ExplorersGeorge Iles Doubleday , Page & Company, 1902 - 171 pages |
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August basalt boat boulders broken camp canoes Cat Island CHARLES WILKES Chipeways Clarence King cliff climb clouds Colorado Chiquito Columbus Columbus's Cotter course crags creek crevice danger deep distance drift early encamped fall foot four frozen gorge granite Guanahani hills hour hundred feet Indians island January John Wesley Powell knapsacks labour Laguna de Bay Lake de Sable land looked Manila Mississippi morning Mount Brewer wall MOUNT TYNDALL mountain mouth narrow night North West Company o'clock oars observed passed peak Philippines picul pine pinnacles Plana Cays portage precipices pull rain rapid reach rice Rio Virgen river rocks rolls Sebastian Cabot seems seen shelf shore side cañon slope smooth snow soon stream summit swift thousand feet three miles trees Triango twenty vessels waves wind
Popular passages
Page 137 - ... now and then, in the bay of a recess, to admire the gigantic scenery. And ever, as we go, there is some new pinnacle or tower, some crag or peak, some distant view of the upper plateau, some strange shaped rock, or some deep, narrow side canon.
Page 156 - What a conflict of water and fire there must have been here! Just imagine a river of molten rock, running down into a river of melted snow. What a seething and boiling of the waters; what clouds of steam rolled into the heavens!
Page 163 - Emma Dean." Two rifles and a shot gun are given to the men who are going out. I ask them to help themselves to the rations, and take what they think to be a fair share. This they refuse to do, saying they have no fear but that they can get something to eat; but Billy, the cook, has a pan of biscuits prepared for dinner, and these he leaves on a rock. Before starting, we take our barometers, fossils, the minerals, and some ammunition from the boat, and leave them on the rocks.
Page 159 - All this takes time which seems very precious to me; but at last they arrive. The blade of one of the oars is pushed into a little crevice in the rock beyond me, in such a manner that they can hold me pressed against the wall. Then another is fixed in such a way that I can step on it, and thus I am extricated. Still another hour is spent in examining the river from this side, but no good view of it is obtained, so now we return to the side that was first examined, and the afternoon is spent in clambering...
Page 154 - The canon walls, for two thousand five hundred or three thousand feet, are very regular, rising almost perpendicularly, but here and there set with narrow steps, and occasionally we can see away above the broad terrace, to distant cliffs. We camp to-night in a marble cave, and find, on looking at our reckoning, we have run twenty-two miles.
Page 41 - We had not gone far from this village when the fog cleared off, and we enjoyed the delightful prospect of the ocean — that ocean, the object of all our labours, the reward of all our anxieties. This cheering view exhilarated the spirits of all the party, who were still more delighted on hearing the distant roar of the breakers.
Page 167 - ... frozen with fear, for we see no boat. Bradley is gone! so it seems. But now, away below, we see something coming out of the waves. It is evidently a boat. A moment more, and we see Bradley standing on deck, swinging his hat to show that he is all right. But he is in a whirlpool.
Page 140 - ... rapid. Two of the boats run it perforce. One succeeds in landing, but there is no foothold by which to make a portage and she is pushed out again into the stream. The next minute a great reflex wave fills the open compartment; she is water-logged, and drifts unmanageable. Breaker after breaker rolls over her and one capsizes her. The men are thrown out; but they cling to the boat, and she drifts down some distance alongside of us and we are able to catch her. She is soon bailed out and the men...
Page 147 - It is especially cold in the rain to-night. The little canvas we have is rotten and useless ; the rubber ponchos, with which we started from Green River City, have all been lost ; more than half the party is without hats, and not one of us has an entire suit of clothes, and we have not a blanket apiece. So we gather...
Page 169 - The river rolls by us in silent majesty; the quiet of the camp is sweet; our joy is almost ecstasy. We sit till long after midnight, talking of the Grand Canon, talking of home, but chiefly talking of the three men who left us. Are they wandering in those depths, unable to find a way out? are they searching over the desert lands above for water? or are they nearing the settlements?