As he looked afar he saw a black basin of timbered country, the darkest
and wildest he had ever gazed upon, a hundred miles of blue distance
across to an unflung mountain range, hazy purple against the sky.
It seemed to be a stupendous gulf surrounded on three sides by bold,
undulating lines of peaks, and on his side by a wall so high that he
felt lifted aloft on the run of the sky.

Southeast y'u see the Sierra Anchas," said the girl pointing. "That
notch in the range is the pass where sheep are driven to Phoenix an'
Maricopa. Those big rough mountains to the south are the Mazatzals.
Round to the west is the Four Peaks Range. An' y'u're standin' on
the Rim."

Jean could not see at first just what the Rim was, but by shifting
his gaze westward he grasped this remarkable phenomenon of nature.
For leagues and leagues a colossal red and yellow wall, a rampart,
a mountain-faced cliff, seemed to zigzag westward. Grand and bold
were the promontories reaching out over the void. They ran toward
the westering sun. Sweeping and impressive were the long lines
slanting away from them, sloping darkly spotted down to merge into
the black timber. Jean had never seen such a wild and rugged
manifestation of nature's depths and upheavals. He was held mute.

"Stranger, look down," said the girl.

Jean's sight was educated to judge heights and depths and distances.
This wall upon which he stood sheered precipitously down, so far that
it made him dizzy to look, and then the craggy broken cliffs merged
into red-slided, cedar-greened slopes running down and down into
gorges choked with forests, and from which soared up a roar of rushing