water and the soil are too bitterly salt; moreover, there is no fresh
water in the rocky hills of the Oquirrh that tower straight up from the
beach, and irrigation is thus forestalled. In lieu of this, a few
wide-verandahed houses and open sheds exist, with several booths made of
boughs and evergreens, under which are long tables and benches for the
accommodation of those who bring their lunches. Nearly every day you
will see these bowers half-filled with picnic parties who have come to
spend the day; and there are frequent excursions from the city, where
large parties go out in the evening, dance all night and return by a
special train in the early morning.
At the edge of the water are rows of dressing closets where the bathing
suits are donned and whence you go by stairways directly into the water.
No special hours are thought preferable. Men and women go in under a
noonday blaze that makes the brain swim on shore, and assert that their
bare heads suffer no discomfort. We thought their crania must be harder
than ours, however, and postponed our dip till the cool of the evening.
While the danger of sunstroke seems very small--the rarity and purity of
the air get the credit for this--the lake is a treacherous place for
swimmers. The great density of its waters sustains you so that you float
easily, but for the same reason swimming ahead is very tiresome work.
Moreover, fatal consequences are likely to ensue if any considerable
quantity of the brine is swallowed. It not only chokes, but is described
as fairly burning the tissues of the throat and lungs, producing death
almost as surely as the inhalation of flame. Of course this occurs in
exceptional cases only, but many persons suffer extremely from a single
accidental swallow. I remind the Madame of this as I lead her rather
timid feet down the steps, and add that most of the sufferers hitherto
have been women.
"That's because they can't keep their mouths shut even on pain of
death," remarks Chum, with malice aforethought. For this remark, some
day, I have no doubt, he will be called to account, by my wife, who
seems more worried at present, however, to keep the brine out of her
hair than out of her mouth.
The powerful effect of this water is not surprising when one remembers
that the proportion of saline matter--about twenty per cent.--in it is
six times as great as the percentage of the ocean, and almost equal to
that of the Dead Sea, though Lake Oroomiah, in Persia, is reputed to
contain water of a third greater density yet. This density is due mainly
to common salt held in solution, but there are various other
ingredients. In Great Salt Lake, for example, only 0.52 per cent. of
magnesia exists, the Dead Sea having 7.82 per cent.; of lime, Salt Lake
holds 1.80 per cent., while the Dead Sea contains only a third as much.
As you look into it the water seems marvelously transparent, so that the
ripple-marked sand and pebbles at the bottom show with strange
distinctness. This is usually adduced as an evidence of its purity, and
in one sense it is so; but it is also the result of its density, since
the invisible particles of salt in it, catch and carry the light to far
greater depths than it would be able to penetrate in distilled water,
which, also, would be perfectly clear. The crystal clearness and intense
color of the water of the Mediterranean is noticed by all travellers;
but it is also the fact that the Mediterranean is considerably salter
than the open Atlantic.
Great flocks of gulls and pelicans inhabit the upper part of the lake
and breed upon the shores and islands; what they all find to eat is a
mystery. No vegetation can survive where the spray of these bitter waves
has dashed, save a miserable little saltwort and a melancholy species of
_Artemisia_, whose straggling and thorny limbs appear black and burnt on
the scorching sands. Salt is made in great quantities in summer, by the
simple process of damming small bays and letting the enclosed water
evaporate, leaving a crust of crystallized salt behind. Several
thousands of tons are exported annually, and great quantities used at
home in chlorodizing silver ores.
I think few persons realize how wonderfully, strangely beautiful this
inland, saline sea is. Under the sunlight its wide surface gives the eye
such a mass of brilliant color as is rarely seen in the temperate zone.
Over against the horizon it is almost black, then ultra marine, then
glowing Prussian blue; here, close at hand, variegated with patches of
verdigris green and the soft, skyey tone of the turquoise. If the lake
were in a plain (remembering the total absence of forest or greensward)
doubtless this richness of color would not suffice to produce the effect
of beauty, but on every side stand lofty mountains. They seem to rise
from the very margin to their riven, bare and pinnacle-studded crests
spotted with snow, though some of them are miles beyond the water's
edge.
