Show STRANGEST 10UNT AIN INTUEWORLD A Pile of ClearCut Granite Blocks Two Thousand Feet HighOnly One Man Has Reached the Summit t A jumbled mass ot granite blocks some of them 50 feet square all of them carrying sharp edges and flat surfaces as though done by the hand of some Titan stone worker and piled helter skelter in a huge heap 2000 feet high and four miles thick at the base Granite Gran-ite blocks of every conceivable shape and size and between them as thev rest unevenly Upon one another dark caverns andpassageways chambers as large as those of Luray or Mammoth cave Not a bush not a tree in sight not even the trace of an animal to lend at least the semblance of life This inn in-n few words is the Black Trevetons of Australia by all odds the strangest most unexplainable mountains in the world SECRET NEVER FATHOMED This wonderful pile of granite situated sit-uated 20 miles back of the coast range of mountains that fringes the edge of cape York peninsula The visitor to t Cooktown would never suspect their presence The mariner far out on the ocean cannot see their black caps The Cooktown blacks deserted their aboriginal aborig-inal haunts about the Trevetons ages I ago and rebuilt their villages high upon up-on the eastern slope of Mt Cook No amount of money or coaxing will induce in-duce them to go back to their old home v > a s aIy1 y = The Mysterious Hoot in the Mountain The reason is awe imbedded in superstition super-stition connected with the Mark pile No white man has ever been able to fathon the secret of this sti tau so finding that no tribesmen as the legends go has ever dared to go to the top and that no white man nail ever ascended higher than the Pln elplpss than half way upthe writer determined to explore the freak and to top the peak if it were possible to do so The aboriginal guide over the Cook ranges declined to go to the foot of the Black Trevetons even for excessive pay ITinaily with the assistance assist-ance of the intrepid mayor of Cook town the guidance and companionship of H B Purcell the noted Queensland tribal linguist explorer and dating bushman was secured Mr Purcell had ventured to the first tier COO feet up a few years before His experience experi-ence in that fearful climb led him to decline the ascent even to the Pinnacle Pin-nacle where stands a crude pOle to mark the achievement of man upon that perilous pile of herbless grassless groundless irregular rocks which have neither handholds nor footholds with sharp jagged points and ledges awaiting t await-ing the sliding incautious climber A MOUNTAIN CUT IN HALF Finding that no one would attempt the ascent of 2000 feet or more I bade camp adieu shouldered my food kit put on my luted rubber bottom shoes into which bodnails had been well and plentifully driven for protection gave instructions in case of failure to return in three days faced the sun and the terrible mount before me and began the ascent with an ironnoosed knotted rope as my only assistant The highest peak in this second tier of coast range is about six miles long and about four deep at the base Just before the topmost peak is reached a dyke cuts the mountain nearly in half Th northern section is a rough wooded rockland with rich umersrowth and plentiful soil like the side of an > other ordinary mountain in the world Suddenly Sud-denly this earth and botany stop Some great god has taken his knife and cut right across the hills cleaving the peak in twain from east to west Beginning Begin-ning at this point where the vegetation vegeta-tion ceases the peak rises a bit higher drops into a low bed like the boulder bottom of a large river the waters of which had sunk out of sight carrying all the sands and pebbles below and leaving nothing but the horrible ghastly ghast-ly stones and their treacherously yawning yawn-ing cavities GRANITE PILE 2000 FEET HIGH The hill then takes an Irregular sweep up in tiers until it rises to a height of over 2000 feet From the clearcut woodland which bisedts the north hill to the furthermost base of the hiirh southern peak is fully four miles and the mountains measure three or lour I milps through at their base and are fully two and a half miles thick at their waist 600 or 700 feet up The foundation i founda-tion is a kind of coarsegrained or pebbled peb-bled blue granite shotting sculntor crystals of tin which still clinging to the crumbling outer rock gives the surface a very sharp and dangerous face To describe the cJiysical make no of the Black Tre1 tons Is difficult There is nothing analogous to them in I any part of the world Collona formations forma-tions have some recuVarity In stone or In the arrangement hence the Giants CUusewav and slmiar rock piles cannot can-not be used for illujration Neither can weatherworn and waterwashed bowl der hills like those in Mauritius be utilized These rocks do not bear the host resemblance to rocks exoobCAl bv floods age or anv such causes They do not even appear to have been gradually grad-ually lifted into the air by some