June 14.—At Lamy, a station named after the good archbishop of Santa Fé, where we halted for a short time whilst the passengers of another train were breakfasting, a citizen came up to me on the platform and exclaimed, as if he were very much impressed by the news he was going to give, "If you look in there, sir, you will see Bob Ingersoll at breakfast!" I asked whether there was anything very remarkable about the fact. "Well, sir," he said, "he is Colonel Ingersoll, of whom you have heard. He is the most remarkable in-fidel in the United States, and I really think he believes what he preaches. A good man to look at, too, and, they say, first-rate in his family." I had a glance at the believer in unbelief, and saw a very presentable-looking person, of fine appearance and good features, busily engaged in making the most of his time at one of the tables in the refreshment-room. He was the observed of all observers, and appeared to like it; and I understood from one of the crowd that he had just returned from inspecting some mining ventures in which he was concerned; for, if he does not believe in the world to come, he is credited with very strong faith in the excellencies of the possession of wealth in the world that is. His lectures are attended by crowded audiences, but, as an astute American observed, "they won't come to much, for, after all, people who do not believe anything can never get up a great enthusiasm. It is in believing something that the populace has faith."
Once more our eyes were rejoiced with the sight of the lovely plains of Las Vegas, wide-spreading fields decked with flowers and dotted with flocks, bordered with ranges of softly contoured mountains, the courses of the water streams indicated by bright vegetation and by growth of trees of many kinds. From Lamy (170 miles) there is a gradual rise to Raton, which we reached at 6.30 in the evening. The appearance of the region we traverse as the train approaches the Raton Pass presents a strong contrast to the desolate country through which we have been passing. From Raton the train was drawn by two engines in front and shoved by one behind, and even then the pace was not very rapid, for the ascent is very sharp. All the more could we enjoy a very glorious sunset, as we slowly ascended the mountain. Then darkness came on rapidly, and we slid down towards La Junta into the night, and were all fast asleep long before we arrived there. In the very early morning, on June 15th, some two hours after midnight, we halted for a time at Pueblo. At 9 o'clock we had to leave our beloved Pullman and change the cars, for we were to take a fresh point of departure, starting from the Union Depôt upon the Denver and Rio Grande narrow-gauge railway for Denver, 119 miles distant, and making an excursion on the way to Manitou, to which we diverged from Colorado Springs: for to go within reach of that famous resort and not to see it would have been a great outrage on all the rules and regulations established for the observance of travellers. Certes narrow-gauge railways need an apology. Their raison d'être is, at the best, that they are better than nothing. "If you won't have us, you can have nothing else." And in such a mountainous region as we were about to visit, the difficulties and expense connected with a broad-gauge line would have been enormous, if indeed it could be constructed at all. The narrow-gauge carriages, with seats to match, with which we were made acquainted for the first time, were of course much less commodious and comfortable than those we had quitted, but far superior to those on the Indian lines of the same gauge, and Indian engineers had been over to take a lesson from the Americans for the use of their carriage-builders. Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fé Company and Denver and Rio Grande Company have been at daggers drawn and pistols cocked—ay, and fired—and at battles waged, in times gone by; and now our friends on the former line were, like ourselves, the guests of the latter, which was represented by several official gentlemen anxious to do the honours to the Duke. The scenery becomes grander and wilder every mile as the special hurries on as well as it can over the sinuous line, which is piercing a mountain region savage and sterile, and climbing by the sides of ravines and creeping upwards in rocky valleys with pine-clad hill-tops and frowning cliffs above. The engineer who designed the line is a Scotchman named McMurtrie—or at least of recent Scotch origin—and he seems to have a special gift for such aspiring work, and a gradient-compelling genius not to be baffled by altitudes. We were mounting towards the snows. Range upon range of whitened summits and hoary ridges came in view, all paying homage to the rugged crown of Pike's Peak, which can be seen from points more than 140 miles away. The fleecy cloudland which seemed to lie before us, as we looked away from Pueblo, was resolving itself into savage alps. And in these passes, which the eye caught for a moment, there might be El Dorados still undiscovered, for around us were cities springing out of the desert. Here the enchanter's wand is the explorer's pick, and no one could say where the precious ore might not be awaiting its touch. We were coming to the Land of Promises. The conversation of our new friends, among whom were some gentlemen of the press, related mostly to mines, and one of them had, as we discovered, a very certain investment at the disposal of the Duke, in the form of a mining-claim, which was worth, at the lowest computation, twice as much as he was willing to take for it. There was no reason to doubt his good faith, but it was felt that it was a kind of fortune which ought not to pass into the hands of strangers, and should be reserved for the people of the country; and I am sure all of the party who had the pleasure of the owner's acquaintance hope that he has "made his pile" out of it, and has more than realised his expectations.
