A Lady's Life in the Rocky Mountains - Pages 97-142



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LETTER VII.
"Personality" of Long's Peak--"Mountain Jim"--Lake of the Lilies--A silent 
Forest--The Camping Ground--"Ring"--A Lady's Bower--Dawn and Sunrise--A 
glorious View--Links of Diamonds--The Ascent of the Peak--The Dog's Lift--
Suffering from Thirst--The Descent--The Bivouac.

   ESTES PARK, COLORADO, October. 
   AS this account of the ascent of Long's Peak could not be written at 
the time, I am much disinclined to write it, especially as no sort of 
description within my powers could enable another to realise the glorious 
sublimity, the majestic solitude, and the unspeakable awfulness and 
fascination of the scenes: in which I spent Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday.

   Long's Peak, 14,700 feet high, blocks up one end of Estes Park, and 
dwarfs all the surrounding mountains. From it on this side rise, snow-
born, the bright St. Vrain, and the Big and Little Thompson. By sunlight 
or moonlight its splintered grey crest is the one object which, in spite 
of wapiti and bighorn, skunk and grizzly, unfailingly arrests the eye. 
From it come all storms of snow and wind, and the forked lightnings play 
round its head like a glory. It is 

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one of the noblest of mountains, but in one's imagination it grows to be 
much more than a mountain. It becomes invested with a personality. In its 
caverns and abysses one comes to fancy that it generates and chains the 
strong winds, to let them loose in its fury. The thunder becomes its 
voice, and the lightning do it homage. Other summits blush under the 
morning kiss of the sun, and turn pale the next moment; but it detains the 
first sunlight and holds it round its head for an hour at least, till it 
pleases to change from rosy red to deep blue; and the sunset, as if spell-
bound, lingers latest on its crest. The soft winds which hardly rustle the 
pine needles down here are raging rudely up there round its motionless 
summit. The mark of fire is upon it; and though it has passed into a grim 
repose, it tells of fire and upheaval as truly, though not as eloquently, 
as the living volcanoes of Hawaii. Here under its shadow one learns how 
naturally nature worship, and the propitiation of the forces of nature 
arose in minds which had no better light.

   Long's Peak, "the American Matterhorn," as some call it, was ascended 
five years ago for the first time. I thought I should like to attempt it, 
but up to Monday, when Evans left for Denver, cold water was thrown upon 
the project. It was too late in the season, the winds were likely to be 
strong, etc.; but just before leaving, Evans said that the weather was 
looking 

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more settled, and if I did not get farther than the timber line it would 
be worth going. Soon after he left, "Mountain Jim" came in, and said he 
would go up as guide, and the two youths who rode here with me from 
Longmount and I caught at the proposal. Mrs. Edwards at once baked bread 
for three days, steaks were cut from the steer which hangs up 
conveniently, and tea, sugar, and butter were benevolently added. Our 
picnic was not to be a luxurious or "well-found" one, for, in order to 
avoid the expense of a pack mule, we limited our luggage to what our 
saddle horses could carry. Behind my saddle I carried three pair of 
camping blankets and a quilt, which reached to my shoulders. My own boots 
were so much worn that it was painful to walk, even about the park, in 
them, so Evans had lent me a pair of his hunting boots, which hung to the 
horn of my saddle. The horses of the two young men were equally loaded, 
for we had to prepare for many degrees of frost. "Jim" was a shocking 
figure; he had on an old pair of high boots, with a baggy pair of old 
trousers made of deer hide, held on by an old scarf tucked into them; a 
leather shirt, with three or four ragged unbuttoned waistcoats over it; an 
old smashed wideawake, from under which his tawny, neglected ringlets 
hung; and with his one eye, his one long spur, his knife in his belt, his 
revolver in his waistcoat pocket, his saddle covered with an old beaver-
skin, from which the paws hung 

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down; his camping blankets behind him, his rifle laid across the saddle in 
front of him, and his axe, canteen, and other gear hanging to the horn, he 
was as awful looking a ruffian as one could see. By way of contrast he 
rode a small Arab mare, of exquisite beauty, skittish, high-spirited, 
gentle, but altogether too light for him, and he fretted her incessantly 
to make her display herself.

   Heavily loaded as all our horses were, "Jim" started over the half-mile 
of level grass at a hand-gallop, and then throwing his mare on her 
haunches, pulled up alongside of me, and with a grace of manner which soon 
made me forget his appearance, entered into a conversation which lasted 
for more than three hours, in spite of the manifold checks of fording 
streams, single file, abrupt ascents and descents, and other incidents of 
mountain travel. The ride was one series of glories and surprises, of 
"park" and glade, of lake and stream, of mountains on mountains, 
culminating in the rent pinnacles of Long's Peak, which looked yet grander 
and ghastlier as we crossed an attendant mountain 11,000 feet. high. The 
slanting sun added fresh beauty every hour. There were dark pines against 
a lemon sky, grey peaks reddening and etherealising, gorges of deep and 
infinite blue, floods of golden glory pouring through canyons of enormous 
depth, an atmosphere of absolute purity, an occasional foreground of 
cotton-wood and 

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aspen flaunting in red and gold to intensify the blue gloom of the pines, 
the trickle and murmur of streams fringed with icicles, the strange sough 
of gusts moving among the pine tops--sights and sounds not of the lower 
earth, but of the solitary, beast-haunted, frozen upper altitudes. From 
the dry, buff grass of Estes Park we turned off up a trail on the side of 
a pinehung-gorge, up a steep pine-clothed hill, down to a small valley, 
rich in fine, sun-cured hay about eighteen inches high, and enclosed by 
high mountains whose deepest hollow contains a lily-covered lake, fitly 
named "The Lake of the Lilies." Ah, how magical its beauty was, as it 
slept in silence, while there the dark pines were mirrored motionless in 
its pale gold, and here the great white lily cups and dark green leaves 
rested on amethyst-coloured water!

   From this we ascended into the purple gloom of great pine forests which 
clothe the skirts of the mountains up to a height of about 11,000 feet, 
and from their chill and solitary depths we had glimpses of golden 
atmosphere and rose-lit summits, not of "the land very far off," but of 
the land nearer now in all its grandeur, gaining in sublimity by nearness--
glimpses, too, through a broken vista of purple gorges, of the illimitable 
Plains lying idealised in the late sunlight, their baked, brown expanse 
transfigured into the likeness of a sunset sea rolling infinitely in waves 
of misty gold.

