Learn ye the secret,—
Taste ye the sweetness.
The visitor to Poncho Springs is pretty sure to get into hot water, and, strange to say, the visitor is pretty sure to like it. There are several reasons for this peculiarity, and among the most important is this, that like the wind to the shorn lamb, the water is tempered. It needs to be tempered, indeed, for when one literally gets into hot water, one does not like to have its warmth so emphatic as to make a veal stew of the first leg that is thrust into it. Hot springs whose temperature makes any well-regulated thermometer’s blood boil and sends the mercury up to 180° in the shade certainly needs tempering. When properly moderated, however, one cannot fail to enjoy a bath in the soda impregnated waters of the Poncho springs.
The village, to which the springs have given their name, is snugly tucked away in a niche in the Arkansas valley, at the mouth of Poncho pass. The waters of the south fork of the Arkansas river, clear as crystal, and flowing with a foam-flecked current, race rapidly past the town. Along the river’s course the cottonwoods crowd, and to their branches, beginning to grow bare, still cling a few trembling yellow leaves. Beyond the river and to the south and west rise the hills, their sides and summits covered with dark phalanxes of pines. Turning one’s back upon the town and looking toward the north and west, one sees the snow-crowned summit of the Collegiate range, with all the differences between Princeton and Harvard and Yale entirely eliminated by that distance which ever adds enchantment to the view. Closer at hand, and towering grandly into the sky, a tremendous watch-tower in the west, stands Shavano, while lesser peaks and nameless pinnacles cluster and crowd around. Great plains, broken by buttes, stretch away to the northward, but mountains and foothills circle round to the east and south and west.
APPROACH TO THE BLACK CAÑON.
In this sheltered nook lies the picturesque village of Poncho Springs, and hither do the invalids and tourists flock during the warm half of the year to drink the medicinal waters and to bathe in the healing springs. I strolled through the main street of the town, along which are built substantial frame shops and hotels, and observed evidences of stability upon every side. Poncho Springs is not the result of a temporary craze, nor is it a railway terminus town to be torn down and shipped forward as the road advances. There is a good agricultural country around the village, and the Springs will be a source of permanent prosperity. One of the most picturesque features of this picturesque town is a residence which my traveling companions called “a symphony in logs.” The house is to the right of the main street and is built of hewn logs, and with gables filled in with ornamental work, with painted roof and fanciful porticos, presents a peculiarly pleasing appearance.