Bristol news. [volume] (Bristol, Va. & Tenn.) 1867-189?, 1871-12-15

The antelopes scamper over the plains.
We ride unimpeded where less than tw @
years ago the buffal1es stopped the train
as the herd scampered across the track;
and along here the savages entered
on theiTponies. You see here and there
groups of red men, with long hair and
cheeks dashed with war paint, rigned
ears, and a superfiuity of dirt that bu-
ries your last romantic notion about
the noble red men of the forest" The
air is laden with the breath of cedar,
madFona manzanita, and buckeye
Here we are passing through what
seem the ruins of castles and temples
and cities, and calling up Omind Pc
ira and pompeii,s and NinVeh and
Thebes; but these ruins, on either
side of our track, must have been vas
ter abOdes, where giants might have
lived till the Titans began here to play
leap-frOg and to turn summersaults.
Now the whistle let's offa wild scream
- COW and n calf on the track. The
COW we cut I'm halves, and the calf
with broken legs, tumbles' over into
the ditch. wonder if that man just
ahead will get Off in time. Perhaps
he is deaf, perhaps he is crazy, and
wants TO be run over. In time to save
himself, he switches off and robs the
coroner.
Hold your breath! Ravine a thou
sand feet deep on this side. Embank-
mentA thousand feet up the other
As we turn the curve the engineer
pulls the steam valve, and the silence
that chiefly reigned here for 6 6,000years
lets slip all its sounhs of echo and re-
verberation.
Whewi how we fly. If bolt break
or n truck fall, or a rock dislOdge, we
are in eternity. Innumerable variety
of flowers break their alabaster at the
feet of the cliffs butyonder the noun
tain-tops are blooming into the white
lily of everlasting snow. Bridges,
high, narrow, tremendous, that creak
and tremble under the pressure of the
train. 4 tunnel Ink black, mid
night doubled, dampness that never
saw the sun; while far ahead is hint
of sunlight pecring through hole
that looks about the size of the arch of
a mOusetrap, but which widens till at
last it is large enough to let a whole
train escape into the golden day.
Out there is the old emigrant road,
with occasionally a skeleton of COW
or horse, or the wreck of wagon that
hupelessly broke down on the way
and here small mound and a rough
stone at the head of il, that shows
where some worn traveller finished his
Journey in those DAYS when in one
year across those heights went 5000
wagons, pulled by 1000 mules and 80
600 yoke of oxen.
And now the night begins to fall,
and the train goes plOughing through
the darkness. The great burning eye
of the lomotive peers through and
flashes far ahead upon the wild scene.
The grizzly bear, the panther, the
nighthawk, the cormorant the pelican
the grosbeck, the eagle, that kept
aloof while the day shOne, MAY ven
ture nearer now il they dare. Oh
how we fly! The rush Of the wind,
the jamming of the car couplings,
the changing of the wheels, the steam
hiss the fierce shower Of sparks that set
the night on fire, the shooting past of
rocks five hundred feet high, followed
by precipice a thousand feet deep,
make the breath short, and the heart
thump, and the very scalp lift.
How the shadows shuttle! How
the crags shiver, How the echoes
rave! An express train at night on
the Rocky Mountains. The irresista-
ble trampling the immovable! Yet
the way is snoothed down by human
Then it will not be so
difficult to prepare the way for a gran
der coming; then mountains shall be
made low, and the crooked straight,
and rough places plain, and the glory
of the Lord shall be revealed, and all
flesh shall see as together.