Chapter C: FARM, July 30th

We found the most lovely batch of letters, almost worth being away from home for ten days, on our arrival here at 12 o'clock P.M. on Tuesday, which completely revived our drooping spirits; we were feeling rather limp and tired after a long day in Winnipeg, and losing our way across the prairie coming home. It was very dark, and the only guide we had was when the vivid flashes of lightning reflected the farm-buildings; as it was, we drove through the big marsh, the mosquitoes nearly eating us up; and A---- so worried by them that he couldn't think of the trail, and trusted to the horses finding their way. The joy of coming upon our own fence is better imagined than described. I pictured to myself that we should be like one of our labourers, who, having gone into town just before we started up west, lost his way coming out, unharnessed his horses and picketed them, and sat down quietly, waiting for daylight before he ventured on. It is marvellous that anyone finds their way on the prairie. There are numberless trails made during the hay-harvest, which may mislead; and in a country which has been surveyed, some time back, the section-posts have almost entirely disappeared, the cattle either knocking them down or they having been struck by lightning.

We found our bedroom very full of mosquitoes, so that our sleep was much disturbed, in fact we never slept properly till after the sun rose; but our letters cheered us up and were far more refreshing than ten hours' sleep.

The netting over our windows had got torn from the tacks, so that the mosquitoes had come in by shoals just to show how they appreciated the attention of having things made easy for them. Otherwise, we are not generally much bothered with them in the house, netting being over every door and window.

The cat sometimes thwarts our protection by jumping through them in the morning, and no thumpings seem to impress her with respect for the said net.

We are told the mosquitoes will be gone in a fortnight; certainly the big yellow ones have lived their time and are, not so plentiful, but they have been succeeded by a small black species which is quite as venomous, and not so easy to kill.

We went to Church yesterday at Headingley: quite a red letter day. It was only the second time we have been able to manage it in the ten weeks we have been here; and though it was very hot in Church we were ashamed to take our gloves off, on account of the scars.

The Church is quite a nice little building, and the service delightful after so many weeks of not hearing it. We had to take our horse out, tie it to the churchyard paling, and put the dog, in the buggy to take care of our goods and chattels.

We are getting quite low at the thoughts of leaving this in ten days' time; being rather like cats, attached to any place where one has heaps of occupation, and where one is kindly treated and well fed, however ugly that place may be.

We have been very busy haymaking since we got home, and a grand stack is in the course of erection nearly opposite the dining-room window. You never saw anything so astonishing as the way the oats, potatoes, etc., have shot up in our absence. Even the puppy, which we left a fluffy ball, seems to have grown inches. Then, all my chickens are hatched, and are an endless pleasure and anxiety. I am supposed to spend hours over them.

We have received four sheets of official paper from Mr. W----, full, of directions about our journey to Colorado, describing his home, etc., even to the nickel-plated tap we shall find in his kitchen, which is to supply us with an unlimited amount of water. He tells us we need bring nothing but a saddle and a toothbrush,--he will find all the rest; and that we are to make it a note that it is one of the strictest rules of mining camps that guests are never allowed to pay for anything. As we hope he is making a fortune by his mines, we shall not have so much compunction of accepting these terms. We are to sight-see, climb I mountains, go into the mines, fish for trout, and do nothing the live-long day but amuse ourselves.

I am afraid A---- will miss us terribly, dear old soul! He is very fond of having us here, and is always bemoaning our departure. I think it will make a great difference to him and to his humdrum hard-working life, as we are always cheery and have never had a difficulty or annoyance of any sort.

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August 6th.

We are rejoicing now that we have settled to go to the Rocky Mountains, as the hot weather we speculated on avoiding has come in with a rush, and for a whole week the thermometer has been at 80 to 85 degrees. One morning before a thunder-storm, when it fell forty degrees in a few hours, it was up to 90 degrees. We have had some rain, but not the heavy if storms we have seen wandering round which generally follow the course of the Assiniboine--a relief to our minds, as our hay is still out.

It has been cut nearly all round the property outside the fence, in spite of the risk one runs of having it subsequently claimed by the owner of the section, who is generally a half-breed, a loss only to be avoided by leading it home at once, which we are doing.

This has happened to our neighbour, with whom, I am afraid, we do not sympathise very keenly, as he had taken up the marsh which our men cut last year, and had the full intention of doing again this year, so they looked upon it in the light of their special property.

We have only two waggons working here, as nearly all the men and horses are gone over to Boyd's; and as our hay is a mile and a half away, we don't get much more than five loads a day, so that the stack does not grow very fast.

Our excitement this week has been a cricket match with Boyle's Farm; four of their men we challenged. It really was too amusing. They had a bat and ball, stumps, but no bales, and played on the prairie, which was so fearfully rough that it was almost dangerous, the ball shot in such various directions after hitting the tufts of grass. Everybody fielded, but a ball going into the wheat-field behind the wickets was not counted as a lost ball. The total score of the two innings was only ten, and in one our opponents went out without a single run; so you may fancy the howls of either applause or derision at every ball.

