Show A QUESTION OF DISCOVERY quoting from the french revue adso de deux beux Mond esbe the review of reviews for june gives unfortunate publicity to the incorrect statement that not until september 1870 was waa the yellow atone park discovered anil and then by mere accident the party who came upon the geysers being at the time la in search of a lost loot companion the at of the NEWS was waa called atthe at the time the deview appeared appen red to v hat was believed to be an error as aa to the date of discovery but we were unable to point with accuracy to any recount account of an earlier visit to we the wonderful region now known as the national park the article referred to is very explicit in detail and bears the exterior evidences of reliability this makes it till all the more necessary that it should be corrected if faulty and that the latter lathe case we are now ju in a position to demonstrate some fifteen or sixteen years ago the question of an appropriation for the national park came up for debate in the house ot representatives when IL member from one of the western abates asked hon george Q cannou cannon who then represented utah iii ID congress se a delegate if he remembered that toe the nauvoo wasp had once published an article ou on the natural wonders of the park paik and whether ih he e could give any information concerning it our delegate did not recall the article and never took occasion to look it up but a hint from him of the incident alluded to was sufficient to cause a search to tp bp instituted the wasp wap is now extremely rare there being but very lew few complete vol unies in existence one of these belongs to the personal library ol of elder franklin D richards church historian and to it he be promptly and courteously gave the NEWS access on the first page of tle the number for august 18 1842 N no 0 17 of the volu volume me the wasp bei being ng a weekly and having continued only about a year appeared the following ROCKY MOUNTAIN GEYSERS extract from an unpublished work entitled lifie IN valli ROCKY MOUI MOUNTAINS STAINS I 1 had heard in the summer of 1833 while at rendezvous that remarkable boiling springs had been discovered on the sources of the madison by a party of trappers in their heir spring hunt of which the accounts they gave were so very astonishing that I 1 determined to 10 examine them myself belore before re recording cordin their de though I 1 had the knitel united testimony of more than twenty men on the subject who all declared they saw them and that they really were as extensive and remarkable as they had been described having now au an opportunity of paying them a visit and as ano her or a better might not soon occur I 1 parted with the company after supper and taking with me two pon pen who were induced to make the excursion with me by the promise of an extra t present resent set out at ai a round pa jaee so the nig night t being clear and comfortable we proceeded over the he P plain a in about twenty miles and halted until til d daylight day a y light on a fine spring flowing into cammas creek refreshed b by a few hours sleep we started again latr after fter a hasty breakfast and entered a very extensive forest called the pine woods a continued succession of low mountains or hills entirely covered by a dense growth of this his species ot of timber which we passed through and reached the vicinity of the springs about dark having seen several small lakes or ponds on the sources ot of the madison and rode about forty miles which was a hard days ride taking into the rough irregularity of the country through which we had bad traveled we regaled ourselves with a cup of coatee the materials for making which we li had ld brought with us and immediately after supper lay down to rest sleepy an and d much fatigued lati gued the continual roaring of the aprin sprin springs however horev r which w as distinctly hearell hearg heard ll for so some me time prevented my going to sleep and excited an impatient curiosity to examine them which I 1 was obliged to defer the gratification of until mori morning jing and filled my slumbers with visions of waterspouts water spouts cataracts fountains jets deau of immense dimensions etc 9 etc when I 1 arose in the morning clouds ot of vapor seemed like a dense tog to overhang the springs from which frequent reports or explosions of different loudness constantly assailed our oui ears I 1 immediately proceeded to inspect them and might have exclaimed with the queen of sheba when their full reality of dimensions and novelty burst upon my any view the half was not told me from the surface of a 9 rocky plain or table burst forth columns of water ot of vari various us dimensions dimensional pr projected high in the air accompanied by loud d explosions anc and sulphurous vapors which were highly disagreeable to the smell the rook from which these springs burst forth was calcareous and probably extends some distance from them beneath the soil the largest of these wonderful fountains projects a column of boiling water be several ver feet in diameter to the height of more than one hundred and fifty feet in in my opinion but the party of alvarez who discovered discovered it persist erist in declaring that it could not be less aas the than four times that