CAMPAIGNING IN WONDERLAND.
This delightful journey was a wonderful revelation of the greatness,
power, and grandeur of this glorious republic in which we live. I
gazed with amazement for many hours as we flew over the marvelously
fertile and beautiful prairies of Kansas; here miles upon miles of
wheat, corn, and alfalfa waving like vast seas, irrigated by means of
numberless windmills; there, herds of cattle, numerous as the leaves
of autumn; here, long lines of steam plows breaking thousands of acres
of virgin soil; there mammoth steam reapers devouring vast areas of
gold mines of grain; the food of the nations pouring into bags at one
end, while the stalks were bound midway ready for the fattening of
cattle. The chaff flew in clouds, and quickly, from these machines,
millions of bushels of wheat were soon on their way to the markets of
the world. What wonder that our country now has in Washington over
five hundred millions of gold dollars; the richest treasury ever known
on earth?
Now we catch glimpses of vast mines of coal and salt; then of great
cities which have sprung up as by magic; and soon my eyes were greeted
with a vision of heavenly splendor in Colorado. Three hundred miles
of the Rocky Mountains, Pike's Peak towering 14,000 feet towards the
stars; great clouds of snow blowing from the summit into the valleys;
there cascades of mighty rivers flowing to irrigate lovely valleys;
here the great city of Denver, having 125,000 population, and one mile
higher up in the air than Boston.
In this city I met my former college professor, now the
multi-millionaire United States senator, burdened with many crushing
cares, knowing about as much peace and quietness as a toad under a
two-forty-gait harrow.
Then on went the mighty train; here a glimpse at Manitou of the
"Garden of the Gods," with cathedral spires of old red sandstone
towering hundreds of feet towards the clouds which capped their
summits with halos; on through the grand canyon of the Arkansas River,
in places two miles nearer heaven than Boston; here we see gigantic
natural castles with battlements, bastions and fortresses whose
leveled cannon you almost instinctively dodge to escape their
imaginary bomb-shells. Now we climb almost perpendicular heights,
thousands of feet; now we slide down into chasms barely escaping the
rushing waters; then we shoot through a tunnel two miles long under
1,500 feet of solid rock; now we rush over vast plateaus 10,000 feet
above the sea; then we catch glimpses of herds of cattle, now of great
caves, lone trees with not a bit of earth visible about their roots;
now we rush into Leadville, a mining camp of 10,000 people. At
midnight a huge stone rolled down the mountainside onto the track,
delaying us for two hours. Had it fallen a minute later we would have
been crushed into nothingness.
In the morning I awoke in Utah, rode all the forenoon over arid
plains; gaunt, hungry wolves scud away, cayotes ran yelping, and jack
rabbits hopped out of sight for dear life; then we arrive at Salt Lake
City, which the Mormons have transformed from a howling wilderness
into a fine city, with a surrounding country budding and blossoming
with bounteous harvests. The peak towers aloft where the United States
Regulars halted after their terrible march over the mountains, near
where the famous Nauvoo Legion of the Mormons surrendered, after their
rebellion to make Brigham Young their king, though he said that by a
wave of his hand he could hurl back the balls of the national cannon
to annihilate the soldiers of the republic.
I drank in with delight the music of the grand organ and the four
hundred trained singers of the Mormon choir in the vast tabernacle.
Then on thundered the train by the great Salt Lake, one hundred miles
long and forty miles wide, so salt that it buoys you up on its surface
like a feather; then on over the sage-brush desert to Reno, Nevada,
where is the world-renowned Comstock mine, from which over one hundred
millions of dollars' worth of silver has already been taken.
Then we climbed the Sierra Nevada Mountains, around and around in a
circle, shot through a snow shed forty miles long; then lumber chutes
appear many miles in length, through which enormous logs are shot down
by water power from the mountain lake. Four billion feet of lumber are
cut here in a year.
Then on we go past Lake Tahoe, twenty-two miles long, surrounded by
mountains two miles in height; then past Cape Horn, along precipices
down which I threw a stone which fell 2,500 feet into the American
River.
We slide down the mountains to Auburn, California, and find fruit
trees in blossom, grass green, and crops several inches high. A sudden
change in a few minutes from deep snow and severe cold to blossoms and
roses. On we go to Sacramento, surrounded by great ranches with vast
herds of cattle and sheep feeding on the wild grasses; then on to San
Francisco, the Golden Gate, and the unpacified Pacific.
