Chapter 4
One of the richest wild gardens I know is a bare, open spot in a cottonwood grove, part of it tunneled by ants, which run over it by millions, and the rest a jumble of bowlders and wild rosebushes, impossible to describe. In this spot, unshaded from the burning sun, flourish flowers innumerable. Rosebushes, towering far above one's head, loaded with bloom; shrubs of several kinds, equally burdened by delicate white or pink blossoms; the ground covered with foot-high pentstemons, blue and lavender, in which the buds fairly get in each other's way; and a curious plant--primrose, I believe--which opens every morning, a few inches from the ground, a large white blossom like the magnolia, turns it deep pink, and closes it before night; several kinds of yellow flowers; wild geraniums, with a look of home in their daintily penciled petals; above all, the wonderful golden columbine. I despair of picturing this grand flower to eyes accustomed to the insignificant columbine of the East. The blossom is three times the size of its Eastern namesake, growing in clumps sometimes three feet across, with thirty or forty stems of flowers standing two and a half feet high. In hue it is a delicate straw color, sometimes all one tint, sometimes with outside petals of snowy white, and rarely with those outsiders of lavender. It is a red-letter day when the flower-lover comes upon a clump of the lavender-leaved columbine. Far up in the mountains is found still another variety of this beautiful flower, with outside petals of a rich blue. This, I believe, is the State flower of Colorado.
I am surprised at the small number of flowers here with which I am familiar. I think there are not more than half a dozen in all this extraordinary "procession of flowers" that I ever saw before. In consequence, every day promises discoveries, every walk is exciting as an excursion into unknown lands, each new find is a fresh treasure.
VI.
A CINDERELLA AMONG FLOWERS.
Like torches lit for carnival, The fiery lilies straight and tall Burn where the deepest shadow is; Still dance the columbines cliff-hung, And like a broidered veil outflung The many-blossomed clematis.
SUSAN COOLIDGE.
A rough, scraggy plant, with unattractive, dark-green foliage and a profusion of buds standing out at all angles, is, in July, almost the only growing thing to be seen on the barren-looking mesa around Colorado Springs. Anything more unpromising can hardly be imagined; the coarsest thistle is a beauty beside it; the common burdock has a grace of growth far beyond it; the meanest weed shows a color which puts it to shame. Yet if the curious traveler pass that way again, late in the afternoon, he shall find that "Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these." He will see the bush transfigured; its angular form hidden under a mass of many pointed stars of snowy whiteness, with clusters of pale gold stamens. Then will stand revealed the "superb mentzelia," a true Cinderella, fit only for ignominious uses in the morning, but a suitable bride for the fairy prince in the evening.
To look at the wide-stretching table-lands, where, during its season, this fairy-story transformation takes place daily, so burned by the sun, and swept by the wind, that no cultivated plant will flourish on it, one would never suspect that it is the scene of a brilliant "procession of flowers" from spring to fall. "There is always something going on outdoors worth seeing," says Charles Dudley Warner, and of no part of the world is this more true than of these apparently desolate plains at the foot of the Rocky Mountains. Rich is the reward of the daily stroller, not only in the inspiration of its pure, bracing air, the songs of its meadow-larks, and the glory of its grand mountain view, but in its charming flower show.
This begins with the anemone, modest and shy like our own, but three times as big, and well protected from the sharp May breezes by a soft, fluffy silk wrap. Then some day in early June the walker shall note groups of long, sword-shaped leaves, rising in clusters here and there from the ground. He may not handle them with impunity, for they are strong and sharp-edged, and somewhat later the beauty they are set to guard is revealed. A stem or two, heavy and loaded with hard green balls, pushes itself up among them day by day, till some morning he stands spellbound before the full-blown bells of the yucca, cream-tinted or pink, and fragrant as the breath of summer.