Two mountainous islands stand prominently in view at the lower end of
the lake--Church and Antelope. On the former some two thousand head of
cattle are pastured. The latter has a less prosaic history, though at
present similarly utilized as grazing-land. When the Mormons first came
hither they wintered their cattle and horses upon it. The eastern side
of the island contains some farming land, and a quarry of roofing slate.
An obliging gentleman told us all about the island, and also gave an
account of what must have been an exciting chase. He said that until two
or three years ago there roamed upon the island a remnant of the
horse-herds once pastured there, numbering fifty or sixty horses and
mares. These were as wild as wild could be, and grazed upon the western
side of the island, which is very broken and rocky, and traversed by
narrow trails that the horses had worn in the hillsides. It was decided
to attempt to capture some or all of these horses and a novel method of
snaring was adopted. Nooses were made at the ends of long lines which
were securely anchored; the nooses were then hung in the bushes in such
a way as to overhang the trail at the proper height. Several mounted men
then got behind a few of the wild herd, and drove them as furiously as
they could frighten them forward along the narrow trails. Overcome with
terror the leading animal never saw the dangling rope, but rushed his
head through the noose and was instantly jerked off the trail. Tearing
wildly past him half a dozen others, one by one went into as many
consecutive snares and were caught.
As each horse was caught, one of the pursuers would hasten to him as
rapidly as possible, fasten the end of the lariat to the horn of his
saddle, and then lose no time in loosening the noose about the captive's
neck, which by that time would have choked the poor beast almost into
insensibility. This done, he would leave the wild and tame animals tied
together, to fight it out, and hurry on to help his companions. In this
way several horses were captured, and proved very docile and capable
when put in the harness.
The story has scarcely been concluded, when we are called to our
homeward-bound train. It is just at sunset--the western horizon a
fountain of fiery gold seen through a saffron veil of ineffable
splendor. The air seems to become saturated--thick with color throughout
the whole space between us and the horizon. The mountains shine through
this veil in a sharply defined mass, not a single feature visible, but
their whole silhouette washed in with a flat tint of marvelous softness
and inimitable delicacy. Yet it changes, almost every instant, and
gradually, as the orb disappears behind the island, and the cloth of
gold laid down for his feet across the lake, is drawn away, the
island-hills and the jagged sierras beyond settle into cold ashy blue,
and the coolness of approaching night already fans our cheeks.
* * * * *
Another day we made an excursion up into the cañon of the Little
Cottonwood to Alta--a mining town known all round the world. The place
is not only entertaining in itself, but in its neighborhood are a large
number of easily accessible gorges, lakes and hilltops full of artistic
material and of trout fishing; or, if the tourist goes late in the
season, of good shooting and ample opportunity for dangerous adventures
in mountaineering. The Little Cottonwood is one of those great crevices
between the peaks of the Wasatch range plainly visible from Salt Lake
City, and distinguished by its white walls, which when wet with the
morning dews gleam like monstrous mirrors as the sunlight reaches them
from over the top of the range.
We took the early morning train down to Bingham Junction, so called
because branch roads diverge here, not only to Alta, our destination,
but also to Bingham, a mining camp opposite, in the Oquirrh, which has
attracted much attention in the past and still has very profitable
mines, with many peculiarities of great interest to the specialist. Here
at the Junction stood awaiting us a locomotive heading a train made up
of almost every kind of car known to rolling stock. Whisked away past
fields of lucerne we were quickly climbing the foothill benches and
entering the mouth of the cañon, where the train came to a standstill
underneath an ore-shed and alongside of a beer-saloon. In front of the
saloon stood on slender rails two or three of the queerest vehicles it
was ever my fortune to ride in. If you can imagine the body of a
three-seated sleigh, with its curled up splash-board, mounted upon a
hand-car and rigged with a miniature "boot" behind, you will have an
idea of these vehicles in which we were to finish our trip up the eight
miles of cañon remaining. The motive power consisted of two black mules,
harnessed tandem, and the driver was the conductor of the train, who
disguised himself so effectually in a big hat and bigger duster that it
was a long time before we discovered his identity.
