Complete Works of Artemus Ward Part 4, To California and Return — Ch 4

A piece hath its victories no less than war.

"Blessed are the Piece-makers."

That is Scripture.

The night of the "comic oration" is come, and the speaker is arranging his back hair in the star dressing-room of the theatre.

The orchestra is playing selections from the Gentile opera of "Un Ballo in Maschera," and the house is full.

Mr. John F. Caine, the excellent stage manager, has given me an elegant drawing-room scene in which to speak my little piece.

[In Iowa, I once lectured in a theatre, and the heartless manager gave me a dungeon scene.

] The curtain goes up, and I stand before a Salt Lake of upturned faces.

I can only say that I was never listened to more attentively and kindly in my life than I was by this audience of Mormons.

Among my receipts at the box-office this night were-- 20 bushels of wheat.

5 bushels of corn.

4 bushels of potatoes.

2 bushels of oats.

4 bushels of salt.

2 hams.

1 live pig (Dr. Hingston chained him in the box-office.

) 1 wolf-skin.

5 pounds of honey in the comb.

16 strings of sausages--2 pounds to the string.

1 cat-skin.

1 churn (two families went in on this; it is an ingenious churn, and fetches butter in five minutes by rapid grinding.

) 1 set of children's under-garments, embroidered.

1 firkin of butter.

1 keg of apple-sauce.

One man undertook to pass a dog (a cross between a Scotch terrier and a Welsh rabbit) at the box-office, and another presented a German-silver coffin-plate, but the Doctor very justly repulsed them both.

4. 14. THE BALL.

The Mormons are fond of dancing.

Brigham and Heber C. dance.

So do Daniel H. Wells, and the other heads of the Church.

Balls are opened with prayer, and when they break up a benediction is pronounced.

I am invited to a ball at Social Hall, and am escorted thither by Brothers Stenhouse and Clawson.

Social Hall is a spacious and cheerful room.

The motto of "Our Mountain Home" in brilliant evergreen capitals adorns one end of the hall, while at the other a platform is erected for the musicians, behind whom there is room for those who don't dance to sit and look at the festivities.

Brother Stenhouse, at the request of President Young, formally introduces me to company from the platform.

There is a splendor of costumery about the dancers I had not expected to see.

Quadrilles only are danced.

The mazourka is considered sinful.

Even the old-time round waltz is tabooed.

I dance.

The Saints address each other here, as elsewhere, as Brother and Sister.

"This way, Sister!"

"Where are you going, Brother?"

&c. , &c. I am called Brother Ward.

This pleases me, and I dance with renewed vigor.

The Prophet has some very charming daughters, several of whom are present to-night.

I was told they spoke French and Spanish.

The Prophet is more industrious than graceful as a dancer.

He exhibits, however, a spryness of legs quite remarkable in a man at his time of life.

I didn't see Heber C. Kimball on the floor.

I am told he is a loose and reckless dancer, and that many a lily-white toe has felt the crushing weight of his cow-hide monitors.

The old gentleman is present, however, with a large number of wives.

It is said he calls them his "heifers."

"Ain't you goin' to dance with some of my wives?"

said a Mormon to me.

These things make a Mormon ball more spicy than a Gentile one.

The supper is sumptuous, and bear and beaver adorn the bill of fare.

I go away at the early hour of two in the morning.

The moon is shining brightly on the snow-covered streets.

The lamps are out, and the town is still as a graveyard.

4. 15. PHELP'S ALMANAC.

There is an eccentric Mormon at Salt Lake City of the name of W. W.

Phelps.

He is from Cortland, State of New York, and has been a Saint for a good many years.

It is said he enacts the character of the Devil, with a pea-green tail, in the Mormon initiation ceremonies.

He also published an almanac, in which he blends astronomy with short moral essays, and suggestions in regard to the proper management of hens.

He also contributes a poem, entitled "The Tombs," to his almanac for the current year, from which I quote the last verse:-- "Choose ye: to rest with stately grooms;

Just such a place there is for sleeping;

Where everything, in common keeping, Is free from want and worth and weeping;

There folly's harvest is a reaping.

Down in the grave among the tombs."

Now, I know that poets and tin-pedlars are "licensed," but why does W.

W.

P.

advise us to sleep in the barn with the ostlers?

These are the most dismal tombs on record, not except the Tomb of the Capulets, the Tombs of New York, or the Toombs of Georgia.

Under the head of "OLD Sayings," Mr. P.

publishes the following.

