Traveling along the shores of Yellowstone Lake for a distance of something more than thirty miles, we came to Lake Hotel, and beyond that the cliffs, which, however, are scarcely deserving of notice when brought into comparison with the Columnar Cliffs of the Yellowstone Cañon, soon to be described. Continuing our circuit of the park, we followed the main road, running along Yellowstone River, past Mud Geyser and Sulphur Mountain, until we found accommodations at Cañon Hotel, the center of another district of wonders, where we tarried for three days, to employ our energies in taking views of the extraordinarily grand and awfully imposing natural objects which cluster hereabout in the Cañon of the Yellowstone.
GENERAL VIEW OF THE NORRIS BASIN GEYSERS.—This beautiful photograph will give a good idea of the vast number of geysers in this locality, all of which emit boiling water and mud. Special attention is called to the accuracy and beauty of this superb photograph. Not only does it show the steam and water of the geysers as naturally as they would appear in reality, but all the other minutiæ of the scene are perfect, even to the shadow of the trees on the roadway in the foreground.
CRYSTAL CASCADE, 129 FEET HIGH.
A short distance from the hotel is Mount Washington, whose massive head is raised to a height of 10,500 feet above the sea; but so gradually sloping are its sides that an easy roadway has been made to the summit, which we ascended and from that lofty peak surveyed the vast landscape that was in the field of vision; and what a glorious panorama was there presented! We were indeed upon the topmost ridge of the Great Continental Divide, with the whole world apparently at our feet. Towards the far west and the distant south, as the range makes a sharp curve, were the high and snow-crested peaks of the Rocky Mountains, among which we readily distinguished the majestic Tetons, upon which the sacred fires lighted by very ancient tribes of Indians are said to be still burning. To the northwest are the Madison and Gallatin Mountains, dropping gracefully towards the east until they form what appears to be the western walls of Yellowstone Valley, speckled with its hundreds of steam-vomiting springs. The mountainous aspect of the western view has its counterpart in the tumultuous landscape which greets us on the east, for the horizon is broken, and the blue sky pierced by the Shoshone Range, which we follow towards the north as far as Emigrant Peak, as it thrusts its brazen front out of the Snowy Range. Still further west we perceive the outlines of the Stinking and Big Horn River Valleys, running in a northwesterly direction, past Fort Custer and the tragic Custer battle-field, until they merge into the Yellowstone Valley, two hundred miles from the park. In the clear depths of the far southwest we perceive a glitter in the tenuous atmosphere, which our glasses discover to us to be caused by snow on the Wind River Mountain peaks reflecting the brilliant sunlight. This magnificent range, that leaps out of the plains of Wyoming, and after running one hundred miles disappears again in the prairie, attains such a lofty altitude that the Wind River Shoshone tribe regard it as the crest of the world. And they have a legend, borrowed from the Blackfeet, that only one warrior ever reached the summits, from which he was permitted to look directly into the happy hunting grounds and survey all the entrancing beauties of that delectable land of happy spirits. But if the distant prospect is pleasing, how much more delightful is the wonder valley that lies at our feet! Looking down from our exceeding high eminence, we behold with amazement the Grand Cañon of the Yellowstone, a gigantic gash in the mountains twenty miles in length, and watch the play of enormous waterfalls that swell the mighty chorus of nature.