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August 17th.

The Farm with all its toils and pleasures is a thing of the past; we were both very low when we turned our backs upon it and its inhabitants just a week ago. We have been in such robust health the whole of our three months, hardly a headache or finger-ache. Our maid-of-all-work life has suited us, and we have acquired such an immense deal of practical knowledge that for those reasons alone, we might be gratified and pleased we came. Since then we have been staying with Mike in Minnesota, where we were either riding or driving (anything to do with horses) all day long. Driving four miles, jumping the horses over a pole, taking them down to water, having a mule race (which was truly amusing as the course was just in front of the house and several bolted home), and driving, a gang plough, were a few of the "diversions" found for us. Our host was most kind and anxious to make us comfortable; he worked heaven and earth to get his house ready, the contractors having taken so much more time than they said; anyhow, he turned the carpenters out of the house the day previous to our arrival, carried in the furniture, nailed up mosquito blinds, and did many things himself, so that everything should be in spick and span order.

As these men, Mike having two partners, are farming thirteen thousand acres, they are on a much larger scale as regards buildings, numbers of horses, etc., to anything we have seen before. Their living-houses are about double the size of C---- Farm; they have also huge stables, which A---- fancies will be cold in winter, but have a most imposing appearance, as have also their implement house, sheds, etc. The land seemed much the same as ours, a rich black loam, but very much wetter, marshes everywhere. They have broken two thousand acres since the beginning of June, and were busy, whilst we were there, cutting hay, Mike hoping he had already got over five hundred ton up!

We drove one day to see a neighbouring farm which is said to be the "boss" one in all the country, belonging to a man who has been out five years. He was just starting to cut his two square miles of wheat, and we watched the seven self-binding machines with great interest. They seem as light as a reaper, and the machinery comparatively not intricate.

We were driven through some standing corn, which was rather agonizing to our British ideas, but he thought nothing of it. The straw was four and a half feet high, and he hopes to get forty-two bushels to the acre. His farm being on the Snake River, and having many creeks running through as drainage, is a great advantage. His vats were pronounced no better, if so good, as ours at C---- Farm.

We remained at Warren a day longer than we had intended, as we got to the station just in time to see our train move off. We accused Mike's Irish groom, who is quite a character, of bringing round the carriage too late on purpose. If he did, I think all the party forgave him; we were very happy, it gave us another night of A----'s society. Mike was low at our going. Poor man! one cannot be much surprised at his liking to keep us, as, besides the fascinations of ladies' society, he has no neighbours whatsoever, and, excepting the two men he has in the house, there is not a gentleman nearer than Winnipeg. He offered me seventy-two dollars a month to be his housekeeper. E---- was to have two dollars a week as parlour-maid, which she considers an insult; or she might have seventy-five cents a day if she would drive the ploughs.

Servants and labourers get higher wages there than in Manitoba, all the men were averaging thirty-five to forty dollars a month and their keep. They were all Swedes and Germans, of whom there is an enormous colony in the state.

We are now trying to spend our day at Council Bluff, a large junction of the Grand Pacific Railway, having come in here at 8 o'clock this morning, and our train to Denver not leaving till 7 o'clock this evening. The hotel is right on the station. The weather is so hot, that as yesterday, at St. Paul's, where we also had to spend a whole day, we have never summoned up courage to go beyond the door. It was suggested we might take the tram and go up into the City; but E---- has a notion that one city is much like another, particularly on a hot day.

It is curious how Americans live in hotels; there are several families in this, and if my letter is not very intelligible you must forgive me, as I am writing in the grand corridor to try and catch the slight draughts of air blowing through, at the same time that half a dozen children are playing up and down.

The scenery yesterday from St. Paul's all along the banks of the Missouri was very pretty. We both of us sat outside the Pullman as long as daylight lasted, feasting our eyes oh the water, trees, etc. The height and luxuriance of the latter seemed quite incomprehensible after the total absence of forest scenery for so many months. It is pretty round here; and by the time we get to the Rocky Mountains we shall have got beyond the stage of thinking a hillock a mountain, and fairish-sized trees not so wonderful after all; but at the present moment we are in that pleasing state, ready to admire anything and everything. We hope to get to Denver on Saturday night, and rest there Sunday and part of Monday, and we also hope to get to Church there. Mike offered to drive us into Warren last Sunday; but as the service was a Swedish Presbyterian, we didn't think we should be much edified.

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DENVER, August 2lst.

