Charles J. Gillis - Another Summer: The Yellowstone Park and Alaska

The more I think of it, the more I find this conclusion impressed upon me, that the greatest thing a human soul ever does in this world is to see something and tell what it saw in a plain way.RUSKIN.

With the Compliments of the Author.

In the spring of 1892, a party was made up for a trip to Alaska. Thedifferent members thereof were to cross the continent by such routesas they pleased, and meet at Portland, Oregon, on the second of July.This plan was followed, and all the party boarded the steamer Queenat Tacoma, prepared for the journey of a thousand miles up the coastof Alaska.

Some account of this, and also of an excursion to the YellowstonePark, made on the way westward, is given in the following pages.

Our long trip to Alaska and return, nine thousand miles in all,commenced on June 17, 1892, at the Grand Central Station, New York.Arriving at Chicago the next afternoon, we obtained a good view of thegreat exposition buildings from our car windows as we passed along thelake front. Shortly afterward we were dumped down at the wretchedsheds of the Michigan Central Railroad. It rained very heavily, andourselves and hand baggage were somewhat wet passing a short distanceto a carriage. We soon crossed the Chicago River to the NorthwesternDepot, boarded the train, which left at 11 P.M., and arrived at thebeautiful modern city of St. Paul at 1 P.M. the next day. The HotelRyan was found to be very comfortable, and everything in and aroundthe city is bright and cheerful. Great business activity, and immenseand costly buildings are especially noticeable.

Running along the streets are great numbers of spacious and elegantcars drawn by cables. We hailed a passing one, got in, and went slowlyand carefully through the crowded streets, up and down hills, withgreat speed and ease, into the country for some miles, passing manyelegant private residences, as costly and fine as any to be seen inany city in the worldnotably one built and occupied by Mr. Hill,president of the Great Northern Railroad, now about completed to thePacific Ocean, whose name you hear mentioned often as one of the greatrailroad magnates of the West. The streets are clean, the sidewalkswide, the front yards of the houses crowded with beautiful plants andflowers, and in all respects we concluded that St. Paul is a mostdelightful city.

We left the city of St. Paul at 4.25 P.M. on the 20th, by the NorthernPacific Railroad, and arrived here at 8 A.M. this morning. A sectionon the sleeping-car had been previously engaged, and we found it andthe dining-room car attached to the train all that could be desired,so that we thoroughly enjoyed the entire trip. Passing through the BadLands was a wonderful experience. Great mountains of clay or stone, inall sorts of grotesque shapes and of many colors, constantly attractedour attention until we reached the Yellowstone River, which was higherthan it had been for many years. Here things began to look serious, asfrequently the dirty and rushing flood came near to the track, andthe rise of a foot or so would have caused a wash-out, and havestopped our progress; but for many miles before we reached thisstation, the engineer moved the train of ten cars very carefully, andwe were only two hours behind time. There has been a bridge burnedbeyond this place, and some bad wash-outs are reported by passengerscoming East, who say that they had to travel around six miles on foot,through a country infested with rattlesnakes, leaving their baggagebehind; but we expect that all will be clear on Monday, when we shallhave been through the park, and will be ready to go on from here West.

There was the usual crowd of "all sorts and conditions" of men on thetrainyoung ranchmen, bright eyed, intelligent, and alert, one ofthem being an English lord, but I did not know this until he left thecar at a way station. All had tales to tell of life in these parts,one of which was that the stage running from one of the stations atwhich we stopped was "held up" three times last week, and thepassengers robbed. This town is a new one, with a lot of small woodenhouses and stores, but as the hotels did not look very attractive, wetook our breakfast on the dining-car attached to a train about tostart for Cinnabar, on a branch road, and an excellent meal we had.

Leaving Livingston at 9 A.M., we travelled by rail forty-two miles toCinnabar, the entrance to the National Park. We passed along thevalley of the Yellowstone River, now a much swollen, turbulent, andrushing stream, hemmed in by mountains reaching their lofty headsthousands of feet high. In one place there had been a land-slide somehundreds of feet long, which had carried down all the earth and treesinto the valley, leaving the rock bare, and presenting a very ruggedappearance. There were numerous farms and ranches on the route, withcattle and cultivated fields. The road bed was in good order, the carsexcellent, and the trip exceedingly interesting and enjoyable. AtCinnabar, we took a stage for eight miles to this hotel. The road is avery good one, passing over rushing streams and along the bases ofgreat mountains, amidst magnificent scenery. Beautiful flowers linethe way and are in the fields, while the mountains are partly coveredwith snow. We hear that the road to the lake is blocked with snow, andimpassable. This hotel is an excellent one, the food, attendance, androoms are good, and for a day we are resting preparatory to commencingthe tour of the park. Here are located the barracks for the UnitedStates soldiers in charge of the reservation, these being now twohundred mounted men, who act as police, and constantly patrol theroads, watching for poachers, and generally keeping everything inorder. From the front of the hotel we look upon the hot springs, whichhave been throwing out hot water and steam, no doubt for ages, andhave formed a large terraced hill of soda or lime-like material, thesurplus water finding its way, partly through subterranean passages,to the river.

This morning at eight o'clock we left the Mammoth Spring, in astrongly built and comfortable wagon drawn by four horses, with eightpassengers and a careful driver, and soon commenced to see the wondersof this remarkable park. The road ran near three lakes, each measuringa hundred acres or moreone green in color, one blue, and oneyellowthe like of which cannot, I think, be seen anywhere else onearth. On examination, I found that the water was clear, and that thepronounced and brilliant colors came from chemical deposits on thebottom of the lakes. We did not linger long to look at theseremarkable phenomena, but drove on, and were soon passing over a roadmade of natural glass, by the side of a great mountain of the samematerial. I picked up several pieces of this glass, and found that itwas green in color, and looked like any other glass, while alongsidethe road and up the mountain we saw large masses of the same material.The only conclusion we could arrive at was, that in some prehistorictime the materials of which glass is composed must have been injuxtaposition, and were fused into their present form by a volcaniceruption. It is safe to say that nowhere else on earth is to be founda roadway made of glass.