Mr. Dide, His Vacation in Colorado

"Ah, weally – to wahd off the sun and the wain."

"Land sakes – mebbe you think you're sugar and'll melt; and you part your hair in the middle like a gal; I see it when you had your hat off."

"Weally – please excuse me, I would like to pass in."

"Set right down and don't let me drive you away. I've taken an interest in you; where's your mother?"

"Weally, ma – mahm – she has been dead many yeahs – I can just wemember her."

"I know'd it, and you've just been left to grow up of your own accord; been to college of course. 'Squire Dodd he let his Jake go off to college, and he staid just one year and come back with one of them glasses and lost it next day; the ole 'squire kep' him home after that, and set him to maulin' rails in the patch down by the hemlock p'int – "

For half an hour the dear old soul held the disconsolate gentleman in durance. I dared not look at the Major but kept my eyes fixed on the landscape, without seeing any of it.

Reaching Leadville, we searched in vain for the Deacon; his lady friends were also absent, and the Major remarked:

"The Deacon evidently is one point ahead in the game. If he does not turn up in the morning we shall be obliged to abandon him."

Leadville, that has added so many millions to the wealth of the world, is more dignified than half a dozen years ago; there is less of the revolver and saloon and a little more of the church and the Sabbath-school; no longer a mining camp, but a city with only a tithe of its resources developed.

It reposes very quietly this Sabbath morning under the bright sun. Turning from the range at the north with its snow-capped peaks and looking down the almost deserted avenue, I am reminded of another Sunday morning – and it seems only a little while ago – when the same street was wont to be alive with humanity. Coming out of an adjacent saloon a couple of young men faced each other, blear-eyed and dishevelled; they had plainly been making a night of it. Each stood with his hand on his hip, while epithets, the most choice in the camp vocabulary, flew thick and furious. It might be dangerous or not; perhaps not. But the innocent third party running away or seeking shelter at the side might be in peril. I took up a vibrating station, so to speak, immediately in the rear of one of the would-be murderers, and awaited the opening. It did not come, but ended in froth and the appearance of an autocrat with a star on his breast and a club in his hand. He gathered in the bad men and was about to possess himself of the undersigned, when I felt compelled to explain the situation. He complimented me by saying: "Your head's level," and I was suffered to depart.

From the carbonate metropolis to the tunnel through the Saguache Range the distance by rail is perhaps seventeen miles, the difference in elevation about thirteen hundred feet. To make this distance one can hardly realize that one is ascending, the grade is so light, winding on and about the mountain sides. Lake Valley, with its crooked band of water here and there widening into silvery pools, and the gold and green of its meadow-like spots, seems to be silently drifting down and away. At the foot lies the city we have just left, and beyond is the Mosquito Range. In following the tortuous line the grand peaks seem to change from one side of you to the other, all the motion being with them.

Mount Massive gives you the aptness of its name. You feel its magnificence as you approach, and that it may be the glorious court of blue-eyed Athena at whose vestibule you stand wonderingly, and whence she issues to kiss the petals of the wild flowers and endow the earth with health and beauty. All about you are the pines, with here and there a patch of aspens, their whitened trunks set in banks of larkspur empurpling the sloping mountain sides. Over deep gorges spanned by threadlike trestle-work, you feel awed at the audacity that planned and executed the way into this solitude. High above the utmost peak of the bulky mass, a spot no larger than your hand is poised in ether, or moving, passes between you and the sun, and you think perhaps of what Tennyson says:

"He clasps the crag with hooked hands,Close to the sun in lonely lands;Ringed with the azure world he stands:The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls:He watches from his mountain walls,And like a thunderbolt he falls."

Or as Campbell puts it:

"And stood at pleasure, 'neath heavens zenith, likeA lamp suspended from its azure dome,Then downward, faster than a falling star,He neared the earth, until his shape distinctWas blackly shadowed on the sunny ground."

Or older still, as we find it in the Iliad:

"So the strong eagle from his airy height,Who marks the swans' or cranes' embodied flightStoops down impetuous while they light for foodAnd, stooping, darkens with his wings the flood."

The Major thought he would give Campbell the benefit of his vote, though the old Greek tells us the bird was a robber in his day as he is in ours.

