ACROSS THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.
START BY TRAIN FOR OMAHA--MY FELLOW-PASSENGERS--PASSAGE THROUGH THE
DEVIL'S GATE--WEBER CANYON--FANTASTIC ROCKS--"THOUSAND MILE TREE"--ECHO
CANYON--MORE TRESTLE-BRIDGES--SUNSET AMIDST THE BLUFFS--A WINTRY NIGHT
BY RAIL--SNOW-FENCES AND SNOW-SHEDS--LARAMIE CITY--RED BUTTES--THE
SUMMIT AT SHERMAN--CHEYENNE CITY--THE WESTERN PRAIRIE IN
WINTER--PRAIRIE DOG CITY--THE VALLEY OF THE PLATTE--GRAND
ISLAND--CROSS THE NORTH FORK OF THE PLATTE--ARRIVAL IN OMAHA.
I decided not to break the journey by visiting Utah--about which so
much has already been written--but to go straight on to Omaha; and I
accordingly took my place in the train about to start eastward. Here I
encountered quite a new phase of American railroad society. One of my
fellow-passengers was a quack doctor, who contemplated depositing
himself in the first populous place he came to on the track-side, for
the purpose of picking up some "'tarnal red cents." A colonel and a
corporal in the American army were on their way home from some post in
the Far West, where they had been to keep the Indians in order. There
were several young commercial travellers, some lucky men returning
from the silver-mines in Idaho, a steward of one of the Pacific mail
steamers returning to England, and an iron-moulder with his wife and
child on their way to Chicago.
The train soon started, and for some miles we passed through a
well-cultivated country, divided into fields and orchards, looking
pretty even under the thick snow, and reminding me of the vales of
Kent. But we very soon left the cultivated land behind us, and were
again in amongst the mountain gorges. I got out on to the platform to
look around me, and, though the piercing cold rather chilled my
pleasure, I could not help enjoying the wonderful scenery that we
passed through during the next three hours. We are now entering the
Wahsatch Mountains by the grand chasm called the Devil's Gate. We
cross a trestle-bridge fifty feet above the torrent which boils
beneath; and through the black, frowning rocks that guard the pass, I
catch the last glimpse of the open sunlit plain below.
We are now within the wild Weber Canon, and the scene is changing
every moment. On the right, we pass a most wonderful sight, the
Devil's slide. Two ridges of grey rock stand some ten feet out from
the snow and brushwood; and they run parallel to each other for about
150 feet, right away up the mountain side. For a distance of
thirty-five miles we run along the dark, deep cleft, the rocks
assuming all sorts of fantastic shapes; and the river Weber running
almost immediately beneath us, fretting and raging against the
obstacles in its course. Sometimes the valley widens out a little, but
again to force us against a cliff, where the road has been hewn out
of the solid bluff. In the canyon we pass a pine-tree standing close to
the track, with a large board hung upon it bearing the words, "1000
miles from Omaha." It is hence named the "Thousand Mile Tree." We have
all that long way before us to travel on this Union Pacific Railway.
At last we emerge from Weber Canon, and pull up at Echo City, a small
place, chiefly inhabited by railway employes. We start again, and are
soon plunged amidst red, rocky bluffs, more fantastic than any we have
yet passed. We pass the Mormon fortifications at a place where a
precipitous rock overhangs the narrowing canyon. Here, on the top of
the rock, a thousand feet above us, are piled huge stones, placed
close to the brink of the precipice: once ready to be hurled down upon
the foes of Mormonism--the army sent out against them in 1857. The
stones were never used, and are to be seen there yet. The rocks in the
canyon are of a different colour from those we passed an hour ago. The
shapes that they take are wonderful. Now I could fancy that I saw a
beautiful cathedral, with spires and windows; then a castle,
battlements and bastions, all complete; and more than one amphitheatre
fit for a Caesar to have held his sports in. What could be more
striking than these great ragged masses of red rock, thrown one upon
another, and mounting up so high above us? Such fantastical and
curious shapes the weather-worn stone had taken! Pillars, columns,
domes, arches, followed one another in quick succession. Bounding a
corner, a huge circle of rocks comes into sight, rising story upon
story. There, perched upon the top of the rising ground, is a natural
castle, complete with gateway and windows. Indeed, the hour passed
quickly, in spite of the cold, and I felt myself to have been in
fairyland for the time. The whole seemed to be some wild dream. But
dream it could not be. There was the magnificence of the solid
reality--pile upon pile of the solid rock frowning down upon me; great
boulders thrown together by some giant force; perpendicular heights,
time-worn and battered by the elements. All combined to produce in me
a feeling of the utmost wonder and astonishment.
