The surveyors had to carry with them, on their backs, for a great portion of the way, the limited supplies of food they took with them, because it was frequently impossible to get the boats along at all. When the boats were used, several were upset, and everything was uncertainty as to the bill of fare that would be presented at the next meal, even if there was to be a meal at all. Mr. Frank M. Brown, president of the railroad company, lost his life in one of the whirlpools. He was in a boat, a little ahead of the others, and seemed to be cheerful and hopeful. He shouted to his comrades in the rear to come on with their boats, and that he was all right. A moment later, his friends were astonished to see the boat gone, and their leader swimming around and around in a whirlpool, trying hard to reach smooth water.
He was a good swimmer, and a brave man, but his efforts were futile, and finally he sank. The party waited and watched for hours, but were finally compelled to recognize the fact that their friend and leader was gone forever.
It was determined almost immediately to beat a retreat. While the party was hunting for a side cañon leading northward through which they could make their exit, it became evident that a storm was brewing. Rain commenced to fall in a steady shower, and to increase in quantity. The surveyors had no dry clothing beyond what they stood up in, and there was no shelter of any kind at hand. They were near Vassey's Paradise, in the deepest part of the cañon they had yet reached. A storm in such a location had its awfulness intensified beyond measure, and the frightened men looked in every direction for shelter. Finally, about forty feet up the side of the marble cliff, the opening to a small cavern was seen. Into this Mr. R. B. Stanton, one of the party, climbed. There was not room enough for his body at full length, but he crawled in as best he could, curled himself up, and tried to sleep.
A terrible night followed. At about midnight he was awakened by a terrific peal of thunder, which re-echoed and reverberated through the cañon in a most magnificently awful manner. He had been caught in storms in mountain regions and deep valleys before, but he had never felt so terribly alone or so superstitiously alarmed as on this occasion. Every now and then a vivid flash of lightning would light up the dark recesses of the gorge, casting ghastly shadows upon the cliffs, hill sides, ravines and river. Then again there would be the darkness which, as Milton puts it, could be felt, and the feeling of solitude was almost intolerable.
The river in the meantime had swollen into a torrent, by the drenching rain, which had converted every creek into a river, and every feeder of the Colorado into a magnificent, if raging, river itself. The noise caused by the excited river, as it leaped over the massive rocks along its bed, vied with the thunder, and the echoes seemed to extend hundreds of miles in every direction. What affected the stranded traveler the most was the noise overhead, the reverberation inducing a feeling of alarm that huge masses of rock were being displaced from their lofty eminence thousands of feet above his head, and were rushing down upon him.
The night was passed, finally, and when the storm had spent itself, the survivors of the party succeeded in getting out of the cañon and reaching a plateau, 2,500 feet above. They then took a brief rest, but with that disregard for danger which is characteristic of the true American, they at once organized another expedition, and a few months later resumed the task so tragically interrupted and marred with such a sad fatality.
The trip through Glen Cañon was like a pleasure trip on a smooth river in autumn, with beautiful wild flowers and ferns at every camp. At Lee's Ferry they ate their Christmas dinner, with the table decorated with wild flowers, picked that day.
On December 28th they started to traverse, once more, that portion of Marble Cañon made tragic by the fatality of the summer before. "On the next Tuesday," writes Mr. Stanton, "we reached the spot where President Brown lost his life. What a change in the waters! What was then a roaring torrent, now, with the water some nine feet lower, seemed from the shore like the gentle ripple upon the quiet lake. We found, however, in going through it with our boats, there was the same swift current, the same huge eddy, and between them the same whirlpool, with its ever-changing circles. Marble Cañon seemed destined to give us trouble. On January 1st, our photographer, Mr. Nims, fell from a bench of the cliff, some twenty-two feet, on to the sand beach below, receiving a severe jar, and breaking one of his legs just above the ankle. Having plenty of bandages and medicine, we made Nims as comfortable as possible till the next day, when we loaded one of the boats to make him a level bed, and constructing a stretcher of two oars and a piece of canvas, put him on board and floated down river a couple of miles--running two small rapids--to a side cañon, which led out to the Lee's Ferry road."
The next day, after discovering a way out of the deep ravine, one of the party tramped thirty-five miles back to Lee's Ferry, where a wagon was obtained for the injured surveyor. Eight of the strongest men of the party then undertook the task of carrying the injured man a distance of four miles, and up a hill 1,700 feet high. It is indicative of the extraordinary formation of the Grand Cañon that the last half mile was an angle of 45 degrees, up a loose rock slide. The stretcher had to be attached to ropes and gently lifted over perpendicular cliffs, from ten to twenty feet high. The dangerous and tedious journey was at last accomplished, and the trip continued.
Finally the unexplored portion of the cañon was reached. For thirty miles down Marble Cañon, to the Little Colorado River, the most beautiful scenery was encountered. At Point Retreat, the solid marble walls stand perpendicularly 300 feet high from the river edge. Behind these walls the sandstone lies in benches, and slopes to an aggregate height of 2,500 feet. Above the narrow ravine of marble, the color is mostly rich gray, although the presence of minerals has in places imparted so many tints that quite a rainbow appearance is presented. Caves and caverns relieve the monotony of the solid walls. Here and there a most delightful grotto is seen, while the action of the water rushing down the cliff sides has left little natural bridges in many places. Countless fountains of pure, sparkling water adorn the smooth rocks, and here and there are little oases of ferns and flowers, which seem strangely out of place so far down into the very bowels of the earth.