The walls of this cañon are extremely lofty, and in places almost
vertical. Though in crevices and ledges here and there some fearless
bushes and trees have maintained a foothold, yet there are large spaces
of almost upright slope, wholly bare of the least soil or vegetation,
and smoothed by the waters that drip over them, the sliding avalanches
that sweep their faces, and the fierce winds that polish them under
streams of sharp-grained dust. Whiter precipices I have never seen, and
the rock lies in long layers, that in the case of sedimentary rocks we
would call strata, inclined at a very steep angle against the higher
heart of the range within. Here, too, are the usual lines of
cross-cleavage, and in these lines, as well as between the layers, water
finds itself able to penetrate more or less easily. Hence the frost
during past ages has slowly cracked off great masses of exposed cliff
and hurled them down. This rock does not crumble, as would the lavas,
but falls in masses, and with these the bottom of the cañon has been
gradually filled up. The water of the creek finding its way over and
among the great pieces, never ceases to be a cataract, or has a moment
rest from its foaming haste; and our tramway squirmed and dodged among
angular fragments, each as big as a house, which had fallen so recently
as yet to be lying on top of the ground.
It is by splitting to pieces these great detached droppings of the
cliff--solid fragments of the original granite cliff,--that the
contractors get the fine building stone of the Mormon temple in the
city. There is no need to open any quarries. It is only necessary to
drill and blast these big stones lying on the surface, and the demands
of a hundred temples would not exhaust the supply. Men were at work as
we passed, splitting out blocks that were dragged by stoneboats, or sent
along the tramway down to where they could be loaded upon the railroad
cars. Until three years ago every bit of this stone was hauled all the
way to Salt Lake City by bullock teams, and the great expense and labor
account both for the large expense and the slow progress of the mighty
structure.
A mile or so above Wasatch station, the tramway entered a snow-shed; and
with momentary exceptions, it never got out of it for seven miles. To
the sight-seer this was discouraging; but it was compensated by the
coolness, for in the stillness of the cañon, the sunshine, reflected
from the dazzling walls, was fiercely hot, and our occasional emergences
into it was like passing before the door of a blast furnace. These sheds
are said to have cost one hundred thousand dollars, though the timber
was close at hand and sawed in the cañon. They were necessary, for this
is a gorge famous for its depth of snowfall and its avalanches. It
required two hours to toil through the sheds and at the end we found as
peculiar a scene of human life as could well be imagined. The cañon
"heads" here, in an almost complete circle of heights, some of which
reach, stark and splintered, far above timber-line. At the disbandment
of General Connor's regiment of Californian troops in 1863, they
scattered through the mountains and among other places came here.
Prospecting the higher slopes, silver ore was discovered, and a host of
miners came in, and began digging on all the hills. The famous "Emma,"
the "Flag Staff," and dozens of other mines were opened. A town,
well-called _Alta_ (high), sprang up, and filled all the level land at
the head of the valley, while buildings, and machinery and dumps dotted
the mountain sides to their topmost ridges. Long paths had marked the
ruin of avalanches before this, but when, to supply timber for the mines
and the cabins, the mountain sides were denuded of their forests, large
areas of deep snow became loosened in every great storm, and slid with
crushing force, tearing up and carrying everything before it, to the
bottom of the slope. Once the whole corner of the town was swept clean
away; again and again miners lost their buildings at their tunnel
entrances. Little work could be done in winter yet many stayed in Alta,
isolated from the world, and at the mines, and many and many a one lost
his life, to have his body found in a horrible condition when the winter
was over. Then in the spring, when the frost was loosening the ground,
and the melting snow was pouring a thousand waterfalls down the sides of
the cañon, the snowslides were succeeded by the giving away of masses of
soil and loose rocks, which came headlong into the bottom of the cañon.
One such avalanche of rocks was pointed out to us which had slid down
the opposite mountain with such force as to carry it clear across, and
almost a hundred feet up the hither slope, sweeping away the tramway,
sheds and all.