Emerging from Echo Canon and the Castle Rocks, we enter a milder
valley, where we crawl over a trestle-bridge 450 feet long and 75 feet
high. Shortly after passing Wahsatch Station, we cross the Aspen
Summit and reach an opener country. Since we left Ogden, we have, in a
distance of ninety-three miles, climbed an ascent of 2500 feet, and
are now in a region of frost and snow. After another hour's
travelling, the character of the scenery again changes, and it becomes
more rugged and broken. The line crosses the Bear River on another
trestle-bridge 600 feet long; and following the valley, we then strike
across the higher ground to the head of Ham's Fork, down which we
descend, following the valley as far as Bryan or Black's Fork, 171
miles from Ogden.
As the day is drawing to a close, I take a last look upon the scene
outside before turning in for the night. The sun is setting in the
west, illuminating with its last rays the red sandstone bluffs; the
light contrasting with the deep-blue sky overhead, and presenting a
most novel and beautiful effect. We are now traversing a rolling
desert, sometimes whirling round a bluff in our rapid descent, or
crossing a dry water-course on trestles, the features of the scenery
every moment changing. Then I would catch a glimpse of the broken,
rolling prairies in the distance, covered with snow; and anon we were
rounding another precipitous bluff. The red of the sunlight grows dull
against the blue sky, until night gradually wraps the scene in her
mantle of grey. Then the moon comes out with her silvery light, and
reveals new features of wondrous wildness and beauty. I stood for
hours leaning on the rail of the car, gazing at the fascinating
vision, and was only reminded by the growing coldness of the night
that it was time to re-enter the car and prepare for my night's rest.
After warming myself by the stove, I arranged my extemporised couch
between the seats as before, but was wakened up by the conductor, who
took from me a cushion more than was my due; so I had to spend the
rest of the night nodding on a box at the end of the car. However,
even the longest and most comfortless night will come to an end; and
when at last the morning broke, I went out to ascertain whereabouts we
were. I found that it had snowed heavily during the night; and we now
seemed to be in a much colder and more desolate country. The wind
felt dreadfully keen as I stood on the car platform and looked about;
the dry snow whisking up from the track as the train rushed along. The
fine particles somehow got inside the thickest comforter and wrapper,
and penetrated everywhere. So light and fine were the particles that
they seemed to be like thick hoar-frost blowing through the air.
We have, I observe, a snow-plough fixed on the front of the engine;
and, from the look of the weather, it would appear as if we should
have abundant use for it yet. Snow-fences and snow-sheds are numerous
along the line we are traversing, for the purpose of preventing the
cuts being drifted up by the snow. At first, I could not quite make
out the nature of these fences, standing about ten yards from the
track, and in some parts extending for miles. They are constructed of
woodwork, and are so made as to be capable of being moved from place
to place, according as the snow falls thick or is drifting. That is
where the road is on a level, with perhaps an opening amidst the
rolling hills on one side or the other; but when we pass through a
cutting we are protected by a snow-shed, usually built of boards
supported on poles.
At Laramie City, we stop for breakfast. The name of "City" is given to
several little collections of houses along the line. I observe that
the writer of the 'Trans-Continental Guide-book' goes almost into fits
when describing the glories of these "Cities," which, when we come up
to them, prove to be little more than so many clusters of sheds. I
was not, therefore, prepared to expect much from the City of Laramie;
and the more so as I knew that but a few years since the original Fort
Laramie consisted of only a quadrangular enclosure inhabited by
trappers, who had established it for trading purposes with the
Indians. I was accordingly somewhat surprised to find that the modern
Laramie had suddenly shot up into a place of some population and
importance. The streets are broad and well laid out; the houses are
numerous, and some of them large and substantial. The place is already
provided with schools, hotels, banks, and a newspaper. The Railway
Company have some good substantial shops here, built of stone; and
they have also provided a very commodious hospital for the use of
their employes when injured or sick--an example that might be followed
with advantage in places of even greater importance.
