The Sunny Side of Diplomatic Life, 1875-1912 Part 2

We have just pa.s.sed thirty snow-sheds at Rock Creek, and have seen some wolves and some antelopes roaming about. We looked for buffaloes, but the only buffalo we saw was the mild Bill, who sat quietly reading a magazine, looking at us with his soft-brown eyes.

We were very high up in the Rocky Mountains. All around us was snow, and the view of the blue mountains, the tops of which were quite white, looked beautiful in the distance. There were some Indians on horseback drawn up in file as the train went by. They had all their war-paint on, were covered with picturesque blankets, and their feather head-dresses reached over their horses' backs; they had buckskin leggings covered with beads, which made them look very picturesque. They looked stolidly and indifferently at us while we stared at them admiringly from the car windows. The prairie-dogs looked like squirrels "sitting up so cute,"

as Miss C. said, "dodging in and out of their holes."

At one of the stations a whole band of Indians climbed into the train with guttural war-whoops and invaded the baggage-car. We thought we were being "held up," but they behaved themselves very well. The thought of Buffalo Bill, to say nothing of Mr. Holmes of Texas with his pistols, rea.s.sured us; and the only difference that the presence of the Indians made to us was that we avoided the baggage-car for our midday meal.

At another station a quant.i.ty of loafers, mostly Indians, smelling dreadfully of whisky, surrounded us and begged for money. Among them an old Indian woman who looked like the witch of Endor (they said she was over a hundred years old) stretched out a long, bony, orang-outang arm, and when we gave her a few cents the old thing actually grinned with joy. It was painful to see this creature with the acc.u.mulated look of greed on her withered old brown face.

Our baggage-master always kept his hat on, slouched at a tremendous angle. We wondered how it could keep on unless it was pinned to his ear. Mr. Ka.s.son begged us to pretend not to notice it, because the man was very sensitive on the subject. He told us his story. The man had been fis.h.i.+ng with some friends, near an Indian settlement, when the Indians attacked them and killed the others outright. The baggage-master saved his life by "playing 'possum" (as Mr. K. called pretending to be dead), and the Indians scalped him with a broken tin can. If he had made the slightest movement they would have despatched him. How horrible! We wondered if it could be true!

To-morrow "the distinguished party" mentioned in the paper are going to arrive at Salt Lake City. I will write from there unless I am s.n.a.t.c.hed up by some craving widower, if there exists such a thing as a widower--or by some husband with too few wives.

A wild desire possessed us to sit on the cow-catcher in order to get a better view of the canon. The engineer refused at first, but gave in at last. He said it was most dangerous.

"You might," he added, "scoop up a Chinaman, or some animal straying on the rails."

"How exciting!" we cried. "Who but a chosen few have the luck to scoop up a live Chinaman?"

Johan had the worst place, and therefore the least chance of getting the Chinaman. He sat up on a little iron seat attached to the boiler, holding on to the piston for dear life, and every time the whistle went off--and it went off very often--he nearly did the same. The fireman was obliged every other minute to whistle to frighten the cows away from the track. We others were more fortunate, having only to balance ourselves and clutch our neighbor. The least jar would have capsized us all. The Chinamen working on the railroad gazed at us in wonder; but we did not scoop any of them in, nor did we get any cows. The long tunnels were nasty and damp, and we were glad to breathe the fresh air again after having pa.s.sed through them. After a ride of half an hour we got off our cow-catcher at the next station, feeling rather proud of the _bravoure_ we had shown, but, all the same, thankful to be safe and sound.

Salt Lake City is such a pretty place, so beautifully situated. The great mountains capped with snow surround it and send the clearest mountain streams down through the streets. No town could be better drained than this one.

The lake is eighty miles away, and salted to exaggeration. Out of four quarts of water one can obtain one quart of salt. We thought of taking a bath in it and being sent home pickled and cured--of traveling.

We met on the train a Colonel Hooker, citizen of Utah. He introduced himself to us and gave us free pa.s.ses on the railroad where the Mormon line branches off; so he must be some one of importance.

He telegraphed to announce our arrival at the hotel, and we flattered ourselves that all Mormondom would be agog. We did not, however, notice any great animation as we drove up to the hotel, and felt rather hurt that we did not create more of a sensation.

We had introductory letters to Brigham Young. The next day being Sunday, we went to the Tabernacle to attend their religious service.

Happily, Brigham Young had returned the night before from St. Joseph, where he had sojourned with the "faithful." The Tabernacle is an enormous building which, we were told, can hold fourteen thousand people. It was filled to overflowing. The seating for the members was arranged in a semicircle of tiers, the minor elders sitting in the lowest seats. As the tiers mounted there were fewer seats and therefore fewer elders, and so on, until the highest point was reached, where the high priest--Brigham Young--sat alone in his glory. On the opposite side was the magnificent organ built in Boston. When they began building the Tabernacle, gigantic as they intended it to be, they did not know that the organ which had been ordered from Boston (probably wrong measurements had been sent) would be bigger than the Tabernacle.

When it arrived they found that, instead of the organ having been made for the Tabernacle, the Tabernacle would have to be made for the organ.

