The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1907-06-29
GRAND CANYON OF SONORA.
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of heecy WhltenesS, soon to out and stant
clear cut against SAPPHIRE sky. Here and ther,
the mountains we're cleft apart by some Titan,
force leaving deep, narrow gorges and wild ravines
where sunlight never enters and near which the eye
is lost in the twilight of a soft purple haze Will
a field glass [ swept the terrifying solitude and the
landscape, expanded by the lens now grew colossal
Around me- and afar off, in this desolation of ST.
lence and loneliness stood in isolated majesty weird
architectural figures, if phantoms of the mag
nation had materalized into stone. Huge irregu-
lar shafts and powders of granite and gneissoid.
left standing after the winds and rains had dis
solved the softer sand and Imestones, assumed ia
miliar but in this mtenanted wilderness. unexpecf-
dexamples of the builders art, In this tumutous
land lonely and forbiddng rose CLOUD capped tow
ers and gorgeous palaces ~ vast rotundas, cathe-
dral spires and rocks of shapeless FORMS
VAR OF THE ELEMENTS.
Between me I'D the valley which doomed with
tropical life far down by the flowing waters, lay
lava lake. where tumblng waves of fire in Mo
Gene times were frozen into rgidity, as if God had
said "Here let the pillows stifen and have rest"
Over this desolate plain of black, gneous matter,
mates of the mountain storm were crossing and an
parently making for the pine lands of Iquaa whose
lofty peak is suused with roseate blush long before
the msts and darkness are out of the valley Some
time in the palasozoic age, in the days when God
said LET the waves that are under the heaven be
gathered together into place and let the day and
land appear" these great mountains vere heaved
up, invading the region of the clouds And the
clouds resented the intrusion and at once began
attack the adamantine Notifications. In this
war of the elements the clouds must "win out" for
before the morning of eternity the clouds will have
pulverized the mountains into dust. These wander
ing, tempest bearing clouds, with restless energy
are ever hurting their allied forces of Wind and rain
against the fronts and tanks of their enemies and
with marvellous cunning are gnawing away their
porphyritc strength, cutting deep gashes in their
sides, separating individual bodies and fashioning
them into towering masses of isolated and archi-
tectural wonderful formations
FIERCE CONFLICT OF PRIMORDIAL
FORCES.
The torrential rains and melting SHOWS have
rushed down the rugged slopes and opened ghasty
wounds in the sides of the mountains These
wounds the deep gulches, the dark ravines and
abysses of horrent and gloomy depths where SUI
light rarely enters. The runlets, streams and hur-
rying waters rushing to common meeting,
and they fed they left scars on the face of their
enemy and the clouds were avenged And when
these fluid auxiliaries met together, each one of
them carried to the common center large contribu
tions of silt and sand, spoils torn from the foe
The mountains rolled huge rocks upon their enc
mics, poured liquid fiery torrents of molten masses
which hardening into metallic shrouds covered the
land and obterated the courses and beds of the
streams. But raw auxiliaries and recruits came
from the region of the clouds, opened chan
nels massed their strength, and together cut into
and through the great mountains frightful cash
one mile deep and many miles long. Through this |
cash flows the Urique river as blood flows from |
gaping wound, and as looked down and into the
dark abyss, | thought | saw Kuba Khau gazing into
the gloomy depths of Anadu-
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns, measureess to man
Down to the silent sea.
Before, above and around me was panorama
of unsurpassed sublimty tremendous manifesto
ton of the creative will of God, co-mingling eff
natural wonders and elemental forces proclaimng
to man the omnipotence of God and the glory of
the Lord To the material mind the land around
me is "a desert land place of horror and of waste
wilderness, which cannot be sowed nor bringeth
forth figs, vines, pomegranites," but to the
man of meditation and of faith it is a land where
the majesty of omnpotence is enthroned and the
voice of Creation supreme.
PEN PICTURE OF THE WONDERFUL
SNENE