Part 11

After a few minutes’ delay to stand and gaze, we resumed the footpath way, whilst the mail-waggon, with wheels rough-locked, descended what appeared to be an impracticable slope. Falling into the gorge of Big Kanyon Creek, we reached about midday a station, half stifled by the thick dust and the sun. We slaked our thirst with the cool water that trickled down the hill by the house side. Presently the station-master arrived; he was introduced to us as Mr. Eph Hanks. I had often heard of him as a Mormon desperado, leader of the dreaded Danite band, and a model ruffian. We found him very pleasant and sociable, though a facetious allusion to the dangers that awaited us under the roof of the Danite was made. We had dinner there, and, after a friendly leave, we entered the mail-waggon again, and prepared ourselves for the last climb over the western-most reach of the Wasach.

The road was now only a narrow shelf, and frequent fordings were rendered necessary by the capricious wanderings of the torrent. At one of the most ticklish turns our driver kindly pointed out a precipice where four of the mail passengers fell and broke their necks. He also entertained us with sundry other horrible tales. In due time, emerging from the gates and portals and deep serrations of the upper course, we descended into a lower level, and the valley presently lay full before our sight. At this place the pilgrim emigrants, like the hajis of Jerusalem and Meccah, were wont to give vent to the emotions pent up in their bosoms by sobs and tears, laughter and congratulations, psalms and hysterics. It is indeed no wonder that children danced, that strong men cheered and shouted, and that nervous women, broken with fatigue and hope deferred, screamed and fainted; that the ignorant fondly believed that the “Spirit of God” pervaded the very atmosphere, and that Zion on the tops of the mountains is nearer Heaven than the other parts of the earth. In good sooth, though uninfluenced by religious fervour――beyond the natural satisfaction of seeing a brand new Holy City――even I could not, after nineteen days of the mail-waggon, gaze upon the scene without emotion.

The hour was about 6 p.m., the atmosphere was touched with a dreamy haze, and a little bank of rose-coloured clouds, edged with flames of purple and gold, floated in the upper air, whilst the mellow radiance of an American autumn diffused its mild, soft lustre over the face of the earth. The sun was setting in a flood of heavenly light behind the bold, jagged outline of Antelope Island. At its feet, and then bounding the far horizon, lay, like a band of burnished silver, the Great Salt Lake, that innocent Dead Sea. South-westwards, and the Oquirrh Range sharply silhouetted against the depths of an evening sky.

The undulating valley-plain between us and the Oquirrh Range, once a howling wilderness given over to a few miserable savages, was now the site of a populous city. Truly the Mormon prophecy had been fulfilled; the desert had blossomed like the rose.

As we descended the Wasach Mountains we could look and enjoy the view of the Happy Valley, and the bench-land then attracted our attention. The eastern valley-bench, upon whose western declivity the city lies, may be traced on a clear day along the base of the mountains for a distance of twenty miles. As we advanced over the bench-ground, the city by slow degrees broke upon our sight. It showed, one may readily believe, to special advantage after a succession of Indian lodges, Canadian ranchos, and log-hut mail-stations of the prairies and the mountains. About two miles north, and overlooking the settlements from a height of four hundred feet, a detached cone called Ensign Mount rose at the end of a chain, and overhung and sheltered the north-eastern corner of the valley. Upon this mount the spirit of the martyred Prophet, Mr. Joseph Smith, is said to have appeared to his successor, Mr. Brigham Young, and pointed out to him the position of the new temple, which, after Zion had “got up into the high mountain,” was to console the saints for the loss of Nauvoo the Beautiful.

