Part 32 (1/2)
”Was.h.i.+ngton beats the world for variety and magnificence of awe inspiring mountains and other scenery. I have seen old ocean in her wildest moods, have beheld the western prairie on fire by night, when the long, waving lines of flame flared and flashed their red light against the low, fleecy clouds till they blossomed into roseate beauty, looking like vast spectral flower gardens, majestically sweeping through the heavens; have been in the valley of the river Platte, when all the windows of the sky and a good many doors opened at once and the cloud-masked batteries of the invisible hosts of the air volleyed and thundered till the earth fairly reeled beneath the terrific cannonade that tore its quivering bosom with red-hot bombs until awe-stricken humanity shriveled into utter nothingness in the presence of the mad fury of the mightiest forces of nature. But for magnificence of sublime imagery and awe-inspiring grandeur a forest fire raging among the gigantic firs and towering cedars that mantle the sh.o.r.es of Puget Sound, surpa.s.ses anything I have ever beheld, and absolutely baffles all attempts at description.
It has to be seen to be comprehended. The grandest display of forest pyrotechnics is witnessed when an extensive tract that has been partly cleared by logging is purposely or accidentally fired. When thus partly cleared, all the tops of the fir, cedar, spruce, pine and hemlock trees felled for their lumber remain on the ground, their boughs fairly reeking with balsam. All inferior trees are left standing, and in early days when only the very choicest logs would be accepted by the mills, about one-third would be left untouched, and then the trees would stand thicker, mightier, taller than in the average forest of the eastern and middle states.
”I once witnessed the firing of a two thousand acre tract thus logged over. It was noon in the month of August, and not a breath of air moved the most delicate ferns on the hillsides. The birds had hushed their songs for their midday siesta, and the babbling brook at our feet had grown less garrulous, as if in sympathy with the rest of nature, when the torch was applied. A dozen or more neighbors had come together to witness the exhibition of the unchained element about to hold high carnival in the amphitheater of the hills, and each one posted himself, rifle in hand, in some conspicuous place at least a quarter of a mile from the slas.h.i.+ng in order to get a shot at any wild animal fleeing from the 'wrath to come.'
”The tract was fired simultaneously on all sides by siwashes, who rapidly circled it with long brands, followed closely by rivers of flame in hot pursuit.
”As soon as the fire worked its way to the ma.s.sive winrows of dry brush, piled in making roads in every direction, a circular wall of solid flame rose half way to the tops of the tall trees. Soon the rising of the heated air caused strong currents of cooler air to set in from every side. The air currents soon increased to cyclones. Then began a race of the towering, billowy, surging walls of fire for the center. Driven furiously on by these ever-increasing, eddying, and fiercely contending tornadoes, the flames lolled and rolled and swayed and leaped, rising higher and higher, until one vast, circular tidal wave of liquid fire rolled in and met at the center with the whirl and roar of pandemoniac thunder and shot up in a spiral and rapidly revolving red-hot cone, a thousand feet in mid-air, out of whose flaring and crater-like apex poured dense volumes of tarry smoke, spreading out on every side, like unfolding curtains of night, till the sun was darkened and the moon was turned to blood and the stars seemed literally raining from heaven, as glowing firebrands that had been carried up by the fierce tornado of swirling flame and carried to immense distances by upper air currents, fell back in showers to the ground. The vast tract, but a few moments before as quiet as a sleeping infant in its cradle, was now one vast arena of seething, roaring, raging flame. The long, lithe limbs of the tall cedars were tossing wildly about, while the strong limbs of the st.u.r.dier firs and hemlocks were freely gyrating like the sinewy arms of mighty giant athletes engaged in mortal combat. Ever and anon their lower, pitch-dripping branches would ignite from the fervent heat below, when the flames would rush to the very tops with the roar of contending thunders and shoot upward in bright silvery volumes from five to seven hundred feet, or double the height of the trees themselves. Hundreds of these fire-volumes flaring and flaming in quick succession and sometimes many of them simultaneously, in conjunction with the weird eclipse-like darkness that veiled the heavens, rendered the scene one of awful grandeur never to be forgotten.
