"The Old, Old Story."

Mr. Dide,
HIS
VACATION IN COLORADO.

BY
LEWIS B. FRANCE,
Author of "Rod and Line," "Mountain Trails and Parks in Colorado," etc.

STATE JOURNAL PRINTING COMPANY,

Printers and Stereotypers,
MADISON, WIS.

Copyrighted, 1890,
BY
L. B. FRANCE.

CONTENTS.

For him who seeks her solitudes in sympathy, Nature has always a welcome. What we call storms are but her periods of house-cleaning, and the sunshine of her smile lurks in every humor; with love it is easy to adapt ourselves to her moods and with prudence we may avoid her missiles.

MR. DIDE:

HIS VACATION IN COLORADO.

CHAPTER I.

A COLD SLOT.

The upper end of the mercury is anchored, say in the vicinity of twenty degrees below zero, and there are two feet of snow on the ground. I have to travel a hundred miles or more from Denver; one mile on foot, the others by rail.

As I make my way down street early in the morning, with the rising sun turning the white peaks into rose-color, I feel disposed to halt and watch the changes. But I am denied the privilege of even walking slowly; I must wipe the tears from my eyes and hurry. The few people I meet seem cheery, and they steam along, reminding me of the cigarette smokers; the men wear icicles for beards, and one woman has a luminous nose, and I think is aware of it, for she holds her handkerchief to her face as she passes by. No one says good-morning—we have become too metropolitan for such courtesies—but every one expresses by a glance, "Cold! ain't it?" and steams on. One should always keep one's mouth shut on such a morning; one's inspirations will always be full and the shoulders thrown back without trying—that is if one be healthy. There is not the faintest indication of a breeze, and the iron tires of a heavy freight wagon, laboring slowly along, ring out like the music of tiny bells, close and smooth, as though the master of the baton were directing a legato movement. The driver walks by the side of his team, thrashing one hand against his shoulder and holding the lines with the other; the horses are half hidden in the steam of their own providing and are frosted even to their flanks. Thunder and Mars! but it is cold! and a cloud of cold air rushes into the car with me. The ebony deity presiding over the coach looked on with a wide, white smile as I thawed my beard.

"Ain't gwine fishin' to-day?"

He seemed a little puzzled when I said I might indulge in a bit of angling. Perhaps he had never fished through the ice, or was not aware that the art of angling depended upon other things than bait and hook and line, or was not aware, in fact, that these tools might be dispensed with, and the votary of the gentle art still be successful.

Pike's Peak from Manitou Park.

The only other occupants of the car were two young ladies, neither of them over twenty years of age, I dare be sworn, and behind whom the porter assigned me a seat. They sat facing each other. One of these young ladies was a blonde with fluffy hair daintily banged, her cheeks were rosy and she reveled in the faintest intimation of brevity of nose—just enough of heavenward proclivity to make it cunning. Her companion was a brunette in glasses, possessing a delicate creamy complexion and a close-fitting dainty ear, not marred by a ring or a place for one. I speak of one ear, the one immediately under my observation. I subsequently learned that she was endowed with a pair, and they were mates, very pretty, and uninfluenced by the cold, of a delicate pink that seemed to rival the exquisite tint of sea shells I had seen; a very bewitching ear, an ear into which a lover—but perhaps I would better not follow the lead of that ear any farther, and will let go before I fall into trouble. Being absorbed I did not catch what the blonde said to the ear, but having released myself, I took in the reply:

"Darwin's theory is, to my mind, correct, and the strongest argument in favor of immortality within my experience."

An experience of less than twenty years! Think of it!

The blonde put on a look of deeper interest; as for myself, a feeling of weak dependence began to creep over me and finally settled in my back. The brunette continued:

"We know that man is an improvement on the monkey, and we know how imperfect man is even in his best estate—are we not authorized in believing that the next change will present something grander?"

I began to wonder whether some man had not failed in his contract with this young lady. The glasses suggested Boston, and yet she was too young for a vagrant schoolma'am or a victim in a desert world. I debated concerning the man and whether I should blame him, if one were in the case, and my wonder quite resolved itself into a conviction in favor of the man. To set my mind at rest if possible, I changed my seat to one behind the blonde. When I saw the pretty, quiet face, and the eloquent, brown eyes appealing to the blonde for approval, I was more in doubt than ever. To get out of the labyrinth I went into the smoking room and took counsel of my briar-root and the foot-hills.

Snow everywhere! The willows are dressed in gray and the pines are almost black; the purple haze of summer has changed into a veil of white and the shrub oaks are garmented in ragged coats of brown. No living thing, except the snow-birds, is in sight between me and the hills, piling tier upon tier to the summit of the range. It is not like looking back from the front seat in the pit upon a grand-opera night—the colors are all sober. Where the rugged cliffs are too precipitous for the snow to cling, I find Titanic jewels with white settings. It is a good time to learn, in truth, how rough and broken are the outlines that the summer's breath makes smooth. Stripped of their finery their majesty is sterner, that is all, but they are still to be reverenced—there is the difference, merely, between the smile and the frown of one we know to be worthy of love, but always lovable. The fences make the white fields look like great, clean napkins edged with black lace and spread out smoothly, to dry.

As we get farther away from the Platte Valley a bird of evil omen shows himself, looking blacker, if possible, as he hovers over this ocean of white. I wonder what has become of the ravens? In the early days they were plentiful and tame, coming into town and perching on the fences and housetops, alert for food, and in the evening, before twilight would set in they were wont to string along overhead, upon lazy wing, to their roost up the river. We must have become too metropolitan also for these sable friends and they are going out with the pioneers! When I saw this solitary representative of the old abundance, he brought to me the remembrance of other changes—I realized thirty miles an hour and steam, instead of ten miles and mules; a luxurious car with scarcely a vibration, instead of the swaying Concord redolent of old leather, musty hay and the stables. Overcoats, buffalo shoes and blankets are necessaries no longer. Yet the old coach possessed some excellent attributes: it was a great leveller of artificial barriers; its patrons were democratic in its presence if never so before or after; they were rarely otherwise than jolly; the emergency demanded cheerfulness, as hardship always does if one would succeed in overcoming obstacles; one might not sit and dream with open eyes in such surroundings. Shadows of familiar faces are flitting about me, very eloquent they are in their silence. And now and then will come one, and another, demanding deeper recognition and whose ways are so sweet to remember that I forget all except the old coaching days and—

But I declare! while I have been drifting, the window has grown dim—it must be with the frost—and I am compelled to wipe it off that I may see a bevy of snow-buntings; bright little fellows in mottled jackets and black neckties. They easily make, in their billowy flight, twenty-five miles an hour. The train is going at that rate, or more, and they keep along with it as if to cheer us on the road for a few hundred yards and then alight to have their places taken by others. They are very numerous, thanks to some one who loved them and placed a penalty in the statute books against their destruction.

Down there in a hollow, sheltered by the bluffs, are a cabin and a corral, and a few stacks of hay protected by a fence. Outside stand three creatures drawn up, and shivering, it must be, wishfully feeding their minds on the unattainable luxury under their noses. I would like to halt long enough to drive the owner out of bed, or away from his fire, with hydraulic appliances. A magpie alights on the back of one of the cows, perhaps to inspire her with hope and to remind her that summer will come again.

