When Coonskin first visited us it was eleven o'clock. Damfino did not sound eight brays to announce the sun's meridian and the hour for barley, but we donks were considered sober enough to be packed by one o'clock, although in poor condition to travel. It was an effort for me to walk, an impossibility to walk straight. My asinine comrades grunted and groaned from nausea, and Cheese complained that we had been cheated of our mid-day meal.
When we arrived at the Hotel, Pod had just finished his luncheon. Damfino looked into the hotel portal and brayed. Then Pod came out, got into my saddle, and amid great applause from the assembled citizens, piloted our caravan down the broad thoroughfare, out of the lovely poplared streets and hospitable, home-lined avenues, past orchard and field and cottage and windmill, over the road to Garfield Beach, on "that mysterious inland sea," a few miles from the city. Once or twice, as I wabbled across the level and luxuriant valley, I turned my head for "one last, lingering look behind," though I confess I did so timorously, with a feeling intermixed with superstitious foreboding, as I recalled the story of how Lot's wife turned into a pillar of salt. It suggested itself to my reason that if there was one spot on earth indigenous to such a dire transformation it was right in that Salt Lake valley.
There, above and behind us, and across the majestic towers of the Temple, lay Fort Douglas, the gem frontier post of America, its white painted fences and barns glistened like meerschaum in the sunshine, with lovely drives and walks, and smooth-cut foliage, and sleek-broomed lawns of emerald, and fountains (not charged with seidlitz), and blooming flowers. And beyond towered the rugged, snow-crowned summits of the "eternal barrier" which holds the fort below, and guards with loving care the "Land of Promise" and that so-called "modern Zion" at their feet, like a dog guards his bone when threatening elements are wagging his way.
We arrived at Utah's Coney Island, Garfield Beach, late in the middle of the afternoon. This famed resort, named after the martyr President who was the victim of an assassin, is a very pleasant retreat on the lake shore. It is accessible by railroad train, horse and buggy, or donkey engine, although few people accept the latter mode of conveyance, as Pod did, I observed.
Pod stopped to swim and float on Salt Lake. Then we went on and brought up at a delicious fresh-water well, in front of the Spencer Ranch-house, where I led my asinine quartette in the song of the "Old Oaken Bucket." An audience at once gathered. Mr. S—— invited us all to tarry for the night, and when the Prof. accepted, we donks gave three "tigers" and a kick, which struck the ranch dog as being most extraordinary. Landing on the other side of the fence, he yelped himself into the house without further assistance.
[CHAPTER XLVI.]
Typewriting on a donkey
BY PYE POD.
There are braying men in the world, as well as braying asses; for what's loud and senseless talking and swearing any other than braying?—Sir Roger L'Estrange.
We set out early from Spencer ranch, refreshed by a good night's sleep. The weather was mild, but the trail dusty, and the country uninteresting. I found Tooele to be a sociable town that, from appearances, subsisted mainly on sympathy and fruit. Some of its denizens own outlying ranches or fruit-farms, and the remainder, those who don't, have sympathy for those who do. There appears, however, betwixt these two outcropping extremes to be ample means with which to provide the more modest comforts of life—wives and children: for such are known to exist, under any conditions, all over the world.