The city was about two miles broad, running parallel with the right bank of the Jordan, which forms its western limit. As we approached, it lay stretched before us as upon a map; at a little distance the aspect was somewhat Oriental, and in some points it reminded me of modern Athens――without the Acropolis. None of the buildings, except the Prophet’s house, were whitewashed. The material, the thick, sun-dried adobe, common to all parts of the Eastern world, was here of a dull leaden blue, deepened by the atmosphere to a grey, like the shingles of the roofs. The number of gardens and compounds, the dark clumps of cottonwood, locust, or acacia, fruit trees――apples, peaches and vines――and, finally, the fields of long-eared maize, strengthened the similarity to an Asiatic rather than to an American settlement. But the difference presently became as marked. Farm houses strongly suggested the old country; moreover, domes and minarets, even churches and steeples, were wholly wanting. The only building conspicuous from afar was the block occupied by the present Head of the Church. The court-house, with its tinned, Muscovian dome; the arsenal, a barn-like structure; and a saw-mill were next in importance.

As we entered the suburbs, the houses were almost all of one pattern, a barn shape, and the diminutive casements showed that window glass was not yet made in the valley. The poorer houses are small, low, and hut-like; the others, single-storied buildings, somewhat like stables, with many entrances. The best houses resembled East Indian bungalows, with flat roofs and low, shady verandahs, well trellised, and supported by posts or pillars. I looked in vain for the outhouse-harems, in which certain romancers concerning things Mormon had told me that wives were kept, like other stock. I presently found this one of a multitude of delusions. The people came out to their doors to see the mail-coach, as if it were a “Derby dilly” of old, go by. I was struck by the English appearance of the colony, and the prodigious numbers of white-headed children.

Presently we turned into the main thoroughfare, the centre of population and business, where the houses of the principal Mormon dignitaries and the stores of the Gentile merchants combined to form the city’s only street, properly so called. We pulled up at the Salt Lake House, the principal if not the only establishment of the kind in New Zion. In the Far West one learns not to expect much of a hostelry, and I had not seen one so grand for many a day. It was a two-storied building, with a long verandah supported by painted posts. There was a large yard behind for coralling cattle. A rough-looking crowd of drivers and their friends and idlers, almost every man armed with revolver and bowie-knife, gathered round the doorway to prospect the “new lot.” The host presently came out to assist us in carrying in our luggage. There was no bar, but upstairs we found a Gentile ball-room, a fair sitting-room, and bedchambers, apparently made out of a single apartment by partitions too thin to be strictly agreeable. The proprietor was a Mormon who had married an Englishwoman. We found him in the highest degree civil and obliging. To sum up, notwithstanding some considerable drawbacks, my first experience of the Holy City of the Far West was decidedly better than I expected.

Our journey had occupied nineteen days, from August 7th to 25th both included, and in that time we had accomplished not less than 1,136 statute miles.

II

_THE CITY AND ITS PROPHET_

Before giving any detailed account of the Mormons, I should like to say that I was twenty-four days at headquarters, and every opportunity was given me of surface observation; but there is in Mormondom, as in all other exclusive faiths, Jewish, Hindu, or other, an inner life, into which I cannot flatter myself to have penetrated. No Gentile, however long he may live in Salt Lake City, or how intimately he may be connected with the Mormons, can expect to see anything but the outside. The different accounts which have been given of life in the City of the Saints by anti-Mormons and apostates are venomous and misleading, whilst the writings of the faithful are necessarily untrustworthy. I therefore take the middle distance of the unprejudiced observer, and can only recount, honestly and truthfully, what I heard, felt, and saw.