The shriek of the whistle echoes and re-echoes through the impressive silence; it startles you, and you feel as if warned in a weird way by the unseen spirits of these wilds, that you are an intruder. Suddenly you are swept from the bright sunlight, the lofty mountains and modest wild flowers into utter darkness. Your dream of the wise goddess may not be all a dream. You are being hurled, in her anger, from the heavenly heights to the depths of Erebus. Looking out, you see mysterious shadows moving with lights through clouds of smoke, and the lights burn dim and red. There is comfort only in the reflection that mortals have preceded us, and that we are merely in Hagerman Tunnel1 and not knocking at the gates of sheol.

In the ghostly light of the car lamp I discover the venerable incubus of Mr. Dide, and inquire what she thinks.

"Land sakes! it's flyin' in the face of the Almighty. I suppose it's all right, but I kind o' wish I was well out of it and with Joshua. I don't know but I was a little hard on that young man with the umbrill."

The Major, overhearing the wail, immediately entered upon the office of comforter, and had but fairly begun when, swish! and we were in the broad daylight once again, on the western slope of the Saguache Range.

There is a beautiful picture to the right; a few miles away, down the mountain side, you catch a view of a little lake, bordered by a strip of level ground carpeted in gold; back of this grow the pines, reaching on and up to the summits of their homes, made dark and green; and away beyond, delicately toned by the ever-present gray mist, stands a lofty mountain range. The engineer is kindly and pauses here, that you may have a glimpse of the enchanting retreat, over the memory of which you may dream when you are back in the turmoil, and that will make you sigh for the coming summer.

The character of the country through which we are now winding our way down toward the valley is more rugged than on the eastern side. The thickly wooded slopes give place to more frequent piles of granite, massive and gray. We come suddenly upon a little park and find the haymakers busy there, with a team of oxen, a motive power already growing quite novel; a little further over, where the gorge widens, affording a few acres of comparatively level ground, we find the white tents of the campers-out. There is a newness about the cotton habitations that suggests experiment. There are women in sun-bonnets and calico gowns and a ruddiness of complexion no city air can paint. Children with brown, bare legs scratched by the briars, their cheeks tanned to a russet that affords a contrast to the whiteness of their milk teeth. And these jolly little fellows always greet you with a broad smile and a hurrah that is without feebleness or fever. Young men in long rubber boots, helmet hats decorated with nondescript flies and sporting an endless variety of trout rods. All pause to look at the train, an act to which they would rarely condescend at home. But this one, maybe, brings accessions to their ranks from the outside world, or a newspaper, and serves as a link between what we call civilization and the glorious freedom of the wilderness. A little further on, standing upon the bank of a still reach, we encounter a tall "lone fisherman," dressed in overalls, a waistcoat ragged at the back, an old white felt hat with the battered brim thrown up from his face and drooping behind; in his hand a long cane pole which it makes one's arms ache to look at. But he will come in to-night with that canvas bag swung from his shoulder well filled with trout, and prove to you that the fishing is good. Artificial flies are not indispensable with him; grasshoppers when he can get them, bugs, grubs, a bit of beef or a strip from the belly of his first trophy of the day, will serve his purpose; he is "after meat" and gets it. What could he do with a fly and that walking-beam?

We reach a cañon whose sides at its mouth are clothed with pines and aspens; the rocks have changed from the granite to red sandstone and great mountains made up of boulders and red clay. The latter have been built here by the waters away back in the untold centuries, and of whose abundance the beautiful crystal stream now brawling over its pebbled bed is but a thread. As the once mighty force has cut its way through all impediments and dwindled century by century to a narrower channel, it has left exposed the great red cliffs; falling still farther, soil has accumulated on the more gentle slopes and has given these Titanic piles broad bases of green interspersed with wild flowers, and the delicate feathers of the clematis here and there twine among the willows. The winds and the rains have bestowed their aid and carved the red mass into castles, buttressed and pinnacled. And so, having traversed one of the grandest gorges in the State and enjoyed a fair view of some of the loftiest mountain peaks and ranges, we slow up in the beautiful valley of the Roaring Fork. The Major declared it was the most delightful ride he had ever taken, and was disposed to enthusiasm.

CHAPTER V.

JOSHUA

While awaiting the departure of the train from Aspen Junction to Glenwood Springs, one of the dwellers in the neighborhood came up with a string of beautiful trout, the largest of which weighed two pounds. Where did he catch them?

"Why, right over yonder in the Roaring Fork; lots of 'em; a fellow got one the other day that weighed three pounds."

