. "Around the circle." . nd stately pines have receded and the trainrolls along a mere granite shelf in mid-air. Above, the vertical wall rises athousand feet; below, hundreds of feet of perpendicular depth and a fathom-less river. The canon is here a mere rent in the mountain, so narrow onemay toss a pebble across, and the cramped stream has assumed the deepemerald hue of the ocean. In the shadows of the rocks, all is solitary, andweird, and awful. The startled traveler quickly loses all apprehension in thewondrous beauty and grandeur of the scene, and, as successive curves repeatand enhance
. "Around the circle." . nd stately pines have receded and the trainrolls along a mere granite shelf in mid-air. Above, the vertical wall rises athousand feet; below, hundreds of feet of perpendicular depth and a fathom-less river. The canon is here a mere rent in the mountain, so narrow onemay toss a pebble across, and the cramped stream has assumed the deepemerald hue of the ocean. In the shadows of the rocks, all is solitary, andweird, and awful. The startled traveler quickly loses all apprehension in thewondrous beauty and grandeur of the scene, and, as successive curves repeatand enhance the enchantment, nature asserts herself in ecstacy. Emergingfrom the marvelous gorge, the bed of the cafion rapidly rises, until the road-way is but a few feet above the stream. Dark walls of rock are replaced withclustering mountains of supreme height, whose abruptness defies the foot ofman, and The Needles, the most pecuUar and striking of the Rockies, thrusttheir splintered pinnacles into the region of perpetual Around the Circle. 41 THE ROYAL GORGE. The crowning wonder of this wonderful Denver & Rio Grande Raihoadis the Royal Gorge. Situated between Canon City and Salida, it is easy otaccess either from Denver or Pueblo. After the entrance to the canon hasbeen made, surprise and almost terror comes. The train rolls round a longcurve close under a wall of black and banded granite, beside which the pon-derous locomotive shrinks to a mere dot, as if swinging on some pivot in theheart of the mountain, or captured by a centripetal force that would neverresign its grasp. Almost a whole circle is accomplished, and the grand amphi-theatrical sweep of the wall shows no break in its zenith-cutting the journey end here ? Is it a mistake that this crevice goes through therange ? Does not all this mad water gush from some powerful spring, orboil out of a subterranean channel impenetrable to us? No, it opens. Re-sisting centripetal, centrifugal force claims the train,
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