Fire, burn; and, cauldron, bubble."
A high toboggan slide in one place descended into the pool, and was much used by the young athletes,—the men, not the girls. In the pool a natural fountain of cold water shot high in the air. The swimmers abounded. Those who were unable to swim would cling to a floating ladder. Here in the moonlight the girls—clinging two and three together—circle around in the water, needing only the melody of the Rhine sisters to complete the illusion of one of the most enchanting scenes in the entire Wagner operas.
Rev. Frederick Campbell wrote of this unique place:
"There is but one word to utter at Glenwood Springs—'Wonderful!' If one enjoys life at the most luxurious of hotels, here it is at Hotel Colorado. Built in the Italian style of peach-blow sandstone and light brick, lighted with electricity, a searchlight reaching from one of its towers at night and lighting the train up the valley, a powerful fountain supplied from the mountain stream up the cañon pouring the geyser 170 feet straight in the air, and views, views everywhere."
The hot cave is as wonderful as anything around Sorrento or Amalfi. In fact, all Colorado reminds the traveller of Italian scenery. It has been called the Switzerland of America, but it is far more the Italy. It has the Italian sky, the Italian coloring, and the mysterious and indefinable enchantment of that land of romance and dream. The volcanic phenomena is often startlingly similar to that of Italy. This hot cave at Glenwood Springs is of the same order as those on Capri and the adjacent coasts of Italy. In this cave at Glenwood hot air continually comes up from some unknown region, and it is utilized for curative purposes. The two or three caves have been made into one, a cement floor laid, and marble seats with marble backs put in (the ancient Romans would have found this a Paradise). Here come—not the halt or the blind, but the people who take "the cure." The process is to sit on the marble seat with a linen bag drawn completely over the entire form, with a hole for the head to emerge. Around the neck is placed a towel wrung out of cold water. To see a cave filled with these modern mummies, sitting solemnly, done up in their linen cases, like upholstery covering, is a spectacle. The men go in the morning, the women in the afternoon. One lady obligingly gave the data of her "cure." Twice a week she migrated in negligée to the hot cave, and sat done up in her linen covering, bathing in the hot air at one hundred and twenty degrees or so. Other afternoons were devoted to the hot sulphur water bathing, and what with the various gradations of temperature and the work of the attendants, the cup of Turkish coffee and the siesta, the process consumed the entire afternoon. It is bliss to those who delight in being rolled up like a mummy and sitting still. But if it were chasing a star that danced, if it were riding on a moonbeam, if it were dancing with the daffodils,—if it were anything in all the world that was motion,—then it might have some fairer title to charm. The felicity of lying about in a state of inertia is in the nature of a mystery. And one questions, too, whether the spring of life is not, after all, within rather than without. Let one take care of his mental life and the physical will, very largely at least, keep in spring and tune without elaborate and expensive processes of propping it up. To disport one's self in the pool,—there is a delight. Who wouldn't be a Rhine maiden under the midsummer moon in the heart of the Rocky Mountains?
In nearly all the cañons and caves of this surrounding region are found traces of the prehistoric peoples who inhabited them. Fragments of pottery, in artistic design and painted in bright colors, are numerous; relics similar to those found in the cliff houses are not unfrequently chanced upon in walks and excursions and the stone implements abound. The ethnologist finds a great field for research in all this Glenwood Springs country. There are carriage roads terraced along the base of the mountains where drives from five to twenty miles can be enjoyed in the deep ravines where only a glimpse of blue sky is seen above, and the saunterer finds a new walk every day. The mountains branch off in every direction, and the lofty peaks silhouette themselves against the sky. It is like being whirled up into the air. The sensation is exhilarating beyond words. If people could take "cures" getting up into sublime altitudes like this, where the views are so heavenly that one does not know where earth ends and Paradise begins,—that would be a cure worth the name. Really, it is vitality and exhilaration that one wants, and it is to be found in the air far more than in any other element.
"'Tis life whereof our nerves are scant;
'Tis life, not death, for which we pant,
More life and fuller that I want."
