Colorado Springs, the fashionable watering place of all Colorado, was to
be our next stopping place. Leaving Denver on the night of October 27th,
we were obliged to change from the broad-gauge cars in which we had been
traveling, into narrow-gauge cars, in which we journeyed as far as
Ogden, and they seemed for a time cramped and uncomfortable as compared
with the "Q." outfit.
We soon became used to them, however, and managed to enjoy ourselves as
thoroughly as though we had no end of room in which to turn around and
stretch ourselves.
I have neglected to say that the old gentleman, or "Pa" Anson, as the
boys soon began to call him in order to distinguish him from myself, had
joined us at starting, and the fact that accommodations for poker
parties were rather cramped, gave him a chance to grumble, that he was
not slow to take advantage of. He soon became a great favorite with all
the party and as base-ball and poker had always been his favorite
amusements, he found himself for at least once in his life in his
natural element, it being one of his theories of life that he would
rather play poker and lose right along than not to play at all. He found
no difficulty in that crowd in getting up a poker party at any time, and
was consequently happy, though whether he won or lost, and how much, I
cannot say.
There was a large crowd at the Denver depot to see us off, and we left
the Colorado metropolis with many regrets, so pleasant had been our
visit there. The day was just breaking when we arrived at Colorado
Springs the next morning, and save for a few early risers, the depot was
deserted. At the depot awaiting our arrival were carriages and saddle
horses, which had been telegraphed for from Denver in order that we
might enjoy a flying visit to Manitou and the Garden of the Gods before
playing the afternoon game.
There was a general scramble at the depot for a choice of steeds, the
park wagons, three in number, having been reserved for the use of the
ladies and such members of the party whose education in the riding line
had been neglected. I was not as quick as I might have been and had the
comfort of Mrs. Anson to look after beside; as a result there fell to my
lot a cross-eyed sorrel that had evidently spent the greater part of his
life in chasing cattle among the mountains, and that true to his natural
proclivities gave me no end of trouble before the morning was over. The
sun was just turning the top of Pike's Peak, some eighteen miles
distant, into a nugget of gold, when we left the depot, but so plainly
could we see the crevices that seamed its massive sides that it looked
not to be more than five miles distant. To our right rose the peaks of
sandstone that form the gateway to the Garden of the Gods, and below us
ran the narrow roadway through the valley like a belt of silver.
Manitou, six miles distant, was reached without accident, and here we
stopped to have breakfast at the Cliff House, and to drink of the clear
waters of the Silver Springs that have become justly famous the world
over. Breakfast over we resumed our ride, turning off into a little
valley a mile below the hotel that formed the rear entrance to the
Garden of the Gods. The sandstone formation here was of the most
peculiar character and the ladies of the party went into ecstasy over
"Punch and Judy," "The Balanced Rock," "The Mushroom Rock," "The Duck,"
"The Frog," "The Lady of the Garden," and the "Kissing Camels." The
great sandstone rocks that form the gateway come in for their share of
admiration and I think we could still have found something to look at
and admire had we remained there for a month instead of for the brief
time that was at our disposal.
That one morning's experience did more to convince me than anything else
that there is no use for the American to travel in search of scenery, as
he has some of the grandest in the world right here in his own country.
After admiring the many remarkable things that were to be seen there we
made on through the gateway down the valley and then to the summit of
the hill, some two miles in height. Here we debouched on to a little
plateau, from which we obtained a magnificent view of Pike's Peak
crowned with its eternal snows; Cheyenne Mountains, looking dark and
sullen by contrast, and the ranges of the Rocky Mountains that upraised
themselves twenty-five miles away, and yet seemed but a few miles
distant.
That cross-eyed sorrel of mine had persisted in taking me off on a
cattle herding exhibition not long after we had left the Springs, and at
Manitou I had turned him over to the tender mercies of Bob Pettit, who
had more experience in that line than I had, and in whose hands he
proved to be a most tractable animal--in fact, quite the pick of the
bunch, which goes to show that things are not always what they seem,
horses and gold bricks being a good deal alike in this respect. Mark
Baldwin's mustang proved to be a finished waltzer, and after the
saddle-girth had been broken and Mark had been deposited at full length
in the roadway, he turned his animal over to Sullivan, who soon managed
to become his master.
It was a morning filled with trials and tribulations, but we finally
turned up at Colorado Springs with no bones broken, and so considered
that we were in luck. The Denver and Rio Grande people had promised to
hold the train an hour for our accommodation, but greatly to our
surprise word came to us right in the middle of the game that we had but
fifteen minutes in which to catch the train, and so we were obliged to
cut the game short and make tracks for the depot.
The exhibition that we put up in the presence of that crowd of 1,200
people at Colorado Springs was a miserable one, the rarefied air being
more to blame for it than anything else, and when we stopped play at the
end of the sixth inning with the score at 16 to 9 in our favor I could
hardly blame the crowd for jeering at us. At this point Jim Hart came
very near to being left behind, he having stopped at the ground to
adjust the matter of finances, and had he not made a sort of John Gilpin
ride of it he might even now be browsing on the side of a Colorado
mountain, and if he were, base-ball would have been none the loser.
I am very much afraid that the residents of Colorado Springs have not to
this day a very high opinion of the Australian base-ball tourists,
but if they are any sorer than I was after my experience with that
cross-eyed sorrel, then I am sorry for them.
The trip through the Grand Canon of the Arkansas that we entered just as
the sun was going down, was a never-to-be-forgotten experience, we
viewing it from an observation car that had been attached to the rear of
the train. Through great walls of rock that towered far above the rails
the train plunged, twisting and turning like some gigantic snake in its
death agony. Into the Royal Gorge we swung over a suspended bridge that
spanned a mountain torrent, and that seemed scarcely stronger than a
spider's web, past great masses of rock that were piled about in the
greatest confusion, and that must have been the result of some great
upheaval of which no records have ever come down to us.