Before the Nature-lover is tired of feasting his eyes upon that stately flower, shall begin to unfold the crumpled draperies of the great Mexican poppy, dotting the hillsides and the mesa with white, as far as the eye can reach. Meanwhile, the earth itself shall suddenly turn to pink, and a close look disclose a tiny, low-growing blossom, sweet as the morning, with the glow of the sunrise in its face; a little bunch of crazy-looking stamens, and tiny snips of petals standing out at all angles, and of all shades on one stem, from white to deep red; the whole no bigger than a gauzy-winged fly, and shaped not unlike one, with a delicious odor that scents the air.
Next day--or next week--wandering over the pathless barrens, the observer may come upon a group of cream-colored satin flowers, wide open to the sun, innocent looking and most tempting to gather. But the great fleshy leaves from which they spring give warning; they belong to the cactus family, and are well armed to protect their treasures from the vagrant hand. The walker--if he be wise--will content himself with looking, nor seek a nearer acquaintance.
While these royal beauties are adorning the highlands, others, perhaps even more lovely, are blooming in the canyons, under the trees, and beside the noisy brooks. First, there is a "riot of roses"--the only expression that adequately suggests the profusion of these beautiful flowers. They grow in enormous bushes, far above one's head, in impenetrable thickets, extending for yards each way.
"Rose hedges Abloom to the edges."
Every country road is walled in by them; every brookside is glorified by their rich masses of color; and no rocky wall is so bare but here and there a tiny shoot finds root, and open its rosy bloom. All these bushes, from the low-growing sort that holds its mottled and shaded petals three inches above the ground, to that whose top one cannot reach, are simply loaded with blossoms of all shades, from nearly white to deepest rose-color, filling the air with perfume.
The first time one comes upon this lavish display, he--or more probably she--picks a spray from the first bush; she cannot resist the next variety, and before she knows it her arms are full, with temptations as strong as ever before her. She may at last, like "H. H.," take home her roses by the carriage load, or, overwhelmed by their numbers, leave them all on their stems, and enjoy them in mass.
Shyly hiding under the taller shrubs beside the running water, the experienced seeker will find the gilia, one of the gems of Colorado's bouquet. This plant consists of one slender stem two feet or more tall, swayed by every breeze, and set for several inches of its length with daintiest blossoms,--
"Like threaded rubies on its stem."
They are like fairy trumpets, in many shades, from snow white to deep rose, and brilliant scarlet, with great variety of delicate marking visible only under a glass. The stem is so sticky that the flowers must be arranged as they are gathered; for they cling to each other more closely than the fabled "brother," and an attempt to separate them will result in torn flowers.
Anything more exquisite than a vase of gilias alone is rarely seen. The buds are as lovely as the blossoms; new ones open every day, and even the faded ones are not unsightly; their petals are simply turned backward a little. One minute every morning spent in snipping off blossoms that are past their prime insures the happy possessor a bouquet that is a joy forever, even in memory; lovely and fresh, in ever-changing combinations of color and form.
Some day shall be made memorable to the enthusiast by the discovery of a flower which should be named for "H. H.,"--the one which looked so charming from the moving train that her winning tongue brought the iron horse to a pause while it was gathered, "root and branch," for her delectation. Finding the gorgeous spike of golden blossoms without a common name, she called it--most happily--the golden prince's feather. It is to be presumed that it has an unwieldy scientific cognomen in the botanies; but I heard of no common one, except that given by the poet.
While this royal flower is still in bloom, may be found the mariposa, or butterfly lily, small and low on the burning mesa, but more generous in size, and richer of hue, in the shaded canyons.
"Like a bubble borne in air Floats the shy Mariposa's bell,"
says Susan Coolidge in her beautiful tribute to her beloved friend and poet. The three petals of this exquisite flower form a graceful cup of differing degrees of violet hue, some being nearly white, with the color massed in a rich, deep-toned crescent, low down at the heart of each petal, while others are glowing in the most regal purple.