Colorado Springs, forty-five miles from Pueblo, is nearly 6000 feet above the level of the sea. The character of the line to it is best described in the fact that the average grade per mile is 44·14, the maximum curvature 6°. There are "no Springs" here, but the little town, charmingly situated, is a halting-place much frequented in tourist-time by travellers, and reputed to be healthful. There are some pleasant houses visible from the station, at which we descended to take our places in the carriages provided to take us to Manitou Springs, five miles away. Mr. Palmer—if General, I beg his pardon—the President of the Railroad, had important business to attend to, but he was so well represented by Mr. Bell, the Vice-President, that no one regretted his absence, and it cannot be said in his case les absents ont toujours tort. He is reported to have made a very large fortune with much ingenuity, and to have business talents which even in this country excite admiration. Mr. Bell is an Irish gentleman, a member of the medical profession, who has a delightful villa embowered in a garden in the environs of Manitou, where the Duke and his friends found a charming interior and an Irish-American welcome, and discovered that strawberries and cream were almost as good in Colorado as in Covent Garden. A quaint, odd place, Manitou—an American Martigny, with Pike's Peak rising (14,300 feet above the sea) over it in the clear sky, inspiring regret that we could not make the excursion to the summit, which is rewarded, we were told, and I can believe, by one of the grandest views in the world—the usual service of guides, horses, and mules, and calèches—a naturalist's store with skins, minerals, feathers, and stuffed "objects"—detached wooden houses and villas in small plots of garden—a straggling street, and large hotels for invalids. But there was the unusual feature of encampments here and there by the roadside, and notices forbidding the pitching of tents within certain limits which were explained by the fact that the high reputation of the waters and air induces people to come from great distances for the treatment of consumption, and diseases of throat and lungs. Many of them find it cheaper to travel in horse waggons and pitch their canvas dwellings when they wish to make a halt, than to take up their quarters at hotels. Poor people! what pale, hectic cheeks and wasted forms we saw; little groups picnicking by the sides of the rivulets along the roads—each with a gnawing care—anxiety about some dear one's health in the midst of them. Our driver, an intelligent, chatty lad, was full of information, and we had to drive the prescribed road by the wells out to the Ute Pass, a mountain-gorge wild enough—a small Tête Noire—to points to which magniloquent names have been given.
It is not for want of what is called puffing that Americans neglect the resorts of health of their own country, and in the States far and wide the beauties and advantages of Manitou are blazoned forth on the walls of hotels and in guide-books to all who can read. I may confess now that, notwithstanding the magnificent altitude of Pike's Peak, and the eccentric forms of the rocks in the "Garden of the Gods," I was disappointed with Manitou. But then the visit was short, and the day was hot, and the way was long and dusty, and haply it might be that under different circumstances Manitou would deserve much warmer praise. It possesses indeed an abundance of curious springs, said to be full of health-giving properties; and in the course of our drive we halted several times to partake of drinks from various springs, out of one of which bubbled up very good soda-water, precisely like Schweppe's best in taste and appearance. At the large hotel, which put one in mind of the great establishments of the same sort in Switzerland, the water served at table to the guests—a sort of pleasant Apollinaris-tasting beverage—came from a natural fountain.
