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Show All Aboard For Zion By Henry Irving Dodge in The Elks Magazine Once upon a time the good Lord said: "Men have been doing foolish things trying to interpret me. I'll give them a hint. I'll make something some-thing graceful, dignified for them to follow. For I love the beautiful." Then the good Lord obviously the use of the pronoun here is in-pertinent in-pertinent made Zion Canyon. "Sublime," observed the good Lord, "but not enough." Again the good Lord picked up His chisel, gouged out the earth and fashioned the Grand Canyoa. Again the good Lord contemplated His handiwork: "Too magnificent, too thunderous, too gloomy, too somber, som-ber, too terrifying. I'll give them something in lighter vein, fanciful for I love the fanciful." So the good Lord swung His chisel into the earth again and gouged out a great bowl Bryce Canyon. Giving Giv-ing free rein to His fancy, the good Lord fashioned in this bowl all kinds of figures and on its walls He etched almost everything that was ever made as if recording the history of all creation from then to now. But more of this later. One said to me, "Go to Zion Canyon Can-yon for the spiritual influence of it. If you are threatened with the effect witnout cause superstition atheism go there. Go there, and while you're there for the Good Lord's sake, keep still. Don't try to describe it. Just contemplate. Humbly, joyously contemplate." Said another, "If you want to look into Heaven, go into Zion Canyon and look upward; if you want to look into in-to Hell, stand on the edge of the Grand Canyon and look down." In a way this is true, for you dwell in the bottom of Zion and look up where the chaste, granite figures point into the sky. At the Grand, you stand on the rim and look down down into a red inferno. That's the way it struck me. From the bottom of Zion, you look up and worship and appeal, but you draw back from the edge of the Grand Canyon in terror. So much has been written of the vast and awful splendors of the Grand Canyon of the Colorado, that the sublime beauty of Zion has been overlooked. After visiting Zion, Bryce, Grand, Cedar Breaks, my loyalty for my first love Zion is unshaken. I had heard that the three great canyons were wholly different. I confess I didn't see how that could be. But I soon found that they were different in every respect, but the coloring and, perhaps, they were different even in the coloring. What can one do when he has but a week in which to view the major canyons? The digestive organs of his imagination are clogged. He is fortunate if he can, in the retrospect, keep them even hazily distinct and separate. There are smaller, or better, bet-ter, less magnificent canyons subordinate sub-ordinate canyons to be visited which one never heard of. Any of these "little fellows," if it were the only one of its kind extant would be worth going around the world to see. Verily, on reaching Bryce Canyon, after standing subdued in wonder on the North Rim of the Grand, one wouldn't have given it a second glance if its distinctly different beauty beau-ty did not enchant one. I can't explain. ex-plain. I can only say, "Go see for yourself." As for describing the scenery with my feeble pen, I can only say that no one would have the impudence to attempt at-tempt it but a college girl or a patent pat-ent lawyer, whose business it is to describe everything, but whose stuff no one ever reads. The experience of Kipling is consoling. con-soling. The noted Englishman was standing on the bank of the Columbia Colum-bia River notebook and pencil in hand. "What yer doin'?" said a native, approaching. "Trying to write a description of it." "Bub, yer better put up yer pencil and paper because it just simply can't be done." I was told that Kipling said later, when writing about the Yellowstone, "I don't expect anybody to believe this." If I were gifted enough to convey even a suggestion of the wonders won-ders of the canyons, I'd repeat the later words of Kipling. The college girl, unless the good Lord should guide her hand, would tell you of her reactions to the scene. But you would not get anything of what the scene was. The patent lawyer or the civil engineer would give you the facts and figures, geometrical geom-etrical descriptions. Hut, oh, what's the use! I doubt even If I'oe would attempt It. I can only say that the many colored color-ed photographs I have seen are not a whit, exaggerated In color and of course, not In form. This I know. For this I have seen with my own eyes. I can't do even as the College girl would do for I can't