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Show REPAIRING BOATS AND BAROMETERS. 63 last camp. A very hard day's work has been done, and at evening I sit on a rock by the edge of the river, to look at the water, and listen to its roar. Hours ago, deep shadows had settled into the canon as the sun passed behind the cliffs. Now, doubtless, the sun has gone down, for we can see no glint of light on the crags above. Darkness is coming on. The waves are rolling, with crests of foam so white they seem almost to give a light of their own. Near by, a chute of water strikes the foot of a great block of limestone, fifty feet high, and the waters pile up against it, and roll back. Where there are sunken rocks, the water heaps up in mounds, or even in cones. At a point where rocks come very near the surface, the water forms a chute above, strikes, and is shot up ten or fifteen feet, and piles back in gentle curves, as in a fountain; and on the river tumbles and rolls. July 25.-Still more rapids and falls to day. In one, the "Emma Dean" is caught in a whirlpool, and set spinning about; and it is with great difficulty we are able to get out of it, with the loss of an oar. At noon, another is made; and on we go, running some of the rapids, letting down with lines past others, and making two short portages. We camp on the right bank, hungry and tired. July 26.-We run a short distance this morning, and go into camp, to make oars and repair boats and barometers. The walls of the canon have been steadily increasing in altitude to this point, and now they are more than two thousand feet high. In many places, they are vertical from the water's edge; in others, there is a talus between the river and the foot of the cliffs, and they are often broken down by side canons. It is probable that the river is nearly as low now as it is ever found. High water mark can be observed forty, fifty, sixty, or a hundred feet above its present stage. Sometimes logs and drift wood are seen wedged into the crevice overhead, where floods have carried them. About ten o'clock, Powell, Bradley, Howland, Hall, and myself start up a side canon to the east. We soon come to pools of water; then to a brook, which is lost in the sands below; and, passing up the brook, we find the caiion narrows, the walls close in, are often overhanging, and at last we find ourselves in a vast amphitheater, with a pool of deep, clear, cold water on the bottom. At first, our way seems cut off; but we soon discover a |
