The Bozeman weekly chronicle. (Bozeman, Mont.) 1883-1889, 1883-06-06
Four Hours At The MammOnth Hot
Springs

Springs
Hon. G. P. Reese and Col. Albert Ord
way, United States Commissioners to
examine the Northern Pacific Railroad
and Col. J. B. Cough, engineer OF the
Northern Pacific Railroad; also c. R.
Reese; of Cooperstown, New York, made
a flying visit 10 the Springs on April 2sth,
and desiring to see as much Of the curl
osities and wonders Of this portion of the
Park as possible in single afternoon,
they placed themselves under the writer's
direction. Each man was provided with
an alpen stock to aid him in climbing
The terraces around these hot springs
are in some places as white as alabaster
and in others tinged with yellow. The
water contains slight solution of white
sulphur and the temperature ranges from
1902 to 1902. The springs are continually
shifting the direction Of their overflow,
making it necessary to frequently change
the position of the bath houses.
Our party now entered the lower gate
of the park, of which the
DEVILS THUMB ..
is the guardian and gate keeper at this
and descending the mountains.
The first object Of interest we passed
was the
VALLEY HOT SPRINGS
situated at the foot Of the mountain on
which headquarters stands.The terraces
are shallow but very beautiful. Some of
them are white as snow, others are tint
ed with many cclors These are nearest
the new hotel and are the first hot springs
that are met with on entering the Park.
Fifty Or sixty yards south east of the
Valley Hot Springs stands old
LIBERTY CAP,
venerable with age, Scared, scanned and
weather beaten. All around him are the
crumbling terraces, still beautiful even
in decay. This geyser cone is nearly
sixty feet high and is the first prominent
object that meets the eye on descending
into the valley north of the Mammoth
hotel. Photographers have given some
fine views of this dying monarch of the
terrace building geysers. But few
years will elapse when these photos will
be all that remains to remind us of this
weird and wonderful vestige of q former
age when boiling water, charged with
'decomposed rock poured out Of its per-
pendicular aqueducts.
A few yards west of Liberty Cap we
saw the bathing houses that had been
erected at the foot Of what has been long
known as
BRIDAL BATHS.
entrance to the park. Here there are
several finger boards giving the direction
and distances to important points in the
interior. But the following notice will
not be out Of place:
HELL's GATE. .
And climb this terrace white rs snow?
Get all the teams you can command,
Then to the top in safety 60.
II rhalf way up you chance to stop,
! Then woe betide your creatures dumb!
Cease blood-stained lash: there is no hope,
You're fast beneath the DEVILS Thumb.
Before you enter stop and pray;
Both prayer and whip may help you some.
| AS you ascend the chalky way,
That leads you past the Devils Thumb.
The Devils Thumb is an extinct gey-
| ser cope similar to Liberty Cap, and
/ when the surrounding terraces have
crumbled away 1t will remain a beacon
| mark to indicate at what point commu-
nication had existed between the inter
nal fires and the upper world. The as
cent of the
| CHALKY WAY
! is not accomplished without much fatigue
not SO much from the abruptness of the
grade as from the sinking of the feet into
the pulverised magnesia. Many a good
team has been ruined in attempting to
pass through Hell's Gate with too heavy
a load. The Rocky Mountain oaths that
have saluted the ears of unfortunate
brutes before reaching the first bench
above the Devils Thumb beat anything
that was ever coined by the "Army in
Flanders" There is little doubt but that
there is some efficacy in well directed
epithets to lift the wheels over the old
terraces and through eight inches Of the
soft calcareous formation. But there il
more efficacy and humanity in either
quadrupling the force or in diminishing
the lead.
Once out of the terraces we were on q
good hard rocky mountain road, which
kept us to the west of the white treach,
erous magnetism deposits. At the head O.
| MOUNTAIN TERRACE
a hot sulphur spring crosses the wagon
road and ran down the hill in the left
hand rut. Here We rested to recover ou1
breath, having gained an altitude Of
about thousand feet from the plain al
Liberty Cap. When the road was graded
at this point it was entirely above the
formation and the hot springs, but now
the hill to our right is invaded and there
is every probability that the same igne
GUS process of decomposition will con-
tinue for centuries to come, levellng the
mountains into beautiful plateaus with
terraced breastworks exactly like those
that extend for four Or five miles, to the
Gardiner river.
All apprehension in regard to the neal
extinction of these beautiful terrace
building springs is entirely unfounded
for no sooner do they cease to flow a
one place than they are found to breal
out with increased activity at another
Descending from the cross road spring
still following the wagon road we soon
began to climb again to the west of i'm
mense terraces, rising one above anothel
and so abrupt as to be insurmountabl'
from the west. These terraces have beer
very oddly named
SODA MOUNTAINS,
for the reason perhaps that there is no
tincture of soda on them, in them, o.
anywhere near them. While ascendin,
the right hand side of these magnesi
l a.. III