There are places where the surface of the Colorado is seven thousand five hundred feet below the brink of the gorge, and at nearly every point it is close on six thousand feet. Looking across from one edge of the canyon to the other, the distance seems to the novice to be two miles. Say so to one of the guides or trailsmen and he may smile; for at Bright Angel trail the width is no less than thirteen miles, while the tourist who stands on the brink at Grand View and looks directly across covers with the glance a distance of eighteen miles. The eye is indeed deceptive here, for if you descend to what is known as the top of the inner gorge and look down upon the river the Colorado appears to be a muddy creek twenty or twenty-five feet wide. But these black walls of granite, which descend almost vertically from the place where you stand, are actually four times the height of Niagara's famous gorge, being nearly fourteen hundred feet sheer, and the river itself is over a hundred and fifty feet wide. Yet, spite of its fierce current and deadly, rock-strewn rapids, men have dared to attempt to float down this semi-subterranean river in boats. They have tried it, but only two such adventurers can say that they did it successfully, and can prove their story by photographs. These men, who have accomplished a feat that seemed to be impossible, are Charles Russell and E. R. Monett, two American gold-miners. Away back in 1869 the famous explorer Powell tried to navigate the river with an expedition consisting of four boats and eight men, but most of the boats were wrecked long before the end of the gorges was reached, and in several places they dared not trust to the waters, but carried their craft bodily round the dangerous passages. Twenty years after Major Powell made the attempt Stanton, another explorer, tried it with three boats and twelve men, but his party did not complete the journey by water. Since then several other expeditions have risked their lives; and in some cases men have gone into those grim and gloomy gorges and never been heard of again.