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   We rode upwards through the gloom on a steep trail blazed through the 
forest, all my intellect concentrated on avoiding being dragged off my 
horse by impending branches, or having the blankets badly torn, as those 
of my companions were, by sharp dead limbs, between which there was hardly 
room to pass--the horses breathless, and requiring to stop every few 
yards, though their riders, except myself, were afoot. The gloom of the 
dense, ancient, silent forest is to me awe-inspiring. On such an evening 
it is soundless, except for the branches creaking in the soft wind, the 
frequent snap of decayed timber, and a murmur in the pine tops as of a not 
distant waterfall, all tending to produce eeriness and a sadness "hardly 
akin to pain." There no lumberer's axe has ever rung. The trees die when 
they have attained their prime, and stand there, dead and bare, till the 
fierce mountain winds lay them prostrate. The pines grew smaller and more 
sparse as we ascended, and the last stragglers wore a tortured, warring 
look. The timber line was passed, but yet a little higher a slope of 
mountain meadow dipped to the south-west towards a bright stream trickling 
under ice and icicles, and there a grove of the beautiful silver spruce 
marked our camping ground. The trees were in miniature, but so exquisitely 
arranged that one might well ask what artist's hand had planted them, 
scattering them here, clumping them there, and training their slim 

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spires towards heaven. Hereafter, when I call up memories of the glorious, 
the view from this camping ground will come up. Looking east, gorges 
opened to the distant Plains, then fading into purple grey. Mountains with 
pine-clothed skirts rose in ranges, or, solitary, uplifted their grey 
summits, while close behind, but nearly 3000 feet above us, towered the 
bald white crest of Long's Peak, its huge precipices red with the light of 
a sun long lost to our eyes. Close to us, in the caverned side of the 
Peak, was snow that, owing to its position, is eternal. Soon the afterglow 
came on, and before it faded a big half-moon hung out of the heavens, 
shining through the silver blue foliage of the pines on the frigid 
background of snow, and turning the whole into fairyland. The "photo" 
which accompanies this letter is by a courageous Denver artist who 
attempted the ascent just before I arrived, but, after camping out at the 
timber line for a week, was foiled by the perpetual storms, and was driven 
down again, leaving some very valuable apparatus about 3000 feet from the 
summit.

   Unsaddling and picketing the horses securely, making the beds of pine 
shoots, and dragging up logs for fuel, warmed us all. "Jim" built up a 
great fire, and before long we were all sitting round it at supper. It 
didn't matter much that we had to drink our tea out of the battered meat-
tins in which it was 

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boiled, and eat strips of beef reeking with pine smoke without plates or 
forks.

   "Treat Jim as a gentleman and you'll find him one," I had been told; 
and though his manner was certainly bolder and freer than that of 
gentlemen generally, no imaginary fault could be found. He was very 
agreeable as a man of culture as well as a child of nature; the desperado 
was altogether out of sight. He was very courteous and even kind to me, 
which was fortunate, as the young men had little idea of showing even 
ordinary civilities. That night I made the acquaintance of his dog "Ring," 
said to be the best hunting-dog in Colorado, with the body and legs of a 
collie, but a head approaching that of a mastiff, a noble face with a 
wistful human expression, and the most truthful eyes I ever saw in an 
animal. His master loves him if he loves anything, but in his savage moods 
ill-treats him. "Ring's" devotion never swerves, and his truthful eyes are 
rarely taken off his master's face. He is almost human in his 
intelligence, and, unless he is told to do so, he never takes notice of 
any one but "Jim." In a tone as if speaking to a human being, his master, 
pointing to me, said, "Ring, go to that lady, and don't leave her again to-
night." "Ring" at once came to me, looked into my face, laid his head on 
my shoulder, and then lay down beside me with his head on my lap, but 
never taking his eyes from "Jim's" face.

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   The long shadows of the pines lay upon the frosted grass, an aurora 
leaped fitfully, and the moonlight, though intensely bright, was pale 
beside the red, leaping flames of our pine logs and their red glow on our 
gear, ourselves, and Ring's truthful face. One of the young men sang a 
Latin student's song and two negro melodies; the other, "Sweet Spirit, 
hear my Prayer." "Jim" sang one of Moore's melodies in a singular 
falsetto, and all together sang "The Star-spangled Banner" and "The Red, 
White, and Blue." Then "Jim" recited a very clever poem of his own 
composition, and told some fearful Indian stories. A group of small silver 
spruces away from the fire was my sleeping-place. The artist who had been 
up there had so woven and interlaced their lower branches as to form a 
bower, affording at once shelter from the wind and a most agreeable 
privacy. It was thickly strewn with young pine shoots, and these, when 
covered with a blanket, with an inverted saddle for a pillow, made a 
luxurious bed. The mercury at 9 P.M. was 12 degrees below the freezing 
point. "Jim," after a last look at the horses, made a huge fire, and 
stretched himself out beside it, but "Ring" lay at my back to keep me 
warm. I could not sleep, but the night passed rapidly. I was anxious about 
the ascent, for gusts of ominous sound swept through the pines at 
intervals. Then wild animals howled, and "Ring" was perturbed in spirit 
about them. Then 

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it was strange to see the notorious desperado, a red-handed man, sleeping 
as quietly as innocence sleeps. But, above all, it was exciting to lie 
there, with no better shelter than a bower of pines, on a mountain 11,000 
feet high, in the very heart of the Rocky Range, under twelve degrees of 
frost, hearing sounds of wolves, with shivering stars looking through the 
fragrant canopy, with arrowy pines for bed-posts, and for a night lamp the 
red flames of a camp fire.

   Day dawned long before the sun rose, pure and lemon-coloured. The rest 
were looking after the horses, when one of the students came running to 
tell me that I must come farther down the slope, for "Jim" said he had 
never seen such a sunrise. From the chill, grey Peak above, from the 
everlasting snows, from the silvered pines, down through mountain ranges 
with their depths of Tyrian purple, we looked to where the Plains lay 
cold, in blue grey, like a morning sea against a far horizon. Suddenly, as 
a dazzling streak at first, but enlarging rapidly into a dazzling sphere, 
the sun wheeled above the grey line, a light and glory as when it was 
first created. "Jim" involuntarily and reverently uncovered his head, and 
exclaimed, "I believe there is a God!" I felt as if, Parsee-like, I must 
worship. The grey of the Plains changed to purple, the sky was all one 
rose-red flush, on which vermilion cloud-streaks rested; the ghastly peaks 
gleamed like rubies, the earth and heavens were new-created. Surely "the 

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Most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands!" For a full hour those 
Plains simulated the ocean, down to whose limitless expanse of purple, 
cliffs, rocks, and promontories swept down.

   By seven we had finished breakfast, and passed into the ghastlier 
solitudes above, I riding as far as what, rightly or wrongly, are called 
the "Lava Beds," an expanse of large and small boulders, with snow in 
their crevices. It was very cold; some water which we crossed was frozen 
hard enough to bear the horse. "Jim" had advised me against taking any 
wraps, and my thin Hawaiian riding-dress, only fit for the tropics, was 
penetrated by the keen air. The rarefied atmosphere soon began to oppress 
our breathing, and I found that Evans's boots were so large that I had no 
foothold. Fortunately, before the real difficulty of the ascent began, we 
found, under a rock, a pair of small over-shoes, probably left by the 
Hayden exploring expedition, which just lasted for the day. As we were 
leaping from rock to rock, "Jim" said, "I was thinking in the night about 
your travelling alone, and wondering where you carried your Derringer, for 
I could see no signs of it." On my telling him that I travelled unarmed, 
he could hardly believe it, and adjured me to get a revolver at once.