tell you how I reacted to the scene. I don't think I reacted at all. I was wonder-stricken, wonder-stricken, that's all plumb wonder-stricken. wonder-stricken. I utterly failed at first to take in the beauty of it. But my spiritual eyes gradually opened as we progressed into Zion Canyon. For the approach into this wonderland wonder-land is gradual. We left Cedar City, southwestern Utah, a night's train ride from Salt Lake City, about nine o'clock in the morning. Traveling by a great-smooth-riding automoble bus over a fine road and through moderately picturesque scenery, and all keyed--up for the first sight of the canyon, we made the sixty-two-mile trip to Zion National Park in a little more than three hours. Nature is the greatest of all dramatists. dram-atists. She never perpetrates an anti-climax unless man meddles with her work. The approach to Zion is no exception. The scenery up to a certain point has been progressively beautiful. Suddenly we rounded a curve and entered at the rear of a vast amphitheatre. Away in front of us was the stage. We approached as if we would enter upon it. Here is the setting. Mark well the metaphors'. meta-phors'. "The Watchman"-a mountain moun-tain on the east guards well the approach. Having passed this guardian guar-dian in safety, we laid our propition-al propition-al offerings upon the "Altar of Sacrifice," Sacri-fice," a slender, flat-topped pinnacle of ivory, stained red, it seemed, with the blood of martyrs. We next passed pas-sed "Bridge Mountain" on the east and entered into Zion proper. However, we found other rites and cermonies to perform before entering to Sublime Presence. We passed the "Court of the Three . Patriarchs," pausing a moment to contemplate their magnificance. Again we did homage devout and reverent contemplation con-templation at the "Temple of the Sun," whose summit catches the first glimmer of the rising sun and reflects re-flects the last glories of the same. We proceeded at leisure through the main court to the base of "El Gobernador, the Great White Throne," whereon the foot of man has never trod. While worshiping here the rustle of the angel's wings on "Angel's Landing" (in front of the Throne) and the chimes of the "Great Organ" (at its side) may be heard (in fancy) in the sighing of the wind through the trees arid the gurgling and swishing of the river as it wends its way over the stones. Remember these great forms are not mountains as we always think of mountains but colossal pinnacles of ivory, it would seem, vari-colored and with naked sides some like loaves of bread standing on end. Zion Canyon is a group or cluster of j these an intimate family group, one might say. A museum of the Gods a garden of heavenly spectres. In reverent mood, you may proceed pro-ceed to the "Temple of Sinawava" and worship in your own untrammel-ed untrammel-ed way; then on to the "Mountain of Mystery" and work your own charms trying to unfold Nature's secrets concerning It. Thus endeth the metaphor. The mountain or, rather, pinnacle pin-nacle top plateaus have never been explored. There's no way to climb those smooth perpendicular sides that reach up three thousand feet dom the floor of the canyon. No one knows what living things obtain up there. One presumes they are nnlv hirrls and Inserts whose sanctu ary has not yet been violated by the airplane. What makes Zion the Temple Is that in it you're always looking up. With most other canyons you're always al-ways looking down, and one never associates looking down with worship. wor-ship. Let any man stand there In those beautiful silences and declare there is no God and he's got more courage than I have. Or he Is a bigger big-ger fool. Zion is my first and only love among the canyons. The others fascinate me but I don't love them. They are marvelous beyond the conception con-ception of man. But there is a chaste sweetness, a spiritual warmth to Zion that the others haven't got. It's a sanctuary of the soul. There's a certain intimacy to It. You feel toward It as you would toward your mother. That's because you're so close to It not worshiping at a distance. You feel like petting It, running your hands over the smooth sides of Its Images. You couldn't do that, with the Grand Canyon. 