Page:The City of the Saints.djvu/366

348 Presently we arrived at a kind of punch-bowl, formed by an amphitheatre of frowning broken mountains, highest and most snowy on the southeast and west, and nearly clear of snow and trees on the east. The level ground, perhaps one mile in diameter, was a green sward, dotted with blocks and boulders, based on black humus and granite detritus. Part of it was clear, the rest was ivy-grown, with pines, clumps, and circlets of tall trees, surrounded by their young in bunches and fringes, as if planted by the hand of man. There were signs of the last season’s revelry—heaps of charcoal and charred trunks, rough tables of two planks supported by trestles, chairs or rail-like settles, and the brushy remnants of three "boweries." Two skulls showed that wolves had been busy with the cattle. Freshly-caught trout lay upon the table, preserved in snow, and in the distance the woodman's axe awoke with artful sound the echoes of the rocks.

At last we came upon the little tarn which occupies the lowest angle, the western ridge of the punch-bowl or prairie basin. Unknown to Captain Stansbury, it had been visited of old by a few mountain-men, and since 1854 by the mass of the Mormons. According to my informants it is the largest of a chaplet of twelve pools, two to the S.W. and ten to the S.E., which are probably independent bulges in the several torrent beds. Some are described as having no outlet, yet all are declared to be sweet water. The altitude has not been ascertained scientifically. It is roughly set down between 9500 and 10,000 feet. It was then at its smallest—about half a mile long by one quarter broad. After the melting of the snow it spreads out over the little savanna. The bottom is sandy and gravelly, sloping from ten to twenty feet deep. It freezes over in winter, and about 25–30 May the ice breaks up and sinks. The runnel which feeds it descends from the snow-capped peak to the south, and copious supplies trickle through the soppy margin at the base of the dripping hills around. The surplus escapes through a head to the north, where a gated dam is thrown across to raise the level, and to regulate the water-power. The color is a milky white; the water is warm, and its earthy vegetable taste, the effect of the weeds that margin it, contrasts with the purity of the creek which drains it. The fish are principally mountain trout and the gymnotus eel. In search of shells we walked round the margin, now sinking in the peaty ground, then clambering over the boulders—white stones that, rolled down from the perpendicular rocks above, simulated snow—then fighting our way through the thick willow clumps. Our quest, however, was not rewarded. After satisfying curiosity, we descended by a short cut of a quarter of a mile under tall trees whose shade preserved the snow, and found ourselves once more in Mill E.

The log hut was of the usual make. A cold wind—the mercury had fallen to 50° F.—rattled through the crannies, and we