Sword and Pen Part 35

When, before sunset, the bar-keeper concluded to sweep some dust out of his poker-room back-door, he felt a momentary surprise at finding the missing horse dozing under the shadow of an oak, and the two lost donkeys serenely masticating playing-cards, of which many bushels lay in a dirty pile. He was then reminded that the animals had been there all day!

Lovelocks (Nevada) is three hundred and eighty-nine miles from San Francisco, and its elevation above the sea-level three thousand nine hundred and seventy-seven feet. It is simply a station, with a few buildings connected with the Central Pacific Railroad; but is a fine grazing region, and large herds of cattle are fattened here upon the rich native gra.s.ses. There is quite a settlement of farmers near Lovelocks. Before the railroad came the pasture lands were renowned among the emigrants, who recruited their stock after the wearisome journey across the plains.

Leaving Lovelocks, Captain Glazier soon found himself again on the barren desert. A side track of the railroad, named White Plains, gave him rest for the night. The spot is surrounded by a white alkali desert, covered in places with salt and alkali deposits. Hot Springs is another station in the midst of the desert, and is so named from the hot springs whose rising steam can be seen about half a mile from the station.

Hastening forward he reached Desert (Nevada), which he found to be three hundred and thirty-five miles from San Francisco, and that the place is rightly named. The winds that sweep the barren plains here, heap the sand around the scattered sage brush till they resemble huge potato hills--a most dreary place.

The captain found it quite a relief on reaching Wadsworth (Nevada), a town of about five hundred souls, and three hundred and twenty-eight miles from the end of his journey. It has several large stores, Chinamen's houses, and hotels, in one of the latter of which he found refreshment and a bed. His route had been for several days across dreary, monotonous plains, with nothing but black desolation around him.

Another world now opened to his view--a world of beauty, grandeur and sublimity. Reluctantly leaving this agreeable place, he crossed the Truckee River, and gazed with delightful sensations upon the trees, the green meadows, comfortable farm-houses and well-tilled fields of the ranches, as he rode forward.

He had now crossed the boundary line that divides Nevada from California, and Truckee was the first place he halted at. This is a flourishing little city of fifteen hundred inhabitants, one-third of whom are Chinese, and is two hundred and fifty-nine miles from San Francisco. A large number of good stores were seen here, and a considerable trade is carried on.

He next reached Summit (California). From this point the road descends rapidly to the Valley of the Sacramento.

Several intermediate places having been stopped at, in which our traveler obtained accommodation for a night, we hasten on with him to Sacramento, where, on November twenty-first, he found himself again surrounded with all the appliances of civilization. Sacramento has a population of twenty-five thousand. The broad streets are shaded by heavy foliage. It is a city of beautiful homes. Lovely cottages are surrounded by flowers, fruits and vines; while some of the most elegant mansions in the State are in the midst of gra.s.sy lawns, or gardens filled with the rarest flowers. Here is the State capitol, a building that cost nearly $2,500,000 for its erection. Sacramento is an important railroad centre, second only to San Francisco.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Captain Glazier Riding Into The Pacific--near The Cliff House, San Francisco.]

Brighton was one hundred and thirty-four miles from the termination of his ride. At the farm-houses along the road numerous wind-mills were seen. These are used to fill reservoirs for household wants, and are common in all the valleys and plains of California.

A halt was made at Stockton, twenty-one miles from destination. This city has a population of about fifteen thousand, and is only twenty-three feet above the level of the sea. It was named to commemorate Commodore Stockton's part in the conquest of California.

Using all despatch, Captain Glazier pushed on to San Francisco, and entered the city November twenty-fourth, registering at the Palace Hotel. He immediately after rode, in company with Mr. Walter Montgomery, and a friend, to the Cliff House, reaching it by the toll-road. This beautiful seaside resort is built on a prominence overlooking the ocean.

Captain Glazier walked his horse into the waters of the Pacific, and then felt that he had accomplished his task. He had ridden in the saddle from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean--from Boston to San Francisco--a distance of four thousand one hundred and thirty-three miles, in just two hundred days.

He was now no longer the slave of duty, and would rest for a few days and see the beautiful city before he returned to the east. He wandered about, mostly on foot, visited and inspected the numerous public buildings, the City Park, Woodward's Gardens, etc., and became convinced from personal observation of the greatness and magnificence of this city on the Pacific, with its three hundred thousand inhabitants, covering a territory of forty-two square miles, and the growth of less than thirty years. On its eastern front San Francisco extends along the bay, whose name it bears, bounded on the north by the Golden Gate, and on the west washed by the Pacific Ocean along a beach five or six miles in extent.