1 can only, most Inadequately, suggest sug-gest my reactions as I walked down there through the valley of heavenly specters. Abler men than I have made sincere efforts to convey something some-thing of the wonders of Zion. Each has used the terms of his trade In doing so. Hut mark how they have, each and every one, resorted to architectural arch-itectural metaphors. More than forty years ago, Captain Cap-tain C. E. Imttori, a celebrated geol- ogist in the services of the Government, Govern-ment, wrote: "In an hour's time we reached the crest of the isthmus and there flashed flash-ed before us a scene never to be forgotten. for-gotten. In coming time, it will, I believe, take rank with a very small number of spectacles each of which will, in its own way, be regarded as the most exquisite of its kind which the world discloses. "Across the Canyon stands the central object of the picture, the West Temple, rising four thousand feet above the river. Its glorious summit was the object we had seen an hour before. Yet it is only the central object of a mighty throng of structures wrought up to the same exalted style. Here are great pediments pedi-ments triangular or circular ornaments orna-ments covered all over with the richest carvings. The effect is much like that which the architect of the Milan cathedral appears to have designed, des-igned, though here it is vividly suggested sug-gested rather than fully realized. "A row of towers half a mile high is quarried out of the palisade and stands well advanced from its face. There is an eloquence to their forms which stirs the imagination with singular power and kindles in the mind of the dullest observer a glowing glow-ing response." You will observe that the writers do not attempt definitely to describe the shapes of the great towering creations that they see. But one and all use oriental architecture for their nnrnose. T slinnose. because these are, to the Western mind, bizarre. biz-arre. Minarets, domes, temples, singly and in groups, are the metaphors meta-phors used. Others see in the tracery trac-ery on the walls the handiwork of the etcher or the sculptor. But to each and every one the natural temples tem-ples suggest incomprehensible, de-vine de-vine art. Dutton goes on: "Directly in front of us a complex group of white towers, springing from a central pile, mounts upward to the clouds. Out of their midst, and high over all, rises a domelike mass which dominates the entire landscape. It is almost pure white, with brilliant streaks of carmine descending des-cending its vertical waals. It is impossible im-possible to liken this object to any familiar shape. Yet its shape is far from being indefinite; on the contrary, con-trary, it has definiteness and individuality individ-uality which exhortan exclamation of surprise when first beheld. The towers which surround it are a study of fine form and architectural effect. They are white above and changed to rich red below. A curtain wall, fourteen hundred feet high, descends vertically from the eaves of the temples tem-ples and is decorated with a lavish display of vertical moldings, and the ridges, eaves and mitered angles are fretted with serrated cusps small projecting ornaments common in Gothic tracery. Exact symmetry Is wanting, but Nature has brought home to us the truth that symmetry is only one of the infinite range of devices by which beauty can be realized. real-ized. "And finer forms are In the quarry Than ever Angelo evoked!" To my impudent, inerudite soul all the canyons lacked symmetry In whole and in detail. Hut what does man's sense of symmetry amount to in the Divine Scheme of things? Another writer he must have been a painter or a geologist or a civil engineer courageously adventures adven-tures the following: "A 'Yosemite Valley done in oils' comes close to a description of the principal features of Zion National Park. This gorgeaous valley has about the same dimensions as the famous Yosemite Valley. Extordin- ary as are tne sandstone rorms, tne color Is what most amazes. The deep red of the 'Vermilion Cliff Is the prevailing tint. Two-thirds of the way up the marvelous walls and temples are painted gorgeous reds; above the reds they rise In startling white. The 'Vermillion Cliff rests upon three hundred and fifty feet of even a more Instent red relieved by mauve and purple shale. That in turn rests upon a hundred feet of other variegated strata. Through these successive layers of sand and shales and limestones, colored like a Roman sash, glowing In the sun like a rainbow, the Mukuntuweap River has cut Its amazing valley. The, entrance en-trance Is between two gigantic stone masses of complicated architectural proportions which are named the West Temple and the Watchman. The latter Is seen from a foreground of river. From a stairway of ninny colors It springs abruptly twenty-five hundred feet. Its body Is a brilliant red. The West Temple, which rises directly opposite and u mile