We stopped for supper at the little mountain station of Solida, and then
with the train divided into two sections steamed away for Marshall Pass,
the huge rocks around us looking like grim battlements as they loomed up
in the gathering darkness. Up and still up we climbed, the train running
at times over chasms that seemed bottomless, upon slender bridges and
then darting through narrow openings in the rocks that were but just
wide enough for the train to pass. Reaching the summit of the pass,
10,858 feet above the sea level, we jumped from the coaches as the train
came to a standstill and found ourselves standing knee-deep in the snow.
In the brief space of six hours we had passed from a land of sunshine to
a land of snow and ice, and the transition for a time seemed to bewilder
us. We had now climbed the back bone of the continent and in a few
minutes afterward we were racing down its other side, past the Black
Canon of the Gunnison, that we could see but dimly in the darkness, we
thundered, and it was long after midnight when, weary with sight-seeing
and the unusual fatigue of the day, we retired to our berths.
Breakfasting the next morning at Green River, we soon afterwards entered
the mountains of Utah, that seemed more like hills of mud than anything
else after viewing the wonders of the Rockies.
On the night of October 30th we reached Salt Lake City, the stronghold
of the Mormon faith, and one of the handsomest and cleanest cities that
the far West can boast of. That morning we took in the tabernacle, the
Great Salt Lake and other sights of the town, returning to the Walker
House in time for dinner. The ball ground there was a fairly good one,
and we started to play our first game in the presence of 2,500 people.
In the first half of the fifth inning it started to rain, and how it did
rain! The water did not come down in drops, but in bucketfuls. The game,
which was called at the end of the fourth inning resulted in a victory
for the All-Americans, they winning by a score of 9 to 3. All night long
the rain fell, and as it was anything but pleasant under foot, we were
content, that is, most of us, to remain within the friendly shelter of
the hotels. The grounds next day were still in bad shape, and long
before the game was over we were covered with mud from head to heels.
The game was a good one so far as the All-Americans were concerned, but
a bad one on the part of the Chicago players, the game going against us
by a score of 10 to 3.
That we could not have had pleasant weather and seen more of Salt Lake
City and its environs is a matter of regret with us to this day. The
evening of November 1st found us aboard the cars and off for 'Frisco,
the Paris of America. Arriving at Ogden at midnight, we found two
special sleepers awaiting us, and were soon once more en route.
The next day time hung somewhat heavy on our hands and the view from the
car window soon became monotonous. Dreary wastes of sage brush greeted
us on every hand, walled in by the mountains that, bare of verdure,
raised their heads above the horizon some thirty miles away. To the
pioneers who crossed those arid wastes in search of the new El Dorado,
belongs all honor and praise, but how they ever managed to live and to
reach the promised land is indeed a mystery.
The morning of November 3d found us away up among the mountains of the
Sierra Nevada range, and here the scenery was a magnificent description,
the great peaks being clothed almost to their very summits in robes of
evergreen. Down toward the valleys clad in their suits of emerald green
we rolled, the mountains giving away to hills and the hills to valleys
as the day drew on, until we finally reached Sacramento, where we
stopped for breakfast. Here we found just such a crowd to greet us as
had met the train at Denver, the base-ball enthusiasts, who had been
notified of our coming, having turned out in full force. Leaving
Sacramento we passed through a most prosperous country dotted with
orchards and vineyards as far as the eye could reach until we finally
came to a standstill at the little station of Suison, thirty miles from
San Francisco.
Here we were met by Mr. Hart, who, in company with Frank Lincoln, the
humorist, and Fred Carroll, had gone on ahead of us to 'Frisco from Salt
Lake City, and who had come out to meet us accompanied by a party of
Pacific Coast base-ball managers, railroad men and representatives of
the San Francisco press.
A telegram from E. J. Baldwin, better known by his soubriquet of "Lucky
Baldwin," had been received by Mr. Spalding during the day, welcoming us
to the city and to the Baldwin Hotel, and apprising us that carriages
would be found in waiting for us at the foot of Market street. Landing
from the ferry boats that carried us across the bay from Oakland, we
found the carriages and proceeded at once to the Baldwin Hotel, where
comfortable quarters had been provided for us. I had been notified by
Mr. Hart while on the steamer, as were a half a dozen other members of
the party, to get into a dress suit as soon as possible, and this I did
with the help of Mrs. Anson, shortly after our arrival at the hotel. At
6 o'clock the invited members were escorted by members of the San
Francisco Press and the California Base-ball League to Marchand's, one
of the leading restaurants of the city, where we found a dainty little
supper awaiting us, to which I for one at least did full justice.
After supper we attended a performance of "The Corsair" at the Baldwin
Theater, two proscenium boxes having been reserved for the members of
the two teams, all of whom were in full dress, and it seemed to me as if
we were attracting fully as much attention, if not more, than were the
actors.
There was a big Republican parade the night that we arrived there and
the streets in the neighborhood of the hotel were literally jammed with
people, while the cheering and the noise that continued long after the
bells had proclaimed the hour of midnight made sleep an impossibility.
Tired as we were, it was not until the "wee sma' hours" had begun to
grow longer that Mrs. Anson and I retired, and even then the noise that
floated up to our ears from the crowds below kept us awake for some
time, and that night in my dreams I still fancied that I was on the
train and that I could hear the surging of the rails beneath me. Glad,
indeed, was I the next morning to wake and find that I was once more on
solid ground.