After a stoppage of about half an hour, we were again careering
up-hill past Fort Saunders and the Red Buttes, the latter so-called
from the bold red sandstone bluffs, in some places a thousand feet
high, which bound the track on our right. Then still up-hill to
Harney, beyond which we cross Dale Creek Bridge--a wonderful
structure, 650 feet long and 126 feet high, spanning the creek from
bluff to bluff. Looking down through the interstices of the wooden
road, what a distance the thread of water in the hollow seemed to be
below us!
At Sherman, some two hours from Laramie, we arrived at the Summit of
the Rocky Mountain ridge, where we reached the altitude of about 8400
feet above the sea-level. Of course it was very cold, hill and dale
being covered with snow as far as the eye could reach. Now we rush
rapidly down-hill, the brakes screwed tightly down, the cars whizzing
round the curves, and making the snow fly past in clouds. We have now
crossed the backbone of the continent, and are speeding on towards the
settled and populous country in the East.
At Cheyenne, we have another stoppage for refreshment. This is one of
the cities with which our guidebook writer falls into ecstasies. It is
"The Magic City of the Plains"--a place of which it "requires neither
a prophet nor the son of a prophet to enumerate its resources or
predict its future!" Yet Cheyenne is already a place of importance,
and likely to become still more so,--being situated at the junction
with the line to Denver, which runs along the rich and lovely valley
of the Colorado. Its population of 8000 seems very large for a place
that so short a time ago was merely the haunt of Red Indians. Already
it has manufactures, warehouses, wharves, and stores of considerable
magnitude; with all the usual appurtenances of a place of traffic and
business.
Before leaving Cheyenne, I invested in some hung buffalo steak for
consumption at intervals between meals. It is rather tough and
salt,--something like Hamburg beef; but seasoned with hunger, and with
the appetite sharpened by the cold and frost of these high regions,
the hung buffalo proved useful and nutritious.
For several hundred miles, our track lay across the
prairie--monotonous, and comparatively uninteresting now, in its
covering of white--but in early summer clad in lively green and
carpeted with flowers. I read that this fine cultivable well-watered
country extends seven hundred miles north and south, along the eastern
base of the Rocky Mountains, with an average width of two hundred
miles. It is said to be amongst the finest grazing land in the world,
with pasturage for millions of cattle and sheep.
Shortly after passing Antelope Station, the track skirts the "Prairie
Dog City," which I knew at once by its singular appearance. It
consists of hundreds of little mounds of soil, raised about a foot and
a half from the ground. There were, however, no dogs about at the
time. The biting cold had doubtless sent them within doors. Indeed, I
saw no wild animals on my journey across the continent, excepting only
some black antelopes with white faces, that I saw on the plains near
this Prairie Dog City.
For a distance of more than five hundred miles--from leaving Cheyenne
until our arrival in Omaha--the railway held along the left bank of
the Lodge Pole Creek, then along the South Fork or Platte river, and
finally along the main Platte river down to near its junction with the
Missouri. When I went to sleep on the night of the 11th of
February--my fourth night in the railway train--we were travelling
through the level prairie; and when I woke up on the following
morning, I found we were on the prairie still.
At seven in the morning, we halted at the station of Grand Island--so
called from the largest island in the Platte river, near at hand. Here
I had breakfast, and a good wash in ice-cold water. Although the snow
is heavier than ever, the climate seems already milder. Yet it is very
different indeed from the sweltering heat of Honolulu only some twelve
days ago. At about 10 A.M., we bid adieu to the uninhabited
prairie--though doubtless before many years are over, it will be
covered with farms and homesteads--and approached the fringe of the
settled country; patches of cultivated land and the log huts of the
settlers beginning to show themselves here and there alongside the
track.
Some eighty miles from Omaha, we cross the north fork of the Platte
river over one of the usual long timber bridges on piles,--and
continue to skirt the north bank of the Great Platte,--certainly a
very remarkable river, being in some places three-quarters of a mile
broad, with an average depth of only six inches! At length, on the
afternoon of the fifth day, the engine gives a low whistle, and we
find ourselves gliding into the station at Omaha.