The "cataract" nearly made us angry, and there was no regret felt when the carriages returned to the hotel, where there was unwonted activity and bustle, as the "Denver Zouaves" had just descended in a friendly razzia on it, and were desolating the hearts and fireside resources of Manitou. The consequences might have been serious, as it turned out, to unoffending strangers. Those who needed it turned into the barber's shop of the hotel to be shaved, and after some delay a coloured man appeared, who began to try his hand on me. Fortunately it was not 'prentice, for it was very unsteady, and I became a little alarmed for my cuticle. "It will be all right, mister," quoth the barber. "I never cut any one. But I'm demoralised, dat's a fact, having to wait on dem Denver Zouaves. Lor a messy on any enemy dey has! My nerve's all gone to pieces wid their wantin' everting at once at the dinner!" The hotel seemed far more clean and comfortable than the caravanserais in the land of William Tell; but our stay was short, for we were put under orders for a sight which has the most inappropriate name that could be invented—a valley in which the most extraordinary-looking columns carved out in a plateau by the agency of water, have been left standing, detached and in groups, to which the visitor enters through a cleft in a barrier of rock passing round the base of a pillar of sandstone as high as a house. The "Garden of the Gods" contains 500 acres, and is surrounded by mountains and cliffs. The sandstone pillars generally taper from the base upwards to a short distance from the tops, which are flattened out or surmounted by slabs or blocks of sandstone of fantastic outline, and they are called by names derived from fancied likenesses to animals, birds, and men. The juxtaposition of the most brilliantly hued, dazzling-red blocks and strata, with masses of the same material of milky whiteness, gives the impression that the scene is the work of human hands; it seems too quaint and artificial for the hand of Nature, to which alone it is due; and the vegetation and the trees are in keeping with the character of the place. A trysting-place for geologists, and their happy hunting-ground, no doubt. But why "the Garden of the Gods," I pray?
From the valley or cup, emerging by another road, the driver took us to a ravine-like recess, almost girt in by high wooded mountains, in which Mr. (General?) Palmer is erecting a mansion of palatial importance—a picturesque site surely—cliffs, forests, and mountain all around, and in view one most singular sandstone pillar, named the Major Domo, 120 feet high and only 30 feet round—a mountain stream brawling through tangled brushwood glades—a garden. But the heat! That must prove a terror by day to the inmates of Glen Eyrie Lodge or Castle—which, by the by, was named, as one of us insisted, from a collection of rubbish on a ledge in the face of one of the cliffs, which was, he maintained, the nest of an eagle. It was now time to return to our train, and we were not sorry to get back to Colorado Springs.
From Colorado Springs to our destination at Denver there were still 75 miles of rail, and the line continued to ascend till we reached Divide (7186 feet), whence there was a gentle descent. There were sixteen stations named on the time-table. We stopped at very few of them, and travelled somewhat too fast to permit our placid enjoyment of the scenery, austere and vast, which indeed deserved more attention than could be given to it by passengers in a very lively train—endless alps on alps, not sheeted with perpetual white, but rather flecked with snowfields, which contrasted finely with the sombre pine-forests, and the rich hues of the rocks, touched by the rays of the setting sun, that, ere it slid behind the mountains, cast a rose-coloured mantle on their summit. The evidences of a bustling city were not wanting in the approaches to the capital of Colorado. There were tall chimneys vomiting out smoke in the distance, and near at hand trains of waggons were toiling over the dusty plain—still 5000 feet above the sea-level—fast trotters and people on horseback, beer-gardens, factories of all kinds, brick-kilns, and then a fringe of log houses and wooden shanties, before the train stopped at the imposing and substantial depot.
