The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1897-12-25
A FARM IN A HOLE.
1t IL 700 Feet Below the SuProun,
Ing TERRITORY.

a FARM TN = HOIEs
1t IL o Feet Below the Surround.
ing Territory.
A hole in the ground has been trans
formed into a veritable paradise. "a
hole in the ground" is what most people
called the place before Perrine began
his work of transformation. Some, with
wider flow Of language, called it the
Devils Corral" 1t is on Snake river,
in southern Idaho. 90 miles south of the
little town of Shoshone, and five miles
down the river below the great Shoshsne
falls. The "hoIe" is about 700 feet deep,
and embraces 600 or 700 acres of bottom
surface.
For ages and ages this Devils Cor
raj" has just been staying here, silent,
CHASTITY, unknown. The prehistoric peo-
pie. and, / fancy, the Indians of later
date passed around 1t when fishing
along the Snake river. The more daring
white nan looked at it, gave it a name,
and made money out of other white men
by bringing them along to see it. One
adventurous parsonage, about a half
white man. decided that down in the
depths of this great basin beside the
river there ought to be gold. Accom-
panied by an Indian wife or two, and
half a dozen children, he clambered
down, located a mine and began to work
1t. His progress Is not worth recording.
Burt Perrine, a young nan from In
diana, seeking his fortune in the west,
came out to see the Great Shoshone
falls. and to see this satanic corral. He
clambered down the cliff to where the
miner was. He was not impressed by
the mine, but he was impressed by the
situation and general appearance of this
rock walled basin. His first thought
was: THE north wind can never find
its way down here. This place ought to
be transformed into a ranch or a truck
garden or a fruit farm"
Upon closer examination he found
that If the rocks were rolled out of the
way, and the miscellaneous bushes
around were grubbed up and burned
there would be several hundred acres of,
very choice soil. In the highest part of
this big basin he discovered, connected
together, two glorious cod water lakes.
They we're 40 to so feet deep and the
two covered about an acres of space.
They were as clear as crystal, as blue
as the sky above them, with white sand
glistening in the bottom and very lively
trout of the mountain sort darling
through them. From these lakes the
entire basin could be easily irrigated,
Again the undertaking was the al
most ~incalculable amount of work
necessary % clear and level and irri.
gate the land; the uncertainty as to
what the winters that brought now six
feet deep over all the Pains above
might do down here, and the possible
power of the north wind to find its way
down after all. As an additional men
ace to the undertaking, there stood
giant lava walls towering above from
500 to 500 feet and sloping from an angle
of 20 degrees to a straight ~perpendicu-
lar. These lava walls, burnt. rent, torn
and twisted into confusing shaplessness
by the fires of former ages, seemed now
as enduring as time.
He went away and advised with his
friends about 1t, They told him he was
crazy. Without exception, they laughed
ut the idea of putting this great hoe
in the ground" to any useful purpose.
They said that even the solitary miner
was half-witted or he wouldn't try to
get gold dust out of there. But he de-
cided to put his opinions to the test and
bought out the claim of the miner so
as to have the hole all to himself, He
surveyed the place and found that it
contained 4so acres that could be worked
or reclaimed. He homesteaded a part Of
the land and made q desert entry Oh the
balance,
Then he began the work of transfer
nation, He managed to blaze out along
the rocky descent a.trail down which
pack animals could travel, and 1t may
be we'll to remark just here that the lit
tie mules and the little burros used in
this country can almost climb a tree pr
walk into a well. To do the work nee
essaF down in this corral, Mr.. Perrine
had to have wagons, scrapers, harrows,
rlows, powder and dynamite and all
sorts of things to work with that even
pack animals couldn't carry. These had
to be let down with ropes over a per-
pendicular lava wall of GOO feet. They
were so let down. Think for a moment
of the care and work that this required,
But to get a road up that 700 feet of
miscellaneous precipice was the real
puzzle. Perrine had done some survey
ing anu q lllllG IdAlIOdQ engineering
back In Indiana, and he thought he
could build a road here. By the use of
much dynamite, more powder, ell the
arts of removing rock that wouldn't be
removed, and q paradoxical amount OF
persistent work. the road was graded
and built. It does much winding In and
out, up and down, back and forth. aside
and across, and at a general glance it
has more the appearance of a stairway
than of a road. Yet two-horse and four
horse teams easily travel it, and the
traffic that goes up 1t and down it is a
marvel to the beholder.
Going down this road excites a very
pleasing feeling. One cannot see more
than 90 steps ahead. Now the horses
seem approaching a rocky wall; now q
yawning precipice. Suddenly, without
any warning whatever, the wagon halts
almost perpendicularly above the beau
tiful Blue lakes. One could dive into
them, so straight are they below. but it
would be a dive of several hundred feet,
and ii is a ride of several hundred wind
ing yards to get beside them. These are
queer lakes. They are filed by srbter-
ranean springs. Except that which is
piped out for irrigation purposes, their
waite is discharged through subterra-
mean caverns. The water in the lakes
remains at the same level all the time.
1t remains, every minute of the year,
without regard to seasons. at the same
temperature-6o degrees. In homer of
them. this place Is not known anv more
as the Devils Corral" but is called. In.
stead, 1.-THE Blue lakes,"-San Francisco
Chronicle.
The number of sheep in the world