Superb Lower Falls of the Yellowstone (312 ft. high), Grand Canyon, Yellowstone Park, U.S.A.

Publication

Superb Lower Falls of the Yellowstone (312 ft. high), Grand Canyon, Yellowstone Park, U.S.A.

Description

About a mile above Artist Point there is a stairway by which one can safely descend with the aid of a guide to the foot of the Lower Falls. The roar is terrific. The river bed is here covered with hot springs, as one discoveres if he obeys the guide and reaches down to the sandy bottom of the stream. The Lower Falls have a descent of 310 feet. Mr Trumbull wrote of them: "The volume of water is about half as great as that which passes over the American Fall, at Niagara, and it falls more than twice the distance. The adjacent scenery is infinitely grander. Having passed over the precipice, the clear, unbroken greenish mass is in an instant transformed by the jagged edges of the precipice into many steams, apparently seperated, yet still united, and having the appearance of molten sliver. These streams, or jets, are shaped like a comet, with nucleus and trailing coma, following in quick succession; or they look like foaming, crested tongues, constantly overlapping each other. The outer jets decrease in size as they descend, curl outward, and break into mist. In the sunlight, a rainbow constantly spans the chasm. The foot of the falls is enveloped in mist, which conceals the river for more than a hundred yards below. These falls are exactly the same in height as the Vernal Falls in the Yosemite valley, but the volume of water is at least five times as great." No other falls in the world have so grand, so beautifully colored, so massive, and altogether magnificent a setting; - that Canyon, with its gorgeously colored, precipitous sites, in such contrast with the soft, silvery white foam and spray of the waters as they take their fearful leap.