Year: 1878

is"ut"t - phuW IN ~ J IstuIfFs


----


DESERTED


"What glorious, all-satisfying country
this Nevada desert would be if one were only
all eyes, and had no need of food, drink and
shelter! Wouldn't it, Miss Dwyer? DO you
know, I've no doubt that this is the true loca-
tion of heaven. You see the lack of water
and vegetation would be no inconvenience to
spirits, while the magnificent scenery and
the cloudless sky would be just the thing TO
make them thrive"


But what can't get over" responded the
young lady addressed, lis that these alkali
plains, which have been described as so dreary
and uniuteresting, should prove to be in real
ity one of the most wonderfully impressive
and beautiful regions in the world What
awful iibbers or what duh people they must
have been whose descriptions have SO msled
the public 1t is perfectly uuaccountable
Here, | expected to doze all the way across
the desert, while, in fact, I've grudged my
eyes time enough to wink ever since left my
berth this morning


The trouble is, replied her companion,
that persons in search Of the picturesque, or
with much eye for it, are rare travellers along
this route. The people responsible for the
descriptions you complain of are thrifty bust



possible attraction in country where crops
can't be raised, timber cut or ore dug up.
For my part, thank the Lord for the beauti-
full barrenness that has consecrated this great
region to loneliness. Here there will always
be n chance TO get out of sight and sound of
the swarming millions who have already left
scarcely standing room for man in the East
| wouldn't give much for country where
there are no wildernesses left"


But / really think it is rather hard to say
in just what way the beauty of the desert
consists, said Miss Dwyer. Tits so simple.
| scribblcd two pages of description in my
note book this morning, but when l read
them over and then looked out of the win
dow, tore them up. l think the wonderful
ly fine, clear, brilliant air transfgures the
landscape aud makes it something that must
be seen and can't be told After seeing how
this air makes the ugly sagebush and the
patches of alike Ii and brown earth a feast to
the eye one can understand how the light of
heaven may make the ugligest faces beauti-
full"


The pretty talker is sitting next the win
dow of palace car No. 80 Of the Central Pa
cifc line, which has already been her flying
home for two days. The gentleman who sits
beside her processes to be sharing the view.
but it is only fair should tell the reader
that under this preten,s ho is nefarious-
ly delighting in the rounded contour of his
companions half-averted face as she in un-
feigned engrossment, scans the panorama un-
rolled before them by the swift motion of the
car. How sweet and fresh is the bright tint
of her cheek against the ghastly white back
ground of the alkali patches as they fit by
Still, it can't be said that he isn't enjoying
the scenery too, for surely there is no such
Claude Lorraine glass to reflect aud enhance
the beauty of landscape rs the face of a
spirituelle girl.


With profound sigh summing up both
her admiration and that despair of attaining
the perfect insight and sympathy imagined
and longed for which is always a part of in
tense appreciation of natural beauty, Miss
Dwyer threw herself back in her seat and
fixed her eyes on the car-ceiling with an ex-
preston as if she We're looking at something
at least as far away as the moon.


I'm going to make a statue when get
nome" she said-''a statue which will per-
sonify Nevada and represent the tameless,
dcsolate, chaugeless, magnificent beauty and
the self-sufiicient loneliness of the desert.
can see it in my minds eye. II will proba-
bly, be the finest statue in the world"


If you'd as lievo put your ideal into
painting will give you a suggestion that will
be original if nothing else" he observed.


whats that" .


why, having in view these white, alkali
patches that chiefly characterize Nevada,
paint her as a leper.'


That's horrid You needn't talk to me
any more, she exclaimed emphatically


With this sort of chatter they had beguiled
the time since leaving San Francisco the
morning of the day before. Acquaintances
are indeed made rs rapidly on an overland
train as ON an ocean steamship, but theirs
had dated from the preceding winter during
which they had often met in San Francisco.
When Mr. Lombard heard that Miss Dwyer
and Mrs, Eustis, her invalid sister, were GO
ing East in April, he discovered that he would
have business TO attend to in New York at
about that time; and oddly enough-that is,
If you choose to take that view of it-when
the ladies came to go it turned out that Lom-
bard had taken his ticket for the selfsame
train and identical sleeping car The result
of which was that he had the privilege of
handing Miss Dwyer in and out at the eating
stations, of bringing Mrs. Eusts her cup of
tea in the car, and of sharing Miss Dryers
seat aud monopolizing her conversation when
he had mind to, which was most of the
time. A bright and congenial companion
has this advantage over book, that he or
she is an author whom you can make dis
course on any subject you please, instead of
being obliged to follow an arbitrary selection
by another, as when you commune with the
printed page,


By way of peace offering for his blasphemy
in calling the Nevada desert a leper Lombard
had embezzled couple of chairs from the
smoking-room, and carried them to the rear
platform of the car, which happened to be
the last of the train, and invited Miss Dwyer
to come thither and see the scenery. Wheth-
er she had wanted to pardon him or not, he
knew very well that this was temptation
which she could not resist for the rear plat
form was the best spot for observation ON the
entire train, unless it were the cowcatcher of
the locomotive.


The April sun mingled with the frosty air
like whisky with ice water, producing an eff
feet cool but exhilarating. As she sat in the
door of the little passage leading to the plat
form she scarcely needed the shawl which he
wrapped about her with absurdly exaggerated
solicitude. One of the most unmistakable
symptoms of the lover is the absorbing and
superAuous care with which he adjusts the
wraps about the object of his affections wheth-
er the weather be warm or cold it is as if he
thought he could thus artifcially warm her
heart toward him. But Miss Dwyer did not
appear vexed, pretending indeed to be obliv-
ious of everything else in admiration Of the
spectacle before her.


The country stretched fiat and bare as a
table for fifty miles on either side of the track
"a distance looking in the clear air not over
one-ffth as great On every side this great