distance in height accompanied with a tremendous a noise the explosions and discharges occur at intervals of about two hours after having witnessed th three ree of them I 1 ventured near enough to put say imy hand into the water of its basin but withdrew it instantly for the heat of the water in this immense was altogether too great for my comfort and the agitation of the water the disagreeable effluvium continually exuding and i the ithe hollow unearthly rumbling under the rock arock on which I 1 stood so ill accorded with my notions of personal safety that I 1 retreated back precipitately to a re distance the indians who were with rile me were quite appalled and could not by bv any means be induced to approach them they seemed astonished at my presumption in advancing up to the large one and when I 1 safely me on my narrow escape they believed them to be supernatural an and d supposed them to be the production of the evil spirit one ot of them remarked that bellof hell of which he had bad learned from the whites must be in that vicinity the diameter of the basin into which the tb waters of the largest jet principally fall and from the center ot of which through through a hole in the rock of about nine or ten feet in diameter the water spouts up as above related may be about thirty feet there are many other smaller fountains that did not throw their waters up so high but occurred at shorter intervals in some instances the volumes were projected obliquely upwards ua and fea into the neighboring fountains 0 or r on n the arx rock k or prairie but their ascent was generally perpendicular falling in and about their own basins or apertures aper tures these wonderful productions of nature are situated near the center of a small valley surrounded by pine crowned hills through which a small fork of the madison flows from several trappers who had recent ly returned from the yellowstone I 1 received an account of boiling springs that differ from those on salt river only in magnitude being on a vastly larger scale some of their canoes are from twenty to thirty feet high and forty to fifty paces in circumference those which have ceased to omit boiling vapour japour etc of which there were several are full of sh shelving cavities even some fathoms in extent which give them inside an appearance pe arance of honeycomb honey comb the ground for several acres extent in vicinity of the springs is evidently hollow and constantly exhales a hot steam or vapor of disagreeable odor and a character entirely to prevent vegetation they are situated in the valley at the head of that river near the lake which constitutes its source A short distance from these spring near the margin of the lake there is one quite different from any yet described it is ot of a circular form several feet in diameter clear cold and pure the bottom api pears via visible ble to the eye and seems seven or eight feet below the surface of the earth or water vet it has been sounded with a lodge pole fifteen feet in length without meeting any resistance what is most singular with respect to this fountain is the fact that at regular intervals of about two minutes a body or column of water bursts up to the height of eight feet with an explosion as loud as the report ot of a musket and then falls back into it for a few seconds the water is IF roiley but it speedily settles and becomes transparent as an before the A slight light tremulous motion of the water and a low rumbling sound from the caverns beneat hp recede each explosion This spring was believed to be connected with the lake by some subterranean passage but the cause of its periodical eruptions or discharges is entirely unknown I 1 have never before heard of a cold spring who whose waters tr exhibit the phenomena of periodical explosive propulsion in the form of a jet the geysers of iceland and the various other european springs the waters of which are projected upwards with violence and uniformity as well as those seen on the headwaters of the madison are invariably hot now let it be remembered that the foregoing was published nearly thirty years before the discovery as quoted by the review at ac the time there was very little known of the country west of the mississippi st scarcely arcely anything of the boundless west beyond the Mi missouri wourl such in fot formation mation as there was however was keenly sought alter after by the mormons cormons and was wa generally in its most ant reliable 1 arm orm possessed by them they were then as indeed they have been ever since and are today an exploring people ever on the lookout tot fot new lauds lands to redeem the old volume before us published in the beginning of its career by william smith and later by john taylor furnishes furnie heg the proof of thip thic on another page it even gives a description of the ibe terrible canyons of the colorado while it may be tech technically to consider 1870 as the date of the discovery of the park because it has only since that time been continuously known and fully explored and utilized ther will have to be the important reserve reserva tion proved from the pages of ft a M mormon 0 rm n newspaper 0 w s paper that there had been knowl knowledge edze of it 28 or 29 years earlier even though that knowledge had been lost again |