Roughing it De LuxeCobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
General
Roughing it De Luxe
Cobb, Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury)
American wit and humor; California -- Description and travel; Grand Canyon (Ariz.) -- Description and travel
IT is generally conceded that the Grand Canon of Arizona beggars
description. I shall therefore endeavor to refrain from doing so. I
realize that this is going to be a considerable contract. Nearly
everybody, on taking a first look at the Grand Canon, comes right out
and admits its wonders are absolutely indescribable--and then proceeds
to write anywhere from two thousand to fifty thousand words, giving the
full details. Speaking personally, I wish to say that I do not know
anybody who has yet succeeded in getting away with the job.
In the old days when he was doing the literature for the Barnum show,
Tody Hamilton would have made the best nominee I can think of. Remember,
don't you, how when Tody started in to write about the elephant
quadrille you had to turn over to the next page to find the verb? And
almost any one of those young fellows who write advertising folders for
the railroads would gladly tackle the assignment; in fact, some of them
already have--but not with any tumultuous success.
In the presence of the Grand Canon, language just simply fails you and
all the parts of speech go dead lame. When the Creator made it He failed
to make a word to cover it. To that extent the thing is incomplete. If
ever I run across a person who can put down on paper what the Grand
Canon looks like, that party will be my choice to do the story when the
Crack of Doom occurs. I can close my eyes now and see the headlines:
Judgment Day a Complete Success! Replete with Incident and Abounding in
Surprises--Many Wealthy Families Disappointed--Full Particulars from our
Special Correspondent on the Spot!
Starting out from Chicago on the Santa Fe, we had a full trainload. We
came from everywhere: from peaceful New England towns full of elm trees
and oldline Republicans; from the Middle States; and from the land of
chewing tobacco, prominent Adam's apples and hot biscuits--down where
the r is silent, as in No'th Ca'lina. And all of us--Northerners,
Southerners, Easterners alike--were actuated by a common purpose--we
were going West to see the country and rough it--rough it on overland
trains better equipped and more luxurious than any to be found in the
East; rough it at ten-dollar-a-day hotels; rough it by touring car over
the most magnificent automobile roads to be found on this continent. We
were a daring lot and resolute; each and every one of us was brave and
blithe to endure the privations that such an expedition must inevitably
entail. Let the worst come; we were prepared! If there wasn't any of the
hothouse lamb, with imported green peas, left, we'd worry along on a
little bit of the fresh shad roe, and a few conservatory cucumbers on
the side. That's the kind of hardy adventurers we were!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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