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In this plain of sage Venters flushed birds and rabbits, and when he had proceeded about awhite tails of a herd of running antelope He rode along the edge of the strea ht behind the nearer protection To Venters the valley appeared to have been filled in by a e shapes of rounded outline He followed the stream till he lost it in a deep cut Therefore Venters quit the dark slit which baffled further search in that direction, and rode out along the curved edge of stone where itbefore he cale readily cliy roll of wind-srass or a bunch of sage colored the dull rust-yellow He sahere, to the right, this uneven flow of stone ended in a blunt wall Leftward, froradual sloelling slope to a great height topped by leaning, cracked, and ruined crags Not for sorasp the wonder of that acclivity It was no less than a ranite, with cedar-trees springing as if by ic out of the denuded surface Winds had swept it clear of weathered shale, and rains had washed it free of dust Far up the curved slope its beautiful lines broke to race in a different order and color of rock, a stained yellow cliff of cracks and caves and seaht before Venters was a scene less striking but nificant to his keen survey For beyond a e, and the ateway into the pass

He got off his horse, and, giving the bridle to Ring to hold, he commenced a search for the cleft where the stream ran He was not successful and concluded the water dropped into an underground passage Then he returned to where he had left Wrangle, and led hie It was a short ride to the opening canyons There was no reason for a choice of which one to enter The one he rode into was a clear, sharp shaft in yellow stone a thousand feet deep, onderful orn caves lon and high above buttressed and turreted raion where deep indentations e, cove-like blind pockets extending back to a sharp corner with a dense growth of underbrush and trees