”So absorbed were we all in the preternatural war of the fiercely contending elements that we forgot our guns, our game and ourselves.
”The burnt district, after darkness set in, was wild and weird in the extreme. The dry bark to the very tops of the tall trees was on fire and constantly falling off in large flakes, and the air was filled ever and anon with dense showers of golden stars, while the trees in the environs seemed to move about through the fitful shadows like grim brobdignags clad in sheeny armor.”
Having witnessed many similar conflagrations I am able to say that the subject could scarcely be better treated.
Through the courtesy of the author, Dr. H. A. Smith, I have been permitted to insert the following poem, which has no doubt caused many a grim chuckle and scowl of sympathy, too, from the old pioneers of the Northwest:
”THE MORTGAGE.
”The man who holds a mortgage on my farm And sells me out to gratify his greed, Is s.h.i.+elded by our shyster laws from harm, And ever laud for the dastard deed!
Though morally the man is really worse Than if he knocked me down and took my purse; The last would mean, at most, a moment's strife, The first would mean the struggle of a life, And homeless children wailing in the cold, A prey to want and miseries manifold; Then if I loot him of his mangy pup The guardians of the law will lock me up, And jaundiced justice fly into a rage While pampered Piety askance my rags will scan, And Shylock shout, 'Behold a dangerous man!'
But notwithstanding want to Heaven cries, And villains masquerade in virtue's guise, And Liberty is moribund or dead-- Except for men who corporations head-- One little consolation still remains, The human race will one day rend its chains.”
In transcribing Indian myths and religious beliefs, Dr. Smith displays much ability. After having had considerable acquaintance with the native races, he concludes that ”Many persons are honestly of the opinion that Indians have no ideas above catching and eating salmon, but if they will lay aside prejudice and converse freely with the more intelligent natives, they will soon find that they reason just as well on all subjects that attract their attention as we do, and being free from pre-conceived opinions, they go directly to the heart of theories and reason both inductively and deductively with surprising clearness and force.”
Dr. Smith exhibits in his writings a broadly charitable mind which sees even in the worst, still some lingering or smothered good.
Dr. Smith is one of a family of patriots; his great-grandfather, Copelton Smith, who came from Germany to America in 1760 and settled in or near Philadelphia, Pa., fought for liberty in the war of the Revolution under General Was.h.i.+ngton. His father, Nicholas Smith, a native of Pennsylvania, fought for the Stars and Stripes in 1812. Two brothers fought for Old Glory in the war of the Rebellion, and he himself was one of the volunteers who fought for their firesides in the State, then Territory of Was.h.i.+ngton.
”A family of fighters,” as he says, ”famous for their peaceful proclivities when let alone.”
The varied experiences of life in the Northwest have developed in him a sane and sweet philosophy, perhaps nowhere better set forth in his writings than in his poem ”Pacific's Pioneers,” read at a reunion of the founders of the state a few years ago, and with which I close this brief and inadequate sketch:
”PACIFIC'S PIONEERS.
”A greeting to Pacific's Pioneers, Whose peaceful lives are drawing to a close, Whose patient toil, for lo these many years, Has made the forest blossom as the rose.
”And bright-browed women, bonny, brave and true, And laughing la.s.ses, sound of heart and head, Who home and kindred bade a last adieu To follow love where fortune led.
”I do not dedicate these lines alone To men who live to bless the world today, But I include the nameless and unknown The pioneers who perished by the way.
”Not for the recreant do my numbers ring, The men who spent their lives in sport and spree, Nor for the barnacles that always cling To every craft that cruises Freedom's sea.
”But nearly all were n.o.ble, brave and kind, And little cared for fame or fas.h.i.+on's gyves; And though they left their Sunday suits behind They practiced pure religion all their lives.
”Their love of peace no people could excel, Their dash in war the poet's pen awaits; Their sterling loyalty made possible Pacific's golden galaxy of states.
”They had no time to bother much about Contending creeds that vex the nation's Hub, But then they left their leather latches out To every wandering Arab short of grub.