We arrived here Saturday evening, very tired and not at all sorry to exchange the Pullman for a comfortable room and bed, which we had telegraphed for, and therefore not, like so many of our fellow-passengers, obliged to seek shelter elsewhere. The Pullman's are most comfortable, and for a long journey like ours nothing could be so good; but I am glad that in England we don't have either these or the ordinary American car in general use. The publicity is so odious, and one does get bored by the passengers constantly wandering up and down the train, and the boys who pass and repass every ten minutes selling books, newspapers, cigars, candy, and the unripest of fruit, which they are always pressing you to buy; to say nothing of chewing, spitting Americans one has to countenance all day long. The last four-and-twenty hours of our journey have been very tiring. The scenery has been so monotonous; endless long undulating plains like the waves of the sea, covered with grass quite dried up, a few flowers, and a bee-shaped cactus. The heat was very oppressive, a hot sirocco, wind blowing which; obliged us to keep our windows shut on account of the fine alkaline dust. E---- had her window open last night, and awoke this morning to find herself in a layer of ashes.

We skirted the South Platte River most of the time; it was only a bed of shingles, wide and shallow, with not a drop of water in it. These plains, extending for thousands of miles in all directions, are the great "ranching," or cattle-farming districts, formerly the favourite breeding-grounds and pastures of the buffalo, which, alas! have all disappeared. We only saw a few tame ones amongst the herds of cattle; they have been killed in the most ruthless, indiscriminate way for their furs, and will soon be "things of the past."

We wondered much, with the river and every visible stream so dry, how the large herds of cattle and horses were watered; but have since been told that water is so near the surface the herdsmen have no great depth to dig to procure any quantity. We thought we could have made a good pick or two amongst the horses, but we didn't care for long-legged ugly big-horned cattle brutes. Here and there was a herdsman mounted on a small Indian pony with a high Mexican saddle, enormous spurs, and a long lasso, galloping and dexterously turning his animals.

Our train had to pull up several times and whistle loudly to turn the animals off the track, there being, as usual, no rail or protection; but pulling up for them was not half as exciting as on Thursday night, when we stopped repeatedly to turn a man off the train who, not having paid his fare, nor apparently intending to do so, had swung himself in some marvellous way under the cars, hanging on by the break. Whenever we slackened speed he jumped off, walking quite unconcernedly alongside; but the moment we moved on he got on again. We never knew how far he continued his perilous ride, I fancy that even the officials gave up remonstrating; anyhow, as long as daylight lasted and we could watch the men, no efforts on their part seemed to make the smallest impression.

Three hours before getting into Denver we had our first glimpse of the Rockies, and although they were then only in the blue distance we were quite excited about them; and at Greely Station (much impressed on our minds by having read Miss Bird's book just before coming here), we came in full view of Long's Peak,--almost wishing "Mountain Jim" might still be alive to ascend it with us,--and the whole of the gorgeous range; and quite one of the loveliest sights I ever saw was watching two thunder-storms on either side of the Peak break and disperse, whilst the reflections from the sunset-glow lit up the rest of the heavens. The railway and Denver City itself is about thirty miles distant from the mountains, but the atmosphere is so clear that they look as if quite within an easy gallop.

It is difficult to understand why the town has been built so far from the mountains, situated as it is on a sandy, treeless plain. It is growing, like most of the western towns, at a tremendous pace, and we are lodging in a luxurious hotel, our room on the fourth floor numbers 454. We found the avenues of trees lining every street an immense boon this morning in going to church at the cathedral.

The heat, though great, is not so oppressive as either at St. Paul's or Omaha, but then we are at the height of 5,000 feet; and this afternoon the air has been cleared by a thunderstorm preceded by a great sand-storm, which we watched from our windows encircling the town, so thick that mountains and all view was obliterated for the time being.

Denver is a great resort for invalids, chiefly those suffering with asthma.

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August 22.

Before leaving Denver we went to a gunsmith and invested in a fishing-rod and numberless flies, with which we intend to do great execution. We also went to the exhibition, opened a month ago and still unfinished; one of the leading men, to whom we had a letter of introduction, showed us everything. It is chiefly interesting to miners, as the display of minerals from Western America is unrivalled. There seemed, in the specimens, enough gold and silver to make us rich for ever; unfortunately our ignorance on the subject of ore is too great to thoroughly appreciate it.

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OURAY, August 24.

It is not easy to sit down and write after forty-eight hours travelling, as we have been doing since leaving Denver on Monday night at 7 o'clock; but in such scenery and air so exhilarating we do not feel as tired as we expected. You should have seen the omnibus, stage-coach, charridon, or any other name you please to give the lumbering vehicle in which we performed our last twelve hours' drive; it looked truly frightening when it drove up to Cimarron depot, one tent, last night, to pick us up, intended for twenty passengers and any amount of luggage, and swung on great straps. It was wonderfully well horsed, and we changed our teams every ten miles; but only then came at the rate of five miles an hour. We both of us started for our sixty-four miles' drive on the box-seat with the driver, who happened to be an extremely nice man and an experienced whip; in former days he had driven the stage-coaches across from Omaha to San Francisco, a journey of three weeks. But he took up much room on the seat, and every time he had to pull up his horses his left elbow ran into me, until "he guessed my ribs would be pretty-well bruised."

