Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-02-15
No Man Can Face It in It's Strength
and Live.
TEE TERRIFIED. BRUTE CREATION
Vivid Description Of the Terrible
Storms Of the Dakotas.
HOW THEY RAGE FOR WEEKS

1--WE call 1t the White Death up in my
country, where the blizzard is born" said
the quiet man from Dakota. mo man can
face 1t in its strength and live. The brute
lies nown before it, and the face of nature
covers under it's snow blanket as though
frightened at the awful calamity that the
white death brings"
He stopped and seemed to be studying the
whirling clouds of snow that filed the ave-
nue.. 81 suppose this seems like a fearful
storm to your he said half interrogatiye-
ly to the half dozen men who Rugged the
open CRATE about him, "and God knows it
is bad enough to those who have to suffer
but I've seen worse He paused again
and gave puff at his pipe a curious
carved thing, but 1t had burned Itself out
and he held it moment in his fingers with
kind Of earessing touch. I'VE have
weathered more than one blizzard together
old girl" he said half to himself, then
empted the ashes and put the pipe aWay in
its case in his inside pocket
GU think then, that the blizzard is the
product of Dakuta?" remarked one of the
men.
Yes. there 1t is born, on the Immense
treeless mesas, and there is the scene of
It's most awe-inspirIng grandeur You see
weak imitation OF it in the more south
ern latitudes, but it is on the northern
plains that you witness that most terrible
OF all natures manifestations and feel it
in all the completeness of its devastating
wrath. Like something from spirit-Iand.
the snow Tails some night, after day that
mas MADE you glad that you are alive it is
so full Of mellow sunshine so full of prono
Use for month of soft winds balmy air
and springs sweet promise In an hour
stretching away to the far north in almost
limitless expanse, the snow-clad wastes
present a scene of utter desolation and
dreary gloom. Down. degree by degree the
temperature falls until the bitter. merciless
cold has turned the whole land to stone
NOT SOUND d1sturbs the great wilderness
or rock and snow. Not q stain disco1ors
the dead, dazzling whiteness of the land
scape. Inc evergreens that cluster in the
canons look like snow wreaths The great
"hlte arms of the giant cottonwoods on the
edge OF the mesas shake their white fingers
against the blue-white sky with a weird
fantastic motion that chills the heart Of
one who sees them. They are reckoning
to the White Death
up from the horizon like q hall of fro
from which the soul of its life has fed
ages ago. rides the sun, and frost sprtes
dance merrily In its path, and form a
sparkling train behind Along the horizon's
rim, creeps another shape, gray robed and
sullen. 1t eats and eats and Greens and
creeps closer and closer to the cold day
goo, swallowing up the frost sprites and
ming the air with a mist like breath which
gets down to your very vitals with its lev
touch. '
The wind begins to gather strength and
the weird white fingers of the cotton
woods limned against the skv CLASH and
clutch at nothingness in ghoulfsh trans
ports. The breath of the creeping cold.
gray shape, turns to ifeathery flakes of
snow and they sail slowly to earth on the
last cold sunbeam. The wind blows colder
and colder, and the snowflakes become
smaller and denser Colder yet, and the
snow spits in your face like the sting from
a a thousand scorpions, the prick of a mil
non needles. There Is an ominous silence
for brief space. Then there comes a
long, low moan, like the expiring breath of
lost soul: 1t fills the sky and air. Above
ana neiow! You hear it. 1t changes to
sob, then to wall that scars the heart of
your memory SO deep that sleeping or walk
ing you never forget it Then 1t shreks in
Its gathering intensity, and bowls in mad
dened rage.
1.-The travail is over and the blizzard ia
born! "
THE snow that changed to sleet, is now
transformed into infinitesimal particles of
ice and driven by the wind that beats and
pummeis space, they cut like razors and
cleave like teasels. The tiny particles be-
come part and parcel of the garments you
wear ana hasten your undoing The mer-
curry shrinks and shrinks away from the
frozen blast, till at last 1t too freezes and
Its pitiless tale becomes its own epitaph
Iod, now the storm demons rage! They
below and bawl they scream and hiss
they snarl and screech! Daylight fees
aHrlghted and a supernatural gloom en-
folds the earth like the blackness of
despair The blizzard is full grown, and all
the lost souls in the inferno seem to be
neiplls crown II King of Terrors, whose
title is the White Death
IL ploWs across the prairies and men go
Gown before its icy breath before a
Mltrailleuse. With their hands on the latch
or their own doors, they fall and the drift
ing diamond points cover them from sight
IN the space of a heart beat. The billiards.
breath forms sepulchre and sere-cloth and
cenOtaph.
of
gives way to terrified inaction, and the
beasts turned loose to drift with the storm,
WIG ana tame, meet on common ground,
ana dumbiy facing the inevitable, fall in
tnelr tracks, whence they have not stirred
since they scented the awful catastrophe
with heads in air, and plaintive cries of
lear IN their Door brute Threats.
through illmitabe space, shrouded in a
gloom that Is impenetrable, the furies go
Snrleking and bowling moaning and sob
ping IN DEVILS chorus that, if long con-
uhned, would drive even the safely housed
10 desperation. 1t sounds like a miserere
for those mercilessly cut off from life and
love. Like wtch's incantation! Like the
aeliant rage of the damned. The agoniz-
ing walls or lost souls. The sounds meet
and mingle; they fight and tusse for the
mastery like the snarling of the angry and
add new terror to the battling elements
Day and night for week, perhaps, the
Iorces OF nature rage ard the reign of the
Wnte death Is absolute. All the storms of
all the ages gathered in one day would be
put puny STRIPPING to Sampson COM
pared with the awful devastation of the
white deaths demons. Then the morning
OF new day dawns with sun as warm
and caressing the kiss Of lover. The
WIND mas gone to sleep and the storm king
is DEAD All the world is in white, sparkling
and coruscating the air is crisp and sweet
ana again 1t seems good to be alive. But
we who have met the white death face to
race have not to ask where his victims are
iald The mounds of heaped up snow that
got the mesas tell the story, and whitening
pones ike fodder In a. corral will warn all
Corners for years to beware of the White
Death. n