James's Account of S. H. Long's Expedition, 1819-1820, part 4James, Edwin
History
James's Account of S. H. Long's Expedition, 1819-1820, part 4
James, Edwin
Indians of North America; Rocky Mountains; United States -- Discovery and exploration; West (U.S.) -- Description and travel
A number of baths have been made, by hollowing out excavations in the
rock, to which the hot water is constantly flowing. By cutting off or
increasing the supply the temperature can be regulated at pleasure;
over some of these are built small log cabins, and in the neighbourhood
are twenty or thirty huts, occupied at some seasons of the year by
persons who resort hither for the benefit of the waters.
Three miles north-east from the hot springs is a large fountain of
water, of the ordinary temperature, forming the source of the small
stream already mentioned as flowing down from that direction. It rises
from the summit of a little knoll, six or eight feet in diameter, and
divides into two streams, one of which flows towards the east, the
other towards the west. Both, however, unite at the base of the knoll,
and {153} the brook flows thence south-west, between two petrosiliceous
hills, to its confluence with another from the north-west, to form the
hot spring creek. The quantity of water discharged by this spring can
scarcely be less than from eighty to one hundred gallons per minute.
Immediately on the south rises a large hill, and the elevation of the
spring itself, above the level of the highest of the thermal springs,
is thought to be not less than one hundred and fifty feet. The water is
transparent, but has a perceptible metallic taste, and deposits upon
the stones over which it flows a copious rust-like sediment. The spring
is known in the neighbouring settlements as the "poison spring," a name
which we were told it had received from the following circumstance,
said to have taken place many years since. A hunter who had been
pursuing a bear, and was much exhausted with heat and fatigue, arrived
at this spring in the middle of the day, and finding the water cool,
and not unpleasant to the taste, drank freely of it, but immediately
afterwards sickened and died. His death was occasioned, probably, not
by any deleterious quality in the water, but by the disease commonly
induced by drinking too largely of cold water when the body is heated.
The neighbouring inhabitants, however, imputed the hunter's death to
some supposed poisonous property in the spring. Not long afterwards a
discontented invalid, residing at the hot springs, came to a resolution
of putting a period to his own life. This he concluded to bring about
by drinking the water of the poison spring. He accordingly repaired
to it, and after drinking as much as he could, filled his bottle, and
returned home. Instead of dying, as he had expected, he found himself
greatly benefited by his potation. Notwithstanding this discovery of
the sanative quality of the water the spring still retained its former
name. It is however used without apprehension, and is much resorted to
by people who visit the warm springs.
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