The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1881-01-06
Winter Travelling In Colorado.

The train discharges its freight into a
dozen coaches, which set of for the
mountain pass that lies between Norton
and Leadville; they rattle of through
the whirling SHOWS toward the range OF
mountains, which is already thick with
storms. Our own way lies across the
South Park toward a lower part of the
Arkansas Valley; for ten miles the four
horses hurry the light open wagon over
the snow-covered plain, through the
binding snow that flies before the blasts
rushing down from the mountain ra-
vines. Then we find our way upon the
regular freighting road that leads in a
devious course through the mountain
gorges to Leadville. 1t is q way for
which little has been done except by the
wheels of the endless trains of wagons;
but nature meant this land for roads;
the scant foliage and slight rainfall
leave each of the ravines a natural
road, and the frost has now bound mud
aud stones together. Every mile of this
trail is occupied by q long caravan of
the freighting teams that carry in pro-
visions and take out bullion The
ordinary train consists of many teams,
each composed of two wagons, the
hinder one being without a tongue,
and the two coupled together as closely
as two railway cars. Sometimes there
are three wagons in the string. Eight
or ten mules and single driver supply
the motive power With this "outft''
one dexterous driveS will drag about
ten thousand pounds of freight at
the rate of twenty-five miles day.
Some of these trains are individual
ventures, but commonly a dozen teams
are under one wagon-master, who fixes
the marches and determines the places
where the train shall halt to pass the
tides of wagons that set the other way.
These caravans give us the most pic
turesque aspect of this mountain life;
the drivers are strange selection from
the vigorous frontiersmen. The labor
is extremely arduous and the life of
the rudest, but the profits are very
large; many of these teams earning
from thirty to fifty dollars per day net
for half year at a time. The men live
and generally sleep with their animals,
even in this fierce cold. They are 81
lent, indefatigable fellows, brutal in ev-
cry outward aspect, yet withal singularly
patient with their difficulties and help
full of each other, unless the other is q
'.greaser. A courteous word or two
will always get their aid in passing
through the perplexing blockade,
where trains going in opposite direc-
tions meet on q narrow defile. Their
life is one of trials. We are rarely out
of sight of dead horses or mules which
have broken their legs or died of over
work, and every precipice along the
road shows the wrecks of wag-
ons that have slipped over the
edge into the gorge below In
two hundred miles travel with
them l did not hear brutal word
from one man to another. and 1
was indebted to them for many consid-
crate acts. They are q marvelously
profane lot, but their swearing has a
curiously impersonal character. In his
difficulties with the teams a man will
lift up his voice and address the Infinite
in diabolic homily that would befit Mil
toms Satan, and then, subsiding like a
geyser, remain silent for the rest of the
day. At night, when they gather
around tho $50, in tha lnw-waIled, turf
covered ranches, they are perfectly
mute; they sit on the benches as still as
mummies, until they slip down upon
the floor and snore until morning.
They seem wrapped up in their own
thoughts, or in the place where their
thoug ghts ought to be. They often
camp alone by the roadside; indeed.
many of them seem to prefer the abso-
lutte isolation that they find in bivouack-
ing in the scrub woods ten miles from
neighbors. One night sought direc-
tions from one of these solitary men.
He was o huge, grizzle bearded fellow,
whom 1 surprised cooking his supper
by little fire in q niche in the rocks
near his team. His ugly visage stood
out in the blaze of his bacon, which he
was toasting on stick. He gave me
sufficient answers without looking up to
see who it was shouting at him out of
the darkness.-N s. Shdler, in atlantic
Monthly.
"A curious police measure was car
Rod ont in Porf;v, ho