As we climb toward the summit of the Divide I catch a glimpse of one of my castles. When travelling by I always look out for this property of mine, to assure myself that it has not been trespassed upon. Some one has taken the liberty of levelling a camera at it, and bestowing a name upon it, thinking it deserted, perhaps, and assuming a claim upon it for that reason. But it is not, nor has it ever been deserted since my knowledge of it; my people are always there. Sweeping round a certain curve in the road the grand pile, without moat or drawbridge, now comes into full view. Its white turrets shine in the morning sun and its grand doorway is always open as a token of the hospitality ever to be found in its spacious halls. It is the old-time hospitality, of course—say of the feudal age—rude, maybe, but bestowed with royal munificence, to be in keeping with the precincts. Claw-hammer coats, vests of percale cut low, and glaring shirt fronts of linen would be novelties amid the concourse of mailed cavaliers and hardy retainers wont to gather here. Its great banqueting hall is decked with ghosts of armor and the rugged walls are hung with rude implements in keeping with the ghosts; the skins of beasts serve as beds or floor cloths as occasion may demand; rough benches and a long table with no sign of covering; a high stiff-backed chair at the end above the salt, where may sit the master. The broad fireplace is aglow this cold day and the fire roars and sparkles up the wide chimney, and dogs lie dozing in its cheerful warmth, while leather-clothed servitors clank back and forth. But how quickly the dogs awake and all the surroundings vanish at the sound of the shriek ahead of me! We have seen much at the rate we are going—and it is better so—we are not moving backward; the broadcloth claw-hammer is, after all, an improvement on the coat of mail.

My other grand estate south of the Divide is also encumbered with the winter mantle, and because of it the red ruins over under the foot-hills are more sharply defined. The red castle on the left with its arched porchway stands out grandly against the clear blue background. But there is no one at home, the place seems deserted for the time; the usual inmates may be away on a hunt in those groves beyond, or perhaps they may have vanished for the same reason as did those we found on the north side.

The air grows warmer as we go on. Above the Peak a few clouds are hovering, and I notice above the summits of the lower mountains two long, slender clouds of a deadwood color. Presently these join at one end, and soon the other ends swing together and form an oval with a stretch of blue between, and there is a lake above the horizon. It requires no stretch of the imagination; on the contrary, I find I am compelled to satisfy my mind that one part of the cloud must be above the other, else the highest is the near shore, in the plane of my vision, and I look across a sheet of blue water to the farther side. An irregular rift in one place makes a cove, and on the bank is a cabin, and around the edges is fallen timber. Thanks to the absent winds, I am for twenty minutes or more treated to this view of a lake and its wooded surroundings, made of a strip of blue sky and a cloud.

It is not necessary that I disclose where I had dinner this day—there were no bills of fare printed, and as I took a seat at one of the small tables I saw that the others were not crowded. It was evidently a cold day for the landlord as well as the rest of us. At one of the tables stood the blonde, her hat and cloak off, and a dainty white apron, with frills and pockets, tied about her waist. She was evidently not here in the character of a guest. Before I had time to wonder why she might be here in the other capacity, a voice at my shoulder said rapidly:

"Roast-beef-boiled-mutton-caper-sauce-pork-and-beans-veal-pie."

I thought I recognized the tones and squared myself to take in the glasses and brown eyes of the brunette. While I studied them she said it all over again in the same key and without pause, as though under conviction that she would forget a part if she failed in the stereotyped manner. She smiled at the end of the second stanza and I saw that her teeth were very white and even—were pretty, indeed, and so was the smile. She sang it again, a note higher, and at the conclusion I could trace only the ghost of the smile. It was time for me to respond. I was painfully aware of it, but somehow I persisted in wandering away thousands of ages and drifting about in the mysteries of the primary period, barking my shins on the azoic rocks trying to find the starting-point and to trace the connection.

"Will you tell me what you want?"

The mood was now imperative. I said I could not tell her that, but I would take pork and beans.

Cascade.

CHAPTER II.

A WARMER TRAIL.

A scientific knowledge of botany is by no means essential to happiness. Latin does not add an atom of beauty to the wild clematis. One can admire a healthy, bright-eyed baby without knowing its name. This morning after I start out on the railroad I notice that the July flowers are abundant on the slopes leading up to the foot-hills. Great patches of wild poppies grow here and there—it is not an infatuating plant, but one loses sight of the coarse leaves in the delicate white of the bloom. The bluish-gray of the wild chamomile of itself makes a rich carpet, but into this the hand of the Master has woven a countless variety of colors. Hanging in bountiful clusters of crimson and scarlet is a little flower, shaped like that of the honeysuckle; beside it, pendant from their slender stems, a wealth of purple bells, while a little canary-colored gem—a tiny, perfect, five-pointed star—peeps up modestly, as if asking permission to add its atom to the gorgeous pattern. So we have acres of tender beauty. I am glad to know that I am not alone in the enjoyment of it. At the first station, where the liberty of a few minutes' pause is allowed, a gentleman with his trousers in his boots gives us to understand that appearances are deceitful, by gathering a bouquet, and a young man in light-colored tweed, small umbrella and eyeglass redeems himself also, in like manner. The ladies are delighted and full of wonder, so beautiful they are—the flowers, I mean, yet lacking fragrance; how can it be? Two senses at least expectant and only one can be gratified? A little three-year-old, disappointed, stigmatizes them as "weed flowers," but is compelled, at the instance of a juvenile friend, to admit: "They are pretty, anyway." They have a generous influence too; people who had barely looked at each other for forty miles, pleasantly express a common sentiment one to another, it may be a smile or a glance merely, but it is sufficient to make them know they are of kin; even the young man with the umbrella unbends and feels on the same plane with humanity.

The delicate haze of summer is again upon the hills; the great, white napkins of a little while ago are changed into fields of grain shimmering in the sun as they are brushed by the gentle wind; the cattle no longer haunt the hay-stack, but slowly feed along the mesas, or, filled and sleek, complacently chew their cuds in the shadows of the pines; my castles on the Divide give evidence of thrift in the surroundings, and in their summer garb display the exquisite taste of their mistress; the song of the meadow lark strikes high above the roar of the car wheels, and you lose entirely the clang of the iron in the clear, sweet trill from the golden-throated beauty perched upon an adjacent fence, or half hid in some grassy tussock; the pines have turned to a lighter green, the willows are in full leaf, and as the eye sweeps over the brilliant carpet toward the foot-hills and beyond, it encounters the only sign of winter in the patches of snow lingering in the clefts of the distant range; you mark the irregular sky-line of the towering summits against that background of delicate blue, while the loftier peaks may be kissed by a cloud. Does disease weigh you down; do you fret under the vexations and disappointments of the daily drudgery; has the sordid strife among your fellows made you feel that life is not worth living; does sorrow brood in your heart? Why, look you, this leaf is a panacea for hurt minds! it was not created for you, but you are so constituted that you may find solace in it if you will—it is one of the many out of the book that gives our copper-hued, untutored brother, faith. Will you accept less than he?

But I am reminded that if I loiter so, I shall not reach Cascade in a week. The Deacon, a young friend of mine, and the Major, are to join me there, fully equipped for a campaign in the Roan Range. I propose, however, to make them stop by the way, as the humor moves me.