and one-half one-half back from the rim, Is over n thousand feet higher." Hal (1. Evarts, also using the ureh-Itectual ureh-Itectual metaphor, writes In the Saturday Evening Post: "It seemed that we gazed out across some vast oriental city that stretched away for u dozen miles. Scores of gaudy mosques and tinted towers, striped citadels topped off by flat-roof gardens rose In countless tiers from this congested, painted metropolis. . . . And Hie coloring! Imagine a tremendous city of spires and turrets ... its building catching catch-ing every dazzling reflection of the sunset. . . . There were soft apricot apri-cot and salmon tints, vague pinks and creams; lemon blending into deepest orange . . . with here and there a haunting suggestion of pale mauve. Brilliant red spires stood beside domes of ivory white. In many of these fairy structures the stratifications pitched so abruptly as to lend a spiralling barber-pole effect." ef-fect." Here are some useful facts: An excellent road has been completed com-pleted from the Park entrance to the Temple of Sinawava, some seven and one-half miles. Twenty-six miles of trails, so well maintained as to be usable us-able at all seasons of the year lead to the most important points in the Park. One may journey on horseback horse-back from the floor of the canyon to the East and West Rims. The West Rim trail begins at the foot of Angel's Landing, is tunneled along a ledge of the wall for two hundred feet into a deep flower-filled gorge, then zigzags up nearly to the level of the top of Angel's Landing. The other trail leads from the foot of Cable Mountain up to the East Rim. Zion Lodge, a delightful hostelry, consisting of a main central building and a large number of square, two-bedroom two-bedroom cottages, nestles under the towering East Wall between the Mountain of the Sun and the Great White Throne. Here one may be accommodated for five dollars a day room and board. Or you may get your breakfast for a dollar, your luncheon and dinner for a dollar twenty-five each and may occupy one of the excellent bedrooms for a dollar fifty a night. The meals are excellent and so are the sleeping accommodations. ac-commodations. An attractive free public campground camp-ground has been established about half a mile from Zion Lodge in the shadow of The Great White Throne for motorists having their own camping camp-ing equipment. Shade trees and pure water are available. So, one may sleep in his own bed, get his meals at the Lodge or do anything else he darn pleases. Also, one may hire horses and guides with which to nose about the Park or mount its almost precipitous sides. The rates for these are very seasonable something like a dollar an hour for a horse. If you like to make the journey to the Rim, which may take youaday and for which you will require a guide, it will cost you ten dollars for the round trip. If there are two of you, it will be seven fifty each, or five dollars apiece if there are three. This includes everything guide, luncheon and horses. We left Zion Canyon In the morning morn-ing about eight o'clock by auto, the only practicable means of transportation transport-ation traversed a considerable breadth of desert. crossed the Arizona line and reached the North Rim of the Grand Canyon at nightfall. To look at the Grand Canyon on a still, moonlight night, as I did. gives one the creeps, fills one with drcam-ings. drcam-ings. On a dark night It Is even more wierd. But. when lighted up at midnight with lighting, while the electric storm plays around and throughout the maze of aerial islands is-lands down there in the depths, It Is like the sudden opening and closing of the one great window of an Inferno. Infer-no. Surely It is the devil's paradise at that moment. The lightning reveals re-veals all kinds of weird things. And the thunder cracks and roars and bellows through the Canyon as if the devil himself were indulging in an orgy of frightfulness. 