All these weeks, too, have been blossoming dozens, yes, hundreds of others; every nook and corner is full; every walk brings surprises. Some of our most familiar friends are wanting. One is not surprised that the most common wayside flower of that golden region is the yellow daisy, or sunflower it is called; but she remembers fondly our fields of white daisies, and clumps of gay little buttercups, and she longs for cheery-faced dandelions beside her path. A few of the latter she may find, much larger and more showy than ours; but these--it is said in Colorado Springs--are all from seed imported by an exile for health's sake, who pined for the flowers of home.
Several peculiarities of Colorado flowers are noteworthy. Some have gummy or sticky stems, like the gilia, already mentioned, and others again are "clinging," by means of a certain roughness of stem and leaf. The mentzelia is of this nature; half a dozen stalks can with difficulty be separated; and they seem even to attract any light substance, like fringe or lace, holding so closely to it that they must be torn apart.
Many of the prettiest flowers are, like our milkweed, nourished by a milky juice, and when severed from the parent stem, not only weep thick white tears, which stain the hands and the garments, but utterly refuse to subsist on water, and begin at once to droop. Is it the vitality in the air which forces even the plants to eccentricities? Or can it be that they have not yet been subdued into uniformity like ours? Are they unconventional--nearer to wild Nature? So queries an unscientific lover of them all.
This slight sketch of a few flowers gives hardly a hint of the richness of Colorado's flora. No words can paint the profusion and the beauty. I have not here even mentioned some of the most notable: the great golden columbine, the State flower, to which our modest blossom is an insignificant weed;
"The fairy lilies, straight and tall, Like torches lit for carnival;"
the primrose, opening at evening a disk three or four inches across, loaded with richest perfume, and changed to odorless pink before morning; exquisite vetches, with bloom like our sweet pea, and of more than fifty varieties; harebells in great clumps, and castilleias which dot the State with scarlet; rosy cyclamens "on long, lithe stems that soar;" and mertensias, whose delicate bells, blue as a baby's eyes, turn day by day to pink; the cleome, which covers Denver with a purple veil; the whole family of pentstemons, and hundreds of others.
An artist in Colorado Springs, who has given her heart, almost her life, to fixing in imperishable color the floral wealth about her, has painted over three hundred varieties of Colorado wild-flowers, and her list is still incomplete.
It is not pleasant to mar this record of beauty, but one thing must be mentioned. The luxuriance of the flowers is already greatly diminished by the unscrupulousness of the tourists who swarm in the flower season, especially, I am sorry to say, women. Not content with filling their hands with flowers, they fill their arms and even their carriage, if they have one. Moreover, the hold of the plant on the light, sandy soil is very slight; and the careless gatherer, not provided with knife or scissors, will almost invariably pull the root with the flower, thus totally annihilating that plant. When one witnesses such greediness, and remembers that these vandals are in general on the wing, and cannot stay to enjoy what they have rifled, but will leave it all to be thrown out by hotel servants the next morning, he cannot wonder at the indignation of the residents toward the traveler, nor that "No admittance" notices are put up, and big dogs kept, and that "tourist" is a name synonymous with "plunderer," and bitterly hated by the people.
I have seen a party of ladies--to judge by their looks--with arms so full of the golden columbine that it seemed they could not hold another flower, whose traveling dress and equipments showed them to be mere transient passers through, who could not possibly make use of so many. Half a dozen blossoms would have given as much pleasure as half a hundred, and be much more easily cared for, besides leaving a few for their successors to enjoy. The result is, of course, plain to see: a few more years of plunder, and Colorado will be left bare, and lose half her charm.
One beautiful place near Colorado Springs, Glen Eyrie, belonging to General Palmer, was generously left open for every one to enjoy by driving through; but, incredible as it seems, his hospitality was so abused, his lovely grounds rifled, not only of wild-flowers, but even of cultivated flowers and plants, that he was forced at last to put up notices that the public was allowed to "drive through _without dismounting_."
VII.
CLIFF-DWELLERS IN THE CANYON.
Glad With light as with a garment it is clad Each dawn, before the tardy plains have won One ray; and often after day has long been done For us, the light doth cling reluctant, sad to leave its brow.
