6 Conservative *
A WINTER GLIMPSE OF ESTES PARK.
"It has always seemed to mo , " wrote
the good Father Do Sinet , "that when
one travels over the plains , ho feels more
inclined to prayer , meditation , confi
dence in God. " The days of those long
and solitaiy journeys are gone by ; wo
lie down at night in the roaring cavern
of the train , and when , in the morning
wo look out of our curtained window ,
the mountains are already there. Such
was the wonderful sleep , "likest to
death , " that overcame that ancient
wanderer , when after a nightmare of
twenty years , he was shipped by those
mysterious islanders upon a vessel , and
in the morning foiind himself , he knew
not why nor how , at the port of his long
desire.
There is , however , something left of
the sentiment that'inspired the Jesuit
father , as one approaclxjs the Rockies
from the east , especially by the northern
route. They are so high , so far removed
from the affairs of daily life , so very
lovely in the early light ; they rise from
the plain in such a sudden wall , and the
chain of them reaches so suggestively to
the limit of vision , with single peaks
rising into view even further beyond ;
they always hint that they are guarding
another and a different world , a land of
healing , where it would be good for us
to be.
There are those who maintain that
certain individual mountain peaks exert
a hypnotic influence upon the worship
per at their bases. Certainly there is
character among mountains , and this is
the cause why each has its admirers.
People will go year after year to Estes
Park , and sit contentedly day by day
watching the Lily , the giant Mummy or
great Long's himself , and will tell you
that each continually grows upon them
as they watch them.
I can testify that familiarity with the
chiefs of the snowy range does not by
any means breed contempt , but rather a
distinct awe and dread. Others have
spoken of a certain reluctance that grew
upon them , in the course of a sojourn
among those tremendous objects , to
mention one of them familiarly by the
name of any man. General Pike was a
most admirable soldier , Major Long was
equally a pattern of all incompetence ;
the more you move about either of the
mouutairis that have borne their names
now for eighty years , each a whole
world of rook and ice , the more remote
and unapproachable do they appear , and
the less fit for association with the
names of those or any other men.
* * * *
It is lonesome in the mountains in
winter. As you draw near you miss the
prairie-dogs , who lie sleeping their long
sleep in a hundred thousand holes , with
the snow piled over them. You can
walk where you will , and be wholly
free from care lest clump of brush or
bunoh of weeds hide a hostile snake.
The pine-tree and the quakcn-asp are
there , but the noisy magpie and the
crested jay-hawk arc gone , and they are
empty and silent. The mountain-side is
bare and still ; no chipmunk frisks over
the rocks , no woodchuck watches you
from their recesses to mock you at a safe
distance.
But in compensation , you find that
there are more people in the mountains
than you had supposed , and you see
them leading their own lives , free from
the oppression of the summer tourist.
When the torrent of travelers , with
their tastes and their needs , and their
adjectives and exclamation points ,
breaks over this devoted land , one may
imagine the inhabitants shutting their
eyes and holding their breaths tintil fall ;
and then coming forth , when the last
tourist has taken his trunk eastward ,
and the last invalid followed the
receding sun with his rug and his
medicine bottle , to resume the inter
rupted current of their lives.
* * * *
The rivers are there , but pitifully
shrunken and enfeebled. Their voices
are weak and old ; how different from
the fierce tumult that fills the gorges as
they riot over rocks in their summer
strength. The canyons themselves are
vastly changed. Their sides are gray
and cold ; the prickly ball of the wild
cactus nestles into crevices and shows
no spurts of variously-colored blossom ;
the skeletons of the wild currant bushes
throng the roadside , but none of them
display those showers of cool and tempt
ing fruit that glow under the August
sun ; nowhere can one find the wild
strawberries and the little red rasp
berries , so stony and so sweet , that
reward the search of the wayfaring
man in the Moon of Bucks.
There is life in the mountains , but
you can hear more of it than you can
see. As soon as night falls the plaint of
the coyote begins ; and if you sleep with
a window open , for the sake of the life-
giving air of the place , and the sound of
the pine-trees and the river in the
infinite stillness you may hear from
somewhere in the dark a hideous cry ,
which they will tell you in the morning
was the yell of the mountain lion that is
bothering around their cattle.
Then , too , from the number of natives
you meet wandering about the moun
tains with guns man's size rifles it is
safe to infer that something good for
food is going up and down on four legs
in that snowy wilderness ; having due
regard for the game laws , let us say
rabbits.
But the only specimen of animal life
that actually appeared to me was a little
feathered oddity which I suppose I shall
always remember , as a complete embodi
ment of the desolateness of the moun
tains in winter. I was walking up the
canyon of the St. Vraiu , which , in sum
mer a soul-stirring gorge , is in winter a
gloomy cavern. It was late in the after
noon , nearly dark , in fact ; it had
snowed all day , and the flakes were still
falling , while the mountains wore
already enfolded in night and snow ; the
boisterous St. Vraiu was ice-locked ,
sheeted across in the stiller places ,
while elsewhere the rocks in mid stream
wore heaps of ice , and plates of it pro
jected from either bank as far as the
current would permit ; and upon the
thin edge of one of tnese sheets there
danced a tiny bird. Ho was no bigger
than a hen's egg all told , and was of a
dark slate-color ; he was round as a ball ,
and his head was so withdrawn into the
shelter of his feathers that his sharp
little bill projected upwards ; he seemed
not to be watching me nor the water ,
but stood first on one foot , then on the
other , and from time to time I saw a
silvery-gleaming film drawn over his
eye ; and there he stayed , at the edge of
the black rushing water in the gather
ing darkness , as long as I chose to watch
him. Nothing , one would suppose , but
the exigencies of a livelihood , could
keep a sentient creature there ; and I
wondered much , as I trudged back to
Mrs. Howe's fireside , and her warm
supper and sitting-room lamp , what
provision the creator had made for that
feathered atom in the waters of that
pitiless stream.
* * * *
Every day it snows , and it is snowing
somewhere in sight all day. Every
morning the porch of the ranch-house
is covered with light fresh snow ; the
sun may shine enough during the day
to melt it off , but that is the limit of his
potency. One must walk , however , in
the Rookies , and so you travel up the
hillside , or perhaps essay an ascent into
the land of rocks , and seat yourself on
the bare ground , where some boulder
shelters you from , the wind , and look
over the landscape. It is not the sum
mer view. The empty stillness of the
region is oppressive under the dull sky.
Probably somewhere there is a blue gap ,
and you watch a dash of sunshine as it
travels over the panorama'but ; it does
not go far toward relieving the deadness
of things. The mountains about you
grow more and more dim as they stand
further from you , and their outlines
vanish and reappear as the sea of cloud
drifts about them , so that they look
only the bigger and more formidable.
Toward the interior your view is entirely
shut off by the smother of darkness that
hides the main range , where the great
peaks are engaged in their endless
brewing of storms , piling up the snow
that is to make next summer's rivers.
And as you' look about you , you are
startled to find that a gray cloud has
come over from behind the mountain
top above you , and that a deadly mist is
stealing down the hillside toward the
spot where you are lying.
* * * *
In rain' , snow or sunshine , Hubbell's
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