FROM NEW YORK TO HEAVEN, 



433 



at the call of reveille. He will linger 

 at the Fountain House to make venture- 

 some plays with the bears that come each 

 night and morning to the hotel garbage 

 heap for food. He will refuse for weeks 

 to depart from the Upper Geyser Basin, 

 where he can have the pure joy of living 

 in a tent, while at the same time surround- 

 ed by the comforts and luxuries of civili- 

 zation. He will move not his feet from 

 the Lake House, where the winds that 

 sweep across the silver lake of Yellowstone 

 bite and thrill like a first kiss. • He will 

 leave his happy home to take care of itself 

 while he lives among primeval forces at 

 the Grand Canyon until the early snows 

 drive him forth, a rejuvenated, renerved, 

 buoyant, vigorous being, ready to take up 

 anew any battle of life that may come his 

 way. 



before which no living man could confine 

 his mind to cold facts. We were in 

 search of rest, color and thrills. The Park 

 furnishes all ; pre-eminently color. 



Standing on the great white and red 

 and yellow and brown plateau of Jupiter 

 terrace we had our first sight of the mar- 

 velous boiling springs and pools, and 

 drenched our souls in color, which to Ger- 

 trude was turquoise, to me green, and 

 which no man knoweth. From that day 

 on we drove through miles of canyons, 

 gorges, forests, mesas ; past peaks and 

 cliffs, lakes and streams ; past hugh cre- 

 vasses where giants at play when the 

 world was young 'had piled boulders and 

 crags in mad confusion ; up and up ; look- 

 ing down on the tops of great mountains 

 covered with the slim, spearlike firs of the 

 Rockies; all a tumult and riot and joy of 



CRATER OF GIANTESS GEYSER, UPPER BASIN. 



The perfect care which the Transporta- 

 tion Company takes of travelers is to me 

 one of the wonders of the Park. They 

 leave the tourist nothing to think of but 

 the scenery ; and that is enough. 



On one point Gertrude and I were 

 agreed and determined ; we did not wish 

 to acquire information. We declined to 

 become an understudy for a guide book. 

 It was vain for Major Bach to draw us 

 neat little maps of the Continental Divide, 

 showing where great rivers part to meet 

 no more, flowing each to its own ocean. 

 In vain to tell us there were more than 

 4,000 springs and ioo geysers in the 70 

 miles square of Park, and that the altitude 

 of the Great Divide was over 8,000 feet. 

 Gertrude would turn on her baby stare, 



color. We were drunk with greens and 

 purples, browns, blues, yellows and greys. 

 Sometimes we stopped and guides con- 

 voyed us up and over white terraces, past 

 boiling pools of green and gold and blue, 

 past spouting geysers of silver and crystal 

 and rainbows until we were dazed and 

 dumb with wonder and awe. Why try to 

 describe it? Send to Mr. Chas. S. Fee, St. 

 Paul, for a copy of "Wonderland," which 

 gives facts and figures and views. 



Mr. Child, President of the Transporta- 

 tion Company, kindly turned on a full 

 moon in our honor, to crown the wonder of 

 the scenes. He also turned on the Giant- 

 ess, one of the hugest of til ? great gey- 

 sers, which travelers do not always see in 

 action, as the lady only disports herself 



