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Show FACTS AND FICTION. "Over traokless plains and through uncounted perils the Mormons of a past generation made their way tn the territory-now known aa Utah, and pitched their fonts in a barren lund by the shores of the great Bult. Lake. Their environ, ment was as sinsuinr as their belief, llefore them lay a hody of water cloar and green, in whom depths life becamedeath.and whose shores glittered not with the varied hues of vegetation, hut. with (lie white brillinnce of Innumerable crystals. Within the limit of the lake a influence boiled and bubbled uncounted pools; here one scalding hot, itnd there one icy cold, and again anothor seething with onrhouio acid gus. Mtrange streams run into the saline reservoir, whose waters wat-ers were clear and tasteless, but which stained with brown everything they touched." The above quotation is cut from tin exchange, ex-change, and as some of the readers of Thb Times are readers of Haggard's novels, possibly this scrap of pure fiction may interest them. The Mormon pioneers followed the well defined wagon trail of the Oregon and California emigrants across the plains. Instead of a "barren lund" surrounding Great Suit Lake, they found one of the most fertile valleys in the world. The lake itself is ; full of life, of a low order and evidently of polygamic habits; the "strange streamn" running into it are beautiful .mountain streams, tilled with trout until they reach the lake and decline ' to become be-come salt fish. On the eastern borders of the lake, hot and cold medicinal springs lire found it is true, but in connection con-nection with a luxurious bath in the lake, invalids find them healing and often palatable. So much for Salt Lake and its beautiful surroundings. Possibly (he writer of the nrticle quoted from, may have drawn upon his imagination in describing "Pitch Lake" in Trinidad one of the West India islands. is-lands. It is from this hike, or rather deposit, that the asphaltuiu which lig-ures lig-ures in the Denver fight with sandstone for paving, is extracted: This famous cesspool, for it esn Imrdly deserve a belter name, covers a apace of 1W acres, and contains millions of tons of bitumen, which pre. vaiien tho air with ita smell. On approaching tha spot the evil odors arovv oppressive end eU-ktm-iOR. It is a vevitabitf Styiitim pool, and present a most singular appearance as it glares aud glitters glit-ters in tho sun. Narrow channels of wntpr divide the black mass into hiindrnlsnf isolated patchee. Small islands si ruckle along t he center, coveml with thick low scrub. Hearobonts the pitch is yellow ami white with sulphur foimi, and loathsome loath-some bubbles of gas ante lo taiut still further the already heavily burdened air. |