Beyond the West: containing an account of two years' travel in the other half of our great continent far beyond the old West, on the plains, in the Rocky mountains, and picturesque parks of Colorado. Also, characteristic features of New Mexico, Arizona, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho ... Oregon, Utah, Nevada, and ... California, the end of the West ... the great continental railroad, together with the ... most wonderful natural scenery in the world .../ by George W. Pine.

CHAPTER III.
ITS FIRST SETTLEMENT.
The discovery itself of the American Continent
may properly be regarded as the most extraordinary
event in history. In this, however, as in other
events, familiarity blunts our conceptions and time
dulls the sharp edge of our perceptions. Yet the
more I have meditated, the more I have investigated, and become familiar with the wonderful circumstances with which it is clothed; its magnitude increases with every successive contemplation. That
a continent as large as Europe and Africa united,
extending on both sides of the equator, lying between the Western shores of Eirope and Africa
and the Eastern shore of Asia, with numerous intervening islands, stopping places on the road of
discovery, should have been undiscovered for five
thousand years is a mystery beyond human comprehension. It would seem that the All-Wise Ruler of
the human family must first see what the nations of
the Old World could do, towards establishing Ii,
great humanity upon earth, before the dark curtain
which hid its last hope is lifted up. The old intolerant civilization, when weighed in the eternal balances of high Heaven, was found wanting. On the
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