   On arriving at the "Notch" (a literal gate of rock), we found ourselves 
absolutely on the knife-like ridge or backbone of Long's Peak, only a few 
feet wide covered with colossal boulders and frag- 

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ments, and on the other side shelving in one precipitous, snow-patched 
sweep of 3000 feet to a picturesque hollow, containing a lake of pure 
green water. Other lakes, hidden among dense pine woods, were farther off, 
while close above us rose the Peak, which, for about 500 feet, is a 
smooth, gaunt, inaccessible looking pile of granite. Passing through the 
"Notch," we looked along the nearly inaccessible side of the Peak, 
composed of boulders and débris of all shapes and sizes, through which 
appeared broad, smooth ribs of reddish-coloured granite, looking as if 
they upheld the towering rock-mass above. I usually dislike bird's-eye and 
panoramic views, but, though from a mountain, this was not one. Serrated 
ridges, not much lower than that on which we stood, rose, one beyond 
another, far as that pure atmosphere could carry the vision, broken into 
awful chasms deep with ice and snow, rising into pinnacles piercing the 
heavenly blue with their cold, barren grey, on, on for ever, till the most 
distant range upbore unsullied snow alone. There were fair lakes mirroring 
the dark pine woods, canyons dark and blue-black with unbroken expanses of 
pines, snow-slashed pinnacles, wintry heights frowning upon lovely parks, 
watered and wooded, lying in the lap of summer; North Park floating off 
into the blue distance, Middle Park closed till another season, the sunny 
slopes of Estes Park, and winding down among the mountains the snowy 
 
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ridge of the Divide, whose bright waters seek both the Atlantic and 
Pacific Oceans. There, far below, links of diamonds showed where the Grand 
River takes its rise to seek the mysterious Colorado, with its still 
unsolved enigma, and lose itself in the waters of the Pacific; and nearer 
the snow-born Thompson bursts forth from the ice to begin its journey to 
the Gulf of Mexico. Nature, rioting in her grandest mood, exclaimed with 
voices of grandeur, solitude, sublimity, beauty, and infinity, "Lord, what 
is man, that Thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that Thou 
visitest him?" Never-to-be-forgotten glories they were, burnt in upon my 
memory by six succeeding hours of terror. You know I have no head and no 
ankles, and never ought to dream of mountaineering; and had I known that 
the ascent was a real mountaineering feat I should not have felt the 
slightest ambition to perform it. As it is, I am only humiliated by my 
success, for "Jim" dragged me up, like a bale of goods, by sheer force of 
muscle. At the "Notch" the real business of the ascent began. Two thousand 
feet of solid rock towered above us, four thousand feet of broken rock 
shelved precipitously below; smooth granite ribs, with barely foothold, 
stood out here and there; melted snow refrozen several times, presented a 
more serious obstacle; many of the rocks were loose, and tumbled down when 
touched. To me it was a time of extreme 

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terror. I was roped to "Jim," but it was of no use my feet were paralysed 
and slipped on the bare rock, and he said it was useless to try to go that 
way, and we retraced our steps. I wanted to return to the "Notch," knowing 
that my incompetence would detain the party, and one of the young men said 
almost plainly that a woman was a dangerous encumbrance, but the trapper 
replied shortly that if it were not to take a lady up he would not go up 
at all. He went on to explore, and reported that further progress on the 
correct line of ascent was blocked by ice; and then for two hours we 
descended, lowering ourselves by our hands from rock to rock along a 
boulder-strewn sweep of 4000 feet, patched with ice and snow, and perilous 
from rolling stones. My fatigue, giddiness, and pain from bruised ankles, 
and arms half pulled out of their sockets, were so great that I should 
never have gone half-way had not "Jim," nolens volens, dragged me along 
with a patience and skill, and withal a determination that I should ascend 
the Peak, which never failed. After descending about 2000 feet to avoid 
the ice, we got into a deep ravine with inaccessible sides, partly filled 
with ice and snow and partly with large and small fragments of rock, which 
were constantly giving way, rendering the footing very insecure. That part 
to me was two hours of painful and unwilling submission to the inevitable; 
of trembling, slipping, straining, of smooth ice appearing when it 

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was least expected, and of weak entreaties to be left behind while the 
others went on. "Jim" always said that there was no danger, that there was 
only a short bad bit ahead, and that I should go up even if he carried me!

   Slipping, faltering, gasping from the exhausting toil in the rarefied 
air, with throbbing hearts and panting lungs, we reached the top of the 
gorge and squeezed ourselves between two gigantic fragments of rock by a 
passage called the "Dog's Lift," when I climbed on the shoulders of one 
man and then was hauled up. This introduced us by an abrupt turn round the 
south-west angle of the Peak to a narrow shelf of considerable length, 
rugged, uneven, and so overhung by the cliff in some places that it is 
necessary to crouch to pass at all. Above, the Peak looks nearly vertical 
for 400 feet; and below, the most tremendous precipice I have ever seen 
descends in one unbroken fall. This is usually considered the most 
dangerous part of the ascent, but it does not seem so to me, for such 
foothold as there is is secure, and one fancies that it is possible to 
hold on with the hands. But there, and on the final, and, to my thinking, 
the worst part of the climb, one slip, and a breathing, thinking, human 
being would lie 3000 feet below, a shapeless, bloody heap! "Ring" refused 
to traverse the Ledge, and remained at the "Lift" howling piteously.

   From thence the view is more magnificent even 

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than that from the "Notch." At the foot of the precipice below us lay a 
lovely lake, wood embosomed, from or near which the bright St. Vrain and 
other streams take their rise. I thought how their clear cold waters, 
growing turbid in the affluent: flats would heat under the tropic sun, and 
eventually form part of that great ocean river which renders our far-off 
islands habitable by impinging on their shores. Snowy ranges, one behind 
the other, extended to the distant horizon, folding in their wintry 
embrace the beauties of Middle Park. Pike's Peak, more than one hundred 
miles off, lifted that vast but shapeless summit which is the landmark of 
Southern Colorado. There were snow patches, snow slashes, snow abysses, 
snow forlorn and soiled-looking, snow pure and dazzling, snow glistening 
above the purple robe of pine worn by all the mountains; while away to the 
east, in limitless breadth, stretched the green-grey of the endless 
Plains. Giants everywhere reared their splintered crests. From thence, 
with a single sweep, the eye takes in a distance of 300 miles--that 
distance to the west, north, and south being made up of mountains ten, 
eleven, twelve, and thirteen thousand feet in height, dominated by Long's 
Peak, Gray's Peak, and Pike's Peak, all nearly the height of Mont Blanc! 
On the Plains we traced the rivers by their fringe of cotton-woods to the 
distant Platte, and between us and them lay glories of mountain, 

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canyon, and lake, sleeping in depths of blue and purple most ravishing to 
the eye.

   As we crept from the lodge round a horn of rock, I beheld what made me 
perfectly sick and dizzy to look at--the terminal Peak itself--a smooth, 
cracked face or wall of pink granite, as nearly perpendicular as anything 
could well be up which it was possible to climb, well deserving the name 
of the "American Matterhorn."(*)

   Scaling, not climbing, is the correct term for this last ascent. It 
took one hour to accomplish 500 feet, pausing for breath every minute or 
two. The only foothold was in narrow cracks or on minute projections on 
the granite. To get a toe in these cracks, or here and there on a scarcely 
obvious projection, while crawling on hands and knees, all the while 
tortured with thirst and gasping and struggling for breath, this was the 
climb; but at last the Peak was won. A grand, well-defined mountain-top it 
is, a nearly level acre of boulders, with precipitous sides all round, the 
one we came up being the only accessible one.

