256 SIR VICTOR BROOKE CHAP. 



spent several hours wandering about the grove, and 

 then came on by the narrow-gauge line here, four hours 

 of about as great misery as I ever suffered. The train 

 was rilled to overflowing, a sort of mixture of Bank 

 Holiday in London and the 1 2th of July in Ireland ! 

 There were sixty-five people in our carriage, and what 

 between the heat, the slamming of doors by noisy 

 officials and newspaper boys, the yells and whistles 

 with infernal machines in the mouths of innumerable 

 children, the danger of having your toes trodden on, or 

 getting deluged with water by little children carrying 

 drinks of ice-water up and down the carriage, life was 

 indeed a burden. However, ' at last it ringeth to 

 evensong.' Whom should I meet waiting for me on 

 arrival but dear old Cherrie Bancroft ! She is one of 

 the gems of the earth that will shine bright some day. 

 She is enthusiastic about the convict prison here, and 

 is doing wonderful work where the labourers are 

 mighty few. And now I must shut up and pack. We 

 are off to Salt Lake, about 800 miles, to-night. I am 

 very fit, and don't cough nearly as much either morn- 

 ing or evening ; in fact, hardly at all at night." 



"SALT LAKE CITY, Wednesday, gfh July. 

 I must send one line from here to say that neither 

 Douglas nor I will become Mormons. I have only time 

 for a scribble. This is a most remarkable place, and 

 after crossing the Sierra Nevada at an altitude of 7000 

 feet, we descended on a high plateau 4000 feet, the 

 Great Nevada desert greatly resembling the Egyptian 

 deserts, which we crossed 600 miles. Such desolation. 

 Salt Lake is an immense sheet of water 90 miles by 

 40, and is very like the Dead Sea. We have been to 

 see the Tabernacle and Temple of the Mormons ; the 

 former is a wonderful building, seating 10,000 people. 