There is a modesty about the last "saying" which will be pretty apt to strike the reader:-- "The Lord does good and Satan evil, said Moses.

Sun and moon, see me conquer, said Joshua.

Virtue exalts a woman, said David.

Fools and folly frolic, said Solomon.

Judgments belong to God, said Isaiah.

The path of the just is plain, said Jeremiah.

The soul that sins dies, said Ezekiel.

The wicked do wicked, said Daniel.

Ephraim fled and hid, said Hosea.

The Gentiles war and waste, said Joel.

The second reign is peace and plenty, said Amos.

Zion is the house of the gods, said Obadiah, A fish saved me, said Jonah.

Our Lion will be terrible, said Micah.

Doctor, cure yourself, said the Saviour.

Live to live again, said W. W.

Phelps."

4. 16. HURRAH FOR THE ROAD!

TIME, Wednesday afternoon, February 10. The Overland Stage, Mr. William Glover on the box, stands before the veranda of the Salt Lake House.

The genial Nat Stein is arranging the waybill.

Our baggage (the Overland passenger is allowed twenty-five pounds) is being put aboard, and we are shaking hands, at a rate altogether furious, with Mormon and Gentile.

Among the former are Brothers Stenhouse, Caine, Clawson and Townsend; among the latter are Harry Riccard, the big-hearted English mountaineer (though once he wore white kids and swallow-tails in Regent Street, and in boyhood went to school with Miss Edgeworth, the novelist), the daring explorer Rood, from Wisconsin; th e Rev. James McCormick, missionary, who distributes pasteboard tracts among the Bannock miners; and the pleasing child of gore, Captain D. B.

Stover, of the commissary department.

We go away on wheels, but the deep snow compels us to substitute runners twelve miles out.

There are four passengers of us.

We pierce the Wahsatch mountains by Parley's canyon.

A snowstorm overtakes us as the night thickens, and the wind shrieks like a brigade of strong-lunged maniacs.

Never mind.

We are well covered up- our cigars are good.

I have on deerskin pantaloons, a deerskin overcoat, a beaver cap and buffalo overshoes; and so, as I tersely observed before, Never mind.

Let us laugh the winds to scorn, brave boys!

But why is William Glover, driver, lying flat on his back by the roadside; and why am I turning a handspring in the road; and why are the horses tearing wildly down the Wahsatch mountains?

It is because William Glover has been thrown from his seat, and the horses are running away.

I

see him fall off and it occurs to me I had better get out.

In doing so, such is the velocity of the sleigh, I turn a handspring.

Far ahead I hear the runners clash with the rocks, and I see Dr. Hingston's lantern (he always would have a lantern), bobbing about like the binnacle light of an oyster sloop, very loose in a choppy sea.

Therefore I do not laugh the winds to scorn as much as I did, brave boys.

William G. is not hurt, and together we trudge on after the runaways in the hope of overtaking them, which we do some two miles off.

They are in a snowbank, and "nobody hurt".

We are soon on the road again, all serene; though I believe the Doctor did observe that such a thing would not have occurred under a monarchial form of government.

We reach Weber station, thirty miles from Salt Lake City and wildly situated at the foot of the grand Echo Canyon, at 3 o'clock the following morning.

We remain over a day here with James Bromley, agent of the Overland Stage line, and who is better known on the plains than Shakspeare is; although Shakspeare has done a good deal for the stage.

James Bromley has seen the Overland line grow up from its ponyicy; and as Fitz-Green Halleck happily observes, none know him BUT TO LIKE HIS STYLE.

He was intended for an agent.

In his infancy he used to lisp the refrain, "I want to be an agent, And with the agents stand."

I part with this kind-hearted gentleman, to whose industry and ability the Overland line owes much of its success, with sincere regret; and I hope he will soon get rich enough to transplant his charming wife from the desert to the "White settlements".

Forward to Fort Bridger, in an open sleigh.

Night clear, cold, and moonlit.

Driver Mr. Samuel Smart.

Through Echo Canyon to Hanging Rock Station.

The snow is very deep, there is no path, and we literally shovel our way to Robert Pollock's station, which we achieve in the Course of Time.

Mr. P.

gets up and kindles a fire, and a snowy nightcap and a pair of very bright black eyes beam upon us from the bed.

That is Mrs. Robert Pollock.

The log cabin is a comfortable one.

I make coffee in my French coffee-pot, and let loose some of the roast chickens in my basket.

(Tired of fried bacon saleratus bread--the principle bill of fare at the stations --we had supplied ourselves with chicken, boiled ham, onions, sausages, sea bread, canned butter, cheese, honey, &c. &c. , an example all Overland traders would do well to follow.