Speeding across and down the south side of the Divide, I notice trespassers on a part of my whilom wild estate under the foot-hills at the right. Specks of cottages perched upon the slope of one of my glades do not add to the romance of the picture, yet I feel a bit flattered in that the builders have exhibited good taste in selecting a location for their brown-roofed boxes. They can be cool in summer and enjoy a view of mountains and plains. Then they may speculate, too, upon what preceded the pines and grass-covered earth about them. The gorge just back of them, and the meagre creek tumbling out from it, give a hint, and as we move quickly down the narrow valley dolmens here and there indicate that the little creek is only the remains of a river of ice. These monuments of the centuries are very abundant hereabouts. I have seen fossilized bivalves from this same drift down which I am speeding, and am set to wondering what kind of mortals inhabited these shores when those oysters were growing, and whether the brown-roofed cottages on the slope above are an improvement upon the architecture of that epoch. Or how many millions of years preceding that ice and ocean age this same valley was a bed of verdure, as now; and whether those who stirred up the soil are permitted to look on us and whether they do so in sympathy with us in our tragedies, or are our tragedies all comedies to them?

Loitering again! well, why may one not loiter when he finds a thrifty city of his own time flourishing on an old ocean bed? This new city is filled with the refinement and culture of the age, even its outlying shanties have an air of respectability. It has its share of vices too, no doubt; however, reformation is not my mission, the duties are too delicate; I might be admonished to "throw the first stone" if I dared. But there is no harm in wondering whether the culture and refinement that flourished in the same spot a great many centuries ago was different from the present ideal. We will not discuss it, as you suggest, but sweep round and into the mountain gorge at our right, looking down, as we speed along, upon Manitou. The Spirit invites one to linger again, and there is comfort in the reflection that the Kind Mother will welcome our coming, without stopping to inquire whether we are compelled by the result of our vices to seek her beautiful places, or are prompted by our virtues.

Thirty years since, the way we are travelling was an unbroken wilderness; the Ute was only then being succeeded by the prospector. Had it been suggested to the latter that his successors would ever journey by rail, it would have moved him to pity for the unfortunate mental plight of the prophet. A broad-gauge train of cars speeding over the way where he found it toilsome to creep! Could anything be more preposterous? Yet we are careening round graceful curves upon the precipitous mountain sides, rushing over bridges that span yawning chasms, plunging from light into darkness and out again from the short tunnels into the light, ever on and up without impediment. Surely, for the first time, it is like a pleasant dream, and one almost forgets to take in the gorgeous, ever-changing panorama made up of pinnacles, pine-clad hills, towering cliffs and flashing stream. Soon the gorge widens into a cozy dell; to the right, a gentle grass-covered slope, with countless wild flowers woven into the pattern, and groups of young pines here and there, leads up to a tier of hills with rock-crowned summits. To the left is Cascade Cañon, sentineled by lofty cliffs, and from out its shady recesses comes tumbling the bright mountain stream that suggested the name.

Key-Hole.

The departing train leaves, besides myself, the gentleman with the eyeglasses and slim umbrella. After dinner, while I solace myself with the briar-root, this gentleman sits a little way off on the veranda puffing a cigar. There is another, an obese party, walking up and down; he is not to be mistaken; his boots are shiny, so are his coat and trousers, and his felt hat gives token of grease and dust about the band. His shirt bosom discloses a compromise between cheviot and wool, and he wears an immense gold nugget for a breast-pin. He possesses the air of one with prospects and bestows an occasional glance of inquiry upon the gentleman with the umbrella. He catches the latter's eye, and halts, almost imperceptibly, feels encouraged, nods and approaches; then with an expression of boundless hospitality pervading his entire person, bursts forth:

"A stranger in Colorado?"

The gentleman with the eyeglasses pauses in the middle of a puff, looks up staringly, and the next moment relapses into his wonted contentment, while the native takes a seat.

"Ya-a-s."

"The grandest country in the world; scenery unsurpassed, and the climate superb; the air—there's nothing like the vivifying air—do you notice the air?"

"Notice—ah—notice the aha?"

The stranger dropped his eyeglass, replaced it suddenly and stared a further inquiry at his interrogator.

"Exactly—the lightness of it—its purity—the ozone, as it were——"

"Aw—y-a-s—I smell the fwagwance of the pines, and I feel sleepy when——"

"You've struck it, my dear sir—that's what every one says—they always feel sleepy on first coming out—but you'll overcome that in time—it's a wide-awake country, you will find."

"You have wesided some time in Colowado, y-a-s?"

"Well, y-e-s, so, so—a few years, long enough to become acquainted with the ways of the country. I came out to see about certain little mining interests," he continued in a burst of confidence, "and was detained longer than I expected, and now, I could not be induced to go anywhere else to live."

There was an air of firmness in this avowal of attachment that carried conviction with it.

"You are intawested in mines—y-a-s?"

"Slightly—enough to occupy my leisure time, that is all."

From the manner of the man he might have owned the State, exclusive of the mines.

"I have one nice little piece of property over in Dead Man's Gulch, I think of developing some day."

And while he patted this property on the back, so to speak, he plunged his hand into his pocket for—a specimen, of course—"ruby silver"—fabulous in ounces to the ton.

"Wooby silvah?" I heard the stranger inquire, as I relighted my pipe and started for the cañon.

The broad avenue quickly narrows into a trail, leading into charming nooks and shady retreats. The air is fragrant with the perfume of the pines and the half mile of cascades contributes to the delight with its music. The bed of this mountain brook is precipitous and has no still reaches in its current. There are seemingly a dozen picturesque waterfalls in its course, and the giver of names seems for once to have been moved with happy intelligence and good taste. At the Naiads' Bath I come to a halt in search of an Old Man, who, I am told, presides over this place sacred to the spirits that flit hereabout, to indulge in their holy ablutions. The early afternoon sun lights up the gray and brown of the cliffs almost overhead and helps work the stately rocks into fantastic shapes. I find him at last, on the opposite mountain side, a tutelary deity carved out of the cold rock by the hand of old Time, and looking down silent and grim upon the consecrated pool of crystal. Not a great way below his chin, sits a modern belle, thin at the waist and with flowing skirts. The sculptor must have anticipated the day when she would be in the fashion, and set her up as a satire in the sanctuary.

While I rest here, peering into the depths in search of the ethereal beauties which I know must be sporting there, and who will be revealed to me by the bright rays glinting through the foliage, and while I listen in vain to catch some change in the deep notes of the silvery organ almost at my side, I am conscious of another presence and look up. The young woman in glasses and her companion with the fluffy hair are standing within a few feet of me. I am at once reduced to plain diet; even Darwin is forgotten, as his fair disciple with uplifted hands exclaims:

"Is it not lovely!"

Her companion had barely time ecstatically to coincide, when the man with the mine and his newly-found acquaintance climbed into sight. The man with the mine remarked for the benefit of all:

"Splendid site for an overshot wheel."

The gentleman with the umbrella said:

"Chawming," leaving one in doubt.

But a startled and evident feeling of astonishment made itself manifest in this gentleman's face as the Darwinian, hearing voices behind her, turned in his direction.

"Why, Miss Gwace," he exclaimed, dropping his umbrella and extending both hands, "this is a vewey gwatifying supwise."

Miss Grace did not seem so much gratified, accepting one hand only, and allowing "Mr. Dide," as she named him, to recover his umbrella with the other.

I considered it high time for me to move on. I had not gone far when I heard a footstep behind me, and looking back, discovered the native puffing up the trail. He had taken off his coat, and was perspiring freely, so I halted, feeling a weakness for the practical mind. At the same time I took comfort in the reflection that there were many economical methods of exit from this life, and that the man with the mine might find one to his taste. If he would only fall off a rock! When he came up very red in the face and had mopped his thinly-covered temples with a questionable handkerchief, he told me it was "hot." I acquiesced by a nod, and he felt encouraged. I knew intuitively what he would say next, and in that affirmative sort of way that precludes denial:

"Stranger in Colorado? What part of the east are you from?"