1 wftndered If uame nau ever stood on Hnglit Angel Point at midnight In a thunderstorm. thunder-storm. Terrifying by night, yes, but on a beautiful day, the sunlight flooding It. all the terrors, the conjured, con-jured, awful things of the night bo-fore bo-fore are forgotten. Nothing but wonder! Wonder! It Is In the night that the Canyon lives; In the daytime It sleeps, basks, smiles at you, grins at you, as fancy pleases, that great red city of the Silences, that devil's paradise. Don't fail to sec it, experience It, as I did. In a thunder-storm. For that's the time Satan himself Is in command, the time when Satan cuts loose. It Is said that persons often go Into In-to hysterics on being brought suddenly sud-denly to the rim of the Canyon. That's the way It strikes one. Some are dumbfounded; others, who have no senso of die sublime, are Inclined to make light of the scene. Here's a clnsHlc Intance: A commercial Englishman said, after gazing downward down-ward for a few moments: "It's a good place to throw your razor blades. blad-es. " A young woman who hud taken u course In nursing In a metropolitan hospital and was obsessed with her profession, and, above all things, practical, observed, after listening to the rhapsodies of the artists (if !e parly, and pointing to a figure scrolled scrol-led by nature on one of the walls opposite: op-posite: "It looks for all the world like a dlptherla germ. That was all she saw. A rase In point Illustrates Illust-rates the danger of templing Kate too far. A pleasant-looking stout man broke the solemn silence of the party with "How pretty!" The artistic art-istic members of the group immediately immed-iately fell upon him and killed him and very properly and threw his remains into the gorge he had insulted. insult-ed. The North Rim is eight thousand five hundred feet, or thereabouts, in elevation. The mad Colorado dashes dash-es and twists on its way to the sea some six thousand feet below. From this point one may look out and down upon the temples Deva, Brahma, Bra-hma, Zoroaster, Wotan's Throne, Manu, Buddha, Isis, Angels Gate, and Cheops Pyramid. The creations away down below are made after the forms of colossal domes, circuses, coliseums. This is proper, for the Grand is vastly bigger than the other oth-er canyons. "To appreciate it," said McKee, "is not a matter of mere sight. You've got to absorb it, get it through the pores rather than through the eyes." And talk about heat! Just stand at the rim on a sunny day and feel the baking waves come up. I was told there was a difference of twenty degrees between Wiley's Camp at the edge and the park ranger's station two miles back. An amazing phenomenon of the Canyon is a wonderful echo. You may stand, as we did, at the extreme point of Cape Royal, some five thousand thou-sand feet abovethe river, and shout. Your call repeats itself eight times with perfect clearness, the last repetition repet-ition being the clearest of them all. Think of that, eight times! If any one says I'm a lair, ask him how he knows. He won't be able to tell you. But I know it's a fact. I've heard it with my own ears. We lingered at Wiley's Camp at the edge of that red inferno, that devil's paradise, that mausoleum of baked colossi, for a day. Then we started for Bryce Canyon, retraced our course across a portion of the desert, again entering Utah and reached our destination in the evening. even-ing. Bryce is a vast, irregular-shaped bowl, perhaps two miles across and a thousand feet deep. Its rim is eight thousand feet in elevation. I shall quote briefly from one ambitious writer's attempt at a description des-cription of Bryce: "In the maze of architecture uprising up-rising from Bryce's sunken gardens, where pine, spruce and manzar.it: spread their greens, there are the styles of China and Egypt, of the Toltecs. Incas. Greeks and Goths; but stronger, perhaps, is the resemblance resem-blance to those decaying Dravidian temples bursting with decoration, in the Jungles of Burmah and Java: pagodas, mosques, minarets, kiosks, fairy castles, cathedrals, theaters, flying buttresses and stairways, suspension sus-pension bridges, niched and fenestrated fenestra-ted walls, peri-styles, colonnades, lotus columns, leaning towers, slim spires, massive pylons, pyramids, obelisks, pilasters capped by tilted disks, cones supporting cones, organs, org-ans, shrines and altars. All the architects of antiquity might have drawn their inspiration from the silent sil-ent cities of Bryce. "And these dream-tissue cities in the realm of muted mystery have weird Inhabitants statued in vari-gated vari-gated stone; giants and gnomes, popes and queens, kneeling penitents, peni-tents, companies of marching soldiers, sold-iers, gargoyles. fauns. satyrs, nymphs, witches, horses, dogs, lizards, liz-ards, frogs and turtles figures that seem to move, sway and posture In the flashing play of light and shadow. shad-ow. The least vivid Imagination needs n rbeck-reln." Very good. 1 mn not capable of ything like that. I can only toll you how It appeared and appealed to me. My first view of Bryce was by moonlight. Everything was hazy, ghost-like, entrancing and silent ns the fancies of a maiden. The sunrise sun-rise over Ilryce Is indescribable. I can only think of it ns one vast mass of aesthetic splendor that is. splendor splen-dor shot through with the Divine Spirit super earthly. 