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WE took our tickets
by the Chicago and Union Pacific line right from Chicago to our
final destination, Los Angeles, with “stop-over” rights by the way;
and I have to acknowledge the courtesy of the railway authorities,
both of this and other American lines, in allowing me to travel at
the rates which clergymen of the country are usually charged. We
left Chicago about mid-day, and nothing could have been more
delightful than the motion of the Pullman car in which we had our
seats. Whether it had more india-rubber in its construction than
other cars, or whether the level surface of the prairie made it run
more smoothly, certain it is that its motion was hardly more
perceptible than that of the earth itself. We moved all afternoon
and evening through the pleasant prairie country, admiring the level
fields, and the soil as rich and soft and loose as if it were all
mole-heaps, looking as if the plough might glide through it as
easily as a boat through water. It was easy now to understand how
these prairies were so admirably adapted for raising grain and
cattle. About seven in the evening we came on the Mississippi. It
was our first sight of the king of waters. I am afraid I am of very
gross temperament, for the sight impressed me but little. There was
of course a large body of water, but what one missed was some
visible mark of imperial grandeur. There were no high hanks like
those of the Rhine, no impetuous defiant rush like the rapids of
Niagara, no visible memorials of majesty and power. You need to draw
on your logical faculty, your multiplication table, and your
imagination to realize the vastness of the Mississippi, and its
claim as king of waters. But it is truly a grand river, and a man
feels himself bigger after he has seen it.
Most of the state of Iowa we traversed during the night. It is
inevitable in American travelling that you lose a good deal by
travelling in the dark. There is some fine scenery, I believe, near
Des Moines, the capital of Iowa, but most of the road is over
prairie. In the morning we were approaching another great river, the
Missouri. The “bluffs” in the Missouri valley are conspicuous and
attractive'. “Council Bluffs” is the name of a thriving little city.
On the other side of the Missouri is the quite recent and very
flourishing city of Omaha, the capital of another state, Nebraska,
which is separated from Iowa by the river.
Not very many years ago, “west of the Missouri” meant something like
“the back o’ beyond,” in old country phrase. It is here that “new
America” begins. Professor Freeman might have added another England
to his list, and found four Englands instead of three. I used often
when in America to repeat his remark that the English were all one
people; that wherever they lived was England; that the first England
was the little territory between Denmark and Prussia whence the
Angli sprang; the second England the island in the German Ocean
where the first set of immigrants settled; and the third, commonly
called New England, the shores of the continent where another body
of emigrants of the same stock made their home. What I claim as the
fourth England is the region west of the Missouri, peopled
substantially by the same race. And without prejudice to the merits
of all the earlier Englands, these “new Englanders,” as they may
emphatically be called, who have made their home in this far west,
have got a country that for gifts of nature may hold its head as
high, if not higher, than any of them.
We knew that a group of half-German half-Scotch cousins, who were
settled some forty miles from Omaha, would give us a very cordial
welcome, and we resolved to spend a day with them. Before our train
started, we had time to take “a hack” and drive through Omaha and
its suburbs. I need not say it was a place undreamt of when I
learned my geography. But in truth what could geography say, in my
day, of that chain of remarkable cities—Chicago, Omaha, Denver, and
Salt Lake City—that are the great landmarks between New York and San
Francisco? What could it say of San Francisco itself? Omaha has been
made by the Pacific Railway Company. The bluffs about it afford
ample variety of ground, and form fine sites for public buildings
and private villas. I do not know whether the massive mercantile
blocks in the centre of such towns or the beautiful villas in the
suburbs give one the more vivid idea of prosperity. It struck me,
not with reference to Omaha merely, but the suburbs of other cities,
that American architects must have been giving great attention of
late to villa architecture. Many a chaste and beautiful design we
saw from first to last; but as all the villas, at least with very
few exceptions, are of wood, the architect has a more pliable
material to deal with than in the old country, and yet I should
think that he is far from having exhausted the forms of which villa
architecture is susceptible in wood.
