"Situated," to quote the distinguished geologist, Professor John Muir,
of California, who recently visited it, "in the heart of the Rocky
Mountains, on the broad, rugged summit of the continent, amid snow and
ice, and dark, shaggy forests, where the great rivers take their rise,
it surpasses in wakeful, exciting interest any other region yet
discovered on the face of the globe." While it contains the most
beautiful and sublime of mountain, lake and forest scenery, its fame
rests, not upon that, but upon the extraordinary assemblage of the
curious products of Nature's caprice, and the infinitely wonderful
manifestations of almost extinct forms of her energy that are found
within its borders. Approached by a branch of the Northern Pacific
Railroad, extending southward from Livingston to its northern boundary,
and the only railroad within one hundred miles, this remarkable region
has, by a judicious expenditure of public money and by admirable
individual and corporate enterprise, been rendered so easy of
exploration that the tourist may within the brief period of five days
visit all its most interesting points.
So majestically do the snow-capped mountains tower above the lesser
hills that inclose the charming valley whose various windings the
railroad follows, from Livingston to Cinnabar, that the traveler can
scarcely believe that still more magnificent scenery lies beyond. And
truly the cloud-piercing Emigrant's Peak, with its famous mining gulch;
the yet loftier Electric Peak; the colossal Sphinx; and that most
singular formation, the Devil's Slide, form the most fitting
introduction that the human mind can conceive to the wonders of the
National Park.
Conveyed by an excellently equipped Concord coach from the terminus of
the railroad to the hotel at Mammoth Hot Springs, six miles distant, the
tourist finds himself surrounded by all the conveniences of modern hotel
life.
And within full view of the hotel, from which they are distant but a few
hundred yards, are the exquisitely filigreed and richly colored terraces
formed by the Mammoth Hot Springs, not the least of the wonders of this
famous region. Here one hardly knows whether to admire more the
delicacy of the formation or that of the coloring, the former not being
excelled by that of the finest lace, while the latter surpasses, both in
brilliancy, harmony, and subtle gradations, any chromatic effects known
to exist beyond the limits of this enchanted ground.
The keenest interest of the newly arrived tourist, however, usually
centres in those constantly recurring evidences of tremendous force, the
geysers. With few and unimportant exceptions, these are found within the
limits of certain distinctly marked areas, known as the upper, middle,
lower and Norris basins, to which one or two days' time is devoted,
according to circumstances. The most celebrated of the geysers--those
with whose names the world has been made familiar by the pen, brush or
camera of author or artist--are in the upper basin. Here are found the
Giant and Giantess, the Castle and Grotto, the Bee Hive, the Splendid
and the Grand. Here, too, is Old Faithful, the constancy of whose hourly
eruption makes it impossible for even the most hurried visitor to the
upper basin to leave without witnessing at least one display of its
tremendous energy.
[Illustration: MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS HOTEL--YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK.]
The reader, who, not having visited the National Park, has yet gazed
into some of the profound gorges to be found in the great mountain
ranges of the far West, will read with astonishment, if not with
incredulity, that there is but one canon in the world,--the Grand Canon
of the Yellowstone. Perhaps slightly exceeded in depth, as it certainly
is in gloom, it is yet made to stand pre-eminent among the natural
wonders of the world by the majesty of its cataract and the gorgeous
blazonry of its walls. To say that the former--no mere silver ribbon of
spray, but a fall of great volume--is a little more than twice the
height of Niagara, would, by means of a familiar comparison, enable
almost any one to form a not altogether inadequate conception of its
grandeur. But for the matchless adornment of its walls, we have no
available comparison; naught but itself can be its parallel. One great
writer describes it as being hung with rainbows, like glorious banners.
Another, borrowing from Mr. Ruskin, likens it to a great cathedral,
with painted windows, and full of treasures of illuminated manuscript.
But, as we take our stand on the brink of the Falls, with twelve miles
of sculptured rock spread out before us, rising from 1,500 to 2,000 feet
in height, and all aflame with glowing color, we have to acknowledge,
with a distinguished writer and a no less celebrated artist, that,
neither by the most cunningly wrought fabric of language, nor the most
skillful manipulation of color, is it possible to create in the mind a
conception answering to this sublime reality. For countless ages, frost
and snow, heat and vapor, lightning and rain, torrent and glacier, have
wrought upon that mysterious rock, evolving from its iron, its sulphur,
its arsenic, its lime and its lava, the glorious apparel in which it
stands arrayed. And the wondrous fabrication is still going on. The
bewildered traveler would scarcely be surprised to see the gorgeous
spectacle fade from his vision like a dream: but its texture is
continually being renewed; the giant forces are ever at work; still do
they--
"=Sit at the busy loom of time and ply,
Weaving for God the garment thou seest Him by.="
For the minor wonders of this world of marvels, the formations of
geyserite and the petrified forests, Tower and Gibbon Falls and the
cliffs of volcanic glass, the caldrons of boiling mud and transparent
pools of sapphire blue, the reader is referred to special guides to the
Park.
It only remains to be stated that there is regularly established
transportation daily between all the principal points, that the
distances are not fatiguing, that the charges are reasonable, and the
equipment everything that could be desired.
The angler need scarcely be reminded that this is the far-famed region
where the juxtaposition of streams of hot and cold water enables him to
cook his fish as fast as he can catch them, without moving from his seat
or taking them off the hook!