To celebrate the Prophet's return they had the communion service.

People all stayed in their pews, and the bread, cut in good healthy pieces, was handed about in bread-baskets; after which pitchers with ice-water were pa.s.sed, and the water was poured in goblets, which were placed before the people. Brigham Young gave his flock a tremendous rating with lowering eyebrows and a thunder-cloud in each eye, and the flock trembled as one man. He said that during his absence they had not behaved themselves as they ought to have done. They had not only been found swearing and drunk, but they had mingled breath with the Gentiles. We feared he referred to Colonel Hooker, whose breath had mingled--the finger of wrath seemed to point that way. We felt very sorry for our companion and sat huddled together, a humiliated group of Gentiles, trembling to meet the glance of the wrathful Prophet.

After the service we were all received at Brigham Young's house, where he seemed to be expecting us. He looked like any old Vermont farmer, with his white fringe of beard under his fat, puffy cheeks, and his thick, jet-black eyebrows over his keen eyes. He talked to us about his mission in this world and told us about the hards.h.i.+ps his people had borne when they came to St. Joseph, which was the first place they "struck" after their tramp over the desert, where most of the men died.

It was there he received a mysterious message from on high telling him that bigamy would be pardonable under the circ.u.mstances. He told Johan that the Danes were some of his best subjects. Johan made his most diplomatic bow, as if he thought that this compliment to his nation ought to be acknowledged. We heard after that Brigham Young had said this because the Danes were known to take the most wives and ask no questions.

It seems that B.Y. is almost a widower now, poor man. He has only twenty-seven wives. Amelia reigns supreme just now; the others sit forlorn in rocking-chairs in their empty parlors, biting their nails and chewing the bitter gum of envy.

Johan thought we ought perhaps to demand an official "audience" of Amelia, but the others repulsed this inspiration. It was amusing to walk by Brigham Young's big house, a long rambling building with innumerable doors. Each wife has an establishment of her own, consisting of parlor, bedroom, and a front door, the key of which she keeps in her pocket.

We walked about after luncheon, and Colonel Hooker drove us through the streets and up the hill to show us the view, which was magnificent beyond words.

We left Salt Lake City next day with regret.

It was telegraphed to Reno that we were to arrive there, to be treated, escorted, and transported to Virginia City free of charge. They began the treating by giving us an excellent breakfast at the hotel. They asked us ladies if we wanted to go down the shaft with the gentlemen to see the famous silver-mine. We cried "Yes" with enthusiasm.

A dressing-room was put at our disposal, and the clothes we were to wear were neatly placed in piles. There were miners' jackets, miner's leather trousers, and felt hats. We chose the suits best fitting our different anatomies, and dressed. My choice fell on a boy's rather clean suit. We felt very rakish in the dressing-room, but very sheepish when we joined the gentlemen outside. In going down the shaft we had to stand on the platform of the cage, which had neither railing nor support of any kind. We went down thirteen hundred feet and stepped out into the alleys of the s.h.i.+ning ore. After walking for what seemed miles, they showed us a hole and a shaft. We looked down a hundred feet deeper, where the men who were working were almost naked. The thermometer was fabulously high. There was a tank of cold water where the men who worked could plunge every two minutes out of the five. The air beginning to be rather oppressive, we requested to be taken up to our mother Earth. How glad we were to breathe the fresh air. A bath was awaiting us, and when we became ladies again we were taken all over the works, and saw the process of making silver bricks out of the walls we had been walking between, the beating of the metal, the sifting and weighing, and finally the silver bricks. They have 2,000 men working day and night. They are 1,400 feet below the surface now, and hope to go lower. The "pocket" is 175 feet long, but the poor stockholders'

pockets are empty, for all that. (I am a stockholder and ought to know.)

Each lady was presented with a bag of silver ore-rocks they seemed to me. My bag had "500 dollars" written on it, in fun, I am sure. I left it at the hotel, as it was too heavy to carry.

We left Virginia City that evening for Carson City and slept there, glad to shake off the silver dust from our weary feet. The next day at 7 A.M. two carriages, one with four horses and the other with two, were before the door, and we drove up the mountain, took the little narrow-gage railroad which is there to carry the logs down to the lake.

Sitting on the front logs, we rode down the mountain. The big beams of timber are brought to the mines in order to prop up the places where the ore has been taken out. These logs do a lot of traveling. They are cut on the other side of Lake Tahoe, dragged over the lake by a tug, sawed the right length by a sawing-mill, then carried up the mountain by this railroad and floated down by means of a wood trough, three feet wide, for twenty-two miles to another railroad, thence to Virginia City.

A steam-launch was waiting for us, and we cruised about this lovely lake, which is of the bluest water and the greenest shadows you ever saw. One sees a hundred feet down; the water is as clear as crystal. J.

talked fis.h.i.+ng with the pilot, who promised to take him out fis.h.i.+ng with him. He caught a beautiful rainbow-trout (as they are called here) from the launch. When he gets home he will tell you how big the biggest fish was he lost.

We arrived at San Francisco at two o'clock. One of the men brought me some splendid cherries, big as plums, and Johan's consul met us on the ferryboat. This last was in a great hurry to get back to his home, as he did not know whether it was a boy or a girl.

