Truly, here was a noble river, vibrating like a bundle of quivering electric wires a mile below, yet notching the centuries, revealing a record of geological time, and disclosing to men how God writes history. It was a canyon full of interest even to the most casual observer in the group. External senses were all appropriately appealed to. Indeed, the hidden recesses of the inner self were reached and stirred by the wild beauty and mystery of the scene. The world would surely want to visit such a place. As they reluctantly journeyed along the river toward the lake, their ears were assailed by a series of resounding thuds. The source was the combined agitations of Mud Volcano and Dragons Mouth. These frightful vents reminded them of two vicious, frothing animals chained in cavernous lairs. There they spewed their foul compounds, as in terrible rage, growling and groaning in their perpetual regurgitations. It was one of the fascinating, if loathsome, sights in the Park. [Illustration: Bighorn resentful toward invaders.] Later there was Yellowstone Lake, nestled serenely against its buttress-based, snow-capped mountain guardians. Many people have been made happy by its sparkling water. One capable writer has left his impression: From a gentle headland, at last we overlooked the lake. It was like the fairest dream which ever came to bless the slumbers of a child. How still it was! What silence reigned! How lovingly it laid its hush upon you![128] It was the Washburn party that fancied a resemblance between the lake and the human hand. Concerning this analogy Professor R. W. Raymond made an amusing observation: The gentleman who first discovered this resemblance must have thought the size and form of fingers quite insignificant, provided the number was complete. The hand in question is afflicted with Elephantiasis in the thumb, dropsy in the little finger, hornet bites on the third finger, and the last stages of starvation in the other two.[129] What a struggle they had in threading their way through fir and lodgepole forests east of the lake. The tanglewood was nearly impenetrable; no trails to guide them except the dim and devious ways of wild animals, “through which we toiled and swore our way, coming out after several days tattered and torn, ragged, bleeding and sullen.”[130] In this welter it was every man for himself after the general course had been determined. It was this circumstance that eventuated in the painful despair of Truman C. Everts. Lost in the Wilderness