New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1869-11-18
LETTERS FROM NEXT DOOR.
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Committee comes out of the silence score OF Dig
and gracious men in uniform of enormous busters
and wide hats, and swathcd about the throat WIN
bandkcrchiefs after the fashion OF Mr "laii
Skies of excellent memory. Old friends oil our sunny
host the Vice President, who had never torgo'en !"
do their young State good turn, they hau pol'teS
agreed to ask us all TO tea on his account anu iilu
lust run TOund-a little matter OF tWehS-t"O i'','
and several mOuutains-tO take us over W. q" 20
outdone in cyllty we said - Yes thank you' WIN
ehusion. and looked at our dropping plunage WIN
disnav. Bnt when we were led out IN such state as
"a nossibIe IN torn busters and sandpOwdered locks
and COW. the bright cayacade-great DTOad-seated
carriages with their six shining horses all gay Win
Aacs1urped toward the purple mountains OF our
DIE tben we said Give us Virginia City, or give
us death !"
Such work as it was TO get us started! All Keno
was there to help. of course. And there were the
thiryseven bags and bundles to be gathered up and
counted And then naturally enough, every Governor,
and General and Judge of the COmmittee-there were
six and two-thirls of EACH if have not forgotten
wanted Fame and Good-FollOwship i'll the person of
the Vice President his own carriage, ana IL De-
came an embarrassment to divide him satisfactorily
But when he had the nobility to assure them that
his following were the seven most agreeable
people in America, however appearances might DO
against us, compromise was effected without APP
peal to the Solomonc precedent and all went merry
asa marriage bell. (In indorsing this sentiment
do NOT wish TO be understood taking sides IN the
Byron controversy 1t was Jehu, the son of MINI
shi who drove our team, and his fellowwhips bore
family likeness. During two minutes we gave our
selves up for lost and in our minds eye saw the
younger members of the household lamentlng US IN
the inherited best clothes that had been ours
Then, discovering that neither fouted laws
of gravtatOn nor a despised centrifugal
force avenged themselves on our dehant
heads we came hilariously back again TO the con-
Germs of this world and felt itching to touch
up the off leader Shade of Phaeton, how they drive
in Nevada We tore round sharp corners as if the
Witch of AToway were close behind, the carriage
giving a great lurch and spinning on again right
side up. At a dead run took rafting bridges,
every board of which jumped up, indignant, in its
place to know without evasion what it was all
about We met enormous mule teams which couldn't
have turned out if lions and the unicorn to boot
had been in the path, and by them we rushed head
long, wheels in the ditch and two on the edge of
the track the wagon coming up into the clear road
again, with bounce of satisfaction that would have
disocated the spine of any Eastern vehicle. These
- miles of track, from Virginia to Reno have been
most carefully built, and day are they watered
from end to end. But a soil which is wet sponge
in the rainy season. and looks up parched perishing,
and hopeless to the Skies vainly asking one little
drop of water for months and months together. gets
fearfuy worn and put upon. All along the level,
the great freight teams grind the road into deep
gullies and ridges, that toss light vehicles
like corduroy, and powder the whole surface into
binding and choking dust. Every wagon of us
looked to the one behind like pillar of sandy cloud
which the flesh shrank from following.
When we started in the early morning the purple
bloom lay on the mountains, the snow of the high
peaks was rosy soft and the huge creatures grouped
themselves like beIinant and protecting guardians
of the daring human life which had thought to grow
and ripen among their ancient solitudes. But even
the sun has an abnormal activity and rude strength
in Nevada. He is material and common-sense, too
chasing away all tender fancies and like Mr.. Edmund
Sparkler's Fanny, tolerating mo demd nonsense
about him." At halfpast eight he had accomplished
more than our poetic and dreamy Orb thinks of
undertaking in along Summers day. He had brushed
off every flmy purple shadow from our mountains as
if they were so many cobwebs which tidy house.
keeper must get ont of the way as soon as
possible or be disgraced forever; he had fright
cred the snow into white silence who should
say, Il see nothing to blush for; why them blush 7"
He had child down below the horizon whole flock
Of little white, woolly, frolcsome Clouds that had
been sticking their heads up over the skyline and
laughing out of pure Joy in the morning, or u.s. or
was wonderfully becoming to them-chid them
down. Isupposs to be combed and sent unwillingly
to school, and taught how to grow into great useful
ran-clouds, and increase the wealth of the State.
He had expressed his views in uliistakabe fashion
to the mountains, wishing TO know why they
should stand about incoming in that vacant aud pur
poseless manner when they had end of RESPONSE
bty Were they not chOck full of metals needed
in the wOrldi Let them declare it in their proper
baroness, and Tuggedness, and ugly seams, and not
wax sentimental over the straits of being who
wanted nothing Of them bat their silver and TIM So
they we're bullied out of their charm of mood and
ugly enough they all day, rising stark and bar
rem and sharp. few pines on them, their redb brown
sides pierced with rocks, and quilted with deserted
eads where the miners had vainly sought treasure
TWAS only when the sun nearly down, and hadre-
Tented little in the consciousness of having done
very fierce and bstering days work, that they mus
tered resolution to be their better selves again, and
kindled into superna beauty of peace and serenity
THE GEIGER GRADE
But let me not anticipate. as the nOvests Of The
LEDGER observe Al halfpast eight o'clock las was say
ing. the sun had all his little chores" done, and was
at work at the cornfeds and fruit orchards in a way
that il took away ones breath to see. There were
but half dozen of either on the long road, 1 think
and all the light and heat that would have fructfed
a State they had, they. and we. between us
What with the dust and the blisterng. scad-
ing skies. and the rough turnpike, and the
long treeless, shadeless level, and the barren
fields which irrigation will one day make fair
and fertile the last of the sixteen miles to the noun
tains were hardly Cheerfuller than Macbeths way
across the blasted heath. But then came to the
Geiger Grade and possessed souls in wonder not
to say terror The Geiger Grade is the mountain