While we were codifying our impressions of Denver, the workmen at the shops had been busy. We were busy, too, in other than literary ways, and badgered our new acquaintances at the railway offices at all sorts of times and with every manner of want. The butcher and baker were harassed, and jolly old Salomon, the grocer, came in for his share of the nuisance. But it didn’t last long, for one afternoon, just three days from the birth of the happy thought, we were in our special train and rushing away to the South.
Not till then did this haphazard crowd—for we had enlisted three gentlemen into our company—inquire seriously whither we were going. What did it matter? We were wild with joy because of going at all. Had we not bed and provender with us? Why could we not go on always? have it said of us when living, Going, going, and written over us when dead—Gone!
I have mentioned three companions besides the Madame. At least two of the gentlemen you would recognize at once, were I to give you their names. The Artist is famed on both sides of the Atlantic for the masterly productions of his brush. He is a wide traveler and an enthusiast over mountain scenery. The Photographer is likewise a genius, and literally a compendium of scientific knowledge and exploration. Connected for many years with the Geological Surveys of this region, his practical experience renders him an especially valuable coadjutor. The Musician is young in years, with the scroll of fame before him. But he comes of good stock, and faith is strong. And there is still another, our Amos, of sable hue, who has our fortunes, to a large extent, in his keeping, for does he not preside over our commissary? We shall know him better by and by.
Our train consisted of three cars; and when we had passed the great works at Burnham, we resolved ourselves into an investigating committee and started on a tour of inspection. We found our quarters exceedingly well-arranged and comfortable, although in some confusion from the hasty manner in which our loose supplies had been tumbled in. So the committee postponed its report.
“How smoothly we bowl along!” remarked the Musician.
“And in what superb condition are the roadbed and track,” added the Photographer.
Yet so gentle and noiseless was the motion that it required the testimony of the speed-indicator to convince us that we were making thirty-five miles per hour. We had passed the huge Exposition building at our left, flitted by the picturesque village of Littleton, with its neat stone depot and white flouring-mills, and were approaching Acequia (which you must pronounce A-sáy-ke-a) along a shelving embankment overlooking the Platte. Away to the west and across the valley, we could discern a yellow band, which the Photographer explained was the new canal under construction by an English company, and which was intended to convey the water of the Platte, from a point far up its cañon, to Denver. The canal or ditch here emerges from the mountains and bears away to the southward for some distance, until it nears Plum Creek, crossing which, by means of an aqueduct, it turns sharply to the northward, and apparently climbs the higher table-lands in the direction of Denver. As observed from the car window the anomaly seems indisputable, the deception of course being attributable to the ascending grade of the railway. This is one of several cases in the State which will be pointed out, by old-timers to new-comers, as veritable instances where water runs up hill.
The valleys of Plum Creek and its branches are of good width, and hollowed out of the modern deposits so as to form beautiful and fertile lands, while on each side a terrace extends down from the mountains, like a lawn. Following up the main valley we reach Castle Rock, with its immense hay ranches and fortress-butte, and beyond is Larkspur, named after one of the most striking of the plains birds. Thence the run is through a section of billowy plains or depressed foot-hills, up a steady ninety-feet grade to the Divide, in whose vicinity we encounter a succession of high buttes and mesas, the lower portions being composed of sandstone, while the tops are of igneous rock or lava. These constantly suggest artificial forms of towers, castles and fortifications, in some places rising nearly a thousand feet above the railway. Not infrequently the cliffs are so regularly disposed that it is hard to believe them merely natural formations. The entire scenery of this great ridge, and extending far out into the plains, is of an unique and interesting character. Near the summit there are remarkable evidences of its having been the coast-line of an ancient sea. The streams which rise on the northern slope of this watershed find their way into the Platte, while those on the southern declivity flow into the Arkansas. The Divide has a good covering of pines, often arranged by nature with park-like symmetry, and forming a charming contrast with the bare but beautifully colored cliffs. This region has been a chief source of Denver’s lumber supply, and the timber tract is estimated to contain about 70,000 acres.