It is not, however, a part of our plan to describe this wonderful city, which has been done most effectively by others.

CHAPTER x.x.xV.

RETURN FROM CALIFORNIA.

Returns to the East by the "Iron Horse."--Boston _Transcript_ on the journey on horseback.--Resumes literary work.--"Peculiarities of American Cities."--Preface to book.--A domestic incident.--A worthy son.--Claims of parents.--Purchases the old Homestead, and presents it to his father and mother.--Letter to his parents.

We now accompany our subject on his return journey to the east. His family and friends had naturally felt great concern for him during his long and perilous ride, and he was anxious therefore to allay their fears for his safety by presenting himself before them. He accordingly purchased a ticket and left San Francis...o...b.. rail on the twenty-eighth of November, and after a journey more rapid and comfortable than the one he had made on horseback, arrived in New York city on December sixth.

Several of the eastern papers, on hearing of the captain's safe return, furnished their readers with interesting, and, more or less, correct accounts of the journey. We can find room only for that of the Boston _Transcript_:

"It will be remembered that on the ninth of May, 1876, Captain Willard Glazier, the author of 'Battles for the Union,' and other works of a military character, rode out of Boston with the intention of crossing the continent on horseback. His object in undertaking this long and tedious journey was to study at comparative leisure the line of country which he traversed, and the habits and condition of the people he came in contact with, the industrious and peaceful white, and the 'n.o.ble' and belligerent red. According to the captain's note-book, he had a closer opportunity of studying the characteristics of the _terror_ than the toiler of the plains.

"Accompanied by certain members of the 'Grand Army of the Republic,' on the morning of May ninth, as far as Brighton, he there took leave of them, and with one companion, rode as far as Albany, the captain lecturing by the way wherever inducement offered, and handing over the profits to the benefit of the Widows'

and Orphans' Fund of the G. A. R. Many of these lectures were well attended, and the receipts large, as letters of thanks from the various 'Posts' testify.

"From Albany Captain Glazier pursued his journey alone, and rode the same horse through the States of New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, and Nebraska, as far as Omaha.

Thence he proceeded on whatever quadruped of the equine species he could obtain, which was capable of shaking the dust from its feet nimbly. That he was fortunate in this respect is proven by the fact that he rode from Omaha to San Francisco, a distance of nineteen hundred and eighty-eight miles in thirty days, making an average of about sixty-seven miles per diem. The distance from Omaha to Cheyenne, five hundred and twenty-two miles, he accomplished in six days; the greatest distance accomplished in one day of fourteen hours was one hundred and sixty-six miles, three mustangs being called into requisition for the purpose. The entire time occupied by the journey was two hundred days, the captain reaching the Golden Gate on the twenty-fourth day of November. The actual number of days in the saddle was one hundred and forty-four, which gives an average of twenty-eight miles and seven-tenths per day.

"During this strange journey of more than four thousand miles, Captain Glazier delivered one hundred and four lectures for the object before mentioned, and also for the benefit of the Custer Monument Fund, and visited six hundred and forty-eight cities, villages and stations. He tested the merits of three hundred and thirty-three hotels, farm-houses and ranches, and made special visits to over one hundred public inst.i.tutions and places of resort. He killed three buffaloes, eight antelopes, and twenty-two prairie wolves, thus enjoying to the full all the pleasurable excitement of hunting on the plains.

"But on the thirty-first of October, while in the company of two herders, the tables were turned, and a band of hostile Arrapahoes suddenly disturbed the harmony of the occasion. After a lively encounter, in which one of the Indians was despatched to the Happy Hunting Grounds, Glazier and his companions were taken prisoners, and one of the herders was gradually tortured to death. All that now seemed to be required of the two survivors was patience--if they desired to share a similar fate. But in the early morning of the second of November, while their captors were asleep, they contrived not only to escape, but to secure the arms which had been taken from them; and, mounted on two mustangs belonging to the Indians, soon placed a considerable distance between themselves and their too confident guards. In the chase which ensued, Captain Glazier was separated from his fellow-fugitive, and made good his own escape by dismounting two of his pursuers, and eventually, after a long, hard gallop, dismounting himself and hiding in a gulch. What the fate of the herder was he had no means of discovering.

