Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1889-09-28

cessruIIy hundreds of years. IN Spain,

cessrully hundreds of years. III Spain,
in China. in India. III Russia, i'll Egypt.
About eight hundred million OF peo-
pie of the earth today are kept alive
by food raised on irrigated land. And
here we have allowed to lie waste,
given up To rattIesllaie aud bat and
prairie dog. lands enough to support
whole nations of Industrious popula-
ton. The work begun will be consum.
mated. Here and there exceptional
lands may be stubborn and rcsdse to
yield any wheat or corn from their
hard fists. but if the whole fail 10
make an impression the miners pick
TX will discover the reason for it and
bring up from beneath those unpro-
ductive surfaces coal and iron and
lead and copper and silver and gold.
Cod speed the biologists and the sur
vcyors. tile engineers and the sunato-
rial commissions and the capitalists
and the new settlers and the husband
mcli who put their brain and hand
and heart to this TRANSPORTATION OF
the American continent!
A WONDERFUL COUNTRY.
But while lspeak Of the immensely
@ofstheeontinent sIsnusts remark it's
not an inniemsity of monotone OF
tamcncss. Tile larger some countries
are, the worse for the world. This
continent is not more remarkable fol
its magnitude than for its wonders oil
construction. What pity the United
States government did not take pos
session Of Yosemite, California. as il
has of Yellowstone, Wyoming, and OF
Niagara Falls. New York Yosemite
and the adjoining California regions
Who that has seen them can think Of
them without having his blood tin
gle2 Trees now standing there that
were old when Christ lived These
monarclls Of foliage reigned before
Caesar or Alexander, and the next
thousand years will not SKATER their
sccptcr. They arc the masts of the
continent, their canvas spread on the
winds while the old ship bears on its
way through tile ages Their size, Of
Which travellers often speak, does not
affect me SO much as their longevity.
Though so old now, the branches Of
some OF them will crackle in the last
conilagration Of the planet.
That valley of the Yosemite is eight
miles long and II half mile wide and
three thousand feet deep. 1t seems as
ii it had been the meaning of Omnipo-
tence to crowd into as small place
as possible some of the most stuDcn.
dous scenery of the world. Some OF
the cliffs you do not stop to measure
by feet, for they are literally u mile
high. Steep SO that neither foot OF
man nor beast ever scaled them. they
stand in everlasting defiance. If Je
hovah has throne of earth these are
its white pillars Standing down i'll
this great chaSm Of the valley YOU
look up and yonder is Cathedral Rock,
vast. gloomy minister built for the 81
, lent worship Of the mountains. Yon-
der is Sentinel Rock. 1920 feet high,
bold, solitary, standing guard among
the ages. IT'S top seldom touched until
bride one Fourth Of July mounted
it and planted the national standards
and tic people down in the valley
looked up and saw the head of the
mountain turbaned with stars and!
stripes. Yonder are the Three BRO.
Tiers. four thousand feet high;
Clouds Rest" North and South
Dome and heights never captured save
by the fiery bayonets OF the thunder
storm.
No pause for the eye, no stopping
place for the mind. Mountains hurled
on mountains. Mountainsin the wake
of mountains. Mountains thanked by
mountains. Mountains split. Noun
tains ground. Mountains fallen.
Mountains triumphant as though
lIont Blanc and the Adirondacks
and Iount Washington were here
uttcring themselves in one magniti.
cent chorus of rock and precipice and
waterfall. Sitting and dasling
through the rocks, the water comes
down. The Bridal Veil falls, so thin
you can sec tho face Of the mountain
behind it Yondcr is Yosemite falls,
dropping 1884 feet, sixteen times
greater descent chan that of Niagara.
These waters dashed to death on the
rocks. so that the white spirit Of the
slain waters ascending in robe of mist
seeks the heaven. Yondor is Nevada
folls plunging seven hundred feet, the
water in arrows, tie wEtcr in rockets.
the water in pearls, the water in anne
thysts, the water III diamonds. That
cascade filings down the rocks enough
Jewels to array all the earth in beauty,
and ruslics on until it drops into a
very hell of waters, the smoke Of their
torment ascending forever and ever.
AN IMPRESSION THAT WILL LAST FOR
EvEE.
But the most wonderful rart Of this
American continent is the Yellow
stone park. Ny visit there last month
made upon me an impression that will
last forever. After all poetry las ex-
hausted itself and all the Morans and
Bierstadts and the other enchanting
artists have completed their canvas.
there will be other revelations to make
and other stories Of its beauty and
wrath, splcndor and agony, to be re.
cited. Tie Yellowstone park is Gcol-
ogist's paradise. By chcapcning of
travel may it become the nations play
ground! In some portions of it there
seems to be the anarchy of the ele-
ments. Fire and water, and the yapor
born of that marriage. terrific. Geyser
cones or hills OF crystal that have been
over five thousand years growing. In
places the earth, throbbing, sobbing,
grooming, quaking with aqueous par.
OXysn.
At the expiration of every sixty-fve
minutes one of the geysers tossing its
boiling water 1S5 feet i'll the air and
then descending into ss;iuging rain
bows. C!avcrns of pictured walls
large enough for the sepulch3r of the
human race. Formations of stone in
shape and color OF Gala lily, of hello
trope, or rose, of cowsllp, or sum
flower and Of rlodioln SulDhlr and