H. H.
The happiest day of my summer in the Rocky Mountains was passed in the heart of a mountain consecrated by the songs and the grave of its lover, "H. H.,"--beautiful Cheyenne, the grandest and the most graceful of its range.
Camp Harding, my home for the season, in its charming situation, has already been described. The fortunate dwellers in this "happy valley" were blessed with two delectable walks, "down the road" and "up the road." Down the road presented an enchanting procession of flowers, which changed from day to day as the season advanced; to-day the scarlet castilleia, or painter's-brush, flaming out of the coarse grasses; to-morrow the sand lily, lifting its dainty face above the bare sand; next week the harebell, in great clumps, nodding across the field, and next month the mariposa or butterfly lily, just peeping from behind the brush,--with dozens of others to keep them company. As one went on, the fields grew broader, the walls of the mesa lowered and drew apart, till the canyon was lost in the wide, open country.
This was the favorite evening walk, with all the camp dogs in attendance,--the nimble greyhound, the age-stiffened and sedate spaniel, the saucy, ill-bred bull-terrier, and the naive baby pug. The loitering walk usually ended at the red farmhouse a mile away, and the walkers returned to the camp in the gloaming, loaded with flowers, saturated with the delicious mountain air, and filled with a peace that passeth words.
Up the road led into the mountain, under thick-crowding trees, between frowning rocks, ever growing higher and drawing nearer together, till the carriage road became a burro track, and then a footpath; now this side the boisterous brook, then crossing by a log or two to the other side, and ending in the heart of Cheyenne in a _cul-de-sac_, whose high perpendicular sides could be scaled only by flights of steps built against the rocks. From high up the mountain, into this immense rocky basin, came the brook Shining Water, in seven tremendous leaps, each more lovely than the last, and reached at bottom a deep stone bowl, which flung it out in a shower of spray forbidding near approach, and keeping the rocks forever wet.
The morning walk was up the road, in the grateful shade of the trees, between the cool rocks, beside the impetuous brook. This last was an ever fresh source of interest and pleasure, for nothing differs more widely from an Eastern brook than its Western namesake. The terms we apply to our mountain rivulets do not at all describe a body of water on its way down a Rocky Mountain valley. It does not murmur,--it roars and brawls; it cannot ripple,--it rages and foams about the bowlders that lie in its path. The name of a Colorado mountain stream, the Roaring Fork, exactly characterizes it.
One warm morning in June, a small party from the camp set out for a walk up the road. By easy stages, resting here and there on convenient rocks, beguiled at every step by something more beautiful just ahead, they penetrated to the end of the canyon. Of that party I was one, and it was my first visit. I was alternately in raptures over the richness of color, the glowing red sandstone against the violet-blue sky, and thrilled by the grandeur of places which looked as if the whole mountain had been violently rent asunder.
But no emotion whatever, no beauty, no sublimity even, can make me insensible to a bird note. Just at the entrance to the Pillars of Hercules, two towering walls of perpendicular rock that approach each other almost threateningly, as if they would close up and crush between them the rash mortal who dared to penetrate farther,--in that impressive spot, while I lingered, half yielding to a mysterious hesitation about entering the strange portal, a bird song fell upon my ear. It was a plaintive warble, that sounded far away up the stern cliff above my head. It seemed impossible that a bird could find a foothold, or be in any way attracted by those bare walls, yet I turned my eyes, and later my glass that way.
At first nothing was to be seen save, part way up the height, an exquisite bit of nature. In a niche that might have been scooped out by a mighty hand, where scarcely a ray of sunlight could penetrate, and no human touch could make or mar, were growing, and blooming luxuriantly, a golden columbine, Colorado's pride and glory, a rosy star-shaped blossom unknown to me, and a cluster of
"Proud cyclamens on long, lithe stems that soar."
