Chapter XII: The Queen of the Cañons

Receding now, the dying numbers ring
Fainter and fainter down the rugged dell,
And now the mountain breezes scarcely bring
A wandering witch note of the distant spell,--
And now, 'tis silent all--Enchantress, fare-thee-well.
--WALTER SCOTT.

When, some ten years ago, the writer had let his mule down into Baker's Park, by hitching its wiry tail around successive snubbing-posts, the prediction was ventured that at some distant day a railway would penetrate these solitudes; and that it would approach from the southward, through a cañon which not even an Indian had ever been known to traverse,--the trails in that direction then leading over a terrible range, at a height far above the limit of vegetation. The prophecy has been verified, for the Denver and Rio Grande has already pushed its southwestern extension through the Cañon of the Animas, reaching Silverton in July, 1882.

Here the cores of the Rocky Mountains have been buried beneath an overflow of eruptive rock spreading over four thousand five hundred square miles of territory; or else, along with the sandstones and slates which were deposited against their sides, they have been metamorphosed into schists and quartzites. "The character of the volcanic rocks throughout the district," says Dr. Hayden's report, "is one of extreme interest, demonstrating an enormous amount of activity during a probably short period of time (geologically speaking), which activity was, nevertheless, accompanied by a comparatively large number of changes in the chemical and physical qualities of the ejected material."

This geological composition gives to these mountains,--and particularly to the quartzite peaks along the southern border of the eruptive area,--a different appearance from any of the northern Rockies,--a more precipitous, Alpine and grander countenance, with sharp pinnacles, tremendous vertically walled chasms, and extensive forests of spruce clothing their lower declivities. In no other locality are so many very lofty summits to be seen crowded together. Sierra Blanca and two or three other single peaks in Colorado and Wyoming slightly outrank any here; but nowhere else can be found whole groups of mountains holding their heads up to fourteen thousand feet, and having great valleys almost at timber-line.

The old maps bear the name Sierra Madre, to designate these heights, whose snowy crests filled the northern horizon and forbade the advance of Spanish exploration. The word admits of various applications, but one which might well have been in the mind of him who first used it, is that this vast highland is the mighty _Mother_ of our rivers. From its western slopes flow the rivulets that unite to make the Gunnison and Grand,--one of the forks of the Rio Colorado. Easterly, but on its northern face, bubbles the great spring which forms the very source of the Rio Grande del Norte. Every gulch upon its southern breast feeds the rushing streams that furnish to the Rio San Juan all the water it gets for its long journey through the wilderness.

Silverton is forty five miles due north from Durango; and after leaving the latter point the road leads straight up the Animas valley, here broad and fertile, with green rounded hills sweeping up on each side. Now and then these exchange their softly curving outlines for a bluff-like form, exposing long vari-colored strata of cretaceous sandstones, unbroken, but inclined upward toward the north, where their beds have been gently lifted by a slow upheaval of the mountains. There is much color in this part of the landscape, especially now, when the rains of August have put a spring-like freshness of tint upon everything verdant. The low, treeless benches between the track and the foot of the hills, the open places beside the river, and the pasture-lands are all glorious in a dense mass of sun-flowers, which stand knee-high, with blossoms scarcely larger than a dollar. Thus the outlines of the ridges running in endless succession down to the water's edge, are defined in gilded ranks, that rise behind one another for miles as you proceed. The whole foreground is enchromed; and this valley is the veritable home of Clytie.

A belt of cedars and dense shrubs stands along the base of the mountains; then perhaps a bare steep space of uniform dull green displays the tone of mingled bunch grass and sage-brush; next will appear a wall of red sandstone set at an angle, and contrasting richly in shades varying from dull vermillion to deep maroon, with the ochre-yellow, white or bluish gray of the rocks surmounting it. Occasionally these capping-stones show themselves in long, well exposed strata, slanting to the horizon; sometimes here and there they simply crop out in water-worn crags; again they will be lost altogether under the fringing shrubbery that overhangs the low forehead of the bluff. It is fifteen miles before the valley narrows in, and throughout this whole extent of bottom-land the ground is tilled from the river-brink to the stony uplands on either side, the fall of the water being so great that irrigation is easy. Ranches succeed each other without any waste land between, and I do not know any portion of the Far West (this side of Salt Lake basin) where the farms seem as thrifty or the houses so comfortable and pleasant. Every sort of grain is raised, and the yield to an acre is large, as must always be the case where the soil is rich, the weather uniform, and the ranchman able to control his water-supply and apply it as he sees need. Garden-produce is much attended to, also, for there is more profit in it than even in grain. Hay and its substitutes, alfalfa and lucerne, take high rank in the list, and of the two last named it is customary to cut three crops annually. In the winter of 1880-81 baled hay was worth $120 and $140 a ton in Durango, while one man told me that it cost him almost $500 a ton to get a supply to his mine in an emergency. In those days the farmer had as good a mine as any on the sources of his river. Such prices will probably never prevail again, now that the railway brings hay and feed from Kansas; but the resident producer can still compete with import figures at a handsome profit.

