第94章

The Mormons are fond of dancing.Brigham and Heber C.dance.So do Daniel H.Wells, and the other heads of the Church.Balls are opened with prayer, and when they break up a benediction is pronounced.

I am invited to a ball at Social Hall, and am escorted thither by Brothers Stenhouse and Clawson.

Social Hall is a spacious and cheerful room.The motto of "Our Mountain Home" in brilliant evergreen capitals adorns one end of the hall, while at the other a platform is erected for the musicians, behind whom there is room for those who don't dance to sit and look at the festivities.Brother Stenhouse, at the request of President Young, formally introduces me to company from the platform.There is a splendor of costumery about the dancers I had not expected to see.Quadrilles only are danced.The mazourka is considered sinful.Even the old-time round waltz is tabooed.

I dance.

The Saints address each other here, as elsewhere, as Brother and Sister."This way, Sister!" "Where are you going, Brother?" &c., &c.I am called Brother Ward.This pleases me, and I dance with renewed vigor.

The Prophet has some very charming daughters, several of whom are present to-night.

I was told they spoke French and Spanish.

The Prophet is more industrious than graceful as a dancer.He exhibits, however, a spryness of legs quite remarkable in a man at his time of life.I didn't see Heber C.Kimball on the floor.I am told he is a loose and reckless dancer, and that many a lily-white toe has felt the crushing weight of his cow-hide monitors.

The old gentleman is present, however, with a large number of wives.It is said he calls them his "heifers.""Ain't you goin' to dance with some of my wives?" said a Mormon to me.

These things make a Mormon ball more spicy than a Gentile one.

The supper is sumptuous, and bear and beaver adorn the bill of fare.

I go away at the early hour of two in the morning.The moon is shining brightly on the snow-covered streets.The lamps are out, and the town is still as a graveyard.

4.15.PHELP'S ALMANAC.

There is an eccentric Mormon at Salt Lake City of the name of W.W.

Phelps.He is from Cortland, State of New York, and has been a Saint for a good many years.It is said he enacts the character of the Devil, with a pea-green tail, in the Mormon initiation ceremonies.He also published an almanac, in which he blends astronomy with short moral essays, and suggestions in regard to the proper management of hens.He also contributes a poem, entitled "The Tombs," to his almanac for the current year, from which Iquote the last verse:--

"Choose ye: to rest with stately grooms;Just such a place there is for sleeping;

Where everything, in common keeping, Is free from want and worth and weeping;There folly's harvest is a reaping.

Down in the grave among the tombs."

Now, I know that poets and tin-pedlars are "licensed," but why does W.W.P.advise us to sleep in the barn with the ostlers? These are the most dismal tombs on record, not except the Tomb of the Capulets, the Tombs of New York, or the Toombs of Georgia.

Under the head of "OLD Sayings," Mr.P.publishes the following.

There is a modesty about the last "saying" which will be pretty apt to strike the reader:--"The Lord does good and Satan evil, said Moses.

Sun and moon, see me conquer, said Joshua.

Virtue exalts a woman, said David.

Fools and folly frolic, said Solomon.

Judgments belong to God, said Isaiah.

The path of the just is plain, said Jeremiah.

The soul that sins dies, said Ezekiel.

The wicked do wicked, said Daniel.

Ephraim fled and hid, said Hosea.

The Gentiles war and waste, said Joel.

The second reign is peace and plenty, said Amos.

Zion is the house of the gods, said Obadiah, A fish saved me, said Jonah.

Our Lion will be terrible, said Micah.

Doctor, cure yourself, said the Saviour.

Live to live again, said W.W.Phelps."

4.16.HURRAH FOR THE ROAD!

TIME, Wednesday afternoon, February 10.The Overland Stage, Mr.

William Glover on the box, stands before the veranda of the Salt Lake House.The genial Nat Stein is arranging the waybill.Our baggage (the Overland passenger is allowed twenty-five pounds) is being put aboard, and we are shaking hands, at a rate altogether furious, with Mormon and Gentile.Among the former are Brothers Stenhouse, Caine, Clawson and Townsend; among the latter are Harry Riccard, the big-hearted English mountaineer (though once he wore white kids and swallow-tails in Regent Street, and in boyhood went to school with Miss Edgeworth, the novelist), the daring explorer Rood, from Wisconsin; th e Rev.James McCormick, missionary, who distributes pasteboard tracts among the Bannock miners; and the pleasing child of gore, Captain D.B.Stover, of the commissary department.

We go away on wheels, but the deep snow compels us to substitute runners twelve miles out.

There are four passengers of us.We pierce the Wahsatch mountains by Parley's canyon.

A snowstorm overtakes us as the night thickens, and the wind shrieks like a brigade of strong-lunged maniacs.Never mind.We are well covered up- our cigars are good.I have on deerskin pantaloons, a deerskin overcoat, a beaver cap and buffalo overshoes; and so, as I tersely observed before, Never mind.Let us laugh the winds to scorn, brave boys! But why is William Glover, driver, lying flat on his back by the roadside; and why am I turning a handspring in the road; and why are the horses tearing wildly down the Wahsatch mountains? It is because William Glover has been thrown from his seat, and the horses are running away.Isee him fall off and it occurs to me I had better get out.In doing so, such is the velocity of the sleigh, I turn a handspring.

Far ahead I hear the runners clash with the rocks, and I see Dr.

Hingston's lantern (he always would have a lantern), bobbing about like the binnacle light of an oyster sloop, very loose in a choppy sea.Therefore I do not laugh the winds to scorn as much as I did, brave boys.