The Holbrook news., 1912-08-09

| NH
 world The national parks that ~ belong to the United States
 and are for the enjoyment of the people have a combined area all most half as great as that of Switzer- land. Within their boundaries may be found every attraction that Switzer- land has to offer and many other scenic marvels such as no other coun- try in the world affords. There are giant glaciers, snow-capped mountains that are as hard to climb as Mont Blanc or the Matterhorn, great for ests, lakes and mighty rivers, water falls more than twice as high as the Metropolitan tower, geysers that spout thousand feet in air, huge caverns in which city might be hid, big trees that were forest monarchs before the Pyramids were planned, titanic chasms-the list of attractions in Un- cle Sam's summer resorts is endless. Many of them are unique.
 Many of these national playgrounds are in the empire of the west. The greatest of them are easy of access. Year by year the number of those that can be reached by the railway or by the trolley is growing. A generation or so from now, when the United States west of the Missouri is more thickly populated, these breathing spots will occupy the same relation to the country at large that Central, Bronx and Van Cortland parks and the other open spaces in New York bear to the metropolis. They will be sum- mer recreation grounds to which mill ions will flock. They are so large that for centuries to come they are not likely to be overcrowded.
 The Yosemite National park, in California, is 150 miles from San Fran cisco as the crow flies. It is not pos sible as yet to trolley thither from the Golden Gate, but it may be within the next few years. Already a stage line leading'to its boundary has been paral- leled by an electric railroad. The Yosemite park is in the heart of the Sierra Nevada mountains. Originally it was fifteen miles in length and lone mile back from the main edge of the precipice on each side of the valley" but the park in it's entirety now GOV CTS a domain thirty-six by forty-eight miles.
 Like Vast Hall.
 Crossing the threshold of the great valley of the Yosemite is like stepping into some vast house or hall carved out of the mountain. One passes sud- denly into a tranquil, restful region hOf fo hry hn grandeur that encompasses it. The picture of sunny glades and falls of lucid water is set in an enormous granite frame three or four thousand feet high, ornamented with domes and spires and peaks that are still higher. The Grand Canyon of the Yosemite is a sublimity of a different order. Com ing from the petrified forest with its trunks of thousands of gigantic trees or tree ferns that grew millions of years ago. one gazes down upon some thing that Is unlike anything ever known upon the earth. It seems like 8 vision of some strange, colossal city carved out of granite that has been uncovered from the depth of geologic time. There is a wilderness of temple like forms and monum ental remains, alcoves and amphitheaters and noble profiles that delight \ while they bewilder the eye. Count less waterfalls hutter like lace against the granite walls.
 The first leap of the falls of the Yosemite is 1,6O0 feet, more than twice the distance Of the gilded dome of the Metropolitan tower from the earth below. The next leap is 400 feet and the last 500. At the bottom the water falls in spray like an endless summer shower. Imagine the Hudson river emptied of its water for seven or eight miles from it's mouth and deep ened 5000 feet or more. Then fancy | the sides nearly vertical, with snow white waterfalls huttering against | them here and there, granite rocks in spires and domes planted along the | rim. and a landscape of groves and J