OUR NATIONAL PARKS. 33 



The country is one of much beauty. Hot Springs Mountain, from 

 whose sides flow the cleansing waters, is about fifty miles west by 

 south from Little Rock. Here, as early as 1804, began the settlement 

 which has developed into the handsome prosperous city of 16,000 

 inhabitants known as Hot Springs. It is a resort city, made wealthy 

 from the many thousands of visitors seeking health from the adjacent 

 Government springs and pleasure in the high and beautiful neigh- 

 hood country with its excellent drives and woodland paths, its 

 mountain and river views, its social gayeties and its exceptional golf. 



INTERESTING INDIAN TRADITIONS 



On the borders of the city at the mountain's foot lies the reserva- 

 tion, a tract of 912 acres enclosing all the forty-six hot springs. 

 Eleven bathhouses are in the reservation and a dozen more in the 

 city, all under Government regulation. There are also cold-water 

 springs of curative value. In the city are many hotels and boarding 

 houses with rates ranging from lowest to highest. The Department 

 of the Interior has spent altogether more than a million dollars on the 

 development of the reservation. The reservation contains, also, an 

 Army and Navy Hospital. 



Dr. William P. Parks, superintendent of the reservation, states in 

 his annual report for 1915 that while the baths are constantly given 

 for such ailments as seem to be benefited in the experience of physi- 

 cians who have prescribed their use and carefully observed the 

 results, there are still many physicians throughout the country who, 

 never having themselves tested the springs, hesitate to send patients 

 there. 



"No physician who is thorough and looks for the best results from 

 the medicines he gives," says Dr. Parks, "would think of prescribing 

 a drug whose physiological effects and therapeutic value had not been 

 scientifically proven and described." 



A perfect explanation, this, of a natural scientific conservatism. 



The War Department's years of experience in the Army and Navy 

 Hospital, however, is thoroughly convincing, and the medical staff 

 officially affirm the waters' marked curative value for rheumatic and 

 many grave ailments more or less kindred. 



Recently the Department of the Interior has established on the 

 reservation the Oertel system of graduated exercise which has proved 

 so successful at the celebrated springs of Bad Nauheim, Germany. 

 Courses have been laid out on the mountain slopes with distances 

 scientifically established and plainly marked by monuments. The 

 length and character of the walks are determined by physicians 

 according to the condition and progress of the patient. 



Tradition has it that the curative properties of the hot springs were 

 known to the Indians long before the Spanish invasion. It is prob- 

 able that they were known to De Soto who died in 1542 less than a 



