CHAPTER III.

The Colorado Pleasure Ground--Manitou.

When the Colorado visitor comes for the first time he is fortunate if his approach is by one of those lines whose trains, like those of the Burlington, come careering across the high plains from the eastward at an hour that shows the notched and serrated mountain wall against the sky. There is no other mountain approach in the world like that to Colorado from the east. Here is the sudden ending of that wide and silent vastness in which the modern traveler now lives less than twenty-four hours, but which the old-time wanderer dwelt in for more than a month. To reach this mountain world, ending abruptly at the plain, is a surprise. Let one ray of sunshine lie upon a peak, far in the distance, and it is known that the fleecy texture of a cloud could not give back that peculiar glint, cold and bright and half a frown, and that these huge shapes are, at last, the Rocky Mountains. Such a glimpse may not occur to the railway traveler once in a hundred journeys, but if seen it is a suggestion of the spires that Bunyan saw; the Beulah that lies beyond the river.

More than a quarter of a century ago, before the time of the transcontinental lines, the present writer, visiting his guard lines at 4 o'clock in the morning on the banks of the Purgatoire, has seen one rose-colored spot high up among the fading stars, and wondered what it was. The mirages of the plains had shown no mountains to the westward while daylight lingered. It was the sunrise on Pike's Peak, eighty miles away.

To this eastward edge of the mountains and western ending of the plains all westward travelers come first, and it is here that the majority linger. In it are situated Denver, Colorado Springs, Manitou, Pueblo, Trinidad, Golden, Boulder, Fort Collins, Greeley, etc. These names are all familiar. Their situation in respect to each other is in a crooked line running north and south along the edge of the high plains, and about three hundred miles long. Greeley is furthest north and Trinidad furthest south. Denver is the center of the line, singularly situated as the gateway to all that lies to the westward.

It is useless to attempt to occupy attention with a description of this beautiful and well-known city. It is in reality of the plains, though standing at an elevation of over five thousand feet. To it all roads lead, and from it all go out toward the nooks and corners of an intricate mountain system. The foothills of the real mountains rise behind it, as high as the average Alleghanies.

Southward and northward from Denver lie the resorts that all tourists visit, whether or not they go into the interior, whose general aspects have been sketched in a previous chapter. Chief among these is Manitou.

To visit Manitou it is necessary to take one of three lines running directly south from the capital to Colorado Springs, a distance of seventy-eight miles. This city is built on the mesa, and to be a health resort was not its original purpose. But such it is, and it has a wide reputation with that class who wish to avoid the activity and merriment of Manitou, which lies in sight to the westward. The hotels are fine, and, speaking largely, every day in the year is sunny. To be able always to see the mountains, and to be able also at any time, and by an easy railroad or carriage ride, to enter some of their most beautiful nooks, is an attraction to many hundreds of people. The town has a population of about twelve thousand, and an elevation of nearly six thousand feet. Like Denver, it stands on the edge of the plains.

Between Denver and Colorado Springs or Manitou there are several smaller resorts, all on railroad lines running south from Denver. Among these is the village of Castle Rock, deriving its name from the castellated cliff under which it nestles. Perry Park, a little distance away from the line, is in a park filled with rock formations similar to those found in the famous Garden of the Gods, near Manitou. Palmer Lake lies in the midst of good foothill scenery. The peaks of the Snowy Range are visible from near this point, and the walks and drives of the neighborhood are fine. Glen Park, half a mile away, is the Chautauqua of Colorado. It is one of the prettiest glens in this region of nooks and glens, and the cliff behind it is 2,000 feet high. The Chautauqua assembly is held here annually, and otherwise the place is used for summer residence and for outings.

Almost midway between Colorado Springs and Manitou, and in sight of both, is the old town of Colorado City. It was the first capital of Colorado, and in some one of the now dilapidated log buildings, wanderers in an unknown land called themselves to order after the manner of the usual American empire builder.

Manitou--About this unique spot there will always be something to say. But generalities do not describe it. He who has not been there at all can get from them no conception of the real place. And it is not so much a place as it is a locality; the center of a group of beautiful places that have made it, with its surroundings, a spot once seen never to be forgotten.

Imagine the outward opening of Ute Pass--a cleft in the undulating mountain wall extending backward and upward. It opened into the plain, as Pike's tattered wanderers first saw it, in V-shape, and in this notch bubbled three or four peculiar springs. There was no one there. The antelope and buffalos from the plains, and the black-tailed deer and elks from the mountains came there to drink. The Utes trailed down the rocky cañon that bears their name, single file, afoot, and camped beside the springs. One of them went out to the edge of the mesa, east toward Colorado Springs and lay down on his naked stomach and peeped out over the plain from behind a sage bush, and was on picket duty there to watch lest the plains Apache catch his kindred unaware.

The waters bubbled as they rose, and had a faint sweetish taste, and the savages, and all who have since tasted them, liked them well. They were "medicine waters," too. There is a pleasant supposition that these painted savages named the place "Manitou"--a name used by the Indians of Cooper and tradition to express the idea of a spirit, God or Devil, indifferently. It is a pretty name in sound, and the legend does not the slightest harm. In reality, the Utes owned these unknown mountains in large part, and they also liked to hunt buffalo on the plains, and they passed this place in their migrations because it was convenient and they were thirsty. All that is left of them now is their one supposed word, "Manitou."