1 am going to forestall criticism by declaring that I did not measure the "Howl" with the instruments of an engineer. Nor did I analyze or classify after the fashion of the geologist. geol-ogist. Hut this 1 do know; how I re-acted to It. I am a total abstainer- so fur as rum Is concerned. Hut I nm free to confess that I, too, like the ambitious writer of the foregoing description, "saw things." I, too. saw gnomes and popes and queens, witches, frogs and turtles. The only difference is that to my vision those creatures did not "sway and posture." 1 am convinced, after seeing Hiyce Canyon, thai the good Lord has ti sense of humor, above all, a divine attribute, else why did He make His servant Nature so marvelous n caricaturist, cari-caturist, so nil vull mi etcher? As you stand faring the canyon from any one point you will see many figures, slnrtllngly rcsvmhllnK hu-mnn. hu-mnn. brute, artistic creations. The possibilities of such fancies are will,, out limit. As you chance your posi tion" even by a few feet, proceeding along the rim of the Bowl, the seines change kaleidoscopically. You have C seen those illuminated advertHn signs in shop windows which show you one face as you approach and another as you get opposite. Very well. You observe the figure which you will call St. Paul. Move along ten, twenty, fifty feet and St. pauj has become Ritchelieu or perhaps Richard the Third. You see the outlines out-lines of a lady-in-waiting; but the back view of her is an orang-outang perched on the spire of a cathedral I walked along the Rim for about a mile. Things that I had seen, or that my stimulated fancy had seen had now become something else' Perhaps the advancing daylight had cast shadows; perhaps the gods were laughing at me for a presumptuous ass of a man. But it seemed to me as if the very tracery on the wn, was elusive. Bryce Canyon is democratic in its favors. It lends itself no more to fancy or artists or poets than it does to the imagination of the child, the old woman or the Piute Indian, it is a veritable playground of the fancies. fan-cies. The child will cry, "Look, Dad there's a wolf chasing a deer over there." And the father will gee it at once see the eye and the ears the imminent fangs, the antlers, the tail, legs and all. And the Piute seated further on, fashions from the same group a hunting scene to his liking. I have a marble clock at home with pillars. I saw its colossal counterpart right in the middle of the canyon. Beyond it was a graveyard grave-yard of serried, heroic mounds Valhalla of the giants. Over these mounds galloped a knight, completely complete-ly horsed, caparisoned, speared and otherwise equipped for the fray. On the walls of the canyon, the gods have etched innumerable figures figur-es of history but all jumbied up. There are, howeverr clearly defined groups such as that of Queen Victoria Victor-ia and her ladies-in-waiting. The Queen stands at the point of a promontory prom-ontory as if reviewing whole legions of -valorous Englishmen Britishers, I mean. Her figure is short and dumpy- pardon the hated word, but no other will do as well. She wears the inevitable widow's cap and veil. There are the over full eyes, the little beak of a nose, the incomparable dignity that no one but Victoria ever could have given to such a face and figure. Back of the Queen, in austerely aus-terely respectful attitudes, is the group of ladies. They are much tal-ler tal-ler than Her Majesty, nor are they i beautiful either of face or figure; ' and they are wearing those mid-Victorian monstrosities called "bustles." counterpoising the slight forward inclination in-clination of the body known as the "Grecian Bend" a kind of turkey slant. Again is manifested irreverent democracy. For right beyond Victoria Vic-toria one sees in bas-relief against the wall a line of convicts following one another step-by-step and close up and disappearing through a mysterious mys-terious door. One would fear that Nature is playing pranks, emphasising emphasis-ing her contempt for the social order of things which man has ordained. But if you move a few psces the line of convicts may become 3 procession of saints quien sabe? All this you see in Bryce. (or it is the portrait gallery of the gods and of the fools, kings, knaves, saints and bad men. "You pays your money and yon takes your choice," says Mother Nature. Na-ture. "If you don't like Queens, we can give you soldiers, knights, beefeaters. beef-eaters. Tommy Atkins