Our cousins were settled some five miles from a station called
Newaka, on a new line of railway. Meeting us was the inevitable
“buggy,” and we drove pleasantly over primitive roads, very
agreeable when not too dusty, utterly innocent of macadamizing or
any such barbarous process; first because there were no stones to
macadamize with, and second, because the traffic was not great
enough to require it. The group of cousins embraced three families,
two of them farmers, the third, who prided himself on bearing the
very name of the Irish Secretary, Arthur James Balfour, was
postmaster. All of them were living simple, primitive,
unconventional lives, the farmers their own landlords and their own
tenants and servants too; for unless a man have a larger farm than
the ordinary, he has to do his own work outside, while the womankind
in like manner have to do all within. Whether the outcome of this
mode of living shall be comfortable or comfortless, is by no means
certain, but, as we say, depends. Diligence thrives, idleness
wastes. One of the houses was a model of good order and comfort. The
owner, still a youngish man, emigrated in childhood with his family
from Germany: and his father having died from wounds received in the
civil war, our friend began life on his own account with but a
handful of dollars. But he was careful, steady, and laborious, and
worked his way upwards till now he has a very desirable farm and a
most comfortable establishment. This gentleman told us that to save
housebuilding when he had no money to spare for it, he had lived at
first in a sort of cave hollowed out from a steep hillside. After
occupying this mansion for a while, a spring of water sprang up in
the bottom of it, and however he might dodge it, or coax it to run
off, or place big stones on the floor on which to step, the thing
became too bad, and he had to abandon it for another dwelling.
Prosperous men like our friend have a handy way of immortalizing
themselves. Some publisher or speculator will get up a county
history in a large quarto volume. Yes; even there, there are already
county histories. A canvasser goes round the county, and to every
man who subscribes five dollars promises a notice of his farm, while
twenty or twenty-five dollars insures a place in the volume for the
likeness of the subscriber. If you are not acquainted with this
private arrangement, you will be at a loss to understand how these
undistinguished prairies should possess so many distinguished men.
Next afternoon we return from Newaka to Omaha, and in the evening we
are again in motion for Denver, the capital of Colorado. Again the
night hides from us the prairies of Nebraska, as it had hid those of
Iowa. The fine agricultural land of the east gives place after a
time to the rich grazing country of the west, till next day we get
among the “sand-hills” of Colorado, and have our first experience of
the desert. It was a dreary day. Sometimes no more than a single
shanty could be discerned all around. At other times, through some
mysterious cause, probably the neighbourhood of a mine, we came on
quite a little town. It was strange in such a situation to find a
large wooden building surmounted in bold letters with the words
“Theatre 55 01* “Opera House," indicating the irrepressible love of
amusement, made more intense no doubt by the monotony all around.
More interesting to us was the belfry of the village school, or the
spire of the village church. Very eloquent in such a place is the
little home of the Christian Church. It attests the presence of men
and women to whom getting rich is not the chief end of life, or who,
at least, are conscious that it ought not so to be. We silently
blessed the men who had planted it; and there arose a prayer from
our hearts that these dwellers in the wilderness, who seemed to have
so little to vary their earthly life, might enjoy much fellowship
with Heaven, and find their souls refreshed, Sabbath by Sabbath,
from the river that makes glad the city of our God.
But the longest lane has its turning. The Rocky Mountains heave in
sight, and thrill you with a new sensation.
And at last you are in Denver, and find handsome and comfortable
quarters in the Lincoln Hotel.
Denver is quite a remarkable city. Its prosperity is due mainly to
the mineral treasures of Colorado; but its singularly exhilarating
atmosphere and the glorious scenery of the Rocky Mountains all
around have helped it on. It is finely situated on commanding
plateaus; has wide streets and handsome blocks of warehouses and
stores, and no end of pretty villas in the suburbs. We spent an
afternoon riding through its streets and suburbs; but we were
unfortunate in weather, for the evening was wet, and on the
following morning there was snow. The wet weather brought out in
perfection one of the outstanding features of Denver—its muddy
streets. It was certainly a peculiar experience to find a city of
some one hundred thousand inhabitants, with numberless tokens of
prosperity and progress, in which the carriage-way of the streets
was in a state of nature, and no lady could cross without having her
boots encased in mud. We were glad to know that the Denver
authorities had wakened up to this condition of things, and that
steps were about to be taken for having the streets fixed.”
