"
He tells another story of how he once took a drink from the
Colorado river. The water is never very clear in the muddy
stream but at that particular time it was unusually murky. He
had nothing with which to dip the water and lay down on the bank
to take a drink. Being very thirsty he paid no attention to the
quality of the water, but only knew that it tasted wet. The
water, however, grew thicker as he drank until it became balled
up in his mouth, and stuck fast in his throat and threatened to
choke him. He tried to bite it off but failed because his teeth
were poor. At last becoming desperate, he pulled his hunting
knife from his belt and cut himself loose from his drink.
Different theories have been advanced to account for the origin
of the Grand Canon, but it is a question whether it is altogether
due to any one cause. Scientists say that it is the work of
water erosion, but to the layman it seems impossible. If an
ocean of water should flow over rocks during eons of ages it does
not seem possible that it could cut such a channel.
Water sometimes does queer things, but it has never been known to
reverse nature. By a fundamental law of hydrostatics water
always seeks its level and flows in the direction of least
resistance. If water ever made the Grand Canon it had to climb a
hill and cut its way through the backbone of the Buckskin
mountains, which are not a range of peaks but a broad plateau of
solid rock.
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