About midnight, when our only other fellow-passenger turned out from the inside of the coach, I entered it, though I expected nearly every moment would be my last, the bumping was so fearful. I managed to get a few winks of sleep towards morning. E---- sat outside all night, finding it very difficult not to drop off the coach from drowsiness. The early hours of the morning, after the moon went down until dawn, were truly wretched, what between the outer darkness, the flickering of our lamps, the unevenness of the road, and the clouds of dust, and one almost began to wonder if the journey was worth so much trouble.

But with daylight we quite altered our opinions; as really I do not think, if you searched the whole world over, you would find anything more beautiful than the Uncompahgre valley and park looked in the morning light.

Mr. W---- met us at 5 o'clock A.M. at the "Hot Springs," so called from the boiling water that gushes out of the ground, and which is said to give the name of "Uncompahgre" to the district, that being the Indian word for hot water. He brought us out hot coffee and food to refresh us, and drove us the last nine miles up the valley. We came slowly, thoroughly enjoying the scenery. On either side of the road are well-cultivated farms. Within two miles of Ouray the park narrows into a magnificent gorge, bounded on each side by precipitous cliffs of red sandstone, covered with pines and quaking aspen, the whole crowned by arid peaks. From this gorge you suddenly come upon the town, situated in an amphitheatre of grand gray, trachyte rocks.

Our house is in Main Street. The ground floor is an office; our four rooms are on the first floor, to which we ascend by a wooden staircase outside.

Every nook and corner is filled with some curiosity or mineral specimen. Our host being a great sportsman, there are various trophies of the chase--a mountain lion, wild sheeps' heads, bears, cranes, even to a stuffed donkey's head; there are also cabinets of fossils, specimens of ore, etc., and great blocks of the same piled on the floor.

Our family consists of our two hosts, Messrs. W---- and B----, two Indian ponies, a mule, two setters, and two prairie dogs, which are reddish-buff marmots. We are only to remain here one night, and, if thoroughly rested after our journey, go up to the log cabin in the Imogene Basin, 3,000 feet higher. We are both looking forward to it immensely. It is right in the heart of the mountains, 10,600 feet, and with no one near us, as all the mines surrounding the cabin belong to a company which had to suspend its works last month for want of funds, so that they are not being worked. The air is glorious, and we feel already perfectly restored to our usual health, though we are warned that strangers cannot walk much at first, the air is so rarefied, that one is soon out of breath. Anyhow the atmosphere has been so clear that it much added to our enjoyment in seeing the ever varying beauties and distant mountain view all along our journey from Denver here.

We unfortunately came through the "Grand Canyon" at night. Had it been clear the porter on the car was to awake us to see it; we could quite picture to ourselves its beauties by the scenery in the Black Canyon we came through yesterday by daylight. The engineering all along the line is marvellous, the way we rose nearly 7,000 feet by a zigzag over the Marshall Pass, or the Great Divide, going down nearly as many feet on the other side and then through these canyons, which are only narrow gorges for a raging torrent to rush through on its headlong career.

Our train was a very narrow gauge with bogie wheels, and we twisted so, in and out of the bends of the river, that the engine often looked as if it might easily come into contact with our carriage which happened to be the last. It is the great advantage of the Pullmans they are always on last to the train when passing through any pretty country, and when there are no other carriages of the same, so that one can sit on the rear platform and see all the scenery.

We entered into conversation with two Germans, and were amused by one of them surreptitiously bringing us two pink trout from his luncheon at the wayside hotel, we having remained in the carriage for our frugal meal; and though we had got to the "Sweets" stage felt hound to begin again, and much enjoyed our fish. The food provided at these wayside inns is generally so bad and dear, a dollar a head charged for sixteen to eighteen dishes, of almost uneatable messes, that we prefer the tinned meats and fruits we have, in our luncheon basket; and for drinks we have beautifully iced water in all the carriages, the ice being replenished at every big station.

The last forty miles of our railroad journey was over a line only opened ten days ago, by which, I am thankful to say, we avoided twelve hours more of the stage-coach and a night in a Colorado inn, which, we are told, is anything but pleasant, there always being many more bed fellows than what one bargains for; and we should not have seen the Black Canyon and its thirteen miles of grandeur and sublimity. The railway track is cut out of the sides of the over-hanging rocks, and in places is built on a bed of stones in the creek itself.

The rocks at times almost seemed to meet overhead, then widened, we crossing and re-crossing the torrent by wooden bridges which shortly are to be replaced by iron ones. The colouring was so beautiful, the chasm being generally in shade with the mountains above standing out in glorious sunshine, covered as they were in many places, even as far down as the water's edge, with pines. Nature is marvellous in its productions, but the ingenuity of man is also wonderful, and we quite came to the conclusion that the scenery of that canyon was worth coming all these thousands of miles to see.

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OURAY, August 27th.