Two or three miles above Durango we pass Animas City, a small village of unpainted houses, which had an existence and an exciting history long years before its prosperous neighbor was dreamed of; and six miles farther come upon Trimble Springs, directly at the foot of the high bank which here confronts the western side of the valley. It is a singular coincidence, perhaps, that within easy distance and access of all the larger towns or population centers in Colorado, mineral springs are found, whose virtues are sufficiently marked to warrant development, thus supplying each neighborhood its own sanitary as well as pleasure resort. Trimble Springs occupies this relation to both Durango and Silverton, and is greatly frequented by the dwellers in these towns, besides numerous visitors from more remote points. A capacious hotel, of attractive exterior, and admirably arranged and furnished within, affords the comforts of a home. Near by is the bath-house, one hundred feet in length, and equipped in the most approved modern style, with all varieties of baths. The temperature of the water as it comes from the ground is 126° F., and iron, soda and magnesia are the predominating qualities, in the order named, while there is also much free carbolic acid gas. The record of cures effected here contains many cases of rheumatism, liver and kidney complaints, and chronic blood and skin diseases; while it is averred that the use of the waters will entirely eradicate the tobacco habit. The temperature is equable, and the surroundings romantic. The river supplies excellent trout-fishing, and the hunter will find an abundance of game in the adjacent foothills. The place must grow in popularity, as it becomes more widely known; for, as the Madame declared, "it excels the White Mountains in scenic features, not to mention the superiority of its thermal founts, and the charm of its climate, over any eastern sanitarium." We marveled at the stateliness of her phrases, but couldn't dispute the facts.

Just at the head of the farming lands, stands the little settlement of Hermosa. I had been there once before this more auspicious advent, after two days of dreadfully weary travel over a mountain trail, and had come down into the valley only to find our much-doubted warnings verified, and these cabins all deserted. We knew what it meant, but made haste to feast upon the green corn, and tomatoes, melons and roots of every sort, which the panic stricken ranchmen had left behind. Stuffing every available bag and pocket full, we went on to a camping-spot, and deliberated while we cooked our princely dinner.

It was certain that Indians had driven these settlers away, yet there were no signs of hostility apparent. There were five of us, and we had proposed going two hundred miles directly into the Indian country. Should we proceed, or turn back and abandon our exploration? Perhaps if we had possessed only our customary bacon and beans we might have halted; but the luscious corn and melons turned the scale, and we resolved to go forward. Had we not done so we should have missed the rare satisfaction of being the first to tell the story of the Cliff-Dwellers of the Mancos and McElmo. In the nine years which since have worn their footprints into the trail of events, little change had come to this particular spot; and I was glad of it, for it left in my memory a landmark which was lost elsewhere under the obliterating hand of an eager civilization, that has tamed the primitive wildness we rode over in 1874.

Above Hermosa, the valley contracts rapidly, and the wide fields give place to groves of pine, free of underbrush, through which are caught glimpses of the bright stream sinking away from us on the right. The railway commences to ascend the western hills, carving its way along their face, and tracing their shallow undulations by sweeping curves. In places the sharp stones blasted from the roadbed cover the steep and forbidding descent for hundreds of feet below us. Now the river has disappeared, though a rocky ledge marks its cañon confines, the intervening space is wild and broken, and the pines are denser, with great blackened trunks. Presently we emerge into a tiny park, and Rockwood is reached. The location is secluded yet picturesque. Lofty cliffs and precipitous mountains hem it in on all sides, and the meadows in the small depression beside the town are fringed with trees, which are tall and imposing, and yet look more like dwarfed bushes against the massive background of towering bluffs. A lively village has grown up here, whose principal stimulus exists in the fact that it is the forwarding point for the extensive mining district lying between the La Plata and San Miguel ranges. Rico, the most important camp in that section, is connected with Rockwood by a good road, thirty-two miles in length, over which stages and supply-trains make daily trips.

Before leaving Rockwood the train-men are observed to examine critically the wheels, trucks and couplings of our cars, and we know that something unusual ahead suggests the precaution.

Moving slowly through a deeply shaded cutting, a sharp outward curve is rounded, and what a vision greets our astonished eyes! The most magnificent of all the cañons of the Rockies! The mountain presents a red granite front, perpendicular for nearly a thousand feet, and midway between top and bottom has been chiseled from the solid rock a long balcony or shelf, just wide enough for the track. From far below comes to our ears the roar of driven waters, and with bated breath we gaze fearfully over the edge, so perilously near, down, down to where a bright green torrent urges its impatient way between walls whose jetty hue no sun-ray relieves. Overhead the beetling precipice towers ominously, as if about to crush the pigmies who had dared to invade its storm-swept breast. In its shadow all is silent, weird and awful.

