LETTER No. X.
Start for Chicago—"The Michigan Central"—Arrival at Chicago—Still no letter from Frank—Start for St. Paul—St. Paul and Minneapolis—Commodore Kitson's stables—Falls of St. Anthony—"The Granary of the World"—Falls of Minnehaha—Telegram to Frank.
St. Paul, Minnesota, Oct., 1885.
On the morning of our start for the West we were aroused before five o'clock to catch a train which did not reach our station till 8.30.
The line over which we travelled to Chicago was "The Michigan Central," which runs along the north side of Lake Erie to Windsor; at this point the train is carried bodily across the Detroit river to Detroit on an enormous barge built for the purpose; from thence we proceed to Chicago. Nothing befell us by the way, and I have only to remark about the railway that the carriages were very comfortable, or rather would have been so but for the stifling extent to which they were heated. The dining-car is well managed, and the food excellent. We reached Chicago at ten o'clock the same night, after a long, dusty, and very hot journey, through not particularly interesting scenery.
We have now got a thousand miles on our way to look after the young ranchero, but where is he? Why does he not write? I was growing anxious, for up to this time I had not received a line, and no letter awaited me here. I telegraphed to him, but no reply came. I wrote requesting that a telegram might meet me at St. Paul, over four hundred miles farther on our route.
We were most hospitably entertained by our friends, and after hurriedly driving round the points of interest in Chicago, we made another departure, still for the Far West. Here we take the Chicago and North Western Railroad for St. Paul. This iron road claims to be "the best and most perfectly equipped railway in the world;" its luxuriantly furnished drawing-room coaches are marvels of beauty and comfort, and the dining-cars are superb; the meals and attendance are equal to what one might expect to find in any first-class hotel, and I can bear most willing testimony to the civility we met with from all the officials, from the chief passenger manager down to the road attendants.
We left Chicago at 9.55 p.m., and we reached St. Paul at 2.25 p.m. next day, a distance of 409 miles.
As regards time, I may mention that American railway companies deal very arbitrarily with the sun.[[3]] At Niagara he is bidden to stand still in the heavens for one hour, and is called Eastern time. Then he makes a sudden jump to Mandan, 476 miles west of St. Paul; over this space, viz., one hour, he is called Central time; then from Mandan to Heron (1,429 miles west of St. Paul), he makes another leap and is called Mountain time. From Heron to Portland on the Pacific he again recedes an hour, and is called Pacific time. This hop, skip, and jump across the American continent, in lieu of his usual steady mode of progression, is of course a very convenient arrangement for railways, and it appears to be universally accepted. I suppose he makes the same hourly jumps on the same longitudinal lines throughout the continent. It will thus be seen that the sun rises and sets four hours later at Portland than at New York.
[3]. See Appendix (page [214]) for Time Diagram.
St. Paul, the capital of Minnesota, is a very flourishing and beautiful city built on a series of terraces on the left or eastern bank of the great "Father of Waters," over which it commands magnificent views. The streets are paved with pine-logs, over which one travels in comfort that contrasts most favourably with the rough and clumsy paving-stones of New York. Minneapolis is situated ten miles further west, on the right bank of the Mississippi. In 1860 the combined population of the two cities was 16,000—to-day it exceeds 250,000. They are rapidly approaching each other, and the time is looked forward to when they will form one great metropolitan city. Within the last three years they have doubled their population. They are now called "The Twin Cities," though their commercial interests are not identical, and there is considerable rivalry between the two cities.
ST. PAUL.
We were driven out by a friend of M.'s, whom we met at the hotel, to a place called Midway Park, where Commodore Kitson keeps his celebrated trotters. Here we were shown the fastest trotters and pacers in the world. "Johnston," the "King of the Turf," was trotted out for our inspection. I am no judge of horseflesh, though I tried to look as knowing as I possibly could. We were told that in pacing—which I think means trotting by advancing the two right legs together and then the two left legs, like the celebrated animal in Miss Thompson's "Roll Call"—he is the fastest horse in the world; to me, who am uninitiated, his trot looked like an awkward shamble; but he paces a mile in 2 min. 6¼ sec. Our attention was drawn to the large bumps on his forehead—a proof, his trainer said, of very unusual intellect. We were also shown "Little Brown Jug," "Fanny Witherspoon," and "Minnie R.," all well-known names in the sporting world. "Minnie R." it appears paced a mile in 2 min. 3½ sec. with "Firebrand" trotting alongside; this I presume is a great help.