"Italy."

"No! why, you talk like a native."

As it was the only word he heard me utter I considered him a competent judge, and felt flattered.

McGregor Falls.

I inquired if he had explored the cañon, and he reluctantly denied that he had, but was going now to the top, notwithstanding it was "hot work" for a man of his "build." I wanted to give him credit, and would have done so, but for his remark touching the beautiful waterfall below. While I kept moving it was impossible for him to talk without discomfort, and I prayed that the way might become more precipitous. Suddenly the trail presented a termination. The rocks towered up grandly to the right, to the left was a steep incline, and directly in front a pile of rocks blocking up the way, save for a slight rift that might admit my working through. "The prayer of the wicked availeth not." I felt that I was one of the righteous: the man with the mine could never accomplish that keyhole, nor could he get around it. I went on with reverence and humility. When I looked around he stood on the lower side of the impassable barrier in evident contemplation, his hat pushed back, his coat still on his arm, and one hand poised in the act of mopping his dripping face. I found the grotto: great slabs of granite leaning together at the top and edges made smooth by the tempests of the ages, leaving a capacious, cool retreat below. I felt a momentary regret at the condition of the man with the mine, and lay in the shade listening to the music of the brook singing to me its mysteries: whence it came, whither it was going, and of its adventures thus far by the way.

CHAPTER III.

TWIN LAKES.

When the Deacon put in his appearance the next day according to appointment, he desired to know, first, whether I had gone up the cañon. I told him I had, then he wanted to know what I had seen to be pleased with. I advised him that when I had a week's leisure, and he felt inclined to listen, I would "dilate fully" my afternoon's experience; that a week devoted to the relation of each half day's enjoyment would be none too much; whereat he seemed tickled, for the cañon is a weakness with him. When I told him I had returned from the grotto in the cool of the afternoon after a delightful interview with the nymphs of the neighborhood, he insisted that I had made a mistake; that I should have climbed on up to the carriage road, and returned by that way, whence a delightful view of the valley and the wooded mountain sides could be obtained. But I reminded him I was in the humor to court the hidden recesses rather than the sunlight, and besides, that just above the grotto it was necessary, if I would go on, to swing-off a perpendicular rock six feet, and I did not care to risk the leap. Then he advised me of another trail turning off to the road, just below the Naiads' Bath, where the ascent was easy, and exacted a promise that the next time I would come out that way.

The Deacon being assigned to the office of guide and general counsellor concerning the early part of this expedition, he suggested that we take a trip into Manitou Park. It became my duty to inform him that we could not in a season, let alone three weeks, visit all the places of interest this side of White River; that we might stop a day or two at Twin Lakes and thence we must go straight into the wilderness.

"But there is a party going over into the park this afternoon; the station is only eight miles up the road, and we can have a delightful drive of half a dozen miles, and be back in time for the west-bound train to-morrow."

"Whom shall we have in this party, Deacon?"

"A couple of ladies, and a man—a dude—with an eyeglass; the ladies are pretty——"

"Deacon! Deacon! none o' that——"

"But see here, I mean the ladies are attractive, and——"

"Yes, I understand—one talks Darwin and wears glasses, and the other is a blonde."

"Exactly—where did you become acquainted with them? I had thought to introduce you."

I was compelled to set the Deacon right and inform him of my last winter's trip. Then I declined his offer of an introduction. He seemed a little nettled at my indifference, and thereupon I pleaded old age in extenuation of my lack of gallantry.

"But, Deacon, how long have you been acquainted with these ladies; and who are they?"

"Oh, several months—the train is coming, let us go in to dinner."

I conjectured that there was a sensitive spot in the Deacon's anatomy, and I had unconsciously touched it with a rude hand. To apologize further at present might provoke embarrassment, and yet I feared something more was demanded of me. He came to my relief by taking a seat at the same table with the parties in question, leaving me in company with the Major, who had arrived on the train.

"Where is the Deacon?" was the Major's first inquiry. I motioned in the direction.

"Whom have we there?" I could give him no information, of course, and we discussed our dinner with the prospects which Twin Lakes might afford.

From the rear end of the train as it nears Manitou Park station, a view is had of the great peak which dwarfs that from the plains. The mountain seems to quadruple in size and grows in grandeur, until the great mass overtopping its companions appears to be standing alone, endowed with the consciousness of its own majesty. Miles beyond, and when we are traversing the lower end of the great South Park, the noble pile still stands out, from its azure background, the gray of its rocks and the snow-drifts flashing down a royal smile in the afternoon light. Ahead of us is the Musquito Range, with Buffalo Peak serving as another grand landmark in the bewildering assemblage of lofty mountains; and the park, for thirty miles, seemingly as level as a floor, reposes peacefully in its cordon of hills.

Arkansas Valley.
(BUENA VISTA.)

At Idlewild our list of travellers is added to—a broad-shouldered young man and a young woman. The boot heels of the young man appear uncomfortably high, and he consequently bears his weight upon his turned-in toes. The new doeskin trousers incase a pair of caliper legs, carrying with them the impression that their owner is astride an invisible something and is not at all accustomed to walking; the Prince Albert is unbuttoned and the white vest is ornamented by a large chain with a silver horse pendant; a low-crowned, broad-brimmed, white felt hat with a wide leather band, is thrown back from a face that is sunburned but smiling; the eyes of the young man are, no doubt, keen even in repose, but there is a shade of embarrassment lingering about them; he evidently feels that everybody in the car understands the situation, and he is ready to be friendly or defiant as occasion may demand. The color in the young woman's cheeks deepens as she smilingly bustles into the only unoccupied seat, and when the couple have settled down there is plenty of room on the end of the seat for another. She has a paper bag of cookies; she takes a bite from one and reaches it up to him, he absorbs the remainder as complacently as a two-year-old being fed with a spoon. The cookies disappear rapidly after this fashion; meantime a sleeve of the Prince Albert, with an arm in it, has quietly stolen along the back of the seat, and a strong brown hand rests tenderly on the plump shoulder where it has a right to be. A backward look through the car discloses a smile on every face, but our new friends are busy with the sunny prospects of the radiant world just opening up to them, and have forgotten that they are objects of interest. The Major leaning a little toward me, whispers:

"I don't know just what you think of it, my boy, but I hope it will always be sunny for them to the end of the long trail."

From Hill-top, at the western side of the park, our way is well up on the mountain sides along well-timbered gorges. Presently, from the shelf in the gray granite, one may look down into the beautiful valley of the Arkansas. The pioneers and familiars of the neighborhood will tell to this day the delight they would feel on reaching the summit over the old trail, whence they could look into this vale. Sloping from the foot of what is now called Mount Princeton down to the river, is an emerald floor of six miles in width, skirted far to the east by pine-covered mountains; the river winds along the northerly side until it disappears through a gorge in the distant hills. Beyond Mount Princeton stand gray and solemn the massive piles of Mounts Yale and Harvard, as if they would shut out from intrusion and guard the lovely valley in perpetual tranquillity. From our vantage-point it seems quiet even now, with the busy town just below. Before the advent of the railroads and the multitude, one may understand why the early miners looked upon it as another dwelling-place of the Genius of Peace.