The day after my arrival I went to see the Governor, the Hon. Alfred Cumming, who had been appointed by the President of the United States to assume the supreme executive authority at Great Salt Lake City. The conditions were that polygamy should not be interfered with, nor forcible measures resorted to, except in extremest need. Governor Cumming, accompanied by his wife, with an escort of six hundred dragoons, entered the city in the spring of 1858, shortly after the Mormons were in open rebellion against the Federal authority. By firmness, prudence, and conciliation, he not only prevented any collision between the local militia and the United States army, but succeeded in restoring order and obedience throughout the territory. He was told that his life was in danger, and warned that he might share the fate of Governor Boggs, who was shot through the mouth when standing at the window. His answer was to enlarge the casements of his house, in order to give the shooters a fair chance. The impartiality which he brought to bear in the discharge of his difficult and delicate duties, and his resolution to treat the saints like Gentiles and citizens, not as Digger Indians or felons, had not, when I was at Great Salt Lake City, won him the credit which he deserved from either party. The anti-Mormons abused him, and declared him to be a Mormon in Christian disguise; the Mormons, though more moderate, could never, by their very organisation, be content with a temporal and extraneous power existing side by side with a spiritual power. Governor Cumming did not meet his predecessor, the ex-Governor, Brigham Young, except on public duty. Mrs. Cumming visited Mrs. Young and the houses of the principal dignitaries, this being the only society in the place. Amongst the Moslems a Lady Mary Wortley Montagu could learn more of domestic life in a week than a man could in a year. So it was among the Mormons, and Mrs. Cumming’s knowledge far exceeded all that I might ever hope to gain.

The leading feature of Great Salt Lake City was Main, otherwise Whiskey, Street. This broadway was 132 feet wide, including twenty sidewalks, and, like the rest of the principal avenues, was planted with locust and other trees. The whole city was divided up into wide streets, and planted with trees. The stores were far superior to the shops of an English country town; the public buildings were few and unimposing. I was disappointed with the Temple block, the only place of public and general worship in the city; when I was there it was unfinished, a mere waste. The Tabernacle, the principal building, required enlarging, and was quite unfitted for the temple of a new faith. It seemed hardly in accordance with the energy and devotedness of this new religion that such a building should represent the House of the Lord, while Mr. Brigham Young, the Prophet, thinking of his own comfort before the glory of God, was lodged, like Solomon of old, in what was comparatively a palace. Near the Tabernacle was the Endowment House, or place of great medicine. Many rites took place here in secret that were carefully concealed from Gentile eyes, and with a result that human sacrifices were said to be performed within its walls. Personally, I did not believe in these orgies; there were probably ceremonies of the nature of masonic rites. Gentiles declared that the ceremonies consisted of a sort of miracle play, and a respectable judge was popularly known as “The Devil,” because he was supposed to play the part of the Father of Sin when tempting Adam and Eve. It was said that baptism by total immersion was performed, and the ceremony occupied eleven or twelve hours, the neophyte, after bathing, being anointed with oil, and dressed in clean white garments, cap and shirt, of which the latter was rarely removed.

On the Monday after my arrival a smoke-like column towards the east announced that the emigrants were crossing the bench-land, and the people hurried from all sides to greet them. Of course, I went, too, as the arrival of these emigrants, or rather prilgrims, was one of the sights of the City of the Saints. Presently the carts came. All the new arrivals were in clean clothes, the men washed and shaved, and the girls were singing hymns, habited in Sunday dress. Except the very young and the very old, the company of pilgrims did not trouble the waggons. They marched through clouds of dust over the sandy road leading to the town, accompanied by crowds, some on foot, others on horseback, and a few in traps. A score of youths of rather rowdy appearance were mounted in all the tawdriness of Western trappings――Rocky Mountain hats, embroidered buckskin garments, red flannel shirts, gigantic spurs, pistols and knives stuck in red sashes with depending ends. By-and-by the train of pilgrims reached the public square, and here, before the invasion of the Federal army, the first President used to make a point of honouring the arrival of pilgrims by a greeting in person. Not so on this occasion; indeed, it was whispered that Brigham Young seldom left his house except for the Tabernacle, and, despite his powerful will and high moral courage, did not show the personal intrepidity of Mr. Joseph Smith. He had guards at his gates, and never appeared in public unattended by friends and followers, who were, of course, armed. On this occasion the place of Mr. Brigham Young was taken by President-Bishop Hunter. Preceded by a brass band, and accompanied by the City Marshal, the Bishop stood up in his conveyance, and calling up the captains of companies, shook hands with them, and proceeded forthwith to business. In a short time arrangements were made for the housing and employment of all who required work, whether men or women. Everything was conducted with decorum.