   It was not possible to remain long. One of the young men was seriously 
alarmed by bleeding from 

(* Let no practical mountaineer be allured by my description into the 
ascent of Long's Peak. Truly terrible as it was to me, to a member of the 
Alpine Club it would not be a feat worth performing.)

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the lungs, and the intense dryness of the day and the rarefaction of the 
air, at a height of nearly 15,000 feet, made respiration very painful. 
There is always water on the Peak, but it was frozen as hard as a rock, 
and the sucking of ice and snow increases thirst. We all suffered severely 
from the want of water, and the gasping for breath made our mouths and 
tongues so dry that articulation was difficult, and the speech of all 
unnatural.

   From the summit were seen in unrivalled combination all the views which 
had rejoiced our eyes during the ascent. It was something at last to stand 
upon the storm-rent crown of this lonely sentinel of the Rocky Range, on 
one of the mightiest of the vertebræ of the backbone of the North American 
continent, and to see the waters start for both oceans. Uplifted above 
love and hate and storms of passion, calm amidst the eternal silences, 
fanned by zephyrs and bathed in living blue, peace rested for that one 
bright day on the Peak, as if it were some region 

"Where falls not rain, or hail, or any snow,
 Or ever Wind blows loudly."

   We placed our names, with the date of ascent, in a tin within a 
crevice, and descended to the Ledge, sitting on the smooth granite, 
getting our feet into cracks and against projections, and letting 
ourselves down by our hands, "Jim" going before me, so that I 

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might steady my feet against his powerful shoulders. I was no longer 
giddy, and faced the precipice of 3500 feet without a shiver. Repassing 
the Ledge and Lift, we accomplished the descent through 1500 feet of ice 
and snow, with many falls and bruises, but no worse mishap, and there 
separated, the young men taking the steepest but most direct way to the 
Notch, with the intention of getting ready for the march home; and "Jim" 
and I taking what he thought the safer route for me--a descent over 
boulders for 2000 feet, and then a tremendous ascent to the "Notch." I had 
various falls, and once hung by my frock, which caught on a rock, and 
"Jim" severed it with his hunting-knife, upon which I fell into a crevice 
full of soft snow. We were driven lower down the mountains than he had 
intended by impassable tracts of ice, and the ascent was tremendous. For 
the last 200 feet the boulders were of enormous size, and the steepness 
fearful. Sometimes I drew myself up on hands and knees, sometimes crawled; 
sometimes "Jim" pulled me up by my arms or a lariat, and sometimes I stood 
on his shoulders, or he made steps for me of his feet and hands, but at 
six we stood on the Notch in the splendour of the sinking sun, all colour 
deepening, all peaks glorifying, all shadows purpling, all peril past.

   "Jim" had parted with his brusquerie when we parted from the students, 
and was gentle and con- 

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siderate beyond anything, though I knew that he must be grievously 
disappointed, both in my courage and strength. Water was an object of 
earnest desire. My tongue rattled in my mouth, and I could hardly 
articulate. It is good for one's sympathies to have for once a severe 
experience of thirst. Truly, there was 

"Water, water, everywhere,
But not a drop to drink."

   Three times its apparent gleam deceived even the mountaineer's 
practised eye, but we found only a foot of "glare ice." At last, in a deep 
hole, he succeeded in breaking the ice, and by putting one's arm far down 
one could scoop up a little water in one's hand, but it was tormentingly 
insufficient. With great difficulty and much assistance I recrossed the 
"Lava Beds," was carried to the horse and lifted upon him, and when we 
reached the camping ground I was lifted off him, and laid on the ground 
wrapped up in blankets, a humiliating termination of a great exploit. The 
horses were saddled, and the young men were all ready to start, but "Jim" 
quietly said, "Now, gentlemen, I want a good night's rest, and we shan't 
stir from here to-night." I believe they were really glad to have it so, 
as one of them was quite "finished." I retired to my arbour, wrapped 
myself in a roll of blankets, and was soon asleep. When I woke, the moon 
was high shining through the silvery 

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branches, whitening the bald Peak above, and glittering on the great abyss 
of snow behind, and pine logs were blazing like a bonfire in the cold 
still air. My feet were so icy cold that I could not sleep again, and 
getting some blankets to sit in, and making a roll of them for my back, I 
sat for two hours by the camp fire. It was weird and gloriously beautiful. 
The students were asleep not far off in their blankets with their feet 
towards the fire. "Ring" lay on one side of me with his fine head on my 
arm, and his master sat smoking, with the fire lighting up the handsome 
side of his face, and except for the tones of our voices, and an 
occasional crackle and splutter as a pine knot blazed up, there was no 
sound on the mountain side. The beloved stars of my far-off home were 
overhead, the Plough and Pole Star, with their steady light; the 
glittering Pleiades, looking larger than I ever saw them, and "Orion's 
studded belt" shining gloriously. Once only some wild animals prowled near 
the camp, when "Ring," with one bound, disappeared from my side; and the 
horses, which were picketed by the stream, broke their lariats, stampeded, 
and came rushing wildly towards the fire, and it was fully half an hour 
before they were caught and quiet was restored. "Jim," or Mr. Nugent, as I 
always scrupulously called him, told stories of his early youth, and of a 
great sorrow which had led him to embark on a lawless and desperate life. 
His 

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voice trembled, and tears rolled down his cheek. Was it semi-conscious 
acting, I wondered, or was his dark soul really stirred to its depths by 
the silence, the beauty, and the memories of youth?

   We reached Estes Park at noon of the following day. A more successful 
ascent of the Peak was never made, and I would not now exchange my 
memories of its perfect beauty and extraordinary sublimity for any other 
experience of mountaineering in any part of the world. Yesterday snow fell 
on the summit, and it will be inaccessible for eight months to come.

I.L.B. 

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LETTER VIII.
Estes Park--Big Game--"Parks" in Colorado--Magnificent Scenery--Flowers 
and Pines--An awful Road--Our Log Cabin--Griffith Evans--A miniature 
World--Our Topics--A night Alarm--A Skunk--Morning glories--Daily routine--
The Panic "Wait for the Waggon"--A musical evening.

   ESTES PARK, COLORADO TERRITORY, October 2. 
   HOW time has slipped by I do not know. This is a glorious region, and 
the air and life are intoxicating. I live mainly out of doors and on 
horseback, wear my half threadbare Hawaiian dress, sleep sometimes under 
the stars on a bed of pine boughs, ride on a Mexican saddle, and hear once 
more the low music of my Mexican spurs. "There's a stranger! Heave arf a 
brick at him!" is said by many travellers to express the feeling of the 
new settlers in these Territories. This is not my experience in my cheery 
mountain home. How the rafters ring as I write with songs and mirth, while 
the pitch-pine logs blaze and crackle in the chimney, and the fine snow-
dust drives in through the chinks and forms mimic snowwreaths on the 
floor, and the wind raves and howls and plays among the creaking pine 
branches and 

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snaps them short off, and the lightning plays round the blasted top of 
Long's Peak, and the hardy hunters divert themselves with the thought that 
when I go to bed I must turn out and face the storm!