) Mrs. Pollock tells me where I can find cream for the coffee, and cups and saucers for the same, and appears so kind, that I regret our stay is so limited that we can't see more of her.

On to Yellow Creek Station.

Then Needle Rock--a desolate hut on the Desert, house and barn in one building.

The station-keeper is a miserable, toothless wretch, with shaggy yellow hair, but says he's going to get married.

I think I see him.

To Bear River.

A pleasant Mormon named Myers this station, and he gives us a first-rate breakfast, Robert Curtis takes the reins from Mr. Smart here, and we get on to wheels again.

Begin to see groups of trees- a new sight to us.

Pass Quaking Asp Springs and Muddy to Fort Bridger.

Here are a group of white buildings, built round a plaza, across the middle of which runs a creek.

There are a few hundred troops here under the command of Major Gallergher, a gallant officer and a gentleman, well worth knowing.

We stay here two days.

We are on the road again, Sunday the 14th, with a driver of the highly floral name of Primrose.

At 7 the next morning we reach Green River Station, and enter Idaho Territory.

This is the Bitter Creek division of the Overland route, of which we had heard so many unfavorable stories.

The division is really well managed by Mr. Stewart, though the country through which it stretches is the most wretched I ever saw.

The water is liquid alkali, and the roads are soft sand.

The snow is gone now, and the dust is thick and blinding.

So drearily, wearily we drag onward.

We reach the summit of the Rocky Mountains at midnight on the 17th.

The climate changes suddenly, and the cold is intense.

We resume runners, have a breakdown, and are forced to walk four miles.

I remember that one of the numerous reasons urged in favor of General Fremont's election to the Presidency in 1856 was his finding the path across the Rocky Mountains.

I wrung my frostbitten hands on that dreadful night, and declared that for me to deliberately go over that path in mid-winter was a sufficient reason for my election to any lunatic asylum, by an overwhelming vote.

Dr. Hingston made a similar remark, and wondered if he should ever clink glasses with his friend Lord Palmerston again.

Another sensation.

Not comic this time.

One of our passengers, a fair-haired German boy, whose sweet ways had quite won us all, sank on the snow, and said--Let me sleep.

We knew only too well what that meant, and tried hard to rouse him.

It was in vain.

Let me sleep, he said.

And so in the cold starlight he died.

We took him up tenderly from the snow, and bore him to the sleigh that awaited us by the roadside, some two miles away.

The new moon was shining now, and the smile on the sweet white face told how painlessly the poor boy had died.

No one knew him.

He was from the Bannock mines, was ill-clad, had no baggage or money, and his fare was paid to Denver.

He had said that he was going back to Germany.

That was all we knew.

So at sunrise the next morning we buried him at the foot of the grand mountains that are snow-covered and icy all the year round, far away from the Faderland, where it may be, some poor mother is crying for her darling who will not come.

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We strike the North Platte on the 18th.

The fare at the stations is daily improving, and we often have antelope steaks now.

They tell us of eggs not far off, and we encourage (by a process not wholly unconnected with bottles) the drivers to keep their mules in motion.

Antelopes by the thousand can be seen racing the plains from the coach windows.

At Elk Mountain we encounter a religious driver named Edward Whitney, who never swears at the mules.

This has made him distinguished all over the plains.

This pious driver tried to convert the Doctor, but I am mortified to say that his efforts were not crowned with success, Fort Halleck is a mile from Elk, and here are some troops of the Ohio 11th regiment, under the command of Major Thomas L. Mackey.

On the 20th we reach Rocky Thomas's justly celebrated station at 5 in the morning, and have a breakfast of hashed black-tailed deer, antelope steaks, ham, boiled bear, honey, eggs, coffee, tea, and cream.

That was the squarest meal on the road except at Weber.

Mr. Thomas is a Baltimore "slosher," he informed me.

I don't know what that is, but he is a good fellow, and gave us a breakfast fir for a lord, emperor, czar, count, &c. A better couldn't be found at Delmonicp's or Parker's. He pressed me to linger with him for a few days and shoot bears.

It was with several pangs that I declined the generous Baltimorean's invitation.

To Virginia Dale.

Weather clear and bright.

Virginia Dale is a pretty spot, as it ought to be with such a pretty name; but I treated with no little scorn the advice of a hunter I met there, who told me to give up "literatoor," form a matrimonial alliance with some squaws, and "settle down thar."

Bannock on the brain!