subterranean subter-ranean or seIsmic cause Let the imagination imag-ination picture a great area of barren coarsegrained blue granule spread out over a plain in layers 10 to 20 feet thick with not a tree or shrub or particle of earth upon it All of a sudden let some giant explosion crack and break it up in sharpedged irregular chunks of all sizes from a ton weight to the size of a small house and in all sorts of sasses from a rude triangle to anything any-thing you might wish to draw except around a-round bowlder Now imagine that some winged Atlas had gathered these Irregular chunks of sharpened blue granite up in his great apron ascended into the skies and drowned them and let them lax as ther fell upon each other until he had heaped up this huge frowning mass 2000 feet into the air and you will have the best description I can give of the Black Trevetons TERRIBLE PLAIN OF STONES These are the Black Trevetons as You st tnd and look at them To clamber I ovor them and to worm about in the black bowels of them heightens their wonder and the wonder of them The mountains and sours about are totally dissimilar in every respect The main I mountain of the Black Trevetons rises I back in three tiers The top of the first tier is about EOO feet high from the base Then there is a jumbled rocky valley a terrible plain of ragged stones with dangerous mouths everwhere A slip on the uncertain gravel of the rock face might take one against a keen edge of rock beneath or further on to dangerous danger-ous depths The climb is still over these to the next tier which looks like the spiked piazza of some iron footed god It extends back a couple of hundred yards Beyond the high swell of the alex rises over this crater valley The foundation soon breaks out Into a kind of soup bowl of two acres size and then the breast of the cupola swells uo against a Treat mass of cracked rocks which crown the peak More properly they leek like a timeworn weight placed there to hold something down After making the effort one could well understand why the daring mountaineer moun-taineer halted at the pinnacle 800 feet up and declined burn his brain further in the blazing pitiless tropical i sun to lacerate his body or risk his i life further at scaling the abrupt rocks I ur slanting slabs uitnout hobnailed rubbed bottomed shoes and my knotted I rope with its iron noose for hooking over the nose of the rocks and a piece of chalk to mark the way through the crevices ascent of certain stages was I impossible When not possible to scale the top I worked my way down under I the mass of rocks and then back up I through the creeks to the surface again going in this way as much as 100 yards into the deptls of the mountains coming com-ing out as much as 200 yards from the I ingress either forward or to the side Often I retraced my slow creeping course to find an egress using the chalk to chart the course to orevent being lost Once I spent fully two hours scaling a 50foot rise in this way Sores and bruises did not count Putting Put-ting your provisions through and then working yourself through the gap of some irregular niche of sharp rocks Is far from pleasant but it must be done if one aspires to top the Black Tree tons INSIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN Working by compass after passing the first tier I found myself worming further and further into the middle of the great hill The sun could not be seen my watch was left behind for safety the fading light soon told the approach of evening While streaks of light still bent themselves about like J silver ribbons during the day they were now getting paler and leadened I The sun may have been shining outside out-side but it had now lost its angle upon the caves about me How far I was in the mountain I do not know I had worked and pulled and crawled through hole after hole and explored cavity after cavity following the brightest light for hours until my I knees were raw and my garments torn in the effort As the dense curtain of night pulled itself down before me the air puffed about my ears like the i spirit wings of invisible ghosts I was tired and worn out When my own hand could not be seen against my own I nose I laid down to resta human parcel par-cel in a mass of stone In that terrible terri-ble climb up and down and about beneath be-neath the surface not able to see further fur-ther than the Immediate rock opposite the hole through which streamed the I I gray streak which guided me the mysteries I mys-teries of the pile remained mysterious still The little rays shot on down or I out the rock still jumbled and yawned and yawned and at times one hardly knew whether he was going up or descending de-scending The beams of the sun didnt seem to come from anywhere in particular par-ticular they just bent and shot and hoisted through the pile as best they could At no time did I double on my 1 course except when forced to retrace my chalked track because of failure to find an opening big enough to admit I ad-mit the body of a 180pound