs, perfectly per-
pendiculaF, and with their sheer height of
more than 4 third Of a mile towering into
lmpressiveness which cOmpels silence on
the part of the onloOker, be he garrulous
as Falstatf or querulOus as Holman.
He would be a queer American who,
looking down into this chasm, did not
feel an immediate and irresistible desire
to penetrate the depths and look up. To
accomplish this is arduOus, but neither
difficult nor dangerous. Two or three
miles south Of the debOuching of the Big
Horn canyon a bride path leads to the
bottom of the Black. 1t is partly a bed of
stream which depends upon the rainy
season for its flow and partly a track
made by bears. elk, or deer, terraced as it
were in the very side of the steepness.
From the entrance to the deep wood to
the bottom plateau is about . mile and
threc-quarters by this path, and over all
but half-mile it is possible to ride.
steep as the side of a house in almost
every part, but winding sufficiently to
allow the line Of direction to be main
tanned within ones base, a careful horse
can make good progress until more than
halfway down. Then must his rider dis
mount, for what was steep before becomes
precipitOus now, and the footway, instead
OF being hard and even, is covered with
sand, earth, loose stones, and other detri-
tuS from the towering sides above. Both
horse and rider must slide; and as in the
middle of the steepest part bends round
large rock, at an acute angle, while to the
right yawns precipice hundreds of feet
in depth, one has the citation which comes
Of semi-danger after he has passed this
evil half-mile and remounts for the last
and comparatively easy half-mile of de-
scent, with the cOmplacency of him who
has encountered and overcome obstacles.
Yet it isn't really very dangerous, since
the loose earth helps to hold one back,
and a number of army ladies have made
the descent in perfect safety, but with
more or less damage to habiliments.
Once landed on the perfectly level sur
face at the bottom of the Big canyon, the
explorer finds that the sides do not meet at
the bottom, as they seemed to do when
looked at from above, but are separated
by from few hundred feet to a quarter of
a mile. The huge bare walls of rocks are
even more impressive when seen from
below, and seem to be like the battlements
of some huge castle erected by Titians
and worthy of defense by the Olympian
gods. Shut out from the world, and
singing a merry dashing song through
the center of the lower level, runs Canyon
creek, here deep and narrow, there wide
and wadeable, and always as cold as ice
and as clear as crystal. Why not? 1t is
fed by snow and ice, and on its waves the
sun can pour its beams but four or five
hours out of every twenty-four. And in
that creek what trout! Lovely salmon
colOred fellows; the mountain trout of
Montana and Idaho; gamy as the cutest
delicious to the palate as Ward could
desire, and sizable in that many attain
the noble size of three or four
Founders, and few which the
angler cares to save weigh
less than pound. They will bite at any
thing, from a piece of red flannel coat
lining to a grasshOpper, and to see one
snatch the bait in the midst of headlong
rush up stream, and then to feel the thrill
in wrist and shoulder as he resents the
barb, is to shave fun in as true and full
a sense as the heart of a fisherman ever
imagined.
Black canyon is not so inaccessible as
to make a journey thereto either tedious or
tiresOme, and in the near future it will be
place of favOrite resort with sight-seers.
Then will come the utilitarian, and the
puff, Whirr, and buzz of the steam saw
mill, turning into "frst clear' those
mighty millions of pines, will usurp the
stiffness and brighten away forever the
speckled denizens of the Crystal creek.
THE VENDER OF FACES.