We lodge at Granite, one of the old mining camps, prominent early "in the sixties," and with golden prospects yet. I get a good bed in a room that reminds me of old times; clean, eight feet square, with a pipe running through the floor from the office stove beneath. The pipe is not to be despised, as an addition to one's bedchamber, if one is unaccustomed to a sudden drop to 45° from 90°. As I stand on the doorstep next morning and take a survey of the town, no longer to be called a camp, I conclude that it must have been named Granite because there is less of that rock here than anywhere else in the vicinity.

After breakfast, at which we taste our first trout of the season, we start on a six-mile ride over a splendid road to the lakes. Though we are fairly in the heart of the mountains the way may not be called mountainous; an exaggerated rolling prairie surrounded by magnificent peaks gives a better idea of the land. The air is fresh and cool, the sun is bright, with no sign of clouds save in the direction we are going. Reaching the mesa from the valley a storm seems to be gathering about the summits of the Twin Peaks and Mount Elbert. Climbing the last rising ground between our starting-point and destination, I find we are upon what I conceive to be a terminal moraine, or the remains of one, and can look down into the grand court where the Ice King, at some remote date, held high carnival; his throne, twenty or more miles away, guarded on either side by peaks over fourteen thousand feet in height; at my feet the ancient floor of his palace, covering an area of six thousand acres or more, no longer solid, but a pair of crystal lakes flashing under the bright rays of the morning sun. The July heat has not yet melted the white helmets on the sentinels' heads, and back of them the clouds I had seen but a little while before, fleecy and drifting in the azure, are gathering volume and blackness. Between them and me a gray mist, driving earthward in perpendicular sheets, tells of the rain coming down; the long lines brushed by the breath of the storm will wave to the right and left, and then drop again straight as a plummet, while the sun's rays here and there flash in the rainbow tints. The background of the sullen clouds begins to pale a little, then breaks, and a great mass of white and gray and rose-tinted vapor rolls majestically to the left, while the main storm, with its artillery in full play, follows south, down the range, and once more lets in the light upon the seat of ancient royalty.

Upper Twin Lake.

We catch only a few scattering drops while we trot briskly around the south side of the lower lake to the rustic hotel. The landlord takes possession of my grip and I walk off alone to the stream that holds in bond the beautiful lakes; it is barely fifty feet wide by a hundred yards long.

I put my rod together with a coachman on the end of the leader. I had not taken time to soak anything and the kinks were not out, but nevertheless the fly had hardly touched the water before I hooked a ten-inch trout. He gave up readily and I lifted him out with an impression of a good time at hand. But a half-hour's work disclosed not another fin, and I concluded he was the last one there.

Wandering toward the shore of the Upper Lake, I overhauled a man with a cane pole and a bag. I gave him my trout by way of encouragement, as he said he was out of luck, and then I tried the head of the outlet without avail. The man said there were trout in the lakes, but the best way to catch them was to row about with half a dozen poles stuck out at different angles, and "hooks baited with grasshoppers and such-like." I sat on a rock and watched the tints of the Twin Peaks and Mount Elbert mirrored in the smooth water, and prayed for the destroyer, that if he had not already overtaken the pot-hunter, he would; and would burn, not drown him; toast him on a fork and turn him around and toast him some more; toast him slowly just in sight of the cool, clear waters he had helped to almost ruin. But the government promises to establish a hatchery here and to restock the waters. When that is accomplished what more attractive spot can be found in all these mountains for a summer sojourn for wife, babies and your precious self? It can be made a headquarters, if you wish, and thence you may make easy runs farther into the wilderness. With sweet air, pure water, grand scenery and trouting, what more can mortal ask when he is tired and the baby teething?

Though injured, the lakes are by no means depleted; the fishing is not quite so gratifying as it was twenty years ago, that is all. There are three different varieties of native trout here: the red or salmon-tinted, the lighter-colored variety, and a slender, active trout, different from the denizens of any other waters in the State except, perhaps, Trapper's Lake. The back is a pale green, just the color of the water in the lake, the lateral lines are fine and black, and the spots perfectly round and smaller than the finest shot; it is a graceful fish in its contour, running to three-quarters of a pound in weight, and possessed of excellent fighting qualities.

The State has made an attempt at improving the lakes, and I met the superintendent of the State hatchery here. He said I must go a-fishing. I asked him where, and he said on the lake, if I was not disposed to take a run of a couple of miles up to the falls, where the fishing was good. I told him what I had heard, that the trouting was nothing to boast of except as the market hunter potted his game. To this he replied that when I came to the lakes I must do as the lakers do. I told him I had not had an oar in my hands for a great many years and was in no humor to be drowned. But he promised to attend to the rowing while I fished. With this assurance and to oblige him I rigged up, under his directions, four pine poles, tied on the lines and fixed up a cast of a coachman for a stretcher and a brown hackle and a gray for droppers. I persuaded him to allow me to take my bamboo, and armed with the implements of torture and my rod, like Hyperion among Satyrs, we stepped into a skiff and started for the lower end of the lake. I stuck out those pine poles with their ten feet of line, two over the stern and one out each side, and sat on the butts. The flies trailed along on the water and I had room to ply the bamboo astern beyond the annoyances floating there. After fifteen minutes of this business, I asked the skipper if he did not think a fellow who called this trouting, ought to drown and go to—sheol. He laughed; I took to praying again and in my earnestness lost one of the poles. Shortly after I had a rise to the coachman on the bamboo and hooked a trout. Inside of two minutes I could not tell whether the fish was on the hook that struck him, or the other three lines, or whether I had four trout in tow. I found out very soon that there was one trout and four lines snarled. I pulled them all in, took off the trout, untangled the knots and stowed the poles. The man wanted to know whether I had become tired and I told him I had, whereat he proposed to tell everybody that I didn't know how to fish. I said he would oblige me by circulating the report, and that I was mortified only at having tried. With this I sent the coachman astern again and caught another trout; that was all; one trout to the mile. Then I prevailed on him to row me back to the landing at the hotel.

Looking down the lake after a little, I saw the Major bending manfully to his oars and coming home in grand style. When he reached us I discovered among his other trophies of the afternoon, two trout, one weighing four, and the other four pounds and a half.

"You did not go far enough toward the east shore," said the Major; "there is a place about half a mile above the outlet, on that side, where there is grass growing; I never failed in finding good sport there; it is the home of these big salmon-colored fellows. When you hook them they make for the grass below; then, you know, you have business in hand."

Later in the evening, while the Major and I enjoyed our pipes and watched the light of the full moon glimmering on the lake, he wondered what had "come over the Deacon."

Our friend had evidently determined to have another view of Manitou Park, and I informed the Major of the Deacon's proposition to me.

"Ah! if he were only here!" sighed the Major; "with the lake in front of him, and under this moonlight, or with the shadows of the pines down by the water's edge, and the melody of the miniature breakers to whisper inspirations—eh! old boy, maybe we should lose the Deacon—at least for this trip," he asserted hastily, as if unwilling to commit himself, against experience, and with a knowledge that the sweetest things in life demand a change. "They get tired of us, you know," continued the Major.

"You talk as if the Deacon were in love."

"The symptoms are marked, my boy—he called the other fellow a 'dude,' you say. It looks bad; I fear he'll spoil the biscuit."

CHAPTER IV.

THROUGH THE SAGUACHE RANGE.

Much of the way from Granite to Leadville lies close to the Arkansas, and with the level of it, the river being but a few feet below the road. The Major and I conclude to occupy the rear platform and encounter an elderly lady on a camp-stool in possession of the car door. She is here evidently with a view to the scenery. As we squeeze past, we are regaled with an odor of rose leaves, suggestive of old-fashioned bureaus with obstinate drawers, catnip tea and grandmotherly tenderness. The velocity of the railroad train is not to be compared to the speed with which the perfume flashes one back through the decades, to the hard times, and I detect a sigh from the Major as he seats himself upon the car step.

