It is not strange that this cañon has been a theme for writer, painter, and photographer, from its discovery to the present time. But at first thought it is strange that all attempts to portray its beauties are less satisfactory than those pertaining to any other feature of the Park. The artist Moran acknowledged that "its beautiful tints were beyond the reach of human art;" and General Sherman said of this artist's celebrated effort: "The painting by Moran in the Capitol is good, but painting and words are unequal to the subject." In photography, the number of pictures by professional and amateur artists, that have been made of this cañon is prodigious. But photography can only reproduce the form, it is powerless in the presence of such an array of colors as here exists. [Illustration: _Terry Engr. Co._ _Haynes, Photo., St. Paul._ Lower Fall of the Yellowstone--from above.] [Illustration: _Terry Engr. Co._ _Haynes, Photo., St. Paul._ Grand Cañon in Winter. Probably from Lookout Point.] The pen itself is scarcely more effective than the pencil or camera. Folsom, who first wrote of the cañon, frankly owned that "language is entirely inadequate to convey a just conception of the awful grandeur and sublimity of this masterpiece of nature's handiwork." Time has shown this confession to be substantially true. From the clumsy work of the casual newspaper scribe, to the giddy flight of that eminent clergyman, who fancied he saw in this cañon a suitable hall for the great judgment, with the nations of the earth filing along the bottom upon waters "congealed and transfixed with the agitations of that day," all descriptions do injustice to their subject. They fall short of their mark or overreach it. They are not true to nature. We shall therefore pass them by, with one exception, and shall commend our readers to a study of this great wonderwork from the pine-clad verge of the Grand Cañon itself. The exception to which reference is made relates to the Grand Cañon in winter. It has been explained in another place why it is that the winter scenery of the Park must ever remain a sealed book except to those few hardy adventurers who are willing to brave the perils of winter travel in that region. It is a pleasure, therefore, to give at first hand what one of those intrepid spirits felt as he stood upon Lookout Point less than two years ago, and saw the famous cañon clad in its annual mantle of white. He says:[BO]