Not a sound broke the impressive stillness as Yermah caught his first grand view from Inspiration Point, save occasional chirps and songs of birds, or the low, distant sigh of waterfalls in the vertical-walled chasm below. Here and there was a dark yellow pine rooted in the crevice, and clinging tenaciously to its dizzy elevation. The wind swept these trees to and fro, and there was a faint, plaintive murmur in their leaves as of pain.
Yermah did not notice that coveys of grouse beat the air with their wings in clumsy and obstinate flight, nor did he see that deer sprang up here and there, making for the undergrowth, lying in an opposite direction. He reined his horse sharply out of the green forest and stood upon a high jutting rock overlooking a rolling, uplifting sea of granite mountains of a beautiful pearl-gray. The colors were cold in effect—all the character being given by the vertical parallel lines of gray, brown, and black which stripe a portion of the walls.
The sun winked at them from behind the pine-trees on the top of the hills, and threw shimmering lances among the cliffs and crags, burnishing up their edges. Its rosy tints etched furrows on the mountain’s face, seeming to take pride in bringing out strongly the wrinkles which the master of the hourglass and scythe had been busily engaged upon for so many thousand years.[[3]]
The first impressive thought was that the granite ledges were standing pale and dumb before their Creator! The towers, the domes, the spires, the battlements, the arches, the white columns of solid granite surging up into the air came to everlasting anchor! The silence seemed to quiver with sound, just as the warm air shimmered without stir all along the rocky outlines. The scene conveys to the soul of man through the eye what might the orchestra of heaven through the ear, were peals of thunder compassed into harmonious notes of music. As the king of day rode farther out, he gently touched the falls of Upper Yo-Semite, transforming a downpour of crystals into tears of liquid silver, which the winds whirled into fantastic wraiths against the frowning cliffs.
All that was mortal in the visitor swept back; all that was immortal surged to the front, and bowed down in awe.
“Here speaks the voice of God; and here His power is manifest.”
It was Akaza’s voice that broke the silence.
“Hail! smiling morn that tips these hilltops with alchemic gold! Teach us the secret of thy magic.”
Again it was Akaza’s words.
“Here we have visual evidence of the power and glory of the Supreme Ruler. The majesty of His handiwork is in that testimony of rocks.”