These are the elements with which the walls are constructed, from black buttress below to alabaster tower above. All of these elements weather in different forms and are painted in different colors, so that the wall presents a highly complex facade. A wall of homogeneous granite, like that in the Yosemite, is but a naked wall, whether it be 1,000 or 5,000 feet high. Hundreds and thousands of feet mean nothing to the eye when they stand in a meaningless front. A mountain covered by pure snow 10,000 feet high has but little more effect on the imagination than a mountain of snow 1,000 feet high--it is but more of the same thing; but a facade of seven systems of rock has its sublimity multiplied sevenfold. Let the effect of this multiplied facade be more clearly realized. Stand by the river side at some point where only the black gneiss 381 powell-canyons-245.jpg A GABLE WITH PINNACLES. 382 powell-canyons-246.jpg NICHES OR PANELS THE RED WALL LIMESTONE. THE GRAND CANYON. 383 is seen. A precipitous wall of mountain rises over the river, with crag and pinnacle and cliff in black and brown, and through it runs an angular pattern of red and gray dikes of granite. It is but a mountain cliff which may be repeated in many parts of the world, except that it is singularly naked of vegetation, and the few plants that find footing are of strange tropical varieties and are conspicuous because of their infrequency. Now climb 800 feet and a point of view is reached where the variegated quartzites are seen. At the summit of the black gneiss a terrace is found, and, set back of this terrace, walls of elaborate sculpture appear, 800 feet in height. This is due to the fact that though the rocks are exceedingly hard they are in very thin layers or strata, and these strata are not horizontal, but stand sometimes on edge, sometimes highly inclined, and sometimes gently inclined. In these variegated beds there are many deep recesses and sharp salients, everywhere set with crags, and the wall is buttressed by a steep talus in many places. In the sheen of the midday sun, these rocks, which are besprinkled with quartz crystals, gleam like walls of diamonds. A climb of 800 feet over the variegated beds and the foot of the cliff sandstone is reached. It is usually olive green, with spots of brown and black, and presents 500 feet of vertical wall over the variegated sand- stone. The dark green is in fine contrast with the variegated beds below and the red wall above.