A Peculiar City.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6384, 27 November 1890, Page 2

A Peculiar City.

Ihe Grand Canyon of the Colorado river has long been known, and adventurous spirits have explored its awful depth and precipitous sides. But until very lately the chasm of the Yerdi Talley in Arizona has been a sealed wonder to travellers. Hero, amid canyons of almost limitless extent, has been found one in particular containing the dwellings of a race long since past and gone. This grand rift in the earth is on an elevated plain 6300 feet above the sea. Its sides are almost perpendicnlar, though admitting of ascent or descent under perilous conditions It will always remain a mystery why human beings should have chosen for their towns the crevices in cliffs, In the Verdi Valley the only approach to the city is by a trail from above, rough and dangerous. Under a huge table of rock are found the ruins of a solitary house, the portal, as it were, guarding the entrance to the mysterious city. But the crevasses lower down are full of ruined dwellings—looo in number. They extend as far as 300 feet down from the top of the chasm, and more than 100 feet up from the bottom. The walls of the houses are very thick and solid—the face of the stone ia dressed in many instances, and the mortar is well laid between the blocks of masonry. Wonderful to relate one dwelling contains a block of. red mountain granite weighing several tons. There is no granite in the quarry used for the construction of the city—none, indeed, anywhere for miles, around. Whence, then, was this huge stone obtained, and how was it lowered more than 390 feet into the olmost perpendicular depths of the canyon ? There are remains to be seen of cooking places in the, houses, and stone beds are in most of the rooms. A vanished people had some knowledge of decorative art and construction, lived in this old-world-city, where now everything is silent as the grave, and the only inhabitant is the , deadly rattlesnake.