   You will ask, "What is Estes Park?" This name, with the quiet Midland 
Counties' sound, suggests "park palings" well lichened, a lodge with a 
curtseying woman, fallow-deer, and a Queen Anne mansion. Such as it is, 
Estes Park is mine. It is unsurveyed, "no man's land," and mine by right 
of love, appropriation, and appreciation; by the seizure of its peerless 
sunrises and sunsets, its glorious afterglow, its blazing noons, its 
hurricanes sharp and furious, its wild auroras, its glories of mountain 
and forest, of canyon, lake, and river, and the stereotyping them all in 
my memory. Mine, too, in a better than the sportsman's sense, are its 
majestic wapiti, which play and fight under the pines in the early 
morning, as securely as fallow-deer under our English oaks; its graceful 
"black-tails," swift of foot; its superb big-horns, whose noble leader is 
to be seen now and then with his classic head against the blue sky on the 
top of a colossal rock; its sneaking mountain lion with his hideous 
nocturnal caterwaullugs, the great "grizzly," the beautiful skunk, the 
wary beaver, who is always making lakes, damming and turning streams, 
cutting down young cotton-woods, and setting an example of thrift and 
industry; the wolf, greedy and 

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cowardly; the coyote and the lynx, and all the lesser fry of mink, marten, 
cat, hare, fox, squirrel and chipmonk, as well as things that fly, from 
the eagle down to the crested blue-jay. May their number never be less, in 
spite of the hunter who kills for food and gain, and the sportsman who 
kills and marauds for pastime!

   But still I have not answered the natural question,(*) "What is Estes 
Park?" Among the striking peculiarities of these mountains are hundreds of 
high-lying valleys, large and small, at heights varying from 6000 to 11,
000 feet. The most important are North Park, held by hostile Indians; 
Middle Park, famous for hot springs and trout; South Park, rich in 
minerals; and San Luis Park. South Park is 10,000 feet high, a great 
rolling prairie 70 miles long, well grassed and watered, but nearly closed 
by snow in winter. But Parks innumerable are scattered throughout the 
mountains, most of them unnamed, and others nicknamed by the hunters or 
trappers who have made them their temporary resorts. They always lie far 
within the flaming Foot Hills, their exquisite stretches of flowery 
pastures dotted artistically with clumps of trees sloping lawnlike to 
bright swift streams full of red-

(* Nor should I at this time, had not Henry Kingsley, Lord Dunraven, and 
"The Field," divulged the charms and whereabouts of these "happy hunting 
grounds," with the certain result of directing a stream of tourists into 
the solitary, beast-haunted paradise.)

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waistcoated trout, or running up in soft glades into the dark forest, 
above which the snow-peaks rise in their infinite majesty. Some are bits 
of meadow a mile long and very narrow, with a small stream, a beaver-dam, 
and a pond made by beaver industry. Hundreds of these can only be reached 
by riding in the bed of a stream, or by scrambling up some narrow canyon 
till it debouches on the fairy-like stretch above. These parks are the 
feeding-grounds of innumerable wild animals, and some, like one three 
miles off, seem chosen for the process of antler-casting, the grass being 
covered for at least a square mile with the magnificent branching horns of 
the elk.

   Estes Park combines the beauties of all. Dismiss all thoughts of the 
Midland Counties. For park palings there are mountains, forest skirted, 
9000, 11,000, 14,000 feet high; for a lodge, two sentinel peaks of granite 
guarding the only feasible entrance; and for Queen Anne mansion an 
unchinked log cabin with a vault of sunny blue overhead. The park is most 
irregularly shaped and contains hardly any level grass. It is an aggregate 
of lawns, slopes, and glades, about eighteen miles in length, but never 
more than two miles in width. The Big Thompson, a bright, rapid trout-
stream, snow-born on Long's Peak a few miles higher, takes all sorts of 
magical twists, vanishing and reappearing unexpectedly, glancing among 
lawns, rushing through romantic ravines, 

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everywhere making music through the still, long nights. Here and there the 
lawns are so smooth, the trees so artistically grouped, a lake makes such 
an artistic foreground, or a waterfall comes tumbling down with such an 
apparent feeling for the picturesque, that I am almost angry with Nature 
for her close imitation of art. But in another hundred yards Nature, 
glorious, unapproachable, inimitable, is herself again, raising one's 
thoughts reverently upwards to her Creator and ours. Grandeur and 
sublimity, not softness, are the features of Estes Park. The glades which 
begin so softly are soon lost in the dark primæval forests, with their 
peaks of rosy granite, and their stretches of granite blocks piled and 
poised by nature in some mood of fury. The streams are lost in canyons 
nearly or quite inaccessible, awful in their blackness and darkness; every 
valley ends in mystery; seven mountain ranges raise their frowning 
barriers between us and the Plains, and at the south end of the park 
Long's Peak rises to a height of 14,700 feet, with his bare, scathed head 
slashed with eternal snow. The lowest part of the Park is 7500 feet high; 
and though the sun is hot during the day, the mercury hovers near the 
freezing-point every night of the summer. An immense quantity of snow 
falls, but partly owing to the tremendous winds which drift it into the 
deep valleys, and partly to the bright warm sun of the winter months, the 
Park is never 

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snowed up, and a number of cattle and horses are wintered out of doors on 
its sun-cured, saccharine grasses, of which the gramma grass is the most 
valuable. The soil here, as elsewhere in the neighbourhood, is nearly 
everywhere coarse, grey, granitic dust, produced probably by the 
disintegration of the surrounding mountains. It does not hold water, and 
is never wet in any weather. There are no thaws here. The snow 
mysteriously disappears by rapid evaporation. Oats grow, but do not ripen, 
and, when well advanced, are cut and stacked for winter fodder. Potatoes 
yield abundantly, and, though not very large, are of the best quality, 
mealy throughout. Evans has not attempted anything else, and probably the 
more succulent vegetables would require irrigation. The wild flowers are 
gorgeous and innumerable, though their beauty, which culminates in July 
and August, was over before I arrived, and the recent snow-flurries have 
finished them. The time between winter and winter is very short, and the 
flowery growth and blossom of a whole year are compressed into two months. 
There are dandelions, buttercups, larkspurs, harebells, violets, roses, 
blue gentian, columbine, painter's brush, and fifty others, blue and 
yellow predominating; and though their blossoms are stiffened by the cold 
every morning, they are starring the grass and drooping over the brook 
long before noon; making the most of their brief lives in the sunshine. Of 

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ferns, after many a long hunt, I have only found the Cystopteris fragilis 
and the Blechnum spicant, but I hear that the Pteris aquilina is also 
found. Snakes and mosquitoes do not appear to be known here. Coming almost 
direct from the tropics, one is dissatisfied with the uniformity of the 
foliage; indeed, foliage can hardly be written of, as the trees properly 
so called at this height are exclusively Coniferæ, and bear needles 
instead of leaves. In places there are patches of spindly aspens, which 
have turned a lemon-yellow, and along the streams bear-cherries, vines, 
and roses lighten the gulches with their variegated crimson leaves. The 
pines are not imposing, either from their girth or height. Their colouring 
is blackish-green, and though they are effective singly or in groups, they 
are sombre and almost funereal when densely massed, as here, along the 
mountain sides. The timber line is at a height of about 11,000 feet, and 
is singularly well defined. The most attractive tree I have seen is the 
silver spruce, Abies Englemanii, near of kin to what is often called the 
balsam-fir. Its shape and colour are both beautiful. My heart warms 
towards it, and I frequent all the places where I can find it. It looks as 
if a soft, blue, silver powder had fallen on its deep-green needles, or as 
if a bluish hoar-frost, which must melt at noon, were resting upon it. 
Anyhow, one can hardly believe that the beauty is permanent, and survives 
the summer heat 

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and the winter cold. The universal tree here is the Pinus ponderosa, but 
it never attains any very considerable size, and there is nothing to 
compare with the red-woods of the Sierra Nevada, far less with the 
sequoias of California.