When I could withdraw my eyes from this dainty wind-sown garden, I sought the singer, who proved to be a small brown bird with a conspicuous white throat, flitting about on the face of the rock, apparently quite at home, and constantly repeating his few notes. His song was tender and bewitching in its effect, though it was really simple in construction, being merely nine notes, the first uttered twice, and the remaining eight in descending chromatic scale.
Now and then the tiny songster disappeared in what looked like a slight crack in the wall, but instantly reappeared, and resumed his siren strains. Spellbound I stood, looking and listening; but alas! the hour was late, the way was long, and others were waiting; I needs must tear myself away. "To-morrow I will come again," I said, as I turned back. "To-morrow I shall be here alone, and spend the whole day with the canyon wren."
Then we retraced our steps of the morning, lingering among the pleasant groves of cottonwood, oak, and aspen; pausing to admire the cactus display of gorgeous yellow, with petals widespread, yet so wedded to their wildness that they resented the touch of a human hand, resisting their ravisher with needle-like barbs, and then sullenly drawing together their satin petals and refusing to open them more; past great thickets of wild roses, higher than our heads and fragrant as the morning; beside close-growing bushes, where hid the
"Golden cradle of the moccasin flower,"
and the too clever yellow-breasted chat had mocked and defied me; and so home to the camp.
At an early hour the next morning, the carriage of my hostess set me down at the entrance of Cheyenne Canyon proper, with the impedimenta necessary for a day's isolation from civilization. I passed through the gate,--for even this grand work of nature is claimed as private property; but, happily, through good sense or indifference, "improvements" have not been attempted, and one forgets the gate and the gate-keeper as soon as they are passed.
Entering at that unnatural hour, and alone, leaving the last human being behind,--staring in astonishment, by the way, at my unprecedented proceeding,--I began to realize, as I walked up the narrow path, that the whole grand canyon, winding perhaps a mile into the heart of this most beautiful of the Rocky Mountains, was mine alone for three hours. Indeed, when the time arrived for tourists to appear, so little did I concern myself with them that they might have been a procession of spectres passing by; so, in effect, the canyon was my solitary possession for nine blissful hours.
The delights of that perfect day cannot be put into words. Strolling up the path, filled with an inexpressible sense of ownership and seclusion from all the world, I first paused in the neighborhood of the small cliff-dweller whose music had charmed me, and suggested the enchanting idea of spending a day with him in his retreat. I seated myself opposite the forbidding wall where the bird had hovered, apparently so much at home. All was silent; no singer to be heard, no wren to be seen. The sun, which turned the tops of the Pillars to gold as I entered, crept down inch by inch till it beat upon my head and clothed the rock in a red glory. Still no bird appeared. High above the top of the rocks, in the clear thin air of the mountain, a flock of swallows wheeled and sported, uttering an unfamiliar two-note call; butterflies fluttered irresolute, looking frivolous enough in the presence of the eternal hills; gauzy-winged dragonflies zigzagged to and fro, their intense blue gleaming in the sun. The hour for visitors drew near, and my precious solitude was fast slipping away.
Slowly then I walked up the canyon, looking for my singer. Humming-birds were hovering before the bare rock as before a flower, perhaps sipping the water-drops that here and there trickled down, and large hawks, like mere specks against the blue, were soaring, but no wren could I see. At last I reached the end, with its waterfall fountain. Close within this ceaseless sprinkle, on a narrow ledge that was never dry, was placed--I had almost said grew--a bird's nest; whose, it were needless to ask. One American bird, and one only, chooses perpetual dampness for his environment,--the American dipper, or water ouzel.
Here I paused to muse over the spray-soaked cradle on the rock. In this strange place had lived a bird so eccentric that he prefers not only to nest under a continuous shower, through which he must constantly pass, but to spend most of his life in, not on the water. Shall we call him a fool or a philosopher? Is the water a protection, and from what? Has "damp, moist unpleasantness" no terrors for his fine feathers? Where now were the nestlings whose lullaby had been the music of the falling waters? Down that sheer rock, perhaps into the water at its foot, had been the first flight of the ouzel baby. Why had I come too late to see him?