| Show FROM PUEBLO TO SALT LAKE CITY I 1 am constantly surprised at the number dumber and endless length of the railroads here only within the past year or so however have the mountains been so entirely seamed anti and cut and crossed by lines of cars care and the plains ag as well I 1 came to pueblo from kansas city a long continuous cornfield of more than five hundred miles on the missouri pacific a road 0 so o new that but few people coming this way are aware of the now new world that it opens up as yet and just U st now khe new road to santa fe direct from pueblo is pointed out as we pass on with faces lifted to the rocky mountains and the awful gorges of colorado I 1 am setting out for rait L like ake city direct by the denver rio grande road because use I 1 am told that such engineering and enterprise as has been exhibited in its building is not matched outside of mexico we are leaving leadville lead vi lie and other famous mining centers to the right or to the left all accessible by rail mil now we are going to pierce right straight through the granite walls of the rocky mountains another thing that occasionally amazes one is the weary distance how far is it by this short cut to salt lake I 1 ask as we wedge our way on up a fertile ballif between its gray white walls oh only about miles says some one at my side so here we go 90 good reader on a ride of the biggest half of 1000 miles through the canyons of granite and over the gold and silver and copper and the iron ribs of the rocky Mounta mountains inal we are winding up the narrow and fertile valley of the arkansas river the one great stream tw waters wate rathe the indian territory itts all thickly settled and the most of it is plowed and planted and such orchards as we see on every side as we wedge on and up and into the feard fearful A gorges through this narrowest and richest of little valleys the apple trees are literally red with their loads f fruit and so rounded ded and shapely are the trees too they look all along here js As if they had only today escaped out or of picture books but after all with all their abundance and their beauty they are not so cheap here as they are away back yonder in the heart of kansas where the cry from forty little throats was five for five FP fl fo W fill but maybe that was because the white boys have little black girls for competitors in the apple trade but be that as it may the cry here is i if t nickel three if t nickel three if P nickel an a pear thrower in and such succulent and rich fruit too fruit like this could not possibly be had bad with all its sweet freshness in new york for love or money and even the semblance of it with all the soul and sense of perfume and blossom gone out of it would cost easily five tim times ea what this cost com here hurrah for the rocky mountains and now we benn begin to climb we e come to oil wells an oil city but you have enough of these near at home suffice to say these wells are numerous and profitable the city reaches right and left and all the long and ugly mies lines of cars and tanks and the like that make hideous the oil towns of the states are gathered up and down and round about this oil town of florence hereon here OB the savage foothills of the soon we break our train and put engines on each section of our long and sinuous si joint snake 1 the engineer ol of the head division beckons me and under an arrangement made days ago I 1 climb into his red hot little cab and away we drive right into the narrow granite defile for salt lake city five hundred miles to the west no room for orchards or apples or shouting little mountain born mo does docs with blue eyes and torn hair here the red granite rises two three four five hundred feet on eveia hand almost instantly the gral granite lite is not only of a royally fine color but it is also of a very fine quality the capitol of the state is being built of this red and gray and black granite here to say nothing of other mas sive edifices already built we have met freight trains with long lines of this granite on their way to denver and other places so 80 yott see there la Is little need of aberdeen granite or any other granite here now Itt would be coals to newcastle the rocky mountains make the granite quarry of the continent and now we observe that there is but a single track a narrow gauge track and the very scantiest room for that one little narrow string of steel hardly a hatful of earth along here now granite on either side below above nothing but granite boulders big as a church AH top of boulders that are bigger t than han barns steep and stupendous walls of granite so high on either hand that they seemingly tear the clouds in twain and knock their foreheads against the stars the little silver threaded A arkansas river is still at our feet under us most of the time it has a famous reputation for its excellent fish and we stop to let out a stout englishman and party who will flag a down train when their sport is done I 1 find myself asking how this chasm came to be I 1 am certain it is not the work of water the world may be very old indeed but it is not nearly old enough for this little river to have washed this awful opening in the breast of earth besides that it is 18 not smooth or sinuous or in any sense a water washed canyon so go I 1 arn ain persuaded from what I 1 can see as I 1 sit where my nose almost rubs i the he wall now and then that it is simply a split in the cruba of the earth a crack that was made when this massive wall and world of granite was in the