The principal occupation of the street cars in 'Frisco, is climbing
almost perpendicular heights, and then sliding down hill. All very
pleasant except when the cogs in the cable slip, and you become part
and parcel of a promiscuous mix-up, all passengers tumbling over and
on to each other into the front end of the car, and if you are at the
bottom of the struggling heap, with your nose banged against the door,
and suffocating fat parties wedged on top of you, this rapid transit
slide is not quite so delightful as when you ride on the top of the
crowd.
Here you can get a good meal with a bottle of wine thrown in for
"two bits" (twenty-five cents), you can buy three different kinds of
newspapers for the same price as one, as they have no coins smaller
than a nickel. For a nickel you can ride for miles to the Cliff House
which is at the Golden Gate, where are acres of giant flowers of every
conceivable variety, all beautiful, but odorless; you watch the sea
lions nearly the size of oxen, and who roar and fight on the boulders.
Then we enter a bath-house, acres in extent, covered with glass, where
you can swim in sea water warmed by steam-pipes, listen to the band,
examine the multitude of wild animals and curiosities collected from
all parts of the world.
[Illustration: The Golden Gate of the Unpacified Pacific.]
Then we visit the city park of twelve hundred acres, once nothing but
flying sand. At first they planted on these dunes, grass roots from
South America; these fastened themselves to the sand and formed a
little soil; then were planted shrubs to stop the sand storms, then
trees, and now the real estate is not all in the air.
This little nickel will take you to a mountaintop overlooking city and
ocean, where you can sit under the Eucalyptus trees which shed
their bark instead of their leaves, and enjoy the music and the not
overmodest dramas, without extra charge.
The saloons, stores and theatres are open seven days and nights in
the week, and multitudes of all nationalities, clad in their peculiar
costumes, hobnob with each other in the most free and easy manner
imaginable, without waiting for introductions, in this the most
cosmopolitan city on earth.
Sometimes you will see the harbor literally covered with the most
delicious fruits and vegetables, dumped into the water, because the
transportation charges to market would more than eat up the proceeds
of their sale. I visited at San Jose, the large flourishing fruit
orchard of a college classmate who had spent years of hard labor and
the earnings of a lifetime, to bring his trees into bearing; but I
found he had deserted his ranch because he could not make a living
thereon, and had gone to preach for a little church far away, at five
hundred dollars per annum.
I saw at Riverside large crops of oranges frozen upon the trees;
but the real estate sharks never allow these facts to be published,
because they fatten on the profits made by selling lands to the
gullible "tender feet" from the east, who, when they have bought these
farms at enormous prices, find to their utter discouragement, that
they must also buy water for irrigation from monopolists, at ruinous
rates, else the soil is worthless. Here as nowhere else is illustrated
the truth of the Scriptural adage: "To him that hath shall be given,
but from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he
hath."
When you go to a place scarcely thirty miles distant, which, in New
England, you would reach in an hour, you are obliged to travel all
night, as you must climb cloud-touching mountains, going many miles to
cover what would be only one mile in a straight line; now you glide
along close to the long, lazy waves of the great Pacific Ocean, where
the grass kisses the salt lips of the sea; now from the tops of the
Santa Cruz mountains, you survey the world at your feet; now you rush
through the red-wood primeval forests, giants touching the clouds with
their tops, while in the hollow trunk of one of these trees a family
of twelve can live quite comfortably; then on to Los Angeles,--"City
of the angels," they call it--a beautiful city for those possessed of
means or who are dispossessed of bodies which must be clothed and fed.
[Illustration: The Dome of Mount Shasta Gleams like "the Great White
Throne."]
Some have "struck oil" here, and the stench and grime from the
spouting wells have ruined the houses of hundreds who have reaped no
profit from the petroleum, because they did not own the adjoining lots
where it was found; then on we go to lovely Passadena on a table-land
surrounded by snow-capped mountains; but the winds from the cold
summits come suddenly when you are melting with the heat, bringing
plenty of catarrh for all; then on to San Diego on the hill by the
sea, where the fog is sometimes so thick you can cut it into blocks
with an axe; then on to the far-famed Coronado Hotel, close by the
sea.
