Tito 



VIII 



The lovely Hiawathan spring was touching all 

 things in the fairy Badlands. Oh, why are 

 they called Badlands ? If Nature sat down 

 deliberately on the eighth day of creation and 

 said, " Now work is done, let's play ; let's 

 make a place that shall combine everything 

 that is finished and wonderful and beautiful — 

 a paradise for man and bird and beast," it was 

 surely then that she made these wild, fantastic 

 hills, teeming with life, radiant with gayest 

 flowers, varied with sylvan groves, bright with 

 prairie sweeps and brimming lakes and streams. 

 In foreground, offing, and distant hills that 

 change at every step, we find some proof that Na- 

 ture squandered here the riches that in other 

 lands she used as sparingly as gold, with colorful 

 sky above and colorful land below, and the 

 distance blocked by sculptured buttes that are 

 built of precious stones and ores, and tinged as 

 by a lasting and unspeakable sunset. And yet, 

 for all this ten times gorgeous wonderland en- 

 chanted, blind man has found no better name 

 than one which says, the road to it is hard. 



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