Note 2: — THE SOUTHWEST

“All this, which is literally true, is a mere trifle of what might be said in trying to fix a standard of comparison for the Grand Canyon. But I fancy there is no standard adjustable to the human mind. You may compare all you will—eloquently and from wide experience—and at last all similes fail. The Grand Canyon is just the Grand Canyon, and that is all you can say. I never have seen any one who was prepared for it. I never have seen any one who could grasp it in a week’s hard exploration; nor any one, except some rare Philistine, who could even think he had grasped it. I have seen people rave over it; better people struck dumb with it; even strong men who wept over it; but I have never yet seen the man or woman who expected it.”2