"Listen! This river which discharges its waters into the Gulf of California is fed by numerous streams in the rainy, elevated regions of the Rocky Mountains. But where the united river leaves Utah and passes into Arizona, it traverses a dry plateau country with little rain, where its waters have cut their way down through mountain limestone to a depth of 6000 feet. The strata are horizontal, and the whole series has been cleared away by the continued erosive power of water, aided by gravel and boulders. This work has been going on from the commencement of the period in the world's history known as the Pliocene Age, and it is reckoned that the interval which must have elapsed since then must have amounted to millions of years. And yet this space of time, from the Pliocene Age to our own, must, geologically speaking, be extremely insignificant compared to the length of the great geological periods. The six thousand years which we call the historical period is but the beat of a second on the clock of eternity, and what the historian calls primeval times is the latest and most recent period in the last of all the geologist's ages. For while the historian deals with revolutions of the sun of only 365 days, the geologist is only satisfied with thousands and millions of years. The Colorado River has presented him with one of the standards by which he is able to calculate lapse of time. You will acknowledge that it is no small feat for running water to cut its way down through solid rock to a depth of 6500 feet; and these cañons are more than 180 miles long and four to eleven miles broad.
"By its work here the river has sculptured in the face of the earth a landscape which awes and astonishes the spectator. It is like nothing he has ever seen before. When he stood at the foot of the Alps he gazed up at the snow-clad wastes of the mighty mountain masses. When he stands at the edge of the cañons of the Colorado he looks down and sees a yawning chasm, and on the other side of the giddy ravine the walls rise perpendicular or sloping. He seems to stand before the artistically decorated facade of a gigantic house or palace in an immense town. He sees in the walls of the valley, niches and excavations like a Roman theatre, with benches rising in tiers. At their sides stand gables and projections of rock, like turrets and buttresses. Under huge cornices rise columns standing out or attached at the back, all planned on the same gigantic scale. The precipitous cliffs are dark, and the whole country is coloured in pink, yellow, red, and warm brown tones. The sun pours its gold over the majestic desolation. No grassy sward, no vegetation carpets the horizontal or vertical surfaces with green. Here and there a pine leans its crown over the chasm, and when the cones fall they go right down to the bottom.
"In the early morning, when the air is still pure and clear after the coolness of the night, and when the sun is low, the cañon lies in deep gloom, and behind the brightly lighted tops of the columns the shadows lie as black as soot. Then the bold sculpturing stands out in all its glory. On a quiet night, when the moon holds its crescent above the earth, an oppressive silence prevails over this region. The roar of the river is not heard, for the distance is too great. A feeling of romance takes hold of the visitor. He fancies himself in a fairy world. Only a step over the edge and he would soar on invisible wings to a bright wonderland."
At Salt Lake City the German leaves the train to begin his investigations round the Great Salt Lake and the Mormon capital. Gunnar travels on through the mountainous districts of Nevada and California, and when the train at last pulls up at San Francisco he has reached the goal of his hopes.
Here is one of the finest cities in the world, situated on a peninsula in a deep and spacious inlet surrounded by mountains. Almost all traces of the terrible earthquake which a few years ago destroyed the city have disappeared, and splendid new buildings of iron and stone have sprung up from the rubbish heaps, for as a commercial emporium San Francisco has the same importance with relation to the great routes across the Pacific as New York has on the Atlantic side.
IV
SOUTH AMERICA
The Inca Empire
A terrestrial globe naturally presents a better image of the earth than any map, for it shows plainly the continents and the configuration of the oceans, and exhibits clearly their position and relative size. If you examine such a globe, you notice that the North Pole lies in the midst of a sea, surrounded by great masses of land, whereas the South Pole is in an extensive land surrounded by a wide sea. Perhaps you wonder why all the continents send out peninsulas southwards? Just look at the Scandinavian Peninsula, and look at Spain, Italy, and Greece. Do not Kamtchatka and Korea, Arabia and the Indian Peninsula all point south? South America, Africa, and Australia are drawn out into wedges narrowing southwards. They are like stalactites in a grotto. But however much you may puzzle over the globe, and however much you may question learned men, you will never know why the earth's surface has assumed exactly the form it has and no other.