Meanwhile the original owners of the mines had sold them in the most
prominent cases, for enough to make the men wealthy. Companies had been
formed, the stock had been put upon the market, and the usual history of
a mining camp was gone through. The "Emma," in the hands of a company of
English capitalists, was made notorious by litigation, and for a long
time was shut down. Now, however, a new era is beginning. Work has been
resumed on many lodes that for years have been idle, and arctic Alta may
yet range herself among the foremost silver-producing localities of the
territory. We were all glad we went up there, yet were quite ready at
four o'clock to return.
When we took our seats in the little sleigh-like car, no mules stood
sedately tandem in front of it; and before we understood that we were
ready, behold we were off! It was merely the loosening of a brake, and
the car began to roll swiftly down the track. That was an exhilarating
ride! Whisking round the curves, rattling through long tunnels, dodging
out into the sunlight to catch a glimpse of a sparkling waterfall, or a
bit of plain seen away down the cañon, then back again into the tunnel,
where gophers and chip-munks and cotton tails were continually perking
up their heads and then scuttling into some small cave of refuge as we
rushed past--on and on, down and down in the face of the stiff breeze
and under lofty walls, without an instant's check, until we glided into
the little terminus, just twenty-five minutes out of Alta!
But our gravity railroading was not done yet. A small passenger car
stood at the head of the railway track by which we had come up from the
valley. As soon as we had entered it, our jolly driver-conductor (there
was no gravity about him!) loosened the brake and we rushed off again
like the ghost of a train, without engine or engineer, and went spinning
down the tortuous track for a dozen miles to Bingham Junction. It was
just as good fun as coasting--and better, for you didn't have to drag
your own sled back up hill again.
XXXVII
AU REVOIR.
End things must, end howsoever things may.
--BROWNING.
This was our last excursion, and all three of us knew it as we gathered
in our own coach again at Bingham Junction.
"At last," remarks Madame, cheerfully--she is thinking that before many
more days an apple-cheeked little damsel in far New England will be back
in her arms--"we have come, sir, to the final chapter. The emptiness of
your utmost corner-pigeon-hole will reproach you no longer. A few days
more and _Finis_ will be written across the completed manuscript, and
our glorious cruise will be a thing of the past. Meanwhile, sir,
remember your 'Cochelunk,'--
'Act, act in the living present,
Heart within and God o'er head.'"
"For instance?" I ask, after this homily.
"Observe, and make a note of, these great meadows of rich grass and the
russet areas where hay has been cut. Note how, among the plumey masses
left standing scarlet flowers are burning like coals--I wonder if
prairie fires ever originate from their igniting the dry and feathery
stalks! See how the Jordan flows stately down the center of this wide
mountain trough, its banks crowded with farmhouses, each in its little
copse of trees. Long lines of Lombardy poplars mark the boundaries of
many farms and willows show where the big irrigating ditches pass or
rivulets trickle. All these things are of the highest interest, and
imply a mass of statistics you ought busily to gather and carefully to
record in tables of precise and copious information."
"Eh?" I say.
What is the matter with the Madame? Is she making fun of somebody whom
she ought to hold in a respect almost amounting to awe? Feeling that I
ought to assert myself I gently hint that this is my affair, and her
help is uncalled for in the matter of book-making; that her own
department is wide enough for all her energies; and that--
But here Chum interrupts in that strix-like way of his which always so
commands attention that one must listen whether or no.
This young man is possessed of a family heirloom in the shape of
several hundred traditions of a more or less mythical grandfather. Some
of these tales are distinctly poetical, while none of them are prosy. It
is one of the traditions coined in the ingenious brain of this talented
old gentleman with which we are now regaled, _apropos_ of the matter in
hand.
The old gentleman, it appears, was once--but let his heir-apparent--
"Who," the Madame interrupts maliciously, "has very little hair
apparent."
"Let him," I say, ignoring the insinuation, "tell his own story."
"Why it was this way, as you very justly remark. The old gentleman was
once captured by the Indians, who, instead of scalping him, decided to
make him a beast of burden. They, therefore, loaded him down with
cooking utensils, the most prominent article of which was the useful,
but heavy frying-pan known in the vernacular as 'skillet.' Each Indian
deposited upon my grandfather's venerable and enduring back, his
skillet. The old gentleman dare not protest, but meekly submitted and
trudged off under his Atlas-like burden. After two hours hard marching,
however, he resolved to argue the question, so he shouted imperatively,
"'Halt!'