Denver was inundated that evening by a swarm of railway conductors,
who were holding a convention and enjoying an excursion.
“Conductors” are greater men than railway guards are with us.
Mysterious badges worn by half the ladies and gentlemen in the
Lincoln Hotel resolved themselves into symbols of this fraternity.
We realized the significance of this convention the following night,
for when we went to the Pullman office to secure sleeping-berths, we
found to our disgust that all were taken. And when we got into the
train next morning, we could hardly get places anywhere.
Denver is not only the capital of the great mining industries of
Colorado, but also a centre of wonderfully fine scenery. We had
taken our tickets by the Rio Grande route, because it passes over
the sublimest scenery of the Rocky Mountains; and during the whole
of the day our course lay through a constant succession of grandeur
and glory. Happily, at a junction not very far from Denver, many of
our fellow-passengers left us, so that we had room enough during the
remainder of our journey. Now we would dash through canyons or
gorges, wild as the Devil’s Bridge in Switzerland, formed by a
narrow slit in the mountain, with high perpendicular precipices oil
either side; and now through passes beautiful as that of
Killiecrankie, but of a vastness and variety that dwarfed all other
scenery. The engine rushed wildly into the canyons, dragging the
train after it, even though it might seem that our further progress
was absolutely barred by the meeting of the rocks; but it found a
way of winding through, though at times the road had to be supported
on brackets fastened to the rock, and at other times kept in
position by stanchions fixed overhead on the other wall of the
chasm. So wonderful are the passes through which the line is carried
that the train obligingly stops at various points to give you a more
deliberate view; at one place you change into what is called a
“prospect” or open carriage, in order to have a better view of the
wonderful scenery. Further on in the day, the train begins to climb
the mountains until it roaches an altitude of nearly ten thousand
feet above the sea-level. The gradients are so steep that it has to
be divided in two, and an extra engine attached to the bigger part
of it. It is Glen Ogle multiplied a hundredfold. Never does the iron
horse appear so noble an animal as when he dashes at the mountain
side, and tears along its precipices, dragging his load after him as
if it were but a feather; then turns and doubles on himself,
zig-zagging his course, till he has carried you to the top of the
first height, and looking down you see the wonderful succession of
terraces along which he has borne you. Without stopping to draw
breath, he plunges, like Fitz-James’s stag, into a bosky thicket,
whirls you round a corner, and bravely sets himself to drag you. Up
another reach of the mighty mountain, and so on until he has reached
the top. Nightfall comes before the marvellous scenery is exhausted;
but if you are favoured with moonlight you can see that your course
is still through precipitous gorges and along banks of mountain
streams, making you wish that, as in Joshua’s days, the sun had only
stood still for an hour or two to make their beauties more apparent.
At last you take to your night quarters. You look out in the
morning—and where are you? In a very wilderness of sand! Nothing can
exceed the desolation. And through this wilderness you are carried
most of the day, but with new features of wonder breaking in upon
you. For not only do you see against the sky a waving line of
snow-clad, summits, but nearer you the sandstone hills are rising in
every variety of picturesque form, great ranges of Salisbury Crags,
often with level battlements piled atop, and natural bits of crag
that look like Tantallan. Castles, or the ruined fortresses on “the
castellated hill.” Your engine needs to make another series of great
efforts to pull you over the mountains; but at last, as evening
again draws on, you are in the plain of Utah. That lake gleaming
brightly on your left is Utah Lake—not the Salt Lake, however, which
is considerably more to the north. You think of the poor Mormon
pilgrims who had to do this journey on foot through weeks and
months, amid heat and thirst and pain. The traditions are yet fresh
of that terrible journey. A friend who has lived long in Salt Lake
City told us of one poor woman who suffered fearfully from an
internal ailment, but was whipped off if she ventured even to lay
her hand on a waggon; and of another who lost the power of her
limbs, and had to be carried by one of her companions on her back.
All accounts testify to the Napoleon-like ability of Brigham Young,
controlling and directing not only this march, but the whole
operations of the colony, by his marvellous sagacity and inflexible
will.
But Utah and Salt Lake City must be reserved for another chapter. |
