Hot Springs weekly star. (Hot Springs, S.D.) 1892-1917, 1897-08-06
POET AND lIUMORIsT'
Editor lsotsfordl of the Quincy. Illinois,
Herald Sees Many Things That
Are Fascinating Here.


Editor Botsford recently wrote "a very
spicy letter to his paper, the Quincy
Nll.) Herald, telling of his experiences
as victim of rheumatic gout under
going the curing process here The
STAR prints it in full becausenof it's
uniqueness and the interesting things
which Mr.. Botsford saw and tells about:
"Oh, don't know!
After ten days experience at Hot
Springs am enabled to testify that it
is not SO warm after all.
y Its name implies that it is hot stuff,
but, guaged by the terrific torridity
Quincy has been experiencing, 9s in
the shade, with all the large section of
hades that such figure implies, Hot
Springs is haven of GOODNESS and a
joy to the heat burdened. work-weary
pilgrim.
''Of course the springs are the things.
You can hardly walk block in any
direction, without running into some
structure encasing spring which CUR
giles up a CHEEKY good morning. The
natural springs are not hot, but warm,
as they bubble out of the bulging
bosom of Mother Earth. They are the
natural temperature of the body and
are chuck full of sodium, potassium,
calcium, ammonium, magnesium and
all the other "ums" which signify dis
ease-destroying, health reviving quail
ties.
"Besides the baths, which you can
take at any temperature consistent
with the callousness of your hide or
the acuteness of your disease, you are
expected to drink copiously of the vari-
Gus medicinal springs. In fact it is
one eternal, external and internal bath
for the invalid here. Before break
fast you are expected to swig Il
couple of glasses of the Evans spring
just to take the kink out of your kid
neys. In the middle of the forenoon
quaff freely of the Minnekahta spring
water. This is supposed to act with
special vigor on the stomach. If you
have gorged yourself too abundantly
with the Hotel Evans triumphs of cui-
sine, this water will root around in the
midst of your dormant breakfast and
set the whole combination moving in
the right direction. Then later in the
day it would be we'll to drive to the
Catholicon springs, about a mile dis
tant, and flush out your liver and
lights with pint or two of that cele-
brated water.
"If you are still dry, there are others
where you may quash your thirst in
an unobserved and unobtrusive way.
"After two or three days of this alb
sorption of humidity your system is SO
filled with gushing and babbling
brooks that you just have to get we'll
or die. 1 Iam HAPPY to say very few
succumb. Most of the men grow SO
eXuberant that they want to dash into
the hills and lasso cowboy or two
while the women are ready for a tramp
or u two-step.
"The great feature of the place. the
spiece de resistance of the whole array
of Hot Springs attractions, is the
mammoth plunge bath. Conceive a
structure under "a high glass domed
roof, $50 feet long and 10 feet wide,
filled with the most crystalline. clean
est and clearest water you ever set
eyes on. Nothing more transparent
or beautiful can be found even in the
famed lakes of Switzerland. The water
is from three to seven feet long and so
clear that every pebble on the bottom
is as clear and distinct as if only few
inches from the surface. All over this
great area every inch or two warm
springs bubble constantly, fresh, genu-
inc spring water-constantly filling
the place, while the surplus is dis
charged in IL big waste pipe and is uti-
lized to run the large electric plant of
the huge Evans hotel.
"The pleasant fiction that this whole
lake of 100000 gallons of water is en-
tirely renewed every fourteen minutes.
Be that as it may, it is always pure, al
ways changing, constant, beautiful.
never-ceasing flow of as fine water as
the Almighty every planted in tho in
side of his wonderful footstool.
Everybody goes to the plunge. The
great arches resound from early morn
ing till late at night with the merry
voices of the swimmers. The we'll and
the ill alike daily resort to this delight
full watery retreat. Cripples are car
ried into the pool like the historic nil.
grims mentioned in holy writ who were
made whole by being dropped into the
waters of at-do-you-call-'em. There
don't seem to be Bible anywhere's
about this hotel) Well. anyway, pa.
tients full of rhnematism and misery
find their aches relieved, their swol-
len joints subduei and their vigor re-