The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1892-12-24


thirty years, and had roads leading to IL
from all points of the compass. reckon
there are a hundred sheep herderS who
could draw map of the mountains. But,
barring these petty annoyances, my first
experience of the desert and the desert
mountains was full OF interest and
wonder The globe-trotter never attacks
a country like this. Your tourist sees
the pleasing and grand parts of the con-
tinents allow and aloft, as it were; ne
admires cathedrals and ruins and sen1-
mentalizes on historic spots; but he
seldom OF never sees nature as she is to DO
seen herein her nakedness and terror.
Let us try picture OF the country IN
hexameters,
Southwards and west from the huge and snow
cover'd range Of the Wasatch,
Blister'd by vertical suns, stretches land that
is witber'd
Once the bed Of an ocean, now it's white DESC
lation,
Smooth as polar snow. treeless, and wide as
the waters.
Here and there, like isles that float on the waste
of the ocean,
Black and Splintered cragS that rise from the
glitIering surface
Rise in rage and pain, tossing their shouts to
the welkin.
Mountains pTecipitous, scoWlng, tumble and
hurl from their SUBMITS
Blood-red pillows of rock, choking the serpen-
tine gorges;
are frozenl
There the rain roars, and storms in cloudy pos
session,
Solemn, and dark, and majestic, sweep round
the desOlate mountains,
Or, deploy'd on the PLAN, spread their phylac-
teries purple
Over the lessening world. There the deep
leOnine thunder
Bellows with cultural rage. There the Great
King and his hOrsemen
Ride with fiery housekeeping their targets and
QUiVers
Follow the spearmen and archers. There to
the fanfare of trumpetS
Rumble the chariot wheels, and rattle the arms
of the phalanX;
Host calls to host, and as dissonance rises to
heaven,
Fogs on the floors Of the desert roll like the
smoke of the battle!
I have no doubt that the prospector who
knows this country, and the freighter
who approaches it, in all seasons, with
something more than mere misgivings,
would think the man lunatic who could
write poetry about it. Yet, to me, there
was not mile of it which had not some
thing nOteWorthy-so something beautiful
or strange. On the border of the desert
though it was weary enough to the pant
ing horses, with their short rations of
water-there was species of fascination
in the endless succession of pillows OF
sand-the long, mauVe-cOlOred ridges,
wrinkled by the wind into rib-like cor
rugations, or presenting smooth surfaces
curiously marked with circles and arcs
of circles, all these impressions being
wrought by grass stems guided by the
fingers of the wind like compass points in
the hands of draughtsmen. There was a
prehistoric, saurian suggestion in the
monstrous, convoluted roots of gigantic
dead cedars, sometimes extending fully
forty feet along the surface of the ground,
and undulating like the folds of dun
colored dragons. Then again, in the
distance, groups of living cedars made q
picture of autumn orchards standing on
sunny stubble slopes, and SO complete
was the illusion that more than once [
thought we were approaching inhabited
spots. The bunchgrass burned like
sheaves of slender tapers, Pickering
against the black background
of the distorted sage. If the
greaseweed vainly struggled to
present holiday appearance and still re-
manned tatterdemalion on dress parade,
his neighbor, the shadscale, scored tri-
umph, and was everywhere to be seen
tricked out in bright greens and violent
puppies, furnishing the most gorgeous OF
umbrellas to numberless lizards, and
growing sweet morseIs for the wild horses.
And all the time, far to the west, across
the bleaching sea- bottom which makes
the desert, there was a misty and uncer-
tain view OF heaven-klsslng peaks
The mountains, that like giants stand
TO sentinel enchanted land
With their heads wrapped in a nimbus, I
looked upon them much as the Arabian
fisherman looked upon the genius when
he had got well out of the bottle and be-
gun to OYerspread the heavens mysteri-
Gus forms, and vastly potent for good or
i'll. Nor was the interest lessened when
we descended into the desert proper.
Though the tufted bunch grass faded and
the sage grew sparse, there was new
conner whose appearance made up the loss
the cactus, which reveled in the oven
like heat, and put forth its gaudy, flavor
less blossoms. Nothing can be more
beautiful than two large plants,
half as big as d cart-wheel, grow
ing side by side, with flowers
of contrasting colors-espec ially when
each has a full constellation of buds,
slowly orbing into splendor like red and
yellow moons. Here and there a badger,
with white bands under his chin ike an
epi SEQ al preacher, came up from his
crs ! t % bask in the beams OF the north
waId- climbing sun, and to wonder at
the canvas covered wagons He GER
tainlv had seen nothing like 1t since
the Bonner party disturbed him in
1919 IN; and both he and his brother
cave-dweller, the gopher, and exc the
diamond backed rattle-snake, might be
pardoned a momentazy curiosity. The
first view of the long canyon, which is
the gateway to the Dugway mountains,
was something to be remembered-weird
and winding, and battlemented-tur
ouoise tints on the spikes of the larkspur,
rocks splashed with the sea- blue of the
observation-disclosures blossoms every
where, and everywhere a saturnalia of
color-the bitter bush even as the bush in
Horeb-a living, growing, perfumed
fame! Even the gnarled old jumpers,
which look like petriied cuttle-fsh IN
the summer time, were green and cOmely
and covered with azure berries as eastern
monarchs are covered with seed-pearl
on coronation days. But how the glory
faded in the midst of the white tents at
Buckhorn City!" Water. ten cents per
c-oIIo,, ar % IN nor harreIi I cow mora