Then, as now, the strange wind-wrought obelisks of the Garden of the Gods stood near at hand, and in the trail the huge Balanced Rock seemed waiting to be pushed to its fall by some passing child. Then, as now, the gateway, guarded by its red perpendicular portals, springing more than three hundred feet straight up from the level plain, stood open. The clefts in the mountain's flank that are called the north and south Cheyenne Cañons were there as now, and the cascade that falls in seven leaps five hundred feet in the southern cañon was there, it is almost difficult to believe, precisely as it is to-day and as it has been for ages. All the trees were there; the Douglas spruce, the Rocky Mountain pine, the Picea Grandis, the creepers, the mauve and white clematis, and, over all, towering and inaccessible, the red granite walls.

The twin cañon to the northward held its tumbling waters too, and Seven Lakes, Monument Park, Rainbow Falls, Manitou Park, Williams' Cañon, Cave of the Winds, Engleman's Cañon, Red Cañon, Crystal Park, Glen Eyrie--all these were the same as now, but unnamed and almost unnoted. Nothing in the modern world is ever done until a railroad comes.

Yet there has been a change; as great a change as the ingenuity of man can make in everlasting things. The Manitou Grand Caverns have been discovered and opened, precisely as though nature had not been lavish enough before, and must needs do some other brilliant thing through man's accident and luck. Wagon roads have been graded in all directions, and from one famous place to another, until there is no pleasure ground in America, possibly in the world, so well equipped for out-of-doors pleasure in a climate that has no vicissitudes, and amid remarkable scenes that have been clustered around this one favored spot with a profusion unknown elsewhere in all the civilized world.

To South Cheyenne Cañon from Manitou it is nine miles; to North Cheyenne Cañon eight and one-half; from the mouth of the cañon to the Rainbow Falls and Grand Caverns it is one and one-half miles, and every visitor wishes it was further, because it is a road of rugged sweetness quite unequaled; to Red Cañon it is three miles; to Crystal Park, three; to the Garden of the Gods, three--a drive lovely as pleasure knows, with an extraordinary scene at the end of it; to Glen Eyrie it is five miles; to Monument Park by "trail"--which is native for a fine riding road--it is seven and one-half miles; by carriage road it is nine miles; to Seven Lakes, again by trail, it is nine miles; to the summit of Pike's Peak, this time by the Cog Road, it is nine wonderful miles, with an elevation rarely attained in this life at the end of it; to the same by trail it is thirteen miles. There are four ways of going up this mountain, to climb which was a few years ago a remarkable feat--afoot, horseback, by carriage and by rail. All these ways are practised, according to the spirit and physical condition of the visitor. The bicycle, for only this once, is not included.

These are some of the show places, the world-renowned scenes about which there cannot easily be any exaggeration. People linger among them for months, and go to them again and again.

But in addition to these there are scores of mountain nooks and corners; cañons, caves, waterfalls; private places that the visitor seeks out or casually finds for himself. There are acres, and quarter and half acres that have been discovered hundreds of times, and are owned, practically without cost, by the finder for so long as he lingers amid these scenes. There may be sometimes a pair, to whom the place is a joint-stock enterprise.

Within the limits of Manitou there are nine springs, all cold mineral waters. They are of two kinds; the "soda" springs, effervescent and resembling in taste and quality appollinaris water, and the iron springs. All are medicinal, and all have records of cures. They are at least the nucleus of an agreeable supposition: the beautiful scenery, the crisp mountain air, the out-of-doors, the inducements to activity, the tiredness that is really rest--these are the health-restoring facilities of Manitou. The waters are very pleasant, and may be regarded as a duty, always with the understanding that if the visitor is made over again in the course of a few weeks, as he often is, he may ascribe it to the waters if he wishes.

It is manifest that of such a place a volume might be written. The specific attractions of each attraction cannot here be described. It would be useless space-writing if they were. Manitou, once visited, remains ever after a picture of the mind, never put into words. Over all, always, shimmers the indescribable Colorado sunshine, a light that is not of other lands.

So far as creature comforts are in question, Manitou has long been sumptuously equipped. There are five large hotels, capable of accommodating an aggregate of over twelve hundred guests. There are, besides, many small hotels, and there are cottages that may be rented for periods of weeks or months.

One of the notable works of man at Manitou is the Cog Railroad to the summit of Pike's Peak. It was completed in 1891, and is in many respects singular even for its kind. It climbs in the eight and three-quarters miles of its length to a height of 14,147 feet above sea level. It cost half a million dollars, and the construction is of the very highest class. There is a cog-rail in the center, between the two other rails, which weighs a hundred and ten tons to the mile. At intervals of two hundred feet the track is anchored to heavy masonry. Brakes are so contrived that the train can be stopped on any grade within a distance of ten inches. The trucks of the cars and engines are always tilted at the angle of the ascent, but in the case of the former the seats are level to the sitter, and the engines are built high at one end and remain so, even on level ground. The engine does not pull the train, but pushes it. Three hours are consumed in making the ascent, and a hundred passengers make a load for the train. Stops are made at interesting points on the way up.

There are many feats of engineering and in the overcoming of great physical difficulties that render this the most remarkable of the climbing passenger railroads of the world. The ascent of this big mountain was always a feat by the ordinary means; the elevation is one not usually attained in this life under any circumstances, and the sensations are indescribable in words.

No attempt is here made to describe in detail the scenes within the scenes at Manitou. No one who has been there ever attempts this even in ordinary conversation. They who return from the Cheyenne cañons or the Garden of the Gods are ever a silent company. That name Manitou should be applied to the entire region, as indicating vaguely that spirit far removed from the platitudes and tediousness of ordinary language and common life that pervades it all.