"Away in the desert we heard its cry," quoted one of the Mormons.

Jones and I climbed the red mesa near camp to see the sunset. All
the western world was ablaze in golden glory. Shafts of light
shot toward the zenith, and bands of paler gold, tinging to rose,
circled away from the fiery, sinking globe. Suddenly the sun
sank, the gold changed to gray, then to purple, and shadows
formed in the deep gorge at our feet. So sudden was the
transformation that soon it was night, the solemn, impressive
night of the desert. A stillness that seemed too sacred to break
clasped the place; it was infinite; it held the bygone ages, and
eternity.

More days, and miles, miles, miles! The last day's ride to the
Big Colorado was unforgettable. We rode toward the head of a
gigantic red cliff pocket, a veritable inferno, immeasurably hot,
glaring, awful. It towered higher and higher above us. When we
reached a point of this red barrier, we heard the dull rumbling
roar of water, and we came out, at length, on a winding trail cut
in the face of a blue overhanging the Colorado River. The first
sight of most famous and much-heralded wonders of nature is often
disappointing; but never can this be said of the blood-hued Rio
Colorado. If it had beauty, it was beauty that appalled. So
riveted was my gaze that I could hardly turn it across the river,
where Emmett proudly pointed out his lonely home--an oasis set
down amidst beetling red cliffs. How grateful to the eye was the
green of alfalfa and cottonwood! Going round the bluff trail, the
wheels had only a foot of room to spare; and the sheer descent
into the red, turbid, congested river was terrifying.