It was a quarter-past eight, nearly dark, when we reached Denver, and glad were we to get into the hall of the Windsor Hotel, which was crowded with a mixed multitude—miners, and speculators, and traders, and some travellers like ourselves—a very busy scene indeed. In the hotel were all human comforts nearly; hot and cold baths, and good rooms, and more appliances of civilised existence, for those who could pay for them, than could be found in many hostelries of approved reputation in venerable towns at home; moreover, exuberant offers of help and information. One goes to bed laden with obligations and heavy with the sense of favours which can never be repaid. There was now a soupçon of frost in the air, and notwithstanding the heat which we had endured the greater part of the day, fires were not ungrateful; and as we peered out of our windows over the roofs of the wide-spread houses of the town, we could see the snow on the lofty ranges of hills, watered by the South Platte River and Cherry Creek, which surround the cup in which Denver has been built in obedience to the impulses of the increasing population, which now numbers, I believe, 38,000 souls. There was a bright glare from the gas-lighted streets, sounds of music, and a tumult of life in the town which would have been creditable to an ancient metropolis. In the morning from the hotel windows appeared a beautiful and widespread panorama of the hills we had seen the evening before, peak above peak, none very densely covered perhaps, or presenting continuous snowfields, but extending in billowy sweeps far away to the horizon, all capped with snow, now bathed in a flood of fervent sunshine, the snow lighted up by the peculiar crimson tints common in Alpine regions. There were duties in the way of sight-seeing and exploration of no ordinary nature to be done. First there were interviews and receptions, and the inevitable drive through the place as soon as the ordeal of breakfast was over; and ordeal in some sort it was for the strangers to file in to the public room and take their places at their table, aware that the morning papers had subjected them to exhaustive criticism, which was being verified by those around us. The morning papers too had given some topics for reflection, indications that in the newly created capital of Colorado desperate men, overtaken by the march of law and order, had refused to accept service, and were vindicating their rights as wild western outcasts to take or part with life as of yore, in reckless encounters and deliberate assassinations. There were, perhaps, at that moment some hundreds, if not thousands, out of the population of 37,000 or 38,000 of the city, who belonged to the adventurous classes—sporting-men, betting-men, ring-men, bar-keepers, hell-proprietors, and their satellites, and the scum of the saloons attracted from the great cities of the States for hundreds of miles, by the prey which miners with belts full of gold, half mad with drink, and always fond of excitement, frequently are; and if to these be added the dissolute loafers and broken-down mining speculators, the strength of the army arrayed against the law may be estimated; and the wonder is that among a population armed to the teeth there are not more cases of such violent deeds as we were reading of at breakfast. To the stranger there was no evidence of the existence of these disturbing elements, unless the bearded and booted men with speculation in their eyes, in the hotel passages and halls, belonged to the dangerous, as they certainly did to the mining, classes. As to the resources of the city, although for rapidity of growth its wonders may be eclipsed by those of Leadville, Denver claims a very high place in the catalogue of these marvellous fungi of civilisation, of which the Western States present almost unique examples. There is everything that any one can want to be had for money in the place, and much more than most people need. Paris fashions and millinery are in vogue. There are fine shops, handsome churches, a theatre, breweries, factories, banks, insurance offices.
The principal street exhibits pretty young people, who would have no occasion to fear comparison with the beau monde in Eastern or European capitals. The thoroughfares are crowded with vehicles, and spruce carriages and well turned-out horses may be seen in the favourite drive, that has been made over an indifferent road to the base of the Rocky Mountains, which appear to be close at hand, though they are thirteen miles away. But here and there in the well-dressed crowd may be seen a Bohemian pur sang, or a miner in his every day clothes, bent on a rig out and a good time of it. The streets, unpaved, dusty, and rugged, are very wide, and bordered with trees, and the houses generally are built of good red brick instead of wood; and there are runnels of water like those one sees in Pretoria and other Dutch towns in South Africa. The roads about the city leave much to be desired; but Rome was not built in a day.
There are many ready-made clothing establishments in the main streets, and there is a heavy trade in tinned provisions. Through the Western States, as in South Africa, the débris of provision-tins constitutes a certain and considerable addition to the objects to be seen in the vicinity of every house, and to the mounds of rubbish in the street of every village. How indeed could the first-comers in such regions keep body and soul together without the supplies in such a portable form of the first necessaries of life? Having once run up a town in these remote wastes, the inhabitants are still compelled to make a liberal use of the same sort of food, and mines of tinned iron gradually accumulate around them.