man At i places I found large caves of rooms I from 10 to 40 feet wide of equal length and as much as 20 feet high The floors were fairly level I It was in a small one of these that night caught me and there I slept How long I do not know No noise save the low seductive cadence of the cool wind which worked its way through the mountain could be heard i K t 5 A CAVERN FILLED WITH LIGHT The light which stole back down 1 there from the morning sun soon awoke me and I limbered my stiffened I Joints for another effort Day might have been well advanced outside Its flood of light was breaking through new cracks from above and some even peeped up from below Taking the line cf the biggest ray I chalked my course through the dubious openings up down back and over All of a sudden a white sheet seemed to hang in front of me It proved to be a cavern filled with light A strange looking arrow I stood perpendicularly in It This was the first sign of wood vegetation or life Leaping down through an opening open-ing six or eight feet and then sliding over a treacherous slab ten feet further fur-ther to the floor I found myself in a chamber about 20x40 feet and about 20 feet high Thinking that the faultlessly Trevetons is similar to this huge section sec-tion then a small dog a kangaroo or a larke hawk could work its way through thEwhol Jdn uhtain fpm easl < to west or elsewhere By daring slides down the face of great blocksV and often of-ten clearing 20foot gaps below landing land-ing on sharp points or o her pieces I found myself ragged wreck walking into camp at deep duskS oclock I having descended In less than six hours i what it took me nearly a day and a I half to climb JOHN F HOBBS < 71 t O i wI t r if > f fffJq IJItt < > < < r c 1 I tfi I f4t k p k c f err r f oi I 1 6 < > 6 f lP t 111 1 V I > Zr Ir rls tl L Z P I Jft 9 l < j < r t o 11i2 7 t Vz 5i 9V W F J z r y t 1J n y t 3k 4 i J1 ir r3 r1 tJFF f fj p i to Jh y 0 IS J i l i r 1Ij C 2jHSfc > Z < 1 1i y t I 3 t YffiJtj JI rot > 1 k > w T tI trj < > p Q c r 4 i f Cr E j 1 1 P 2 A > z t4 b li g t tI < r < 0 < R n 1 itpt f rt 7v < = L j J ta G t < k C 7 c ia1a W 60 jt Strange Formation of Granite Blocks Two Thousand Feet High straight spearshaped stem was the weapon of an aborigine I fancied all sorts of queer things To my astonishment the assagai was the lie root of some tree or shrub from the outside blackened in here by the decomposing oxide of iron It came out of the root dropped in a perfectly vertical portion pierced the floor and disappeared among the rocks below Leaving my kit but taking my knotted rope I chalked my way after it for at least 100 yards Then the hungry I thing disappeared through a small aperture and was lost Its size did not I diminish in the least from the 1inch diameter it measured in the cavern j No shoots or suckers curled out from its stem and no semblance of earth I fed its course There was nothing save little handfuls of sandy gravel which I the level surface of had settled upon i JI I the hard rock A STRANGE PLOT I Retracing my chalked course and taking my new discovery as a pilot to lead me upward from this wilderness of rock I wended in and out after its winding course for an hour losing I then finding it and finally losing it for good Where It came from is uncertain I eI7 el Oq i us I certain where it went to is equally so i After moping and creeping here and there for two or three hours longer a big gray pillow of light lay in the yawning chasm beneath It came from somewhere Getting down Into it and looking up a silvery vista wound in and out from above like the rays of a great searchlight seeking out the I darkness down there Following it up I and veering to the right past an ill j placed lot of jagged overhanging rock j the hot air of the outer world warmed I my face and the noonday sun sweltered I swel-tered on the meridian above Sentinel rock lay fullj half a mile back and 500 I feet further up in the air though invisible In-visible from the pinnacle on the first tier The ascent from my exit to the I apex while wearying and hazardous on the surface required no more I i the I perilous slides and climbing which necessitated ne-cessitated navigation within and you didnt have to go over by going under The sun beat down mercilessly By 3 I oclock the top was reached and the rock there felt its first press of aans foot The climber preferred rest to feelings of triumph WIND FROM ALL QUARTERS Deep down in the Black Trevetons the wind comes from all quarters and from below Rock wallabys < entering j either side have been seen to emerge upon the other The ni inference i is than I they went through When the sun has I passed to the west and is low down below be-low the first tier the light peeps in I from the western shafts and rents and the easterly and top holes darken This j shows that the rays penetrate from the j I west and from below the first tier and at a depth of 500 or 600 feet through j that half mile of piled stones Assuming Assum-ing that the remainder of the Black |