"The Indians paused in wonder. The venerable victim climbed upon a
fallen tree and delivered his famous forensic effort, as follows:
"'Mr. Injuns! I have a proposition to make. _I move that every Injun
carry his own skillet._'
"The modesty and yet fairness of this proposition met with an
enthusiastic reception and every Indian after that 'carried his own
skillet,' which commendable example it would be well for all to follow."
"That's a good story!" I remarked. "A good moral story! This expedition,
my dear Madame, was for fun, not for geographical pedantry; and my book
shall make no pretense to be a cyclopædia, a guide, or a useful
companion of any sort, but just a jolly story of a care-forgetting
vacation. If it jogs the curiosity, whets the appetite, nerves the
fingers, weak through long toil in tying, and untying purse strings, to
come and see what _we_ have seen, that is all the effect that can be
expected; and this much done, the traveller who follows our uncertain
trail will find out far more for himself than we ever could hope to tell
him. Seeing Colorado, no matter how briefly,
'Of her bright face, one glance will trace
A picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain.'
"But here we are at Salt Lake, and home again, for one more gay dinner
in the red-walled car; one more gay evening under the cool stars; one
more night's rest in the queer little stateroom. To-morrow, Chum, old
'friend and fellow-student,' in lonely grandeur you will be taking the
long-to-be-remembered 'special' swiftly back to Denver; while the Madame
and I are rolling away to the Golden Gate. Fill your glasses. And what
shall the toast be? The God-wrought landscape we have seen? The
wide-awake people we have known? The splendid railroad whose
achievements we know and of whose hospitality we have partaken? The
glorious 'good times' we've had? The stores of health we have laid away?
Ay, all these and more. Let us toast each other; and then--
GOOD NIGHT!"
* * * * *
Transcriber's note:
The approximate position of each illustration, including any
caption text, is shown as [Illustration: caption]. Those which
occur in the middle of paragraphs are positioned at the nearest
paragraph break.
Punctuation is sometimes missing from the images used to create this
text, and has been restored. Normally, there is space where the
punctuation was intended. Commas are sometimes vestigial, appearing as
full stops, and have also been restored, without further comment. On
occasion the punctuation is simply incorrect, and has been changed to
follow the conventions elsewhere.
For example, from p. 81:
"... or deep blue, or washed with an amethystine tint[,/.] Arching over
all bends the cloudless azure of the canopy."
or, from p. 237:
so here it is, or at least so much of it as relates to the boy[:]
The few instances of the 'oe' ligature have been rendered as
separate characters.
Spelling is not entirely consistent and is left as printed, with the
exceptions noted below. Hyphenation of compound words varies. Where the
sole instance appears on a line break, the hyphen is generally retained.
The word 'height' was spelled twice as 'hight' (p. 225 & 316), and both
instances were retained. The caption of the image on p. 21 is spelled
'PHEBE', but appears as 'PHOEBE' in the list of illustrations. It is
also retained.
The following table summarizes any other obvious printer's errors that
have been corrected. It also includes a number of dubious spellings or
questionable usage. Misspellings in quoted text are retained.
p. 15 mig[r]atory Added.
p. 175 I've hooked him Added.
p. 237 as it relates to the boy[:] Added.
p. 238 [(]until my husband bought him a cap) Added.
p. 281 the easter[n]most buttress Added.
p. 285 reconnoisance _sic_
p. 303 and beh[e/o]ld the mountains of Utah. Corrected.
p. 309 a strange, [wierd], grand region _sic_
p. 314 catatrophe/catastrophe Corrected.
p. 315 Wel[c]hmen _sic_
p. 315 chara[c]teristic Corrected.
p. 319 eq[u]ally Added.
p. 320 a[t/s] they called the redskins Corrected.
p. 320 su[r]burban Removed.
p. 321 Brewer's [grakle] _sic_
p. 336 the Mediterranean is considerably [salter] _sic_
than the open Atlantic
p. 339 and our occasional emergenc[i]es into it Corrected.