"I reckon you are, sir."

"The river has a winding way-----"

"That's the way with rivers," muttered Chunky to himself.

"Millions of years have been consumed in the building of this great
Canyon. In that time ten thousand feet of non-conformable strata have
been deposited, elevated, tilted, and washed away; the depression of
the Canyon Surface serving for the depositing of Devonian, Lower
Carboniferous, Upper Carboniferous, Permian, Triassic, Jurassic,
Cretaceous; the formation of the vast eocene lake and its total
disappearance; the opening of the earth's crust and the venting from
its angry stomach the foul lavas---the mind reels and whirls and grows
dizzy-----"

"So do I," almost shouted Chunky, toppling over in a heap. "Quit it!
You make me sea sick-----"

"I am amazed," bristled the Professor. "I am positively amazed that
a young gentleman---"

"It was the whirling, reeling suggestion that made his head swim, I
think, Professor," explained Tad, by way of helping out the fat boy.

The lecture was not continued from that point just then. The Professor
postponed the rest of his recital until a more opportune time.

"Will you go down to-day, or will you wait?" asked the guide.