I mingled freely among the crowd, and was introduced to many, whose names I did not remember. Indeed, the nomenclature of the Mormons was apt to be rather confusing, because, in order to distinguish children of different mothers, it was usual to prefix the maternal to the paternal parents’ name, suppressing the Christian name altogether. Thus, for instance, my sons, if I had any, by Miss Brown and Miss Jones and Miss Robinson respectively, would call themselves Brother Brown-Burton, Brother Jones-Burton, and Brother Robinson-Burton. The saints, even the highest dignitaries, waive the reverend and the ridiculous esquire, that “title much in use among vulgar people.” The Mormon pontiff and the eminences around him are simply brother or mister. _En revanche_, amongst the crowd there are as many colonels and majors, about ten being the proportion to one captain, as in the days when Mrs. Trollope set the Mississippi on fire. Sister is applied to women of all ages, whether married or single.

Many of the pilgrims were English, who had crossed over the plains, looking towards Mr. Brigham Young and Great Salt Lake City much as Roman Catholics regard the Pope and Rome. The arrangements for their convoy appeared to have been admirable, but many tales were told of mismangement. An old but favourite illustration of the trials of inexperienced travellers from the Mississippi to California was as follows. A man rode up to a standing waggon, and seeing a wretched-looking lad nursing a starving baby, asked him what the matter might be: “Wal now,” responded the youth, “guess I’m kinder streakt――ole dad’s drunk, ole marm’s in hy-sterics, brother Jim be playing poker with two gamblers, sister Sal’s down yonder a-courtin’ with an in-tire stranger, this ’ere baby’s got the diaree, the team’s clean guv out, the waggon’s broke down, it’s twenty miles to the next water. I don’t care a damn if I never see Californy!”

The dress of the fair sex in Great Salt Lake City was somewhat peculiar. The article called in Cornwall a “gowk,” in other parts of England a “cottage bonnet,” was universally used, plus a long, thick veil behind, which acts as a cape or shawl. A loose jacket and a petticoat, mostly of calico or some inexpensive stuff, made up all that was visible. The wealthier ladies affected silks, especially black. Love of dress, however, was as great among the sisters as in women in any other part of the world; in fact, I noticed that this essential is everywhere a pleasing foible, and the semi-nude savage, the crinolined “civilisee,” the nun and the quakeress, the sinner and the saint, the _biche_ and the _grande dame_, all meet for once in their lives pretty much on a par and on the same ground.

The sisters of Great Salt Lake City――at least, the native ones――were distinctly good-looking, with regular features, lofty brow, clear complexion, long, silky hair, and a bewitching soft smile. It would seem that polygamy had agreed with them. The belle of the city, so far as I could see, was a Miss Sally A――――, daughter of a judge. Strict Mormons, however, rather wagged their heads at this pretty person. She was supposed to prefer Gentile and heathenish society, and it was whispered against her that she had actually vowed never to marry a saint.

The City of the Saints was not a dull city. In addition to the spiritual exercises, provision was also made for physical pastimes. The Social Hall was the usual scene of Mormon festivities, and here one could see the beauty and fashion of Great Salt Lake City _en grande tenue_. Good amateur acting took place here, and dancing seemed to be considered a most edifying exercise. The Prophet danced, the apostles danced, the bishops danced, the young and the old danced. There is high authority for perseverance in this practice: David danced, we are told, with all his might; and Scipio, according to Seneca, was wont thus to exercise his heroic limbs. The balls at the Social Hall were highly select, and conducted on an expensive scale; ten-dollar tickets admitted one lady with one gentleman, and for all extra ladies two dollars each had to be paid. Space was limited, and many a Jacob was shorn of his glory by having to appear with only Rachael in his train, and without a following of Leahs, Zilpahs, and Bilhahs.

