took action in the matter, setting the region aside as a National Park and Reservation, for the benefit of the people at large forever, retaining the fee and control of the same in the name of the government.
Not many persons have ever attempted to traverse the Park in the winter season, but it has been done by a few hardy and adventurous people, who nearly perished in the attempt. Such individuals have reported that the raging snow-storms and blizzards which they encountered were on a scale quite equal to the other demonstrations and natural curiosities of the place. The trees in their neighborhood were beautifully gemmed with the frozen vapor of the geysers, and the heated springs seemed doubly active by the contrast between their temperature and that of the freezing atmosphere. It was only by camping at night upon the very brink of these boiling waters that life could be sustained, with the atmosphere at forty degrees below zero.
One who comes hither with preconceived ideas of the peculiar sights to be met with is sure to be disappointed, not in their want of strangeness, for the Park is overstocked with curiosities having no counterpart elsewhere, but the features are so thoroughly unique that his anticipations are transcended both in the quality and the quantity of the food for wonder which is spread out before him on every side.
CHAPTER V
Westward Journey resumed. – Queen City of the Mountains. – Crossing the Rockies. – Butte City, the Great Mining Centre. – Montana. – The Red Men. – About the Aborigines. – The Cowboys of the West. – A Successful Hunter. – Emigrant Teams on the Prairies. – Immense Forests. – Puget Sound. – The Famous Stampede Tunnel. – Immigration.
After a delightful, though brief, sojourn of ten days in the Yellowstone Park, realizing that twice that length of time might be profitably spent therein, we returned to Livingston, where the Northern Pacific Railroad was once more reached, and the westward journey promptly resumed. The Belt Range of mountains is soon crossed, at an elevation of over five thousand five hundred feet. A remarkable tunnel is also passed through, three thousand six hundred feet in length, from which the train emerges into a grand cañon, and soon arrives at the city of Bozeman. This place has a thrifty and intelligent population of over five thousand, and is notable for its rural and picturesque surroundings, in the fertile Gallatin Valley, which is encircled by majestic ranges of mountains, shrouded in “white, cold, virgin snow.” Having passed the point where the Madison and Jefferson rivers unite to form the headwaters of that great river, the Missouri, whence it starts upon its long and winding course of over four thousand miles towards the Mexican Gulf, we arrive presently at Helena, the interesting capital of Montana. This is called the “Queen City of the Mountains,” and is famous as a great and successful mining centre, the present population of which is about twenty thousand. It is said to be the richest city of its size in the United States, an assertion which we have good reasons for believing to be correct. The vast mineral region surrounding Helena is unsurpassed anywhere for the number and richness of its gold and silver-bearing lodes, having within an area of twenty-five miles over three thousand such natural deposits, the ownership of which is duly recorded, and many of which are being profitably worked. The city is lighted by a system of electric lamps, and has an excellent water-supply from inexhaustible mountain streams.
We were told an authentic story illustrating the richness of the soil in and about Helena, as a gold-bearing earth, which we repeat in brief.
It seems that a resident was digging a cellar on which to place a foundation for a new dwelling house, when a passing stranger asked permission to remove the pile of earth that was being thrown out of the excavation, agreeing to return one half of whatever value he could get from the same, after washing and submitting it to the usual treatment by which gold is extracted. Permission was granted, and the earth was soon removed. The citizen thought no more about the matter. After a couple of weeks, however, the stranger returned and handed the proprietor of the ground thirteen hundred dollars as his half of the proceeds realized from the dirt casually thrown out upon the roadway in digging his cellar.
Between Helena and Garrison the main range of the Rocky Mountains is crossed, and at an elevation of five thousand five hundred and forty feet the cars enter what is called the Mullan Tunnel. This dismal and remarkable excavation is nearly four thousand feet long. From it the western-bound traveler finally emerges on the Pacific slope, passing through the beautiful valley of the Little Blackfoot.
The region through which we were traveling stretches from Lake Superior to Puget Sound, on the Pacific coast, and spreads out for many miles on either side of the Northern Pacific Railroad, known as the “Northern Pacific Country.” No portion of the United Sates offers more favorable opportunities for settlement, and in no other section is there as much desirable government land still open to preëmption, presenting such a variety of surface, richness of soil, and wealth of natural productions. Intelligent emigrants are rapidly appropriating the land of this very attractive region, but there is still enough and to spare. Europe may continue to send us her surplus population for fifty years to come at the same rate she has done for the past half century, and there will still be room enough in the great West and Northwest to accommodate them.
As we left the main track of the Northern Pacific Railroad at Livingston to visit the Yellowstone Park, so at Garrison we again take a branch road to Butte City, situated fifty-five miles southward, and which is admitted to be the greatest mining city of the American continent. Here, on the western slope of the main range of the Rocky Mountains, stands the “Silver City,” as it is generally called, though one of its main features is its copper product, which rivals that of the Lake Superior district in quantity and quality, giving employment to the most extensive smelting works in the world. There are thirty thousand inhabitants in Butte, and it is rapidly growing in territory and population. Its citizens seem to be far above the average of our frontier settlers in intelligence and thrift. The Blue Bird silver mine is perhaps the richest in this locality, yielding every twelve months a million and a half of dollars in bullion; while the Moulton, Alice, and Lexington mines each produce a million dollars or more in silver yearly. There are several other rich mines, among them the Anaconda copper mine, which gives an aggregate each year larger in value than any we have named. The Parrott Copper Company, also the Montana and Boston Copper Company, each show an annual output of metal valued at a million of dollars. In place of there being any falling off in these large amounts, all of the mines are increasing their productiveness monthly by means of improved processes and enlarged mechanical facilities. But we have gone sufficiently into detail to prove the assertion already made, that Butte City is the greatest mining town on the continent. Eight tenths of its population is connected, either directly or indirectly, with mining.
“It would seem that the United States form the richest mineral country on the globe,” said an English fellow-traveler to whom these facts were being explained by an intelligent resident.
“That has long been admitted,” said the American.
“And what country comes next?” asked the Englishman.
“Australia,” was the reply. “But the United States,” continued the American, “have another and superior source of wealth exceeding that of all other lands, namely, their agricultural capacity. There are here millions upon millions of acres, richer than the valley of the Nile, which are still virgin soil untouched by the plow or harrow.”
Not mining, but agriculture forms the great and lasting wealth of our broad and fertile Western States, rich though they be in mineral deposits, especially of gold and silver.
Before proceeding further on our journey, let us pause for a moment to consider the magnitude of this imperial State of Montana, which measures over five hundred miles from east to west, and which is three hundred miles from north to south, containing one hundred and forty-four thousand square miles. This makes it larger in surface than the States of New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, Maryland, Ohio, and Indiana combined. With its vast stores of mineral wealth and many other advantages,