"What are you sighing for, Major?"

With a hasty glance toward the car door: "For the happy times of nearly half a century ago."

"And the rose leaves——"

"Aha!" with a cheerful smile, "you caught the fragrance too, did you, my boy?"

Loop.

Except for the rumble of the car wheels, silence reigned for five minutes; the Major's meditations were finally interrupted by the appearance of Mr. Dide, camp-stool in hand. The new arrival had just taken his seat on the side next the Major when the old lady exclaimed in a shrill treble:

"Land sakes! I believe in my heart that crick is runnin' up hill."

Certainly from our level, and running in an opposite direction, the current had that appearance when looked at casually.

Mr. Dide turned toward the lady, stared, and addressed her:

"Begpahdon! But weally that is not phenomenal."

"Eh?"

"It is not unusual foah watah to wun up hill."

"Where was you born and bred, young man?"

"New Yauk."

They were both serious, the old lady, with her head thrown a little forward and inclining to one side, gazing at him over her glasses.

"What's your business?"

"I am a gentleman of lesyah, madam," and for the first time something like a smile hovered about the mouth of Mr. Dide.

"Evidently you was brought up that way—you ain't married, surely?" with a manner implying that though the world were full of feminine fools, he had not discovered one foolish enough to enter into the marriage relation with him. Mr. Dide seemed discomfited, but rallied in a moment.

"Begpahdon! but you know the earth is not a spheah but a spheaoid, flattened at the poles, and the equatah is a dozen miles hiah than the surface at the poles, and that some of the pwincipal wivahs flow toward the equatah——"

"See here, young man, I don't know as I just rightly understand what you're talkin' about, and I don't think you do yourself. Seems to me you must be one of them chaps that believes his grandfather was a monkey, and lookin' at you I don't know as you're to blame. I've raised nine children, six boys and three girls, all married and settled down 'cept Hannah—she's next to the baby, and I don't know as she ever will; and if I'd had one like you, indeed I'm afraid I'd a-flew into the face of natur and set on him when a baby. Where's your mother? you'd better go to her and let her learn you not to talk to an old woman like me as if I was a fool—there now!"

"Begpahdon, but——"

"Oh, git away with your begp-a-h-don, as you call it——"

"But, my deah madam——"

"But me no buts, and don't dear madam me. I'll tell my Joshua and he'll shake that glass out of your eye for insultin' his mother, he will."

Either the condition of Mr. Dide reflected in the old lady's mind with his eyeglass gone, or his general demoralization under the hands of Joshua, mitigated her indignation; she laughed as she bridled.

"Weally, madam," and Mr. Dide arose, held on to the guard rail with one hand while he removed his hat with the other, and with a manner that went far toward making his peace, continued: "I should nevah faugive myself if I went away leaving you with the impwession that I intended an insult—believe me, I am incapable."

"Well—don't you try to make anybody believe again that water runs up hill."

"I will not, madam, I assauh you."

"And don't talk as if you was swearin' every time you say madam. Why don't you say ma'am like a Christian?"

"I will mahm, with plesyah."

"That's right. Set down now, I want to see out. I think somethin' might be made out of you with a little trainin', though mebbe it's too late; 'as the twig is bent the tree's inclined,' you know. What do you carry that little umbrill for, that thing you've got in your hand—don't you know the name of it?"

"Ah, weally—to wahd off the sun and the wain."

"Land sakes—mebbe you think you're sugar and'll melt; and you part your hair in the middle like a gal; I see it when you had your hat off."

"Weally—please excuse me, I would like to pass in."

"Set right down and don't let me drive you away. I've taken an interest in you; where's your mother?"

"Weally, ma—mahm—she has been dead many yeahs—I can just wemember her."

"I know'd it, and you've just been left to grow up of your own accord; been to college of course. 'Squire Dodd he let his Jake go off to college, and he staid just one year and come back with one of them glasses and lost it next day; the ole 'squire kep' him home after that, and set him to maulin' rails in the patch down by the hemlock p'int——"

For half an hour the dear old soul held the disconsolate gentleman in durance. I dared not look at the Major but kept my eyes fixed on the landscape, without seeing any of it.

Reaching Leadville, we searched in vain for the Deacon; his lady friends were also absent, and the Major remarked:

"The Deacon evidently is one point ahead in the game. If he does not turn up in the morning we shall be obliged to abandon him."

Leadville, that has added so many millions to the wealth of the world, is more dignified than half a dozen years ago; there is less of the revolver and saloon and a little more of the church and the Sabbath-school; no longer a mining camp, but a city with only a tithe of its resources developed.

It reposes very quietly this Sabbath morning under the bright sun. Turning from the range at the north with its snow-capped peaks and looking down the almost deserted avenue, I am reminded of another Sunday morning—and it seems only a little while ago—when the same street was wont to be alive with humanity. Coming out of an adjacent saloon a couple of young men faced each other, blear-eyed and dishevelled; they had plainly been making a night of it. Each stood with his hand on his hip, while epithets, the most choice in the camp vocabulary, flew thick and furious. It might be dangerous or not; perhaps not. But the innocent third party running away or seeking shelter at the side might be in peril. I took up a vibrating station, so to speak, immediately in the rear of one of the would-be murderers, and awaited the opening. It did not come, but ended in froth and the appearance of an autocrat with a star on his breast and a club in his hand. He gathered in the bad men and was about to possess himself of the undersigned, when I felt compelled to explain the situation. He complimented me by saying: "Your head's level," and I was suffered to depart.

From the carbonate metropolis to the tunnel through the Saguache Range the distance by rail is perhaps seventeen miles, the difference in elevation about thirteen hundred feet. To make this distance one can hardly realize that one is ascending, the grade is so light, winding on and about the mountain sides. Lake Valley, with its crooked band of water here and there widening into silvery pools, and the gold and green of its meadow-like spots, seems to be silently drifting down and away. At the foot lies the city we have just left, and beyond is the Mosquito Range. In following the tortuous line the grand peaks seem to change from one side of you to the other, all the motion being with them.

Mount Massive gives you the aptness of its name. You feel its magnificence as you approach, and that it may be the glorious court of blue-eyed Athena at whose vestibule you stand wonderingly, and whence she issues to kiss the petals of the wild flowers and endow the earth with health and beauty. All about you are the pines, with here and there a patch of aspens, their whitened trunks set in banks of larkspur empurpling the sloping mountain sides. Over deep gorges spanned by threadlike trestle-work, you feel awed at the audacity that planned and executed the way into this solitude. High above the utmost peak of the bulky mass, a spot no larger than your hand is poised in ether, or moving, passes between you and the sun, and you think perhaps of what Tennyson says:

"He clasps the crag with hooked hands,
Close to the sun in lonely lands;
Ringed with the azure world he stands:
The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls:
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls."

Or as Campbell puts it:

"And stood at pleasure, 'neath heavens zenith, like
A lamp suspended from its azure dome,
Then downward, faster than a falling star,
He neared the earth, until his shape distinct
Was blackly shadowed on the sunny ground."

Hagerman Pass.

Or older still, as we find it in the Iliad:

"So the strong eagle from his airy height,
Who marks the swans' or cranes' embodied flight
Stoops down impetuous while they light for food
And, stooping, darkens with his wings the flood."

