THE MOST IMPRESSIVE SIGHT EVER SAW.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1862, 23 September 1913, Page 3

THE MOST IMPRESSIVE SIGHT EVER SAW.

Madame Sarah Bernhardt, Father Bernard Vaughan, and Field Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood each describe in the August "Strand" "The Most Impressive Sight I,Ever Saw."

"Of all sights that I havo witnessed, [ cannot recall ono which, has so arrested and riveted my attention as the Grand Canyon of Colorado," writes Father Bernard Vaughan.

"Until I saw the Colorado canyon, tho canyon of Yellowstone Park nad seemed to mo the most wonderful sight that I had seen. -Both canyons are oewilderingly wonderful, but, curiously enough', they are in' nothing alike. Each one has what tho other has not; each completes and is completed by the other. "The Yellowstone Park canyon is wonderfully fine and beautiful; the Colorado canyon is wonderfully grand and magnificent. And' both strike mo as a symbolio of perfect wedded life, the perfection of what is womanly and of what, is manly united in bonds indissoluble. What makes these United States canyons so impressive is that they aro monuments of Nature's creative genius. They , are built up out of ruins, out of debris, out of erosion. "Yes, the Yellowstone canyon is wonderfully beautiful; but the . Colorado chasm is far more wonderfully magnificent.' As, some few weeks ago, I stood on an elevated plain and saw at my feet, and before me, a gorge fifteen miles across and stretching east and west as far as tho eye could travel, I found myself looking into another world, a world untenanted.and voiceless save for the sound of the whirling, whistling wind. 1 "Just imagine the scene. There below me, a mile deep and fifteen miles across, was this yawning gulf. There, in that immenso depth, stood out before my 1 ewildered and worshipping eyes a perfect city in which I could recognise every stylo of classio architecture and every period of Gothic: towers, keeps, and turrets, domes, spires, and minarets, streets laid out. and open -spaces, and flights of steps to cathedral, capitol, castle, and-encircling ramparts. "Nor was. the, scene without the life of colour,or tho play of light and shade. Every Hue and tint was there, and every scheme of treatment was depicted before my eyes. Nothing was wanting to make mo feel how poor, petty, end paltry is all man's work when put into comparison with tho wonderful works of Cod! • "When we came away, after having seen the great spaces "flooded with sunlight, hidden in mist, and swept by rain storm, I could not help exclaiming to a friend who was with me, 'This to me is the last word in architecture, in painting, and in poetry.' "At Yellowstone Park my soul broke forth into the Magnificat. But hero in the presence of the Grand Canyon cf Colorado 1 felt inclined to intone tho 'Gloria in Excelsis.' "To view that canyon and to seowhat Nature had wrought in this wonderland of wonderlands held me spellbound with awo, admiration, and adoration. And as I stood there I offered up a silent prayer to'heaven for sight and understanding, and for tho privilege of being there."