Arizona weekly enterprise., 1890-12-20
Corr. Phenix Herald. GUNsIeHT MINE, PIMA Go, Ariz. |

DecemDer |. lSJ0.
 Desert? There is no such thing in Ariz- ona. It has disappeared, vanished with the ogres, hydra headed monsters and other dreadful fancies that made child hoods life so burdensome.
 A least so thinks the traveller as he sets forth by sunrise from Gila Bend, in Frank Welcomes comfortable, two-seated car riage for the Gunsight mine, seventy miles southward.
 Far away in every direction stretch level plains, ending at last in blue circles of hills, above which climb other azure peaks telling that still more valley land succeeds, rising and falling like vast swells of a lazy sea.
 NOT MUCH LIKE A DESERT.
 Everywhere verdure greets ones gaze. ! The grasses, gaietea, gramma and ''six weeks grass, fillin many spaces that sage brush, grease wood mesquite, cats claw. palo verde and iron wood might otherwise leave unoccupied. Seemingly, judged by
 the eye alone, we are bowling along thruogh some vast vine yard that Moot, of Mesa City, Adams and Logan, of Peoria, and all the intervening and surrounding
 growers, had pooled upon and planted, The cawing crow flies overhead: little
 birds twitter among low bending twigs.
 The sun creeps cheerily up a still cool 1 eastern sky. The air is bracing and well i fed Yankees feel existence to be very de- lightful
 So much the eye tells.
 THE DRINK QUESTION SETTLES IT.
 But twenty five miles from Gila Bend
 another sense awakens. The tongue, that unruly member which has made such l trouble, the world over, since Time began.
 iS acting disagreeably. It wants drink. The horses sneeze along in their peculiar
 fashion, They want drink. Here come
 two men walking northward, They have
 walked all night from Gunsight. Their bottles, that hang from a string around
 each mans wrist, are empty. The men
 stop Us and ask anxiously, "can we spare
 some water?" They. too, crave drink. And now 1t appears that Frank Welcome
 never believed the desert had vanished
 He knew the plains we are travelling were
 as waterless as when Noah's flood ceased
 and its deluge drained in other directions. So he pulls out his big canteen for those
 two foot-sore wayfarers. Without 1t they
 might have found their winding sheet in
 the gramma grass that rolled on before
 them to Gila Bend. Eagerly the spokes-
 man applies the nozzle to his upturned lips
 and down his throat in noisy gulps rushes
 the delicious nectar. His partner is a lit- tie more controlled. He fills his bottle,
 after his companion has finished and, look
 ing back when both pass on, we see him,
 too. quaff refreshing draughts, better than
 wine or cordial of most ancient brewing.
 With a rubber tube MT. Welcome next
 syphons pails of water from two tin tanks
 under the rear seat for his horses, and we
 all, horses and passengers, regale ourselves.
 IlA,l l. IFo1. l .4
 after all, that the desert Is no more. pro :. +vided you "allow for it" and carry a sub
 sJltute for the Pnenix Wate. Works along
 with you.
 LIVING IS THE DESERT.
 At noon we art still on the plains. No
 house has been passed since we started;
 none will be met till our seventy miles have been accomplished. So down we squat in the sand; boil coffee, tear tender chicken to pieces and feast on all the good things that Wan Gun put up for IS at
 starting
 Once more we push ahead. Towards nightfall we reach the crater" lonely amphitheatre that seems to have formerly ) belched forth molten lava from its huge 5 throat three or four miles across. But we must hasten on. in spite of fatigue which } has at last won acknowledgment from our l aching bones for our water is gone and the nearest. the only we'll is still ten miles ahead. with rather heavy roads and rolling 3 country between.
 Our young lady passenger, who ha:
 trilled opera bouffe so gaily all day long slips at last upon roll of blankets on the ] floor, pillows her. ringleted head on the Q seat and so slumbers, forgetful of deserts y dreaming perhaps of golden fountains l higher than cloudland
 f Presently Luna pops up her silvery n head. Our lard-ol headlight is extin : guished and silently we drive onward; tht s wheels crunching in sand so monotonous e ly that three male heads nod and drool | till some overhanging mesquite busl l switches each cheek sharply and rouse. e would-be sieepers to greater wakefulness S At last we stop. It is nine o'clock an( y Child's well oonfronts us, fifty miles iron n Gila Bend. We have not driven fast. fo Q we were pretty heavily laden. There i s no house here only matched roof, per : haps for Tom Child's 100 cattle that he i Il raising for Gunsight miners to stiffen thei a muscles upon.
 > We bear the sleeping little lady to IT bed upon an old table, cheating her o IS supper, lest she grossly cry if awakene,
 at that late hour. Then the horses ar . looked after and finally the three male h cook coffee, sup and tumble themselve 2 into blankets spread upon the ground. '' HE SAVES HIS EAR il What grand nights rest was that 2 Under the blue canopy of heaven W e slumbered, with moonlight seeming t le soften olr couch; a erispness in the al n that quickened every atom of blood int o | aynrosS tpa17, Snao1 fh ro11 ryb 1ra17,c on r. arteries, and that built anew all the lun n cells that life's work, exposures and da1 le gers have thus far managed to considera Is hly demolish.
 G. Not one of the four sleepers awoke say T, the Herald reporter, who raised his hea I just in time to save an ear that a browsin y jack would otherwise have thoughtlessl as nipped with the toothsome herbage upo + which that auditory member lay. IL Before sunrise next morning we are u of and preparing to move. The young lad, l. fresh as morning glories in eastern dey
 forgives the cheat of last nights suppt of on being allowed to eat two breakfas ed Now, and off we trot towards Gunsight. y COPPER IGNORANCE AND WAR. nr At Child's are the ruins of an old copp' n fo mining camp. Piles of bright green ol ,r, lie scattered everywhere. Mismanag to ment brought the New York corporatic c[ to grief and now, having Governmel ar patent, they hold the property, waitin ri Micawber-like, for something to turn Il og Otherwise many miner would have r nj located the claims and long ago forwar cb ed their cupriform treasures to markt ,n- despite the learned English expert repo
 upon them, He refused even to get out m the wagon and look, saying the "formatit nd was wrong for copper" and denying ,a- possible existence there. right in the ve sb teeth, so to speak, of trainloads of the o .a5 piled up all about him.
 or On high point stands ruined fo t,- where the New York company withstot on siege by angry Mexicans who claimed t % on- ledges under pretense of discovery ce o,, turies ago, ltwas rude in them to tn b;s ignore the Englishmen's stubborn den ato ai and it served them right to be driven ( aI' ;4; defeated by Winchester bullets and t +ar want of water.
 of HOW WATER FLOWS the The rest of the ride is up and down, O les, hill, arroya and fiat. Our young la re- learns that water in the gulleys. wh lion the summer rain drops it down in torre by- cannot flow north to the Gila; where dl the ruhhish cauobt on bushes all point