   As I have written before, Estes Park is thirty miles from Longmount, 
the nearest settlement, and it can be reached on horseback only by the 
steep and devious track by which I came, passing through a narrow rift in 
the top of a precipitous ridge, 9000 feet high, called the Devil's Gate. 
Evans takes a lumber waggon with four horses over the mountains, and a 
Colorado engineer would have no difficulty in making a waggon road. In 
several of the gulches over which the track hangs there are the remains of 
waggons which have come to grief in the attempt to emulate Evans's feat, 
which, without evidence, I should have supposed to be impossible. It is an 
awful road. The only settlers in the Park are Griffith Evans, and a 
married man a mile higher up. "Mountain Jim's" cabin is in the entrance 
gulch, four miles off, and there is not another cabin for eighteen miles 
towards the Plains. The Park is unsurveyed, and the huge tract of 
mountainous country beyond is almost altogether unexplored. Elk-hunters 
occasionally crone up and camp out here; but the two settlers, who, 
however, are only squatters, for various reasons are not disposed to 
encourage such visitors. When Evans, who 

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is a very successful hunter, came here, he came on foot, and for some time 
after settling here he carried the flour and necessaries required by his 
family on his back over the mountains.

   As I intend to make Estes Park my headquarters until the winter sets 
in, I must make you acquainted with my surroundings and mode of living. 
The "Queen Anne Mansion" is represented by a log cabin made of big hewn 
logs. The chinks should be filled with mud and lime, but these are 
wanting. The roof is formed of barked young spruce, then a layer of hay, 
and an outer coating of mud, all nearly flat. The floors are roughly 
boarded. The "living-room" is about sixteen feet square, and has a rough 
stone chimney in which pine logs are always burning. At one end there is a 
door into a small, bedroom, and at the other a door into a small eating-
room, at the table of which we feed in relays. This opens into a very 
small kitchen with a great American cooking-stove, and there are two "bed-
closets" besides. Although rude, it is comfortable, except for the 
draughts. The fine snow drives in through the chinks and covers the 
floors, but sweeping it out at intervals is both fun and exercise. There 
are no heaps or rubbish-places outside. Near it, on the slope under the 
pines, is a pretty two-roomed cabin, and beyond that, near the lake, is my 
cabin, a very rough one. My door opens into a little room with a stone 
chimney, and that 

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again into a small room with a hay bed, a chair with a tin basin on it, a 
shelf and some pegs. A small window looks on the lake, and the glories of 
the sunrises which I see from it are indescribable. Neither of my doors 
has a lock, and, to say the truth, neither will shut, as the wood has 
swelled. Below the house, on the stream which issues from the lake, there 
is a beautiful log dairy, with a water-wheel outside, used for churning. 
Besides this, there are a corral, a shed for the waggon, a room for the 
hired man, and shelters for horses and weakly calves. All these things are 
necessaries at this height.

   The ranchmen are two Welshmen, Evans and Edwards, each with a wife and 
family. The men are as diverse as they can be. "Griff," as Evans is 
called, is short and small, and is hospitable, careless, reckless, jolly, 
social, convivial, peppery, good-natured, "nobody's enemy but his own." He 
had the wit and taste to find out Estes Park, where people have found him 
out, and have induced him to give them food and lodging, and add cabin to 
cabin to take them in. He is a splendid shot, an expert and successful 
hunter, a bold mountaineer, a good rider, a capital cook, and a generally 
"jolly fellow." His cheery laugh rings through the cabin from the early 
morning, and is contagious, and when the rafters ring at night with such 
songs as "D'ye ken John Peel?" "Auld Lang Syne," and "John Brown," what 
would the chorus be 

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without poor "Griff's" voice? What would Estes Park be without him, 
indeed? When he went to Denver lately we missed him as we should have 
missed the sunshine, and perhaps more. In the early morning, when Long's 
Peak is red, and the grass crackles with the hoar-frost, he arouses me 
with a cheery thump on my door. "We're going cattle-hunting, will you 
come?" or, "Will you help to drive in the cattle? you can take your pick 
of the horses. I want another hand." Free-Hearted, lavish, popular, poor 
"Griff" loves liquor too well for his prosperity, and is always tormented 
by debt. He makes lots of money, but puts it into "a bag with holes." He 
has fifty horses and 1000 head of cattle, many of which are his own, 
wintering up here, and makes no end of money by taking in people at eight 
dollars a week, yet it all goes somehow. He has a most industrious wife, a 
girl of seventeen, and four younger children, all musical, but the wife 
has to work like a slave; and though he is a kind husband, her lot, as 
compared with her lord's, is like that of a squaw. Edwards, his partner, 
is his exact opposite, tall, thin, and condemnatory-looking, keen, 
industrious, saving, grave, a teetotaler, grieved for all reasons at 
Evans's follies, and rather grudging; as naturally unpopular as Evans is 
popular; a "decent man," who, with his industrious wife, will certainly 
make money as fast as Evans loses it.

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   I pay eight dollars a week, which includes the unlimited use of a 
horse, when one can be found and caught. We breakfast at seven on beef, 
potatoes tea, coffee, new bread, and butter. Two pitchers of cream and two 
of milk are replenished as fast as they are exhausted. Dinner at twelve is 
a repetition of the breakfast, but with the coffee omitted and a gigantic 
pudding added. Tea at six is a repetition of breakfast. "Eat whenever you 
are hungry, you can always get milk and bread in the kitchen," Evans says--
"eat as much as you can, it'll do you good," and we all eat like hunters. 
There is no change of food. The steer which was being killed on my arrival 
is now being eaten through from head to tail, the meat being backed off 
quite promiscuously, without any regard to joints. In this dry, rarefied 
air, the outside of the flesh blackens and hardens, and though the weather 
may be hot, the carcass keeps sweet for two or three months. The bread is 
super-excellent, but the poor wives seem to be making and baking it all 
day.

   The regular household living and eating together at this time consists 
of a very intelligent and high-minded American couple, Mr. and Mrs. Dewy, 
people whose character, culture, and society I should value anywhere; a 
young Englishman, brother of a celebrated African traveller, who, because 
he rides on an English saddle, and clings to some other insular 

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peculiarities, is called "The Earl;" a miner prospecting for silver; a 
young man, the type of intelligent, practical "Young America," whose 
health showed consumptive tendencies when he was in business, and who is 
living a hunter's life here; a grown-up niece of Evans; and a melancholy-
looking hired man. A mile off there is an industrious married settler, and 
four miles off, in the gulch leading to the Park, "Mountain Jim," 
otherwise Mr. Nugent, is posted. His business as a trapper takes him daily 
up to the beaver-dams in Black Canyon to look after his traps, and he 
generally spends some time in or about our cabin, not, I can see, to 
Evans's satisfaction. For, in truth, this blue hollow, lying solitary at 
the foot of Long's Peak, is a miniature world of great interest, in which 
love, jealousy, hatred, envy, pride, unselfishness, greed, selfishness, 
and self-sacrifice can be studied hourly, and there is always the 
unpleasantly exciting risk of an open quarrel with the neighbouring 
desperado, whose "I'll shoot you!" has more than once been heard in the 
cabin.