The name of Ouray, given to this town, is from the last chief of the Utes, who, with his tribe, lived to within a couple of years on a reserve down in the Park. The first stake is said to have been struck by white men in 1865, but no cabin was built until 1874, and from that time the town has been growing rapidly, having now about 1,000 inhabitants. In the south-west portion of the basin in which it stands, and where the waters of Canyon Creek flow into those of the Uncompaghre, there are some lovely canyons and picturesque gorges, and here, in places where the hot springs overflow the banks of the main stream, the rocks are covered with maiden-hair and other ferns. These hot springs serve to keep the river unfrozen even in the severest weather.

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MOUNTAIN BAT'S NEST, IMOGENE BASIN,

August 29th.

This is a glorious region, and we send you the enclosed sketch to show our picture of comfort and perfection. I assure you, nightly as we sit down to our evening repast, or later round our wood fire in our "parlour," we congratulate each other, and fancy we would not change places with the highest of the land, the air and life are so intoxicating.

After twenty-four hours in Ouray we came up here, sending the darkie Henry and our luggage on before us in a waggon. We have brought nothing but the bare necessaries of life--all our heavy boxes are gone to Chicago to await our return--being warned to bring as little as possible, on account of the difficulties of transport in the mountains, also of only being allowed 50 lbs. weight on the coach, every extra lb. charged ten cents. We ourselves rode up here, arriving about 6 o'clock, and found poor Henry waiting outside, not having been able to get into the cabin, the door-key being carefully in Mr. W----'s pocket; but as everything is always left in order it didn't take us long to make ourselves comfortable; and as at sunset the cold had been piercing, a fire soon lit was very acceptable.

This cabin is quite unique. It consists of two rooms on each side of the front door, with a tiny passage used as larder, wood-hole, saddle-room, &c.

Our room is our bed and drawing-room combined, which is hung all round with every imaginable skin, wolf, skunks, lynx, &c., stuffed animals and birds, guns and traps, to say nothing of shelves covered with different specimens of ore taken out of the adjoining mines. It was quite creepy, the first night, having to sleep with a bear's head at the foot of our bed, with a stuffed fox just over our head, which has the most awful squint, and is the first object that catches the eye on awaking, and a dried root, the fibres of which so much resemble a man's beard that it looks horridly like a scalp. The hay-mattress on our bed has to be; shaped into grooves for our poor bones to rest comfortably. In the day-time it is covered up with skins, and then is called the "lounge."

Our washing-stand is primitive, a box standing on end, in which our tin bason and cans are concealed, so that we can consider our "parlour" quite correct. Our other room is the kitchen, and fitted up with four bunks against the wall, which Mr. W---- and Henry occupy. We breakfast and dine out of doors, at a table placed just outside the cabin, and on the only bit of flat ground we have near, as we are situated on the slope of a mountain, and a most beautiful stream of water runs about forty feet below us with the clearest and coldest of water. One of our first occupations in the morning is to take the animals down to water, and afterwards to picket them in amongst the long grass, growing in great profusion and height during the short summer on all the foot hills and wherever there is an open space. The first afternoon we were up here we went for a ride round Imogene basin, and were delighted with the wild flowers, which are quite innumerable--columbine, phloxes, blue gentian, dandelions, harebells, vetches, and fifty other species. E---- picked a good many, and hopes to draw them for the benefit of you all at home. The flowers shoot up almost before the snow has melted, and make the most of their short existence which lasts about two months and a half. We tasted the "bear berry," which grows as a bush and has a round brown berry, quite bitter, but, as its name shows, is much appreciated by the bears, who come any distance to get it.

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September 4th.

We are enjoying this mountain life; the weather is all we can desire, and we are in the most robust of health. We live almost entirely out of doors, sketching all the morning, in the afternoons making expeditions either into some of the mines, or over a mountain-pass; and for "tender-feet" the name given to all new-comers, are pronounced to be good mountaineers; but our ponies and mules are so sure-footed and pleasant that we follow any trail, however narrow and uneven, with the greatest confidence.

The scenery everywhere is far beyond our sketching capacities, but we find spoiling many sheets of drawing-paper a never-failing amusement and occupation; and we can sit out anywhere, as neither snakes nor mosquitoes are known in these altitudes. Our darkie's criticism might be discouraging, he saying he cannot understand our wasting so much time on "things not at all like nature," were it not counterbalanced by the praise given us in the "Ouray Times" which paper we sent home to you last week. The balsam pine, which is about the only tree we have, is rather monotonous and sombre- looking, being of a blackish-green; and we have not here, as in the valley around Ouray, the beautiful sandstone and porphyry rocks for background; only never-ending blue distances, brought out so clearly on account of the extraordinary dryness and purity of the atmosphere.

We have been escorting two men to-day over a pass 12,500 feet, part of the way to San Miguel, going as far as the ridge, from whence we had a most glorious view and panorama, as we could see into the valleys and canyons some miles below; Mount Wilson, which unfortunately was shrouded in dark, stormy clouds; a range of mountains in Utah called Sierra la Sal, about 120 miles distant; and a long way into New Mexico.