or doughboys regiments of them. If yon don't like cardinals, we can give you flat-hnttod flat-hnttod doniinios, or bearded pirates. It's all the same to us crowns or cathedrals." You get to have nn affection for those creations on short notice, a proprietary Interest In them if yon have discovered thorn and pointed thorn out to your friends by tte power of your imagination b:ivt conjured con-jured them from their granite obscurity. ob-scurity. If you know thorn loncer you would bo Intimate with them as you are with your old friend t tie nian-ln-tho-moon or certain st.us From the photographs one would think thorp was nothing there but serried ranks of cardinals and vir' gins. It Impresses you that ' al first. Hut Nature Is Just :w fond of pirates as she is of prophet. A friend grabbed mo by the and pointed. "See that group of roisterinf-bearded roisterinf-bearded sailors Just beyond the Queen." "Hy beck. 1 do. " said ! "A nilnuto ago I saw them from over there. Then they were s 1"'"" of apostles." Nor do I think the colors, marvelous marvel-ous ns they nro. nnd not one whit px ur.r.onited In the books, are mnr volous us the conformation11 ''j lend themselves to the dullest ns ns to the most active fnm-los of n,il" How Is this for H general "'' l,p here Is n group which might ho f-1 " lrd "The Court of the Anrv-ls:" wtli1'' (Continued on Vff ,i, "Tpoliticia11 going on a spree. ff Ls is no exaggeration. 4 vordoes Nature concern herself .' ivjng things alone. She gives ' ; this museum of Bryce, cathed- pipe-organs, tracery and lacery "at would do credit to an etcher, she deals in sculptured groups of ioTing-cuPs- chalices' stalactites of nfinite delicacy, inverted now and Ending on bases of red; dragons, ,tles, all in minature. One' is a 03 up like a board o ivory chessmen. On&e may see all kinds of bottles, flat and round, and wonderful clocks, and great lamps decorated in the oot delicate, lacy way. imagine, it you will, a toy shop delves and sides covered with little netal toys that you get for a penny each; soldiers serrated regiments of them; lions and their cubs, setting dens in their nests; fat-faced German Ger-man officers in helmets; that's the ffay it is. Surely, Nature doesn't care how she arranges her curios-. Like Zion, one may get adequate, Tes excellent, accommodations at 'Bryce and at quite as reasonable figures. From Bryce Canyon to Cedar Breaks is a run of something more than three hours. Cedar Breaks is wonderful, magnificent; magni-ficent; it has almost everything that your fancy can conjure, but I think it should be visited first of all the canyons. As many have observed, if it were the only one it would be worth traveling around the world 'to contemplate. But after enjoying the sublime beauty of Zion, shuddering at the awfulness of the Grand Canyon Can-yon and feasting eye and fancy on Bryce, there's little else to be said. One is pretty well fed up on canyons. Not that I have the impudence to speak In any sense deprecatingly of the unspeakable beauty of Cedar Breaks. Imagine, if you can, this vast amphitheatre, its forested rim ten thousand three hundred feet in elevation. The Breaks is eroded two thousand .feet down into the pink cliff formation at the summit of Markagunt Plateau. It covers an area of sixty square miles in the Sevier Sev-ier National Forest. To the north the blunted, volcanic crest of Bryan Head rises nine hundred feet righer, affording a panorama of practically all of southern Utah, Nevada and northern Arizona. Writes one authority: "Within its limitless labyrinth countless million of grotesque and magnificent architectural forms, anointed with all the colors of the 0 spectrum, flash into the eyes of the beholder." Again mark the architectural metaphor. The writer goes on: "The erosional structures are blends of Egyptian and massive, medieval Gothic walls. ... In board aspect the color scheme is pink, red, orange, yellow, lavender. . . . An artist has counted more than sixty tints at Cedar Breaks. . . . Along the rims are several easily reached view-points, among them Point Supreme and Point Perfection." Perfec-tion." Here mark the similarity to Bryce: "Conspicukius in the welter of forms below are innumerable red, castellated bastions in paralled rows; long, riding dragon-like forms of Pure white; and huge, sprawling dinosaurs covered with blood. "In vastness, in variety of color, in ild grandeur, Cedar Breaks is the greatest of Utah's painted amphitheatres." amphi-theatres." - ! That may all be. But after the round of the major canyons I can only declare that Zion is my first and only love. |