Authors, American -- 19th century -- Biography; Authors, American -- 20th century -- Biography; Garland, Hamlin, 1860-1940
The splendor of that mighty wall, the kiss of that wind, the memory of
that majestic peak looming amid the stars, comes back to me as I write,
filling me with an almost intolerable longing to recover the magic of
that summer, a summer which has receded with the speed of an eagle.
Each day we breakfasted and lunched and dined on a vine-clad porch in
full view of the mountains. Each afternoon we drove or rode horseback or
loitered on the lawn. Never in all my life had I come so near to
flawless content, and Zulime, equally joyous, swiftly returned to
perfect health. Her restoration was magical.
Louis Ehrich, one of the gentlest men I have ever known, rejoiced in our
presence. He lived but to fill our days with pleasure. He and I had been
friends for ten years, and his family now took my wife into favor--I was
about to say into equal favor, but that would not be true. They very
properly put her above me in the scale of their affection, and to this
subordination I submitted without complaint, or even question.
It chanced that on the second day of our stay the Ehrichs were due at a
garden party in "Glen Eyrie," General Palmer's palatial home in the foot
hills, and kindly obtained permission to bring us with them. That drive
across the mesa was like a journey into some far country--passage to a
land which was neither America nor England, neither East nor West. To
reach the Castle we entered a gate at the mouth of a narrow, wooded
canon and drove for nearly a mile toward the west through a most
beautiful garden in which all the native shrubs and wild flowers had
been assembled and planted with exquisite art.
People were streaming in over the mountain roads, some on horseback,
some on bicycles, some in glittering, gayly-painted wagons, and when we
reached the lawn before the great stone mansion, we found a very curious
and interesting throng of guests, and in the midst of them, the General,
tall, soldierly, clothed in immaculate linen and wearing a broad white
western hat, was receiving his friends, assisted by his three pretty
young daughters.
The house was a veritable chateau--the garden a wonderland of Colorado
plants and flowers, skilfully disposed among the native ledges and
scattered along the bases of the cliffs whose rugged sides enclosed the
mansion grounds. The towers (of gray stone) were English, but the plants
and blooms were native to the Rampart foot hills. In a very real fashion
"Glen Eyrie" bodied forth the singular and powerful character of its
owner, who was at once an English squire, a Pennsylvania civil war
veteran, and a western railway engineer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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