| Show beautiful little zion the beauty and wonder of the mu koon tu deap could perhaps better be told in verse than I 1 ir pr e it may be better painted than de scribed there is that about the wild and stupendous architecture of the I 1 ittle zion valley the vally of the many water waters the rock rivers land the land of the home of god the varied names by which the place has been called that would brine to silence at least any at tempt to describe in raD turus hn ian guage the combined beauty and sublimity of that remarkable place in the southern part of our state one would need the pen of a ruskin or of a kingsley to describe the mu koon tu na eap in arse and the pen of a milton or of a dante to deb describe cribe it in verse there is 13 some thu thit g too about its beauty and arid sol emu grandeur that is scriptural arid homeric the place brings one so near tae te primitive he ile feels there the grandeur of holy writ ind of that large utterance of the early gods yes one feels the in of the great poet back to the words of st john and homer fhe rhe distinctive feature of this wonderful place which has been s little known among our lovers of western scenery is aside from the richness of forms in its sculptured walls the wealth and not riot of its remarkable color foe poe has written i a tale the valley of the many elored grasses the little zion might well be called the valley ot of many colored stones the cold granite cliffs ot of the 1 yosemite lo isern semite ite a almost most chill one the sombre hues of the arand cam canyon on of the colorado de press the soul but the hues of the mighty walls between which aich the rio virgin finds its way warm the heart with their ruddy gl iw ye one might teel feel almost app appalled ap pilled billed when he looks into the fulfs of time tries to imagine the ages which ha have hae e parsed away in th tha up rearing of the tremendous v walla alli ot of the f ittle ZI n and when he thinks of the centuries which ve e needed to perform the sculpture culp ture which make th we se walls to stand as now they at st indin then strange ind and bewildering beauty and vet yet in the end he be feels a sort ol 01 rapture in the pre present ent hour that puts that remarkable scene before his astonished delighted gaze the great plateaus of sandstone in which occurs the mu alu koon tu deap cover a vast vit extent and are a dominating feature in the scenery of southern utah ft ater it was tint th it laid down dl the sediments of the many plateaus and w iter again it was which did all the won erful carving in the rock lovers and land orange cliffs na hite butte pr million bluff red mesa are fire names on the map of utah which suggest the lavish dimp ay av of color of which we have spoken ind and the circle cliffs the dome of dolob and the temple of the rio N irgin suggest in a way architectural forms assumed by the remnants of the de eded plateaus fire has acted its part of the productions of the scenes as s well A ell as the action of the te water the dark sombre lines black in some instances of ane foundation tires of stone or which arm t rm over the side of the cliffs are f volcanic origin land the great sandstone cliffs range in color from deep deer indian red venetian red ver million orange yellow and cream and the highest strata the capping of the great towers and domes are aten of a su iden whiteness imagine a rift some 20 miles in length through a sandstone plateau ome 2 feet in thickness im igme a river the rio virgin pass pas pa s ing through this ritt rift I 1 et this rift in some places be wide enough to be called a valley the mu koon I 1 iu u deap and in others so narrow not more than 15 or 16 feet that it at noonday the sky above appears as i a blue ribbon and at night as a river ot of stars and let the river too completely fill the narrow space be tween the to towering nering walls and at others let it form pools edged with trees and shrubbery and wide enough to reflect in its waters the surrounding wonders let it in some places crawl ove f fillen illen stones from which grows groins the and cacti make it all wonderful tui in forms and colors 1 and one ls be beginning inning to imagine the little zion in times of drought the streams dwinelle away in the rock rivers land but in time of storms they suddenly become roaring to rients 1 ahe he plateaus are great collections of water during the rainy eason look on the map again aquaria plateau flood canyon are suggestive names sometimes one sees re sights at the bases of the plateaus aus the manner in which the water fills up tip the narrow fi and rushes forth from the sandstone heights la is truly surprising woe to one caught in a box canyon in time of flood they are beders of the nearby colorado thomas carlyle in one of his moods once s ild show me no scenic lions 11 he ile wished to make his deductions from the average t well that is good but why not also see the culminations the acme f things and the culmination of scenery in the land of plateaus Plate ius is tho I 1 title little zion valley with its temples of the III rn virgin temples of the ri virgin I 1 may one write the NN ads the temple not made with h hinds ands at a turn in tl e road where the stream travels and foams over ruins of the cliffs and above the arrow wood and the pinion pine there their red parti cl clofed ored mural fronts fritter frit ted traced and sculptured by the elements stand against the blue of a cloudless sky most astonishing spectacle A reality and vei ve a sort of a dream yes a dream that one will be under the spell of all his remaining dis dils yet remarkable as is the scene here there is a view of the mu koon tu deap the little zion which it impasses n it in strangeness wonder and grandeur this view is from the cliff top on the right hind hand of the observer looking up the valley over a foreground of rocky shelves from which grow the cedar and the pinion pine one looks at the vast assemblage of sculpture walls and the river in the valley below him this scene la wonderful at any hour at iny time but most wonderful of all at the cloe ot of a summer day when the sun has just set and the full newly risen moon hangs in the east the upper parts of the assembled walls of the temples of the rio virgin hold long the light from the dome ot of dolob the highest point of all the light is last to fall that this dome has once been an island in a prima primativa tive ocean it is easy to know all these plateaus plate iud have once been in the bottoms of ancient beas u alfred lamborn la in dearee De aret bew awo abor |