The Major thought he would give Campbell the benefit of his vote, though the old Greek tells us the bird was a robber in his day as he is in ours.

The shriek of the whistle echoes and re-echoes through the impressive silence; it startles you, and you feel as if warned in a weird way by the unseen spirits of these wilds, that you are an intruder. Suddenly you are swept from the bright sunlight, the lofty mountains and modest wild flowers into utter darkness. Your dream of the wise goddess may not be all a dream. You are being hurled, in her anger, from the heavenly heights to the depths of Erebus. Looking out, you see mysterious shadows moving with lights through clouds of smoke, and the lights burn dim and red. There is comfort only in the reflection that mortals have preceded us, and that we are merely in Hagerman Tunnel[1] and not knocking at the gates of sheol.

In the ghostly light of the car lamp I discover the venerable incubus of Mr. Dide, and inquire what she thinks.

"Land sakes! it's flyin' in the face of the Almighty. I suppose it's all right, but I kind o' wish I was well out of it and with Joshua. I don't know but I was a little hard on that young man with the umbrill."

The Major, overhearing the wail, immediately entered upon the office of comforter, and had but fairly begun when, swish! and we were in the broad daylight once again, on the western slope of the Saguache Range.

There is a beautiful picture to the right; a few miles away, down the mountain side, you catch a view of a little lake, bordered by a strip of level ground carpeted in gold; back of this grow the pines, reaching on and up to the summits of their homes, made dark and green; and away beyond, delicately toned by the ever-present gray mist, stands a lofty mountain range. The engineer is kindly and pauses here, that you may have a glimpse of the enchanting retreat, over the memory of which you may dream when you are back in the turmoil, and that will make you sigh for the coming summer.

The character of the country through which we are now winding our way down toward the valley is more rugged than on the eastern side. The thickly wooded slopes give place to more frequent piles of granite, massive and gray. We come suddenly upon a little park and find the haymakers busy there, with a team of oxen, a motive power already growing quite novel; a little further over, where the gorge widens, affording a few acres of comparatively level ground, we find the white tents of the campers-out. There is a newness about the cotton habitations that suggests experiment. There are women in sun-bonnets and calico gowns and a ruddiness of complexion no city air can paint. Children with brown, bare legs scratched by the briars, their cheeks tanned to a russet that affords a contrast to the whiteness of their milk teeth. And these jolly little fellows always greet you with a broad smile and a hurrah that is without feebleness or fever. Young men in long rubber boots, helmet hats decorated with nondescript flies and sporting an endless variety of trout rods. All pause to look at the train, an act to which they would rarely condescend at home. But this one, maybe, brings accessions to their ranks from the outside world, or a newspaper, and serves as a link between what we call civilization and the glorious freedom of the wilderness. A little further on, standing upon the bank of a still reach, we encounter a tall "lone fisherman," dressed in overalls, a waistcoat ragged at the back, an old white felt hat with the battered brim thrown up from his face and drooping behind; in his hand a long cane pole which it makes one's arms ache to look at. But he will come in to-night with that canvas bag swung from his shoulder well filled with trout, and prove to you that the fishing is good. Artificial flies are not indispensable with him; grasshoppers when he can get them, bugs, grubs, a bit of beef or a strip from the belly of his first trophy of the day, will serve his purpose; he is "after meat" and gets it. What could he do with a fly and that walking-beam?

We reach a cañon whose sides at its mouth are clothed with pines and aspens; the rocks have changed from the granite to red sandstone and great mountains made up of boulders and red clay. The latter have been built here by the waters away back in the untold centuries, and of whose abundance the beautiful crystal stream now brawling over its pebbled bed is but a thread. As the once mighty force has cut its way through all impediments and dwindled century by century to a narrower channel, it has left exposed the great red cliffs; falling still farther, soil has accumulated on the more gentle slopes and has given these Titanic piles broad bases of green interspersed with wild flowers, and the delicate feathers of the clematis here and there twine among the willows. The winds and the rains have bestowed their aid and carved the red mass into castles, buttressed and pinnacled. And so, having traversed one of the grandest gorges in the State and enjoyed a fair view of some of the loftiest mountain peaks and ranges, we slow up in the beautiful valley of the Roaring Fork. The Major declared it was the most delightful ride he had ever taken, and was disposed to enthusiasm.

Loch Ivanhoe.

CHAPTER V.

JOSHUA.

While awaiting the departure of the train from Aspen Junction to Glenwood Springs, one of the dwellers in the neighborhood came up with a string of beautiful trout, the largest of which weighed two pounds. Where did he catch them?

"Why, right over yonder in the Roaring Fork; lots of 'em; a fellow got one the other day that weighed three pounds."

The manner of the informant defied contradiction or doubt.

"Not improbable, my friend. I have landed more than one five-pounder from that same water," said the Major.

"See here, mister, if I'd a-know'd you was goin' to chip in I'd a-made it bigger—the last man hain't no show, that's a fact."

"Honor bright, my friend; I camped here nineteen years ago this summer; five-pound trout were no rarity then."

The Major's tones carried conviction with them, and, mollified, the native admitted he had "heard of bigger ones up the fork."

The ride of twenty-five miles to Glenwood Springs completed our trip by rail. The next business was to look up a man with a team and wagon. We found him lingering over some old circus posters on a bill-board down a side street, which he seemed reluctant to abandon. He had been recommended to us as a good cook, possessed of a complete camp outfit, and to whom the whole country was an open book.

Mr. Miles was a blue-eyed man of forty, perhaps, with a hint of gray hairs about his temples, broad-shouldered and wearing a pleasant smile. He had been to Trapper's Lake times without number, but he "couldn't get a wagon over the trail."

"If you want to go by wagon, the best way is round by Meeker, and up the White River; it's a hundred and thirty miles, mebbe, while it's only about a day's ride by the trail."

"By Meeker," was our route; we had come to look at the White River Valley; we might return to Glenwood by the trail.

"Meeker it is; then four dollars a day and you find the grub and your own saddle-horses, or ride in the waggin."

After assuring us that he would be back in an hour with "everything ready to roll out for Newcastle," where we were to stop the first night, Mr. Miles took his departure, singing in a delightful tenor, "The sweet by-and-by."

Two hours elapsed and Mr. Miles had failed to put in his appearance. We set out to hunt him and found his cabin. It was a very neat cabin of logs, hewed to the line, and a rustic porch covered with a wild clematis vine made the place inviting on a warm day. A couple of women in calico gowns and sun-bonnets sat outside picking wild hops from a vine which they had cut off at the roots and brought in bodily. A youngster in slips, regardless of the conventionalities of good society, was standing on his head in the shade of the chimney out of sight of the occupants of the porch. The ground being sandy our approach was unheeded by the women. The hands of one were toil-worn, of the other slender and shapely, but browned by the sun. The Major was about to speak but was forestalled by the imp from the chimney appearing, right side up, with the announcement:

"G'amma! here's men!"

The old lady's face, from her position, was first to be seen, and revealed Mr. Dide's monitress. The other was that of a young woman of twenty, perhaps. As the child spoke the latter raised her hands to the sun-bonnet, and turning toward us, disclosed a very pleasant face with wonderful brown eyes.

"Land sakes! if it ain't you; come in and set down—Hannah, git some cheers."

The Major declined, as we were in a hurry, and inquired for Mr. Miles.