The opposite side of the cañon, scarcely the toss of a pebble away, rises almost vertically, a smooth, unscalable wall, that gleams like brightly polished bronze, but is striped with upright lines of shadow, so that it recalls Scott's picture of Melrose Abbey under the harvest-moon:--

"And buttress and buttress alternately
Seemed carved in ebon and ivory."

Higher up, the wall breaks away into receding hills, on whose grassy and wooded slopes the sunshine plays hide and seek. A little above the gorge we can discern where the track turns to the right and crosses on a long, low trestle, the alcove in the cañon, while in the loftier heights beyond, the verdure-clad mountains are seen rising into shapely cones and coquetting with the fleecy clouds. Such were the elements of the sublime view in the Cañon of the Rio de las Animas Perdidas caught and perpetuated by our Artist.

Beyond the opening the defile again closes into so narrow a compass that the pines and spruces clinging precariously to the cliffs mingle in a dim arch that spans the chasm. Again the train is creeping cautiously along a dizzy brink, while an hundred feet below the pent-up flood is forcing its passage through the unworn and pitilessly hard rocks. The water is still green as emerald, and has the same luminous quiver and transparence of verdancy which the gem possesses. What gives it that vivid color here in this dark recess?--anything but the fact that it is surcharged with the air caught in its turbulence? We can see great nebulæ of submerged bubbles racing by, meteor-like, too swiftly to rise at once to the glassy surface. Niagara, below the Falls, has that same wonderful, deep green tint. Imprison Niagara, or only so much of it as you could span with a stone's throw; contract its upright, volcanic walls into a crevice sixty feet wide--turn the river up on edge, as it were--and send it down that black, resounding flume, with all the impetus of a twenty-mile race,--then you have an image of this "River of Lost Souls," in the wildest portion of its marvelous channel.

The building of the railway, for the first mile north of Rockwood, exceeded in its daring any work even in the famous Grand Cañon of the Arkansas. The engineer who had charge of the construction showed the Madame a picture one of his surveyors drew of the manner in which the location was made. Evidently the draughtsman took his observations from the water's edge, where his vista was between two walls of natural masonry, and was limited by the side of the gorge which bent sharply there. This wall was vertical and smooth, for almost a thousand feet from its base. From that height were seen hanging spider-web-like ropes, down which men, seeming not much larger than ants, were slowly descending, while others (perched upon narrow shelves in the face of the cliffs, or in trifling niches from which their only egress was by the dangling ropes), sighted through their theodolites from one ledge to the other, and directed where to place the dabs of paint indicating the intended roadbed. Similarly suspended, the workmen followed the engineers, drilling holes for blasting, and tumbling down loose fragments, until they had won a foothold for working in a less extraordinary manner. Ten months of steady labor were spent on this cañon-cutting,--months of work on the brink of yawning abysses and in the midst of falling rocks, yet not one serious accident occurred. "Often it seemed as though another hair's distance or straw's weight would have sent me headlong over the edge," said the chief engineer, and no doubt all his subordinates could say the same. The expense attending such construction was of necessity great, the outlay for this single mile aggregating about $140,000.

Crossing the handsome bridge shown in our sketch, the course of the road thereafter is generally on the eastern bank of the stream, although it is recrossed a few times where, by this expedient, expensive excavation could be avoided. The water gradually rises to the level of the track, which is henceforth rarely a rod above it. Often in making a curve, one obtains a charming view up the river, with its gracefully drooping borders of willows and aspens. Everywhere the mountains are close at hand on either side, and a goat could scarcely climb their inaccessible steeps.

Presently a halt is made, and as we alight, such a picture is presented as it may never be our fortune to again behold. The cañon is compressed into a narrow fissure among mountains of supreme height, whose fronts are in unbroken shadow. At the right a waterfall comes leaping down, to join the foam-flecked river. In the foreground great banks of moss sustain gay flowers, while over them nod the stately pines, with swaying vines, keeping time to the fretful murmur of the water. Between and far beyond the clear-cut sky-lines of nearer peaks, The Needles lift their splintered pinnacles into the regions of perpetual snow, wrapped in the gauze of a wondrous atmosphere, and their crests glowing as with a golden crown.

Continuing northward, we speedily enter Elk Park, a little valley in the midst of the range, with sunlit meadows and groups of giant pines. As we turn from the park, a backward glance discloses the subject of our frontispiece,--Garfield Peak,--lifting its symmetrical summit a mile above the track, a peerless landmark among its fellows.

Onward, the everlasting hills are marshalled, and among them for miles the cañon maintains its grandeur. Frequent cascades, glistening like burnished silver in the sunlight, leap from crag to crag for a thousand feet down the mountain sides, to lose themselves in the Animas. Thus grandly ends this glorious ride, and we sweep out into a green park, and are at Silverton, in the heart of Silver San Juan.