Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1874-10-15

Z
the unfortunate squaw out of her trou-
BILE. The braves look on with the ut
most contempt, and he will ever after
ward be dubbed the sQ,tdU man.
In an hour they were all off for
camp to finish TIE day by a feast, and
make the night hideous by a war-dance
for they have igtely taken the scalps
of some half dozen braves of neigh
boring tribe. Their camp is just out
side of the city, and hundreds of people
go out each day to illness repetition
of this barbaric celebration.
In few days after our arrival, we
are in camp and ready for the march
and the mountains. We are mounted
on mules or ponies, and our provisions
and bedding and general camp equip
age are packed on the backs of mules.
Our small party leaves the main camp
and moves off toward the foot of the
hills, some 10 miles away, where there
is small area in the coal regions that
must receive few days especial study.
A narrow-gauge Railroad has been
built into this locality, and the mining
regions beyond, and in order to get in
full days work, I take the train in
the early morning for Golden. We
pass up pleasant and moderately wide
valley, cut by the creek, few hundred
feet below the general level, in which
were great many farms, and very
good fields of wheat, oats and corn.
Harvest has hardly commenced, the
great altitude-nearly 1000 feet above
the sea level, giving climate scarce
ly warmer than that of Northern Min
nesota. Farming at present is confined
to the valleys and lower slopes, as the
rainfall is very slight, and irrigation is
necessary. 1t is difficult to carry the
water by means OF bitches from the
low creek beds around to the higher
lands, but have no doubt that in a
few years the greater part of this region
OF course irrigation adds something TO
the farmers works, but not as much as
one would at first imagine, and then
there is no danger of a drOuth, as each
man can govern the water supply to
suit his taste. But here is large field
of wheat that has been badly tended
perhaps unavoidably so; a thousand
yellow spots, in all parts of the field,
indicate where the ground has been
left in bumps little too high for the
water to reach.
We are now close up under the noun
tains. The first rise is a great table
land, some 800 feet above the surround
ing plain. This table land comprises
an area of about fifteen square miles,
is made up of horizontal beds of soft
rock, capped and protected by bed of
LdUa, and separated from the noun
tains proper by a narrow valley. Clear
Greek, in emerging from its canon
above, crosses the valley and cuts its
way directly through the plateau, and
our train passes directly through this
natural gateway, and we are landed in
the city of Golden. The mountains
rise abruptly to the west; the table
lands are on the east, and the three
gateways into the outer world are so
blinded by hills, or so narrow that the
view comprises hardly more than the
walls and sky. 1t is a neat
little town of some 1000 inhabitants,
located, and with a promis-
ng future. 1t has rich coal mines,
with fire-clay and limestone, as well
IS agricultural advantages. The streets
lere, like those of Denver, are alive
With a fantastic crowd of visitors.
Peat, a chief of the Utes, has his village
lear by, and the grassy slopes are dot
ed with the picturesque 'tecpecs' of his
people. They are rich in horses, and
he hills are fairly black with their nu-
nerous herds. Opposite the barbaric
wickcups' of the savage camp, rise the
teeples of churches, and richly endow-
ID institutions oflearning; an orphans
chool, a school of mines, and divin-
ty school, each have fine brick build
ngs, that seem far ahead of their time.
But they are exceedingly well located,
specially the school of mines, since the
ichest mineral regions of Colorado
will be easily accessible to the students.
1 walk up a bluff to the north of
own to observe hegeologic characters
# this interesting region. Beneath me
ies beautiful city, surrounded by
arms and countless cattle, where ten
ears ago all was wilderness and an
pparent desert, where a thousand
ears before the winds and waters |
we're at work excavatiLg these valleys |
where ages since great volcano had !
een raging, and from its crater-which |
nay still be seen on the north table
ad poured forth mass of lava suf-
to bury the whole region
bout, in hundreds of feet of the burn
1g fluid, and still more remotely
he mysterious forces that raised the
asst mountains from the plains, and
,ooped out the depths of the seas, had
cen at work. In the far East the his
Dry of man forms a great chapter in
ne worlds history, bnt here the title
age is hardly written.
But what is the strange sound I
ear? what these millions of glisten-
lg particles that fly hither and thither
18th the wind? 1t cannot be snow,
'r the day is warm-nor rain, nor hail,
,r the sky is clear. A shower of the
range objects fall about my feet and
lake the somewhat surprising discov-
" that they are grasshoppers. look