In the boom-time, this was claimed to be the veritable "Garden of
Eden," and soil was considered worth its weight in gold, but now my
guide offered me six house lots which cost him three thousand dollars,
for two hundred dollars; the bubble had burst, a few had become rich,
while hundreds of speculators had lost their all.
I swam in the spacious warmed-water sea-baths, communed with the wild
ducks, cormorants and pelicans, looked with amazement at the giant
ostriches, and sympathized with their seeming wonderment as to why we
were all sent into this sad, bewildering maze of life.
At National City the refluent wave of the boom had left many of the
houses and business blocks dilapidated and unoccupied save by bats,
spiders and flies. You could occupy free of rent many buildings with
none to molest or make you afraid.
Thence on dashes the train to the celebrated Hotel Delmonte, at
Monterey, the show place of the Southern Pacific Railroad, which, by
its extortionate transportation charges, has ruined many struggling
fruit raisers in this state where monopoly holds such mighty sway.
There are many hotels in Florida which far surpass this as far as
the buildings are concerned; but the grounds are extensive and very
beautiful, and the wide piazzas are embowered in a profusion of
all kinds of climbing vines covered with the loveliest blossoms.
Stretching away until earth and sky meet, is an imperial domain,
covered with noble trees which were giants when Adam was a baby, many
festooned with English ivy and flowering trumpet creepers almost to
the stars. Then we walked under long Gothic arches, cool and fragrant.
Here is every arrangement conceivable for entertainment; on one side
the Pacific ocean; on the other the Coast Range Mountains, a very
pleasant resort for the very rich; but we found there at this time
more servants than guests.
The town of Monterey is interesting only for its ruins of ancient
monasteries and convents, where a few lazy half-breeds alone remain
to tell the tale of multitudes over whom the Catholic priests reigned
supreme, reducing their dupes to beggary by their extortions. Once
these mountains were covered with vast flocks of sheep, but the
foolish reduction of the tariff on wool by the Wilson bill, destroyed
all profits, and the flocks disappeared into the hungry mouths of the
people.
Thence the iron horse took us back to 'Frisco, and we sailed all day
and all night to Sacramento. The scenery was grand, but the cold
weather chilled us to the very bones. Islands of old red sandstone
loom like sentinels along the coast, covered with lighthouses to warn
the mariners. The twin peaks of Montepueblo covered with perpetual
snow, seemed to support the heavens as do the pillars the dome of the
capitol.
Swarms of screaming sea gulls fill the air, some of which, benumbed by
cold alighted on the steamer's deck. Lonely ranches are seen, hemmed
in by the everlasting hills.
Our great, lazy boat, propelled by a stern wheel as big as a barn,
paddled slowly over the muddy waters of the great Sacramento River,
made yellow by the turbid waters sent to it from scores of hydraulic
mines on the mountains. On one island is an immense smelting furnace,
the tall chimneys of which send forth volumes of poisonous smoke,
dangerous to breathe, and covering everything with a coating black as
soot. Inhaling this, some of the operators die of lead poisoning. Many
islands are here scarcely above the water's edge, having little houses
built on stilts occupied by the salmon fishers who are seen pulling
their nets, and around whose heads whirl and scream flocks of fish
hawks, ravenous for their prey.
After a successful book fight at the capital city, I went to Red Bluff
where I was broiled and roasted in a day and night temperature of a
hundred and twelve degrees in the shade. I survived only by keeping
my head wrapped in ice water; I could neither eat nor sleep, and like
Dickens, I longed to "take off my flesh, and sit in my bones." It was
a veritable hell on earth.
The county superintendent of schools here, told me he sold his prune
crop that year for five thousand dollars, and went away leaving the
purchaser to pick the fruit. On his return, he found that the red
spiders had anticipated the pickers, and destroyed the entire crop, so
that his work of years came to naught, as the buyers of course refused
to pay to feed the spiders.
Thence I went to San Luis Obispo, and on the way we struck the Coast
Range Mountains. The tortuous upclimbing and downsliding of the train
disclosed scenery imposing and grand. You looked down the precipitous
rock-ribbed sides thousands of feet to the narrow, beautiful valleys,
made productive by the irrigation from many foaming waterfalls. We
circle the mountains many times before reaching the valleys, traveling
many hours to gain a straight-line mile.
These valleys are lovely to look down upon; but the fogs much of the
time hang over them like a pall, and catarrh and rheumatism render
life one of misery to many of the people.
[Illustration: Above the Clouds.]