"That's my Joshua, certain. He's gone to hunt his horses; he's been hired to go out campin' with some tenderfeet, and they are out grazin'; but do set down; this is my daughter Hannah," as the young woman returned with the chairs, which she burnished with her apron, though they were entirely innocent of dust.

The Major felt obliged to repeat his excuse; then pleasantly:

"I guess we are the tenderfeet——"

"Now, you don't say!—Land sakes—but you won't mind an old woman's nonsense, will you? Set down, do; Joshua'll be here by-'m-by, he greased his waggin just before he went; don't mind the muss—me and Hannah's been savin' these hops, they're better'n any store truck; they're good for yeast; I never could 'bide salt risin' anyway, and for neuralgie, I've suffered with that some, so's Joshua, seems it's in the altitude, that's what the doctors call it, and to my mind there's nothing like a hop piller. Wish you'd set awhile."

The Major assured the good soul that we should be delighted, but really we were anxious to start and had a multitude of trifles to look after. Would she be kind enough to request Joshua not to delay longer than was necessary? and we bowed ourselves away.

The sun went down and Joshua did not appear. At ten o'clock we went to bed with the conviction that we should have to abandon the namesake of the potent commander. About the time we were fairly asleep, he came and assured us, through the door, that he would "be on hand at eight o'clock, sure, with everything ready." That the horses had "strayed and were not to be found until after dark." We were prompt at the appointed time and waited until nine. The Major was again about to give him up, when he came around with a pair of stout-looking mares and an empty lumber wagon, and announced that he must "go and hunt up an extra spring seat," as we had concluded not to take saddle-horses. He came back in about half an hour, with a seat lying in the wagon, and said he had "a mind" to go after his bedding. The Major suggested that he hurry.

"Oh, I'll be round, you bet."

At ten o'clock he returned with a roll of blankets and we inquired after his camp outfit.

"By the great horn spoon—if I didn't forget all about it; just hold on a minute," and he drove off again. In the course of another half hour he returned with a frying-pan and a broken skillet. We inquired for the plates, cups, knives and other articles supposed to be convenient in camp, including the coffee-pot.

"Well, I lent my coffee-pot to a feller who's gone prospectin' and I don't think he'll be back inside of a week—you've got some canned beans and such like—we can use the cans for coffee, and have a new one every day, and I'm out of plates and cups just now, though if I'd a-knowed it I might 'a borrowed some of Jake."

The Major complimented him on this evidence of cleanliness and economy, and then went off and purchased the necessary tinware and cutlery. Joshua packed everything snugly and undertook to adjust the borrowed wagon seat. It was found to be too short.

"Well, I swan! but I'll git a seat if I have to steal it—just hold on a minute."

"I think, Mr. Miles," said the Major, "as it is near noon, you'd better drive home and get your dinner and the seat, and call for us in an hour."

"All right, I'll be round on time—hannup, Woman, get on, Baby—we're not goin' to camp here."

"'There's a land that is fairer than day,
And by faith we can see it afar,
For the Father waits over the way,
To prepare us a dwelling place thar,

In the sweet by-and-by.'"

"That man and his song match well," said the Major, as Joshua disappeared around the corner and the refrain died away, "'my dukedom to a beggarly denier' he does not get back until too late in the day to start. I wonder if he is not trying to make an extra day in his count?"

At two o'clock he returned, but had not succeeded in obtaining a seat. He stood before the Major with eyes cast down and his forefinger on his chin, evidently in deep communion with himself.

"I wonder, now, where I can get a seat—lemme see—Bowers' got a waggin same as mine, but he started yesterday with a load to Newcastle. Ben Soggs-no! his is broke. Lemme see—Pat McGinnis—no, he's usin' his every day——"

"Suppose you buy one—is there not a wagon shop in the city?" said the Major.

"Well, I swan! I hadn't thought of that—just hold on a minute."

In the course of half an hour he returned with the announcement that he had found a seat, but the man wanted five dollars and a half, "second hand, and that's a dollar'n a half more'n it's worth, and——."

"Well, get it, we'll stand the dollar and a half."

"All right—just hold on a minute."

It was three o'clock in the afternoon when we started. We were blessed with several friends in Glenwood; they manifested much interest in our preparations for departure, and, as they had a number of resident acquaintances, the sidewalk was well peopled by the time we climbed into the wagon. Looking over that sea of faces, as I remember it now, every one was lighted up with a broad smile, which resolved itself into a laugh, with a hearty good-by and wishes for luck, together with the request that we "leave some of the game on the White," and would "not kill it all."

We smiled in return, and I felt that I should be happy if Mr. Miles' shoulders were not so broad and I had his head in chancery.

"Where do you propose camping to-night, Mr. Miles?" inquired the Major as we reached the bridge across the Grand River.

"Lemme see—it's fifteen miles to Newcastle, pretty good road, we can make that in three hours with the load we've got; then it's about fourteen miles to Rifle Creek, but there's muskeeters. We might stop at Ferguson's, that's about ten miles beyond Newcastle; that's a good place."

"But it will be quite dark by that time."

"Yes, that's a fact, it will be quite dark by that time."

"Well, it is not very pleasant to make camp in the dark."

"No, that's a fact; you're right about that—'tain't pleasant to make camp in the dark."

"What will you do?"

"Lemme see—we was goin' to stop at Newcastle, wasn't we? that's a good place."

"To camp, do you mean?"

"Yes, good place to camp, or there's a good hotel—we might stop at the hotel over night and take a fresh start in the mornin'."

"How far is it from Newcastle to Meeker?"

"Fifty-five miles,—hannup, Woman! we won't camp here!"

"That's rather a long drive for one day?"

"You're right, it is—but we can make it, with the load we've got—Baby! come out o' that!"

"It would be better not to try."

"You're right—we might camp at Morgan's, t'other side of the Divide, if you want to, that's more'n half way."

"Very well, we'll make Newcastle to-night, Morgan's to-morrow night, and reach Meeker the next day—say at what hour?"

Queen of the Cañon.

"Oh, anywhere before dark, easy."

"Well, we'll see if you can make it."

"Oh, I'll make it, or break a trace!"

The "pretty good road" between Glenwood and Newcastle had recently been traversed by a herd of cattle and seemed the paradise of loose stones. The Grand was muddy, as it frequently is, from the mining on the Blue River and a recent storm. But there is enough beauty in the scenery to compensate one for the roughness of the road, which Joshua seemed to make more rugged by hitting all the rocks in the way.

When we reached Newcastle, Joshua drove up to the hotel and the landlord put in an appearance.

"Why do you stop here, Mr. Miles?" inquired the Major.

"This is a good place to stop, and I thought you said you'd stop here to-night and take a fresh start in the mornin'?"

"We purpose to have an outing, Mr. Miles, and although the hotel may be excellent, we will go into camp just below here on Elk Creek."

There was a decisiveness about the Major's tones not to be misunderstood. Mr. Miles turned around to get a better view.

"All right, just as you say—hannup, Woman! Baby!"

He kept silent until we reached the creek, when I made a remark about its beauty, then Joshua broke out:

"Fresh from the throne of glory
Bright in its crystal stream."

At the first verse the sternness vanished from the Major's face; he could not resist the inclination to laugh; the laugh was contagious; Joshua turned in his seat with a look of inquiry, and halting in his song, joined us.

"How d'you know the name of the creek, Major?"

"I have been here before, Mr. Miles."

"Oh! How long you lived in this country, Major?"

"Thirty years, next spring."

"No? Then you're a mossback sure enough——

'Tell me the old, old story,
Of unseen things above'".