   The party, however, has often been increased by "campers," either elk-
hunters or "prospectors" for silver or locations, who feed with us and 
join us in the evening. They get little help from Evans, either as to elk 
or locations, and go away disgusted and unsuccessful. Two Englishmen of 
refinement and culture camped out here prospecting a few weeks 

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ago and then, contrary to advice, crossed the mountains into North Park, 
where gold is said to abound, and it is believed that they have fallen 
victims to the bloodthirsty Indians of that region. Of course, we never 
get letters or newspapers unless some one goes to Longmount for them. Two 
or three novels and a copy of Our New West are our literature. Our latest 
newspaper is seventeen days old. Somehow the Park seems to become the 
natural limit of our interests so far as they appear in conversation at 
table. The last grand aurora, the prospect of a snow-storm, track and sign 
of elk and grizzly, rumours of a bighorn herd near the lake, the canyons 
in which the Texan cattle were last seen, the merits of different rifles, 
the progress of two obvious love affairs, the probability of some one 
coming up from the Plains with letters, "Mountain Jim's" latest mood or 
escapade, and the merits of his dog "Ring" as compared with those of 
Evans's dog "Plunk," are among the topics which are never abandoned as 
exhausted.

   On Sunday work is nominally laid aside, but most of the men go out 
hunting or fishing till the evening, when we have the harmonium and much 
sacred music and singing in parts. To be alone in the Park from the 
afternoon till the last glory of the afterglow has faded, with no books 
but a Bible and Prayer-book, is truly delightful. To worthier temple for a 
"Te Deum" or "Gloria in Excelsis" could be found than 

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this "temple not made with hands," in which one may worship without being 
distracted by the sight of bonnets of endless form, and curiously 
intricate "back hair," and countless oddities of changing fashion.

   I shall not soon forget my first night here.

   Somewhat dazed by the rarefied air, entranced by the glorious beauty, 
slightly puzzled by the motley company, whose faces loomed not always 
quite distinctly through the cloud of smoke produced by eleven pipes, I 
went to my solitary cabin at nine, attended by Evans. It was very dark, 
and it seemed a long way off. Something howled--Evans said it was a wolf--
and owls apparently innumerable hooted incessantly. The pole-star, exactly 
opposite my cabin door, burned like a lamp. The frost was sharp. Evans 
opened the door, lighted a candle, and left me, and I was soon in my hay 
bed. I was frightened--that is, afraid of being frightened, it was so 
eerie; but sleep soon got the better of my fears. I was awoke by a heavy 
breathing, a noise something like sawing under the floor, and a pushing 
and upheaving, all very loud. My candle was all burned, and, in truth, I 
dared not stir. The noise went on for an hour fully, when, just as I 
thought the floor had been made sufficiently thin for all purposes of 
ingress, the sounds abruptly ceased, and I fell asleep again. My hair was 
not, as it ought to have been, white in the morning!

   I was dressed by seven, our breakfast-hour, and 

Page 134

when I reached the great cabin and told my story, Evans laughed 
hilariously, and Edwards contorted his face dismally. They told me that 
there was a skunk's lair under my cabin, and that they dare not make any 
attempt to dislodge him for fear of rendering the cabin untenable. They 
have tried to trap him since, but without success, and each night the 
noisy performance is repeated. I think he is sharpening his claws on the 
under side of my floor, as the grizzlies sharpen theirs upon the trees. 
The odour with which this creature, truly named Mephitis, can overpower 
its assailants is truly awful. We were driven out of the cabin for some 
hours merely by the passage of one across the corral. The bravest man is a 
coward in its neighbourhood. Dogs rub their noses on the ground till they 
bleed when they have touched the fluid, and even die of the vomiting 
produced by the effluvia. The odour can be smelt a mile off. If clothes 
are touched by the fluid they must be destroyed. At present its fur is 
very valuable. Several have been killed since I came. A shot well aimed at 
the spine secures one safely, and an experienced dog can kill one by 
leaping upon it suddenly without being exposed to danger. It is a 
beautiful beast, about the size and length of a fox, with long thick black 
or dark-brown fur, and two white streaks from the head to the long bushy 
tail. The claws of its fore-feet are long and polished. Yesterday one was 

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seen rushing from the dairy and was shot. "Plunk," the big dog, touched it 
and has to be driven into exile. The body was valiantly removed by a man 
with a long fork, and carried to a running stream, but we are nearly 
choked with the odour from the spot where it fell. I hope that my skunk 
will enjoy a quiet spirit so long as we are near neighbours.


   October 3. 
   This is surely one of the most entrancing spots on earth. Oh, that I 
could paint with pen or brush! From my bed I look on Mirror Lake, and with 
the very earliest dawn, when objects are not discernible, it lies there 
absolutely still, a purplish lead-colour. Then suddenly into its mirror 
flash inverted peaks, at first a bright orange, then changing into red, 
making the dawn darker all round. This is a new sight, each morning new. 
Then the peaks fade, and when morning is no longer "spread upon the 
mountains," the pines are mirrored in my lake almost as solid objects, and 
the glory steals downwards, and a red flush warms the clear atmosphere of 
the Park, and the hoar-frost sparkles and the crested blue jays step forth 
daintily on the jewelled grass. The majesty and beauty grow on me daily. 
As I crossed from my cabin just now, and the long mountain shadows lay on 
the grass, and form and colour gained new meanings, I was almost 

Page 136

false to Hawaii; I couldn't go on writing for the glory Of the sunset, but 
went out and sat on a rock to see the deepening blue in the dark canyons, 
and the peaks becoming rose colour one by one, then fading into sudden 
ghastliness, the awe-inspiring heights of Long's Peak fading last. Then 
came the glories of the afterglow, when the orange and lemon of the east 
faded into gray, and then gradually the gray for some distance above the 
horizon brightened into a cold blue, and above the blue into a broad band 
of rich, warm red, with an upper band of rose colour; above it hung a big 
cold moon. This is the "daily miracle" of evening, as the blazing peaks in 
the darkness of Mirror Lake are the miracle of morning. Perhaps this 
scenery is not lovable, but, as if it were a strong stormy character, it 
has an intense fascination.

   The routine of my day is breakfast at seven, then I go back and "do" my 
cabin and draw water from the lake, read a lithe, loaf a little, return to 
the big cabin and sweep it alternately with Mrs. Dewy, after which she 
reads aloud till dinner at twelve. Then I ride with Mr. Dewy, or by 
myself, or with Mrs. Dewy, who is learning to ride cavalier fashion in 
order to accompany her invalid husband, or go after cattle till supper at 
six. After that we all sit in the living-room, and I settle down to write 
to you, or mend my clothes, which are dropping to pieces. Some sit round 
the table playing at eucre, the strange 

Page 137

hunters and prospectors lie on the floor smoking, and rifles are cleaned, 
bullets cast, fishing-flies made, fishing-tackle repaired, boots are 
waterproofed, part-songs are sung, and about half-past eight I cross the 
crisp-grass to my cabin, always expecting to find something in it. We all 
wash our own clothes, and as my stock is so small, some part of every day 
has to be spent at the wash-tub. Politeness and propriety always prevail 
in our mixed company, and though various grades of society are 
represented, true democratic equality prevails, not its counterfeit, and 
there is neither forwardness on one side nor condescension on the other.

