ummit slightly truncated. Detached boulders lie around its base, huge
pieces that having yielded to the disintegrating influences of rain and
wind, had lost their balance, and rolled down the declivity of its
sides. No other similar elevation is near--the distant bluffs alone
equalling it in height. But there the resemblance ends; for the latter
are a formation of stratified sandstone, while the rocks composing the
butte are purely granitic! Even in a geological point of view, is the
Orphan Butte isolated from all the world. In a double sense, does it
merit its distinctive title.

Singular is the picture formed by this lone mound, and the park-like
scene that surrounds it--a picture rare as fair. Its very framing is
peculiar. The bench of light-reddish sandstone sharply outlined on each
edge--the bright green of the sward along its base--and the dark belt of
cedars cresting its summit, form, as it were, a double moulding to the
frame. Over this can be distinguished the severer outlines of the great
Cordilleras; above them, again, the twin cones of the Wa-to-yah; and
grandly towering over all, the sharp sky-piercing summit of Pike's Peak.
All these forms gleaming in the full light of a noonday sun, with a
heaven above them of deep ethereal blue, present a picture that for
grandeur and sublimity is not surpassed upon the earth.

A long while could we have gazed upon it; but an object, that came at
once under our eyes, turned our thoughts into a far different channel.
Away up the valley, at its furthest end, appeared a small white spot--
little bigger to our view than the disc of an archer's target. It was
of an irregular roundish form; and on both sides of it were other,
shapes--smaller and of darker hue. We had no difficulty in making out
what these appearances were: the white object was the tilt of a waggon:
the dark forms around it were those of men--mounted and afoot! It must
have been the last waggon of the train: since no other could be seen;
and as it appeared at the very end of the valley--in the angle formed by
the convergence of the cliffs--we concluded that there the canon opened
into which the rest had entered. Whether the waggon seen was moving
onward, we did not stay to determine. The caravan was in sight; and
this, acting upon us like an electric influence, impelled us to hasten
forward.

Calling to our companions to advance, we remounted our horses, rode out
of the gorge, and kept on up the