We were driven to the Palace Hotel, which is very fine. Each of us had a complete apartment, _salon_, bed, and bathroom. Having been five days and nights in the train, you may imagine we were tired. I was not only tired, but dizzy and glad to go to bed.

Senator Sharon, who owns this hotel, sent us word begging us not to make any engagement for Sat.u.r.day and Sunday next, as he intends inviting us to his country place. No bill is to be presented to us here. We are not expected to pay for anything. We are his guests, and, strange to say, not one of us knows him, excepting, of course, Mr.

Ka.s.son.

The drive out to the cliffs is enchanting. I had never seen a live sea-lion before, and here were thousands of them, barking, diving in the water and wriggling out of it, and basking in the sun on the rocks.

General McDowell took us out for an early tour the next day in his steam-launch. At five o'clock there was a dense fog covering everything, but suddenly it lifted as we approached. We made the circle of the Angel Island, then landed in a paradise of flowers. I don't think I ever saw such flowers as these. The heliotropes looked as big as cauliflowers, and I saw an ambitious and enormous tomato resembling a pumpkin, on the top of a veranda. The fuchsias were as large as dinner-bells, and when the sun rose over the bay no words can describe how beautiful it was--like one of Turner's pictures, only more exaggerated.

I think if I am going to be an angel, as I certainly am, instead of going to Paris when I die, I should prefer to go to this angelic island.

We ladies were invited by a well-known Chinese tea merchant to a Chinese feast. The table looked rather bare, having only a teacup and a plate before each person. The cups are double, the smaller one being placed on the other to keep in the tea-leaves. After drinking the pale water in which the leaves have soaked, we were served the viands. Each dish is brought in separately and put on the table. Every one of them is a _ragout_ of some kind. The Chinaman dives in with his chopsticks, and aims for the best piece he sees. Everything is eaten from the same plate--indeed, why should the plate be changed, since everything tastes and looks alike? I waited in vain for birds'-nest pudding, but I could probably not have distinguished it from the other _ragouts_ if it had been there.

The gentlemen went off on a purely masculine tour, with a policeman in tow. They wanted to see opium-dens and slums. They never told us a word of what they did see--the mean things! Philip V.R., accompanied by an American policeman, took us to a Chinese theater in the evening. I was so nervous I hardly dared to look about me.

The dusky ma.s.s of uncanny Chinamen with their shaved heads and their black pigtails sitting underneath us in the parquet was not pleasing, and the stage was merely a platform where some privileged of the audience sat unconcernedly. The scenery was--screens. How easy to s.h.i.+ft. We had the policeman of course; but, though he kept a vigilant eye on us to prevent anything from happening in the way of an a.s.sault, as frequently happens here, the idea of fire frightened us to such a degree that our one wish was to get away. The upper gallery in which our box was situated was so low that you could touch the ceiling with your hand. The gas-jets had no globes, and the flickering flames suggested everything that was horrible. If there had been a fire no one could possibly have been saved. We felt no interest in the play. It had begun a month ago; the hero had not yet advanced further than his childhood. Perhaps next year when he grows up the play will be more interesting.

Nougats and other sweets, which looked as if they had circulated since the hero of the play was born, were pa.s.sed about to the spectators. We were glad to reach the hotel in safety and bid our nice American policeman good night.

SAN FRANCISCO, _May, 1877_.

My dear Aunt,--The letters of introduction we brought to San Francisco have already procured us many invitations.

We were at a dinner last night, which Governor Stanford gave us. He has only twenty-five millions--hardly worth mentioning. Each of us ladies had a millionaire to take us in to dinner. Mine was most amiable. He pa.s.sed all the other millionaires _en revue_; I wish I could remember all he said about them, but I only have a sort of vague recollection that every millionaire had come to San Francisco with only fifty cents in his pocket, and that all the millionaires' wives had gone, in former days, about in the streets of San Francisco selling milk or thread and needles. I was not spared the history of any of them. Mr. S. himself told me that he had made his fortune first in hosiery, and then he invested his money in stocks.

There were thirty people present, divided thus: distinguished party, ten; millionaires, twenty.

Every conceivable bird, alive or mechanical, was heard during this repast; besides, there were musical boxes at each end of the room, which made a tremendous confusion. I know to a cent how much this house cost--one million two hundred thousand dollars, my neighbor told me. It is a great, white, wooden, square house with a veranda around it, perched up on a sandy hill without any garden and without a view of any kind, and certainly without the least beauty.

The picture-gallery, which really has some fine pictures, cost four hundred thousand dollars.

They had had Italian workmen brought especially from Italy to put down the mosaic pavement in the hall, which was huge. We wandered through all the rooms, each one in a different style and epoch, and all in bad taste. I looked about in the so-called ballroom for a piano, and was surprised at not seeing one there; but I noticed several in the other rooms, decorated in the style of the room. They were in every color of wood and charged with bra.s.s ornaments. Evidently they were there _as ornaments, not to be used_. Some one must have said to Mr. S., "You must have a piano." And he must have answered: "Certainly. Of course we must. Let us have one in each room, by all means."