In returning home we got into clouds, and could hear a thunderstorm raging in the valley below us, for some little time losing our trail, and not sorry when we found it again and were able to descend from higher regions, the cold was so intense; not so surprising, as we found when the mist lifted that snow had fallen on all the surrounding peaks.

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IMOGENE BASIN, September 12th.

Two days' after our expedition to San Miguel we awoke to find ourselves in a "white world," the snow being two inches deep. It is said to be a most unusually early storm, but it was not altogether a surprise: the glass had been falling and storms had been audibly growling all round us. The snow only lasted about twenty-four hours, just long enough for us to realise and admire Imogene in its winter garb, and enable us to try and walk in snow- shoes. We did not attempt either going up or down hill in them, so that our performance was confined to the small space in front of the cabin.

With the exception of this one storm our weather continues lovely; bright, sunshiny, warm days--we do not even require an extra jacket out of doors until after sunset--with a slight frost every night.

Last Monday we started early, taking provisions with us, and spent a long day in Red Mountain Park, sketching the marvellously brilliant scarlet peaks, whilst Mr. W---- shot grouse, of which he got three and a half brace. The grouse are much like ours, only larger, and roost in trees. These parks abound in game. We have been wishing to see a bear; at a safe distance, perhaps, but have never succeeded, though several have been killed since our arrival. Whilst shooting, Mr. W---- came upon the fresh trail of one and its unfinished meal of a gophir not very far from where we lunched; only fancy what a stampede there would have been had the bear appeared. We are always looking out for thin trees round which a bear's claws would overlap, and therefore they could not climb, to take refuge up in case of danger; but they very seldom attack, unless wounded or a she-bear with cubs. In the spring and autumn these parks abound in deer; but in summer they go above timber line to graze on the succulent bunch grasses and to be free from flies. There are also mountain-sheep, coyotes, and foxes, and along the streams several beaver; but we never have seen any animal bigger than a prairie-dog, or smaller than a coney.

Chipmunks and the mountain-rats disturbed our slumbers at night, running about the cabin, and I do not at all think we should like our dormitory were we not watched over during our slumbers by a cat, the most sociable of beasts, who as a rule sleeps between us, and protests loudly if we either of us move or wake him.

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September 7th.

By degrees we are learning something of the mines and miners; also are beginning to know all the packers who daily go up and down the trails, each with a train of ten donkeys carrying the ore from the mines. The men's appearance is of the roughest, but they, one and all, are most civil, both of speech and manner. Women are rare in these districts, the wife of the manager of the Wheel of Fortune Mine being the only one living up here. She has been here two years, and is quite idolized by the miners and trappers, as she has never been known to refuse hospitality to any. We were much amused, whilst going through the Wheel of Fortune tunnels last Saturday, to hear one of the miners ask who we were, and when told with the ready answer, natural to this country, that "we were Duchesses," he wished much to know if that was not something like the Prince of Wales.

We went into a lower shaft whilst two fuses were fired in an upper. The anticipation of the shock was worse than the realisation. Each of us carried a candle, and the concussion blew them all out; but beyond that, the smell of gunpowder, and smoke, we experienced no harm, and as we had matches and the candles were soon relit, we had not to grope our way back in darkness.

We have been into several of the tunnels on the eight well-defined lodes in this basin, also into some in Sneffels; these veins may be all traced through into Red Mountain Valley, which seems to be the volcanic centre of this neighbourhood. The porphyry vein matter or ore-bearing quartz, having decomposed more readily than the trachyte of the mountains which they intersect, in some instances, as in the peak just above our cabin, they have cut deep notches in the summit of the ridges, making the outline very jagged and rugged looking.

The mineral wealth around us is astounding, hundreds of rich mines have been discovered in all the surrounding mountains, and are being discovered now. Three men, whilst at dinner a month ago in Red Mountain Valley, in picking round with a small axe where they were sitting, knocked off a piece of rock which, when analysed, proved to be so valuable a lode, that they have since then sold their claim for 125,000 dollars.

Any man can stake a claim of 1,500 feet on a vein if not previously done; but he has to expend 100 pounds on it in the first five years to enable him to obtain a patent from Government, which secures the property to him for ever.

There must be a certain amount of excitement to miners as to what treasure will be produced after every blast of gunpowder; but oh! how I should hate the life, living underground in these subterranean passages, which are all more or less wet from the water percolating through the rock, and never able to see the sun or the beauties of nature. The wages of the men are enormous, able miners getting four dollars a day; sorters, or the men who break and turn over the stone, three and a half.

Mr. W---- had a hard life when he first came out here in 1877; as he and his partner worked with no other help for four years underground mining, besides having to build their cabin, being their own blacksmiths, assayer, cook, &c., and he declares he enjoyed it immensely, with the exception, perhaps, of the first winter, when, getting in their supplies very late, they had to live on bacon (and that rancid) and flour, but little else.