The manner of the informant defied contradiction or doubt.

"Not improbable, my friend. I have landed more than one five-pounder from that same water," said the Major.

"See here, mister, if I'd a-know'd you was goin' to chip in I'd a-made it bigger – the last man hain't no show, that's a fact."

"Honor bright, my friend; I camped here nineteen years ago this summer; five-pound trout were no rarity then."

The Major's tones carried conviction with them, and, mollified, the native admitted he had "heard of bigger ones up the fork."

The ride of twenty-five miles to Glenwood Springs completed our trip by rail. The next business was to look up a man with a team and wagon. We found him lingering over some old circus posters on a bill-board down a side street, which he seemed reluctant to abandon. He had been recommended to us as a good cook, possessed of a complete camp outfit, and to whom the whole country was an open book.

Mr. Miles was a blue-eyed man of forty, perhaps, with a hint of gray hairs about his temples, broad-shouldered and wearing a pleasant smile. He had been to Trapper's Lake times without number, but he "couldn't get a wagon over the trail."

"If you want to go by wagon, the best way is round by Meeker, and up the White River; it's a hundred and thirty miles, mebbe, while it's only about a day's ride by the trail."

"By Meeker," was our route; we had come to look at the White River Valley; we might return to Glenwood by the trail.

"Meeker it is; then four dollars a day and you find the grub and your own saddle-horses, or ride in the waggin."

After assuring us that he would be back in an hour with "everything ready to roll out for Newcastle," where we were to stop the first night, Mr. Miles took his departure, singing in a delightful tenor, "The sweet by-and-by."

Two hours elapsed and Mr. Miles had failed to put in his appearance. We set out to hunt him and found his cabin. It was a very neat cabin of logs, hewed to the line, and a rustic porch covered with a wild clematis vine made the place inviting on a warm day. A couple of women in calico gowns and sun-bonnets sat outside picking wild hops from a vine which they had cut off at the roots and brought in bodily. A youngster in slips, regardless of the conventionalities of good society, was standing on his head in the shade of the chimney out of sight of the occupants of the porch. The ground being sandy our approach was unheeded by the women. The hands of one were toil-worn, of the other slender and shapely, but browned by the sun. The Major was about to speak but was forestalled by the imp from the chimney appearing, right side up, with the announcement:

"G'amma! here's men!"

The old lady's face, from her position, was first to be seen, and revealed Mr. Dide's monitress. The other was that of a young woman of twenty, perhaps. As the child spoke the latter raised her hands to the sun-bonnet, and turning toward us, disclosed a very pleasant face with wonderful brown eyes.

"Land sakes! if it ain't you; come in and set down – Hannah, git some cheers."

The Major declined, as we were in a hurry, and inquired for Mr. Miles.

"That's my Joshua, certain. He's gone to hunt his horses; he's been hired to go out campin' with some tenderfeet, and they are out grazin'; but do set down; this is my daughter Hannah," as the young woman returned with the chairs, which she burnished with her apron, though they were entirely innocent of dust.

The Major felt obliged to repeat his excuse; then pleasantly:

"I guess we are the tenderfeet – "

"Now, you don't say! – Land sakes – but you won't mind an old woman's nonsense, will you? Set down, do; Joshua'll be here by-'m-by, he greased his waggin just before he went; don't mind the muss – me and Hannah's been savin' these hops, they're better'n any store truck; they're good for yeast; I never could 'bide salt risin' anyway, and for neuralgie, I've suffered with that some, so's Joshua, seems it's in the altitude, that's what the doctors call it, and to my mind there's nothing like a hop piller. Wish you'd set awhile."

The Major assured the good soul that we should be delighted, but really we were anxious to start and had a multitude of trifles to look after. Would she be kind enough to request Joshua not to delay longer than was necessary? and we bowed ourselves away.

The sun went down and Joshua did not appear. At ten o'clock we went to bed with the conviction that we should have to abandon the namesake of the potent commander. About the time we were fairly asleep, he came and assured us, through the door, that he would "be on hand at eight o'clock, sure, with everything ready." That the horses had "strayed and were not to be found until after dark." We were prompt at the appointed time and waited until nine. The Major was again about to give him up, when he came around with a pair of stout-looking mares and an empty lumber wagon, and announced that he must "go and hunt up an extra spring seat," as we had concluded not to take saddle-horses. He came back in about half an hour, with a seat lying in the wagon, and said he had "a mind" to go after his bedding. The Major suggested that he hurry.