"Though a man of usually robust const.i.tution, Captain Glazier felt the transitions of climate acutely, but he experiences no ill effects from the long journey now that it is over. The 'iron horse'

brought him back to the East of this continent in a few days, and there are probably few men in the States who have formed a higher opinion of the blessings of steam, than Captain Willard Glazier."

Returned to Washington our soldier-author applied himself again to literature, his ever active brain having been sufficiently recruited by the comparative relaxation it had enjoyed during the long ride. One of the fruits of his pen at this time was a volume ent.i.tled "Peculiarities of American Cities," a subject upon which his flowing pen expatiates with great freedom and a nice discrimination. That the reader may perceive the bent of Glazier's mind at this period of his history, we here present the brief and succinct preface to that work:

"It has occurred to the author very often," he writes, "that a volume presenting the peculiar features, favorite resorts, and distinguishing characteristics of the leading cities of America, would prove of interest to thousands who could, at best, see them only in imagination; and to others who, having visited them, would like to compare notes with one who has made their peculiarities a study for many years.

"A residence in more than a hundred cities, including nearly all that are introduced in this work, leads me to feel that I shall succeed in my purpose of giving to the public a book, without the necessity of marching in slow, and solemn procession before my readers, a monumental array of time-honored statistics; on the contrary it will be my aim in the following pages to talk of cities as I have seen and found them in my walks from day to day, with but slight reference to their origin and history."

We will bring this chapter to a close by recording one incident in the life of its hero, which, humble and common-place as it may be deemed by some, is one which, in the judgment of a majority of our readers we venture to think, reflects glory upon Willard Glazier as a son, and the nation may well feel proud that can rear many such sons.

A subject of great domestic interest which had occupied his thoughts for a considerable period, but to which he had, in his busy life, been unable hitherto to give the necessary time and attention, at this time again forcibly presented itself to his mind. Glazier's sense of a son's duty to his parents was not of the ordinary type. He was profoundly conscious of the moral obligation that devolved upon him, to render the declining years of his parents as free from discomfort and anxiety as it was within his power to do. They had nursed and trained him in infancy and boyhood; had set before him daily the example of an upright life, and had instilled in him a love of truth, honesty and every manly virtue. Their claim upon him, now that he had met with a measure of success in life, was not to be ignored, and to a good father and a good mother he would, so far as he was able, endeavor to prove himself a good son.

The Old Homestead near the banks of the Oswegatchie, in St. Lawrence County, New York, where his parents still resided; where all their children had been born, and where many happy years had been pa.s.sed, was not the property of the Glazier family, and there was a possibility that the "dear old folks" might in time have to remove from it. The thought of such a contingency was painful to Willard Glazier. It was the spot of all others around which his affections clung, and he resolved to make a strenuous endeavor to possess himself of it, so that his father and mother might pa.s.s their remaining days under its shelter.

He accordingly opened negotiations with the owners of the property for the purchase of the Homestead, and was soon rejoiced to find himself the sole proprietor of a place endeared to him by so many a.s.sociations.

The following letter to his parents will form a fitting conclusion to this chapter:

102 Waverley Place, New York, _May 1st, 1878_.

My Dear Father and Mother:

I am just in receipt of the papers which place me in possession of the _Old Homestead_. This, I am sure, will be very pleasing news to you, since it is my intention to make it the home of your declining years: poor old grandmother, too, shall find it a welcome refuge while she lives. I have never felt that I could see the home of my birth pa.s.s to other hands; my heart still clings to it, and its hallowed a.s.sociations, with all the tenacity of former days. The first of May will, in future, have special charms for me, for from this day, 1878, dates my claim to that spot of earth which to me is dearer than all others.

Imagination often takes me back to the Old House on the Hill, where your children spent many of the happiest hours of their childhood and youth. In fancy I again visit the scenes of my boyhood--again chase the b.u.t.terfly, and pick the dandelion with Elvira and Marjorie in the shade of the wide-spreading elms.

I have been working for you, dear parents, in the face of great obstacles since the close of the war. If you think I have neglected you--have not been home in ten long years, then I reply, I did not wish to see you again until I could place you beyond the reach of want. _One of the objects of my life is to-day accomplished:_ and now, with love to all, and the fervent hope that prosperity and happiness may wait upon you for many, many years to come,

I remain, always, Your most affectionate son, Willard.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Headwaters Of The Mississippi.]

CHAPTER x.x.xVI.