These stables are admirably arranged. Each animal lives in a sort of little drawing-room, decorated with flags, pictures, and records of deeds accomplished. I much regretted my extreme ignorance with respect to these worldwide wonders, but I was careful not to betray it. There were many other horses pointed out to us, but I forget their names. I was told they were not to be matched in the wide world, and not one of them was worth less than 20,000 dollars—probably there was a little vain boasting in this. The same day I cut the following from a St. Paul paper:—
"The death of George Wilkes, the editor (of 'The Spirit of the Times'), and 'Goldsmith Maid,' the trotter, on the same day, may not be a very singular thing, after all, but a St. Paul horseman remarked yesterday that it was 'a queer coincidence that two such old and well-known sports should fly the track on the home stretch together.'"
I rather think the "Goldsmith Maid" had been a thorn in the side of the sanguine head-boss of the Kitson stables. I knew poor Wilkes well many years ago, not however in his capacity as sportsman, but as author of a work on Shakespeare, the main object of which, if my memory serves me, was to prove that the Swan of Avon was a "bloated aristocrat!"
We had not time to stay at Minneapolis, and could only catch a slight glimpse of its magnificent bridges and corn elevators as our train swept by.
Here, somewhere in the immediate neighbourhood of Minneapolis, are the celebrated Falls of St. Anthony, and also those of Minnehaha, which we would gladly have gone to see had time permitted. We were told, however, that their charms are not less practical than poetic.
The practical charms of Minneapolis, St. Anthony's Falls, and the surrounding country, are demonstrated in the following cutting from "Forest and Stream":—
"The Granary of the World.
"So it has been called, this northern land of lakes and forests and broad prairies. And the appellation is not altogether fanciful. Visit Minneapolis and inspect its flouring mills, inquire as to their number and the capacity of each, and you will find that the annual product of flour from this source is enough to supply the world with bread—for a while at least. These mills can turn out thirty thousand barrels of flour per day, when running on full time, and at this rate their product for a year would supply one-quarter of the population of the United States with the bread which they annually consume. It may be taken for granted that these mills have not been established here without some good reason. The great water-power of the Falls of St. Anthony is usually alleged as the cause of the growth of this tremendous industry, but that alone would not be enough to have brought it into existence and to have raised it to its present proportions. The true cause is that the whole vast country from the Mississippi to the Rocky Mountains, all through Minnesota, Dakota, and Montana, is a wheat-producing country, all of the product of which is tributary to the city where these mills are located."
And was it not at the wonderful "Falls of Minnehaha" near by—
"That my Hiawatha halted
In the land of the Dacotahs?
Was it not to see the maiden,
See the face of Laughing Water
Peeping from behind the curtain;
Hear the rustling of her garments
From behind the waving curtain,
As one sees the Minnehaha
Gleaming, glancing through the branches—
As one hears the Laughing Water
From behind its screen of branches?"
We had now to travel by the Northern Pacific Railroad for 1,200 miles. Before beginning this long journey I was anxious to hear something of Frank, for no telegram or letter had even yet reached me. I am indebted to the general passenger manager at St. Paul, Mr. Chas. S. Fee, for his great courtesy in sending the following telegram, free of cost to me, to his own agent at Bozeman:—
FALLS OF MINNEHAHA.
"Mr. ——, of London, desires that his son, Frank M., whose post-office is Bozeman, shall meet him in Livingston next Wednesday, on arrival of number one. He desires that he shall come equipped for a five days' trip in the Park. Drop this telegram in the post-office at once.—C. S. F."
Livingston is the station about twenty-five miles east of Bozeman, where we branch off southward for the Yellowstone National Park; and I thought surely this would stir the boy up, if alive and well. I need hardly say that my anxiety was increasing. My feverish desire now is to get on to Livingston, as quickly as possible, and my next letter will, I hope, be dated from Frank's abode.