"Oh, I'll be round, you bet."

At ten o'clock he returned with a roll of blankets and we inquired after his camp outfit.

"By the great horn spoon – if I didn't forget all about it; just hold on a minute," and he drove off again. In the course of another half hour he returned with a frying-pan and a broken skillet. We inquired for the plates, cups, knives and other articles supposed to be convenient in camp, including the coffee-pot.

"Well, I lent my coffee-pot to a feller who's gone prospectin' and I don't think he'll be back inside of a week – you've got some canned beans and such like – we can use the cans for coffee, and have a new one every day, and I'm out of plates and cups just now, though if I'd a-knowed it I might 'a borrowed some of Jake."

The Major complimented him on this evidence of cleanliness and economy, and then went off and purchased the necessary tinware and cutlery. Joshua packed everything snugly and undertook to adjust the borrowed wagon seat. It was found to be too short.

"Well, I swan! but I'll git a seat if I have to steal it – just hold on a minute."

"I think, Mr. Miles," said the Major, "as it is near noon, you'd better drive home and get your dinner and the seat, and call for us in an hour."

"All right, I'll be round on time – hannup, Woman, get on, Baby – we're not goin' to camp here."

"'There's a land that is fairer than day,   And by faith we can see it afar,For the Father waits over the way,   To prepare us a dwelling place thar,In the sweet by-and-by.'"

"That man and his song match well," said the Major, as Joshua disappeared around the corner and the refrain died away, "'my dukedom to a beggarly denier' he does not get back until too late in the day to start. I wonder if he is not trying to make an extra day in his count?"

At two o'clock he returned, but had not succeeded in obtaining a seat. He stood before the Major with eyes cast down and his forefinger on his chin, evidently in deep communion with himself.

"I wonder, now, where I can get a seat – lemme see – Bowers' got a waggin same as mine, but he started yesterday with a load to Newcastle. Ben Soggs-no! his is broke. Lemme see – Pat McGinnis – no, he's usin' his every day – "

"Suppose you buy one – is there not a wagon shop in the city?" said the Major.

"Well, I swan! I hadn't thought of that – just hold on a minute."

In the course of half an hour he returned with the announcement that he had found a seat, but the man wanted five dollars and a half, "second hand, and that's a dollar'n a half more'n it's worth, and – ."

"Well, get it, we'll stand the dollar and a half."

"All right – just hold on a minute."

It was three o'clock in the afternoon when we started. We were blessed with several friends in Glenwood; they manifested much interest in our preparations for departure, and, as they had a number of resident acquaintances, the sidewalk was well peopled by the time we climbed into the wagon. Looking over that sea of faces, as I remember it now, every one was lighted up with a broad smile, which resolved itself into a laugh, with a hearty good-by and wishes for luck, together with the request that we "leave some of the game on the White," and would "not kill it all."

We smiled in return, and I felt that I should be happy if Mr. Miles' shoulders were not so broad and I had his head in chancery.

"Where do you propose camping to-night, Mr. Miles?" inquired the Major as we reached the bridge across the Grand River.

"Lemme see – it's fifteen miles to Newcastle, pretty good road, we can make that in three hours with the load we've got; then it's about fourteen miles to Rifle Creek, but there's muskeeters. We might stop at Ferguson's, that's about ten miles beyond Newcastle; that's a good place."

"But it will be quite dark by that time."

"Yes, that's a fact, it will be quite dark by that time."

"Well, it is not very pleasant to make camp in the dark."

"No, that's a fact; you're right about that – 'tain't pleasant to make camp in the dark."

"What will you do?"

"Lemme see – we was goin' to stop at Newcastle, wasn't we? that's a good place."

"To camp, do you mean?"

"Yes, good place to camp, or there's a good hotel – we might stop at the hotel over night and take a fresh start in the mornin'."

"How far is it from Newcastle to Meeker?"

"Fifty-five miles, – hannup, Woman! we won't camp here!"

"That's rather a long drive for one day?"

"You're right, it is – but we can make it, with the load we've got – Baby! come out o' that!"

"It would be better not to try."

"You're right – we might camp at Morgan's, t'other side of the Divide, if you want to, that's more'n half way."