   Evans left for Denver ten days ago, taking his wife and family to the 
Plains for the winter, and the mirth of our party departed with him. 
Edwards is sombre, except when he lies on the floor in the evening, and 
tells stories of his march through Georgia with Sherman. I gave Evans a 
100-dollar note to change, and asked him to buy me a horse for my tour, 
and for three days we have expected him. The mail depends on him. I have 
had no letters from you for five weeks, and can hardly curb my impatience. 
I ride or walk three or four miles out on the Longmount trail two or three 
times a day to look for him. Others, for different reasons, are nearly 
equally anxious. After dark we start at every sound, and every time the 
dogs bark all the able-bodied of 

Page 138

us turn out en masse. "Wait for the waggon" has become a nearly maddening 
joke.


   October 9. 
   The letter and newspaper fever has seized on every one. We have sent at 
last to Longmount. This evening I rode out on the Longmount trail towards 
dusk, escorted by "Mountain Jim," and in the distance we saw a waggon with 
four horses and a saddle-horse behind, and the driver waved a 
handkerchief, the concerted signal if I were the possessor of a horse. We 
turned back, galloping down the long hill as fast as two good horses could 
carry us, and gave the joyful news. It was an hour before the waggon 
arrived, bringing not Evans but two "campers" of suspicious aspect, who 
have pitched their camp close to my cabin! You cannot imagine what it is 
to be locked in by these mountain walls, and not to know where your 
letters are lying. Later on, Mr. Buchan, one of our usual inmates, 
returned from Denver with papers, letters for every one but me, and much 
exciting news. The financial panic has spread out West, gathering strength 
on its way. The Denver banks have all suspended business. They refuse to 
cash their own cheques, or to allow their customers to draw a dollar and 
would not even give greenbacks for my English gold! Neither Mr. Buchan nor 
Evans could get a cent. Business is suspended, and everybody, however 
rich, is for the 

Page 139

time being poor. The Indians have taken to the "war path," and are burning 
ranches and killing cattle. There is a regular "scare" among the settlers, 
and waggon loads of fugitives are arriving in Colorado Springs. The 
Indians say, "The white man has killed the buffalo and left them to rot on 
the plains. We will be revenged." Evans had reached Longmount, and will be 
here to-night.


   October 10. 
   "Wait for the waggon" still! We had a hurricane of wind and hail last 
night; it was eleven before I could go to my cabin, and I only reached it 
with the help of two men. The moon was not up, and the sky overhead was 
black with clouds, when suddenly Long's Peak, which had been invisible, 
gleamed above the dark mountains, all glistening with new fallen snow, on 
which the moon, as yet unrisen here, was shining. The evening before, 
after sunset, I saw another novel effect. My lake turned a brilliant 
orange in the twilight, and in its still mirror the mountains were 
reflected a deep rich blue. It is a world of wonders. To-day we had a 
great storm with flurries of fine snow; and when the clouds rolled up at 
noon, the Snowy Range and all the higher mountains were pure white. I have 
been hard at work all day to drown my anxieties, which are heightened by a 
rumour that Evans has gone buffalo-hunting on the Platte!

Page 140

   This evening, quite unexpectedly, Evans arrived with a heavy mail in a 
box. I sorted it, but there was nothing for me, and Evans said he was 
afraid that he had left my letters, which were separate from the others, 
behind at Denver, but he had written from Longmount for them. A few hours 
later they were found in a box of groceries!

   All the hilarity of the house has returned with Evans, and he has 
brought a kindred spirit with him, a young man who plays and sings 
splendidly, has an inexhaustible repertoire, and produces sonatas, funeral 
marches, anthems, reels, strathspeys, and all else, out of his wonderful 
memory. Never, surely, was a chamber organ compelled to such service. A 
little cask Of suspicious appearance was smuggled into the cabin from the 
waggon, and heightens the hilarity a little, I fear. No churlishness could 
resist Evans's unutterable jollity or the contagion of his hearty laugh. 
He claps people on the back, shouts at them, will do anything for them, 
and makes a perpetual breeze. "My kingdom for a horse!" he has not got one 
for me, and a shadow crossed his face when I spoke of the subject. 
Eventually he asked for a private conference, when he told me, with some 
confusion, that he had found himself "very hard up" in Denver, and had 
been obliged to appropriate my 100-dollar note. He said he would give me, 
as interest for it up to November 25th, a good horse, saddle, and 

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bridle for my proposed journey of 600 miles. I was somewhat dismayed, but 
there was no other course, as the money was gone.(*) I tried a horse, 
mended my clothes, reduced my pack to a weight of twelve pounds, and was 
all ready for an early start, when before daylight I was wakened by 
Evans's cheery voice at my door. "I say, Miss B., we've got to drive wild 
cattle to-day; I wish you'd lend a hand, there's not enough of us; I'll 
give you a good horse; one day won't make much difference." So we've been 
driving cattle all day, riding about twenty miles, and fording the Big 
Thompson about as many times. Evans flatters me by saying that I am "as 
much use as another man;" more than one of our party, I hope, who always 
avoided the "ugly" cows.


   October 12. 
   I am still here, helping in the kitchen, driving cattle, and riding 
four or five times a day. Evans detains me each morning by saying, "Here's 
lots of horses for you to try," and after trying five or six a day, I do 
not find one to my liking. To-day, as I was cantering a tall well-bred one 
round the lake, he threw the bridle off by a toss of his head, leaving me 
with the reins in my hands; one bucked, and two have tender feet, and 
tumbled down. Such are some of our little varieties. Still I hope to get

(* In justice to Evans, I must mention here that every cent of the money 
was ultimately paid, that the horse was perfection, and that the 
arrangement turned out a most advantageous one for me.)

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off on my tour in a day or two, so at least as to be able to compare Estes 
Park with some of the better known parts of Colorado.

   You would be amused if you could see our cabin just now. There are nine 
men in the room and three women. For want of seats most of the men are 
lying on the floor; all are smoking, and the blithe young French Canadian 
who plays so beautifully, and catches about fifty speckled trout for each 
meal, is playing the harmonium with a pipe in his mouth. Three men who 
have camped in Black Canyon for a week are lying like dogs on the floor. 
They are all over six feet high, immovably solemn, neither smiling at the 
general hilarity, nor at the absurd changes which are being rung on the 
harmonium. They may be described as clothed only in boots, for their 
clothes are torn to rags. They stare vacantly. They have neither seen a 
woman nor slept under a roof for six months. Negro songs are being sung, 
and before that "Yankee Doodle" was played immediately after "Rule 
Britannia," and it made every one but the strangers laugh, it sounded so 
foolish and mean. The colder weather is bringing the beasts down from the 
heights. I heard both wolves and the mountain lion as I crossed to my 
cabin last night.

I.L.B.