aract had been reported.

The story of the passage is too long to tell here. Chilled, hungry, and
worn, they struggled through it. Often they were obliged to let their
boats down steep rapids by ropes, and clamber after them along the
slippery precipices. Often there was nothing to do but to climb into
their boats and run down long foaming slants around the corners of which
death, perhaps, awaited. Many times they were upset and barely escaped
with their lives. With no wraps or clothing that were not soaked with
water, there were nights when they could not sleep for the cold.

So the days passed and the food lessened to a few handfuls of wet flour.
The dangers increased; some falls were twenty feet in height. Finally
three of the men determined to desert; they believed they could climb
the walls and that their chances would be better with the Indians than
with the canyon. Powell endeavored to dissuade them, but they were firm.
He offered to divide his flour with them, but this they refused.

These men, two Howlands, brothers, and William Dunn, climbed the canyon
walls and were killed by Indians. Two or three days later Powell and the
rest of his party emerged below the Grand Canyon, where they found food
and safety.

Taught by the experience of this great adventure, Powell made a second
trip two years later which was a scientific achievement. Later on he
became Director of the United States Geological Survey.

Since then, the passage of the Grand Canyon has been made several times.
R.B. Stanton made it in 1889 in the course of a survey for a proposed
railroad through the canyon; one of the leaders of the party was
drowned.

V

The history of the Grand Canyon has been industriously collected. It
remains for others to gather the legends. It is enough here to quote
from Powell the Indian story of its origin.

"Long ago," he writes, "there was a great and wise chief who mourned the
death of his wife, and would not be comforted until Tavwoats, one of the
Indian gods, came to him and told him his wife was in a happier land,
and offered to take him there that he might see for himself, if, upon
his return, he would cease to mourn. The great chief promised. Then
Tavwoats made a trail through the mountains that intervene between that
beautiful land, the balmy region of the great West, and this, the desert
home of the poor Numa. This trail was the canyon gorge of the Colorado.
Through it he led him; and when they had re