That is what is the matter now.

Wagon-load after wagon-load of emigrants, bound to the new Idaho gold regions, meet us every hour.

Canvas-covered and drawn for the most part by fine large mules, they make a pleasant panorama, as they stretch slowly over the plains and uplands.

We strike the South Platte Sunday, 21st, and breakfast at Latham, a station of one-horse proportions.

We are now in Colorado ("Pike's Peak"), and we diverge from the main route here and visit the flourishing and beautiful city of Denver.

Messrs, Langrish & Dougherty, who have so long and so admirably catered to the amusement lovers of the Far West, kindly withdrew their dramatic corps for a night, and allow me to use their pretty little theatre.

We go to the mountains from Denver, visiting the celebrated gold-mining towns of Black Hawk and Central City.

I leave this queen of all the territories, quite firmly believing that its future is to be no less brilliant than its past has been.

I had almost forgotten to mention that on the way from Latham to Denver Dr. Hingston and Dr. Seaton (late a highly admired physician and surgeon in Kentucky, and now a prosperous gold miner) had a learned discussion as to the formation of the membranes of the human stomach, in which they used words that were over a foot long by actual measurement.

I have never heard such splendid words in my life; but such were their grandiloquent profundity, and their far-reaching lucidity, that I understood rather less about it when they had finished than I did when they commenced.

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Back to Latham again over a marshy road, and on to Nebraska by the main stage-line.

I meet Col. Chivington, commander of the district of Colorado, at Latham.

Col. Chivington is a Methodist clergyman, and was once a presiding elder.

A thoughtful, earnest man, an eloquent preacher, a sincere believer in the war, he, of course brings to his new position a great deal of enthusiasm.

This, with his natural military tact, makes him an officer of rare ability; and on more occasions than one he has led his troops against the enemy with resistless skill and gallantry.

I take the liberty of calling the President's attention to the fact that this brave man ought to have long ago been a brigadier-general.

Col. Chivington vanquished the rebels with his brave Colorado troops, in New Mexico last year, as most people know.

At the commencement of the action, which was hotly contested, a shell from the enemy exploded near him, tearing up the ground, and causing Captain Rogers to swear in an awful manner.

"Captain Rogers," said the Colonel, " gentlemen do not swear on a solemn occasion like this.

We may fall, but falling in a glorious cause, let us die as Christians, not as rowdies, with oaths upon our lips.

Captain Rogers, let us -" Another shell, a sprightlier one than its predecessor, tears the earth fearfully in the immediate vicinity of Col. Chivington, filling his eyes with dirt and knocking off his hat.

"Why, G- d- Their souls to h- ," he roared, "they've put my eyes out- AS CAPTAIN ROGERS WOULD SAY!"

But the Colonel's eyes were not seriously damaged, and he went in.

Went in, and came out victorious.

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We reach Julesberg, Colorado, the 1st of March.

We are in the country of the Sioux Indians now, and encounter them by the hundred.

A Chief offers to sell me his daughter (a fair young Indian maiden) for six dollars and two quarts of whisky.

I decline to trade.

Meals which have hitherto been 1 dol.

Are now 75 cents.

Eggs appear on the table occasionally, and we hear of chickens farther on.

Nine miles from here we enter Nebraska territory.

Here is an occasionally fenced farm, and the ranches have bar-rooms.

Buffalo skins and buffalo tongues are on sale at most of the stations.

We reach South Platte on the 2d, and Fort Kearney on the 3d.

The 7th Iowa Calvary are here, under the command of Captain Wood.

At Cottonwood, a days ride back, we had taken aboard Major O'Brien, commanding the troops there, and a jovial warrior he is, too.

Meals are now down to 50 cents, and a good deal better than when they were 1 dol.

KANSAS, 105 miles from Atchison.

Atchison!

No traveller by sea ever longed to set his foot on shore as we longed to reach the end of our dreary coach-ride over the wildest part of the whole continent.

How we talked Atchison, and dreamed Atchison, for the next fifty hours!

Atchison, I shall always love you.

You were evidently mistaken, Atchison, when you told me that in case I "lectured" there, immense crowds would throng to the hall; but you are very dear to me.

Let me kiss you for your maternal parent!

We are passing through the reservation of the Otoe Indians, who long ago washed the war-paint from their faces, buried the tomahawk, and settled down into quiet, prosperous farmers.

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We rattle leisurely into Atchison on a Sunday evening.

Lights gleam in the windows of milk-white churches, and they tell us, far better than anything else could, that we are back to civilization again.