An account of one of these balls might be of interest. The hall was tastefully decorated. At four o’clock in the afternoon the Prophet entered, and order was called. He ascended a kind of platform, and, with uplifted hands, blessed those present. He then descended to the boards and led off the first cotillon. At 8 p.m. supper was served; dancing was resumed with spirit; and finally the party ended as it began, with prayer and benediction, about five o’clock in the morning――thirteen successive mortal hours. I may mention that, in order to balance any disparity of the sexes, each gentleman was allowed to lead out two ladies and dance with them, either together or alternately. What an advantage this would be in many a London ball-room!

I will now proceed to describe my visit to the President, or Prophet, Brigham Young. Governor Cumming had first written to ask if he would give me the honour of an interview; and, having received a gracious reply, I proceeded with him to call upon the Prophet on August 31st, at 11 a.m., as appointed. We arrived at the house, and, after a slight scrutiny, passed the guard, and, walking down the verandah, entered the Prophet’s private office. Several people who were sitting there rose at Governor Cumming’s entrance. At a few words of introduction, Brigham Young advanced, shook hands with me, and invited me to be seated on a sofa on one side of the room, and presented me to those present.

The “President of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints all over the World” was born at Whittingham, Vermont, on June 1st, 1801. He was, consequently, at the time I saw him, in 1860, fifty-nine years old; he looked about forty-five. I had expected to see a venerable-looking old man; but scarcely a grey thread appeared in his hair, which was parted on the side, light-coloured, and rather thick. His forehead was somewhat narrow, the eyebrows thin, the eyes between grey and blue, with a calm and somewhat reserved expression. A slight droop in the left lid made me think he had suffered from paralysis; I afterwards heard it was the result of a neuralgia, which long tormented him. The nose, which was fine and somewhat pointed, was bent a little to the left; the lips were like the New Englander’s, and the teeth were imperfect. The cheeks were rather fleshy, the chin somewhat peaked, and face clean-shaven, except under the jaws, where the beard was allowed to grow. The hands were well-made, and the figure was somewhat large and broad-shouldered.

The Prophet’s dress was neat and plain as a Quaker’s, of grey homespun, except the cravat and waistcoat. His coat was of antique cut and, like the pantaloons, baggy, and the buttons were black. A necktie of dark silk, with a large bow, was passed round a starchless collar. He wore a black satin waistcoat, and plain gold chain. Altogether, the Prophet’s appearance was that of a gentleman farmer in New England.

His manner was affable and impressive, and distinctly unpretentious. He showed no signs of dogmatism or bigotry, and never once entered, with me at least, on the subject of religion. He impressed me with a certain sense of power. It was commonly said there was only one chief in Great Salt Lake City, and that was “Brigham.” His temper was even, and his manner cold; in fact, like his face, somewhat bloodless. He had great powers of observation and judgment of character; if he disliked a stranger at the first interview, he never saw him again. He lived a most temperate and sober life, his favourite food being baked potatoes, with a little buttermilk, and his drink water; he disapproved, like all strict Mormons, of spirituous liquors, and never touched anything stronger than a glass of lager beer, and never smoked tobacco. His followers deemed him an angel of light, his foes a fiend damned; he was, I presume, neither one nor the other. He has been called a hypocrite, swindler, forger, and murderer; no one looked it less. In fact, he was the St. Paul of the New Dispensation; he gave point, energy, and consistency to the disjointed and turbulent fanaticism of Mr. Joseph Smith; and if he was not able to create, he was at least able to control circumstances.

Such was His Excellency, President Brigham Young, “painter and glazier”――his earliest craft――prophet, revelator, translator, and seer; the man who was revered as no king or kaiser, pope or pontiff, ever was; who, like the Old Man of the Mountain, by holding up his hand could cause the death of any one within his reach; who, governing as well as reigning, long stood up to fight with the sword of the Lord, and with his few hundred guerillas, against the mighty power of the United States; who outwitted all diplomacy opposed to him; and, finally, made a treaty of peace with the President of the great Republic as though he had wielded the combined power of France, Russia, and England.