"Very well, we'll make Newcastle to-night, Morgan's to-morrow night, and reach Meeker the next day – say at what hour?"

"Oh, anywhere before dark, easy."

"Well, we'll see if you can make it."

"Oh, I'll make it, or break a trace!"

The "pretty good road" between Glenwood and Newcastle had recently been traversed by a herd of cattle and seemed the paradise of loose stones. The Grand was muddy, as it frequently is, from the mining on the Blue River and a recent storm. But there is enough beauty in the scenery to compensate one for the roughness of the road, which Joshua seemed to make more rugged by hitting all the rocks in the way.

When we reached Newcastle, Joshua drove up to the hotel and the landlord put in an appearance.

"Why do you stop here, Mr. Miles?" inquired the Major.

"This is a good place to stop, and I thought you said you'd stop here to-night and take a fresh start in the mornin'?"

"We purpose to have an outing, Mr. Miles, and although the hotel may be excellent, we will go into camp just below here on Elk Creek."

There was a decisiveness about the Major's tones not to be misunderstood. Mr. Miles turned around to get a better view.

"All right, just as you say – hannup, Woman! Baby!"

He kept silent until we reached the creek, when I made a remark about its beauty, then Joshua broke out:

"Fresh from the throne of gloryBright in its crystal stream."

At the first verse the sternness vanished from the Major's face; he could not resist the inclination to laugh; the laugh was contagious; Joshua turned in his seat with a look of inquiry, and halting in his song, joined us.

"How d'you know the name of the creek, Major?"

"I have been here before, Mr. Miles."

"Oh! How long you lived in this country, Major?"

"Thirty years, next spring."

"No? Then you're a mossback sure enough —

'Tell me the old, old story,Of unseen things above'".

"Are you a member of the church, Mr. Miles?"

"Why, I ain't never just professed, exactly – what makes you ask that?"

"Your familiarity with the Gospel hymns."

"Mebbe you don't like 'em – "

"Quite the contrary, Mr. Miles – I not only like them, but your singing."

"Oh, give us a rest, Major – you can't blame me for takin' you for tenderfeet with them knee-breeches."

"What did you pay for this wagon-seat, Mr. Miles?"

"Four dollars, – honest Injun."

"I think we understand each other, Mr. Miles?"

"George Washington and his hatchet – I've felt for some time's if I wanted to kick myself for bein' a fool."

The footing being established, Joshua drew up in a grassy spot near some scrub oaks.

"Just rest easy, gentlemen, till I git this team unhitched, and I'll look after the supper, and put up the tent while you're eatin' it."

"We have only a fly, and will not need that to night."

"That's an offset to the knee-breeches; if I'd only knowed it! You don't care for a tent, even?

'The proper study of mankind is man'".

I suggested to the Major that he try the creek, – perhaps he could get a mess of trout for breakfast. He adopted the suggestion, and when we called him, half an hour afterward, he came with five good-sized trout. Not contented with his success, after supper he went to the mouth of the creek and hooked a pound-and-a-half fish, which he brought in with much gratification.

Joshua seemed endowed with new life; he was out of bed next morning and had breakfast prepared before we were fairly awake; by seven o'clock we were on the road. The coach on its way to Meeker passed us shortly after we had started, and would reach its destination by five o'clock. Joshua admitted that he had more than once made the trip in one day from Glenwood with a light wagon and a good team.

The country between Newcastle and Rifle Creek is blessed with spacious mesas covered with black sage brush. Here and there these acres are under ditch and cultivation, attesting that the uninviting uplands, with the aid of water, can be converted into beautiful farms. We crossed Rifle Creek, up and over a broad mesa to Dry Rifle, and found ourselves in a neighborhood by no means attractive. Sage brush, cactus and greasewood, inhabited by magpies and an occasional raven, do not tend to inspire one with pleasant fancies. The soil is adobe, the gulch contracted and hot, and water to be thought of only; the sage brush had assumed dignity and grown into trees. But the arroyo soon widened and gave us a view of pleasantly wooded low hills, and a cool breeze greeted us. The road was good, and we trundled along in cheerfulness, Joshua aiding at intervals with a lively air from the Gospel Collection, or stimulating us with the assurance that game was plenty "back among them hills." We took a lunch about noon but found the water warm and slightly impregnated with alkali; at Morgan's, where we went into early camp, the water was better.