Nelly's Silver Mine: A Story of Colorado LifeJackson, Helen Hunt
History
Nelly's Silver Mine: A Story of Colorado Life
Jackson, Helen Hunt
Colorado -- History -- To 1876 -- Juvenile fiction
The journey to Rosita took six days: they had to go very slowly on
account of the cattle. The weather was perfect; and every night they
slept on the ground, in a tent which Mr. March had bought in
Colorado Springs. Rob rode on Pumpkinseed's back a good part of the
way, like a little postilion. Before the end of the journey, they
were all so burnt by the sun that they looked, Mrs. March said, "a
great deal more like Indians than like white people." They drove
into Rosita just at sunset. I wish I could tell you how beautiful
the whole place looked to them. You go down a steep hill, just as
you come into the town of Rosita. On the top of this hill, Mr. March
called out to his wife to stop. She was driving Fox and Pumpkinseed;
and he was following behind with the mules. He jumped out, and came
up to the side of her wagon.
"There, Sarah!" he said, "did you ever see any thing in your life so
beautiful as this?"
Mrs. March did not speak; both she and Nelly and even Rob were
struck dumb by the beauty of the picture. They looked right down
into the little village. It was cuddled in the ravine as if it had
gone to sleep there. The sides of the hills were dotted with
pine-trees; and most of the little houses were built of bright
yellow pine boards: they shone in the sun. Just beyond the village
they could see a bit of a most beautiful green valley; and, beyond
that, great high mountains, half covered with snow.
"That is the valley," said Mr. March; "that bit of bright green, way
down there to the west."
Nelly was the first to speak.
"Papa," said she, "it looks just like a beautiful green bottom to a
deep well: doesn't it?"
"Yes, this little bit that you see of it from here, does," said Mr.
March: "but, after you get into it, it doesn't look so. It is thirty
miles long; and so level you would think you were on the plains. And
oh, Nell! you can see your dear Pike's Peak grandly there! It looks
twice as high here as it does from any place I have seen it."
"Oh, I'm so glad!" said Nelly.
Still Mrs. March did not speak. Her husband turned to her at last,
anxiously, and said:--
"Don't you like it, Sarah?"
"Oh, Robert!" she said, "it is so beautiful it doesn't look to me
like a real place. It looks like a painted picture!"
"That'll do! that'll do!" laughed Mr. March; "I'm satisfied. Now
we'll go down the hill."
Rob nudged Nelly. They were on the back seat of the wagon.
"Nell," he whispered, "did you ever see any thing like it? I see
lots of silver mines all round on the hills. Billy told me how they
looked. Those piles of stones are all on top of mines; that's where
they throw out the stones. I'll bet we'll find a mine."
"Oh," said Nelly, "wouldn't that be splendid! Let's go out the first
thing to-morrow morning."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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