Stores for the winter have to be brought up in October, as the trails early become impassable, and all outer communication can only be kept up on snow-shoes. The snow averages about seven or eight feet, though in this basin it has been known to be thirty- eight deep, but in the Uncompaghre Valley and down by Ouray it averages only a few inches. Animals are left out to graze there all the winter.

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THE RANCH, UNCOMPAHGRE PARK, September 16. Ten miles below Ouray.

Amidst many tears and regrets, we have torn ourselves away from the cabin, where we could have spent another month or six weeks in perfect contentment; but a storm being predicted, and duck-shooting and fly-fishing being part of our Colorado programme, we accepted the loan of a house on a farm down in the valley, and are installed in it. It wanted a certain amount of pluck, on first seeing our accommodation, to come down. Our house is one room, thirty feet long by about eighteen wide, an open roof with plenty of air-holes, and no partition whatsoever, excepting what we have made by hanging three blankets from a rafter, behind which is our bed (or lounge in day-time), the washing-stand, a box set up longways, and a tin bason, an arm-chair which consists of two pieces of wood, and an old wolfskin, much worn, and a rickety table, at which I am writing now, lighted by a candle stuck into a bottle. On the other side of the blanket-partition is the kitchen stove, big table, store shelves, a pile of saddles, &c. Mr. W---- sleeps in a tent outside; Henry in a waggon: he, poor man, is not at all happy, as he imagines bears and coyotes are nightly intending making their evening meal off his portly form. He is the greatest coward I ever saw, and came in horror confiding to me that he had seen a snake, yards long, which Mr. W---- killed the day following, and it proved to be a small water-snake, hardly ten inches.

Henry affords us a great deal of amusement; he does not at all presume, but, in his quaint way, wishes to tell, and asks so many things, queries which often are almost unanswerable. The day we spent in Ouray on our way down from the cabin here, we much distressed him by not "striking a show" in the street, and not wearing smart clothes which had a "tong," if it were only to show that we consider Mr. W---- a "big bug."

He left his wife in the South eleven years ago, and, in spite of all our protestations and lectures, informs us he is going to marry again, as in the Bible he reads "that it is wrong for man to live alone."

It is a matter of infinite surprise to him how we can remain out of doors with no covering to our heads, he could not stand the rays of the sun as we do; and why our complexions in consequence are not as dark as his is a mystery to him.

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THE RANCH, UNCOMPAGHRE PARK, September 24th.

Although this house does consist of only one room, is situated in a stony field, with not a tree near us, and that we are not having good sport, either trout-fishing or duck-shooting, we should be quite happy and contented were it not for the B flats which abound, the first we have come across, which, Henry assures us, are not from dirt, but grow in the pine-wood. Why are they not, then, in the log cabins which are entirely built of pine? We have not disclosed the fact to Mr. W----, he is so thoroughly enjoying his holiday, as we know that we should be instantly ordered back to Ouray, where he would have to begin his work. Whilst he is out shooting, we make expeditions, exploring over all the foot-hills. One day, after wandering up a beautiful valley, we came upon a Park or "Mesa," and I do not ever remember having seen such a view: miles of grass on which wild cattle and horses were feeding, with clumps of trees artistically dotted here and there, and for background the orange and scarlet tinted foot-hills, pines on higher regions, and a glorious panorama of snow-capped mountains beyond. But for the mountains, one might almost fancy oneself in some English park, and at every turn we felt we ought to come upon an Elizabethan House. There were many tracks of deer, but none were visible. We overtook a man driving a team of ten oxen with lumber, and of him asked our way, as one might very easily lose oneself in these rolling park-like glades, intersected with deep canyons, with no trails or roads, excepting here and there one made by lumberers. In coming down the hill again, close to a large saw-mill, we watched a man breaking in a horse of five years old. He had secured a dozen, all wild, in a corral or fenced enclosure, and had thrown a noose over this one's head. He was trying to draw it up by means of a thick rope to the fence, the rope getting tighter and tighter as the animal backed or tried to gallop round with the other horses. Finally, when the poor brute was almost choked, and perspiration was streaming down him, he allowed the man to go up to him, who very dexterously and quickly slipped a halter over its head. The horse then was tied up to the post, the others turned out, and the man intended keeping him there until the following morning without any food, when he would put a saddle on, and ride him, and hoping to sell him as broken for eighty dollars.

Many of these horses are not broken at all; we were shown a good- looking mare of thirteen years old who had never had a bit in her mouth.

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THE RANCH, September 29th.

