There could be no doubt concerning the significance of that rent in
the solid mountain-wall; and, moreover, it was exactly as William
Spike had described it. However, I called to him and he came up from
the smoky camp-fire, axe on shoulder.

"Yep," he said, squatting beside me; "the Graham Glacier used to
meander through that there hole, but somethin' went wrong with the
earth's in'ards an' there was a bust-up."

"And you saw it, William?" I said, with a sigh of envy.

"Hey? Seen it? Sure I seen it! I was to Spoutin' Springs, twenty mile
west, with a bale o' blue fox an' otter pelt. Fust I knew them geysers
begun for to groan egregious like, an' I seen the caribou gallopin'
hell-bent south. 'This climate,' sez I, 'is too bracin' for me,' so I
struck a back trail an' landed onto a hill. Then them geysers blowed
up, one arter the next, an' I heard somethin' kinder cave in between
here an' China. I disremember things what happened. Somethin' throwed
me down, but I couldn't stay there, for the blamed ground was runnin'
like a river--all wavy-like, an' the sky hit me on the back o' me
head."

"And then?" I urged, in that new excitement which every repetition of
the story revived. I had heard it all twenty times since we left New
York, but mere repetition could not apparently satisfy me.