ADOBE WALLS, ZUÑI
escarpment which faces us, continued by canyons, ragged and flaring and set with cliffs and towering crags, down to the river. I can see far up Marble Canyon to long lines of chocolate-colored cliffs, and above these the Vermilion Cliffs. I can see, also, up the Colorado Chiquito, through a very ragged and broken canyon, with sharp salients set out from the walls on either side, their points overlapping, so that a huge tooth of marble on one side seems to be set between two teeth on the opposite; and I can also get glimpses of walls standing away back from the river, while over my head are mural escarpments not possible to be scaled.
Cataract Canyon is 41 miles long. The walls are 1,300 feet high at its head, and they gradually increase in altitude to a point about halfway down, where they are 2,700 feet, and then decrease to 1,300 feet at the foot. Narrow Canyon is 9 1/2 miles long, with walls 1,300 feet in height at the head and coming down to the water at the foot.
There is very little vegetation in this canyon or in the adjacent country. Just at the junction of the Grand and Green there are a number of hackberry trees; and along the entire length of Cataract Canyon the high-water line is marked by scattered trees of the same species. A few nut pines and cedars are found, and occasionally a redbud or Judas tree; but the general aspect of the canyons and of the adjacent country is that of naked rock.