cooling process as was the case with the theyone yose mite walls and the gray old engineer at my elbow with his hand band on the throttle quite agrees with me at last we halt a as horse might halt a moment to take breath in a terribly steep pull we are resting on an iron bridge above the tumbling little river that runs under us fierce enough we are not crossing a river at all we are simply trying to make our way up this fearful re red granite canyon but the precipitous walls have refused to lot let us pass to right or to left and so it is that we are at this moment rid riding jag and resting on in an iron bridge that runs lengthwise with the river and the of it all is t this his iron bridge has idt n ot a sign of a pier or block or support of any sort beneath we are hanging in a basket here as you yoju would hang a bird cage we are swinging in an iron platform that is supported by beams above there are iron arches overhead these iron arches or beams coming together at an angle overhead are at this moment holding bridge and train up in the air while the little river rolls on entirely untroubled far below As we rest here and breathe a bit out of the awful stillness above us I 1 hear a pitiful cry and a I 1 look above an eagle rides down the canyon with a little cottontail cotton tail rabbit in his hi claws she mut have a nest with little ones in these fearful clefts somewhere for surely etisa it is a fitting fisting place in w which h ich to rear the fierce and liberty loving bird that perches on the glorious banner of this brave land Wit whoever oever it was that but buot this road read here or had th the audacity to dare the thought of it 1 I do not dot know dead perhaps loag since and maybe forgotten but to that man or the memory of that man I 1 lift mahat my hat the spirit or of yonder eagle wis was his he deserved to companion bonwith with these everlasting peaks of granite he deserved to drink water from the same fountain with the grizzly bear Livi living ngor or dead rich or poor god bless the brave spirit that first dared set foot here and gird these granite steeps with strips of steel but we must get off on this swinging bridge and on an and on and on it is much alike now one granite wall of a thou thousand saud feet is much like another granite wall of fifteen hundred feet A continuity 0 ol 01 this the tumbling water more eagles a juniper tree on the cliff some trees now for the river is not so narrow narro I 1 chamreon some mormons cormons burning charcoal and so we pull up at sunset for the long promised supper of fresh trout two of the grand old eagles caged there is no use protesting against it but I 1 thought I 1 saw a bit of pity and pleading in the fierce black eyes of one of those birds I 1 offered to buy them but they were not for sale the supper here was nut not a rail road supper if it was it would not be news or art or literature we were all seated and adf for the first time in my railroad rail roid life had plenty of time to sit down and time to spare some of the men notably a man with diamonds and a bent nose began to pound on the table when suddenly onel one two three and they were so pretty and so shy and sa so rosy each had a hot bot plate on a napkin and each plate was heaped high with trout done in butter and crumbled bread the perfume filled the room ah that was a profession of nuns n u ns to live for they laid a whole trout in your plate a big rich read trout as solid almost as the read granite walls that they grew between and then the pretty procession passed out and did not come back any more mormons cormons Mor mons hey demanded the man with a bent nose but a frown from right and left silenced dimand we had peace and add trout I 1 was told after returning to the cars that the pretty women who bore the plates of trout were ladies from the east who having been very lueky lucky in catching trout took this method of seeing our party in h disguise and at the same time putting their rare catch of trout where i they would do the most good As night came on the moon came I 1 up and I 1 could hardly refrain from uttering the lines of manfred in in the alps where grand and gloomy byron placed him ah these them mountain passes here are wait ing for the poet their prophet and they can wait and he will come we climbed in sections to the summit under the grand round moon and then we glided down under the air brakes under the pines under the moon filled and thrilled with the tremendous memories of the day in the great granite bosom of the earth then we came to a plain a dimple in the face of the mountain stars and moon and mountain a cil in this dimple of the mountain a great mining city and center the city of I 1 gunnison electric lights long lines of cars the old confusion incident to all cities and we begin to wish for the granite walls to shut out the world once more we want to he be back on the mountaintop mountain to top with the moon arid and the stars and ans all the inspiring elements that make up the grandeur of the upper world but here we ive are down in the dust again bowling away on the dead ead level of our dimple in the faue of the rocky mountains for salt lake there is another canyon above some say grander than the red granite canyon through which we have passed but I 1 say is impossible for this other bon is ia called the black canyon igind of coil course rae cannot be nearly so flue fine for it is the glorious color of the red canyon that makes it so surpassingly su perfect by joaquin miller anter in new york rk independent |