This is the country I should like to have a farm in, were I bound to emigrate. In this valley every sort of grain and vegetable seem to grow in the most luxuriant way, and we have been feasting on tomatoes, cabbages, beets, lettuces, etc. The butcher, who is also greengrocer, sent a potato twelve inches long by nine round, "hoping the ladies would take it in their trunks to England as an average specimen." Then on the "Mesa" or parks above the foot-hills, large herds of cattle can always graze through the winter. We have had jelly made of squawberries and the Oregon grape, which is excellent. There are also wild gooseberries and black currants, both of which we have found. This ranch is 160 acres; the only buildings the owner has put up are the dwelling-house and one shed as a stable and implement-house. Hay last year was selling at 10 to 12 pounds a ton, potatoes 3d. to 6d. a lb., oats 4d. a lb., and everything in proportion; eggs 3s. to 4s. a dozen all the year round, milk 6d. a quart; so that any man ought to make a very large profit, the land originally costing him nothing, and, excepting in hay or harvest time, very little labour required. Oats are cut very green and stacked for winter fodder. These fertile valleys are very limited in number, and as the consumption must be on the increase, mines being discovered and opened out, some time must elapse and the railway come nearer, ere competition reduces the prices, or the farmer's profits are lessened.

The people round are most kind and friendly, and would be more so had they received the slightest encouragement; but Mr. W---- gave out we wanted to know no one, that we were not to be in Ouray, and that all our time was to be taken up seeing the country. We went one day up Bear Creek, as Mr. W---- was asked to see a mine, and dined with the manager and his wife. They gave us a sumptuous repast, and tried to persuade E---- and I to remain the night, though we were only about four miles from home; but even we two are not enough un-Englishified as yet not to object to sleeping with two other people. They had only one room for kitchen, bed, sitting-room, &c.; and it is curious how little one now thinks of the bed standing in one corner, the washing-stand in another, whilst kitchen-stove, and scullery fill up a third. I suggested that when strangers did sleep there they gave them the adjoining cabin; but was told that a trussel bed put alongside of the host's "took no room whatsoever." Mr. W---- tells a funny story of a picnic party in the mountains in an old cabin of his, which only contained one room, and where five women and six men had to sleep the night, the women occupying the bunks, the men (after promenading outside whilst the women were getting into bed) sleeping on the floor. They all laughed and talked so much that daylight almost appeared before any of them got to sleep, and there was a regular stampede under the blankets among the ladies when a match was struck, one of the men objecting to his neighbour lying alongside of him with all his clothes on.

* * * * *

October 3rd.

How the time flies! in forty-eight hours from now we shall have said good-bye to the most fascinating of regions, and Ouray and the Rocky Mountains, with all the glorious scenery, will only live in our memories and be things of the past.

I fancy one could never tire of it, and wish so much I could describe the view we had from our Ranch looking up the Uncompahgre.--the valley bright yellow with the grasses and aspen trees turning colour from the frosts, the scarlet dwarf oak on the foot-hill, and the mountains lost in the blue distance. During our six weeks' stay we have tried all the different phases of life. The cabin life in amongst the mountains and miners, the Ranch, and town, and certainly give the palm to the first-mentioned. As we anticipated, our Ranch life was brought to an abrupt end the moment we owned to Mr. W---- how our slumbers were disturbed with the B flats; we had to return into Ouray, and have been living here some days.

Mr. W---- found such an accumulation of work on his return, that, excepting at meals, we never see him; and have to content ourselves wandering and exploring on our ponies all the different trails, and we shall soon be acquainted with every one within miles. The only ride we do eschew is the Toll Road up the park, the only piece of flat ground anywhere about, and fit for cantering along. It is the favourite resort of the ladies of the town, who are smartly arrayed in very long-skirted habits ornamented with brass buttons and velvet jockey-caps, and who must naturally look down upon us as disgracefully turned out in our every-day gowns and broad-brimmed hats, which, to say the least, have seen better days.

Ladies riding alone are required to pay no toll; a custom we think ought very much to be encouraged all over the civilized world.

We have spent one more night at the cabin in Imogene, leaving Henry in Ouray and "doing" for ourselves; and whilst Mr. W---- and the "expert," for whom we went up, were inspecting mines, we two fetched the water, made bread, and had a general sweep out. The cat was supremely delighted to see us, and could not apparently make enough of us when not allowed on our knees, stood up against or walked round us.

The heavy snow-storm of last week destroyed all the grass and flowers; they were so high when we left that a mule could hardly have been seen whilst grazing, and now they are laid quite flat with not a vestige of their beauty left. The wind was very high as we went up the canyon, so we had to hurry past the patches of aspens growing on the rocks and having very little hold for their roots, which were being blown over unpleasantly near us.

This will be the last letter you will receive, as when once started we shall go as fast as the stage-coach, rail, and steam- boat can take us to England, I having had a telegram which hurries us home.

Good-bye, we look forward immensely to seeing you all again; but we have had such a pleasant trip throughout, without a single _contretemps_, that we can but be delighted we came, and shall always look back with immense gratification on our six months' sojourn in the Western hemisphere.

* * * * *

LONDON, December, 1882.

Since arriving in England I have received the following letter from my brother in Manitoba, and as I want this book to be a sort of guide to colonists I think it well to add it:--