Comstock Lode (Nev.) -- Fiction; Miners -- Fiction; Virginia City (Nev.) -- Fiction
"I saw," he said, "in Salt Lake City, three years ago on a summer
evening, a sunset scene which I thought was very beautiful. The electric
conditions had been strangely disturbed for several days; there had been
clouds and a good deal of thunder and lightning. You know Salt Lake City
lies at the western base of the Wasatch range. On this day toward
evening the sky to the west had grown of a sapphire clearness, but in
the east beyond the first high hills of the range a great electric storm
was raging. The clouds of inky blackness which shrouded the more distant
heights, and through which the lightnings were incessantly zigzaging,
were in full view from the city, though the thunders were caught and
tied in the deep caverns of the intervening hills. To the southeast the
range with its imposing peaks was snow-crowned and under a clear sky. In
the southwest the Oquirrh range was blue and beautiful. Just then from
beyond the great lake the setting sun threw out his shafts of fire, and
the whole firmament turned to glory. The sun blazed from beyond the
waters in the west, the lightnings blazed beyond the nearer hills in the
east, the snowy heights in the southeast were turned to purple, while in
the city every spire, every pane of glass which faced the west, every
speck of metal on house and temple in a moment grew radiant as burnished
gold, and there was a shimmer of splendor in all the air. Then suddenly
over the great range to the east and apparently against the black clouds
in which the lightnings were blazing the glorious arch of a magnificent
rainbow was upreared. All the colors were deep-dyed and perfectly
distinct. There was neither break nor dimness in all the mighty arch.
There it stood, poised in indescribable splendor for quite five minutes.
So wonderful was the display that houses were deserted: men and women
came out into the open air and watched the spectacle in silence and with
uncovered heads.
"No one stopped to think that the glory which shone on high was made
merely by sunlight shining through falling water; the cold explanation
made by science was forgotten, and hundreds of eyes furtively watched,
half expecting to catch glimpses of a divine hand and brush, for the
pictures were rare enough to be the perfect work of celestial beings
sent to sketch for mortals a splendor which should kindle within them
dim conceptions of the glories which fill the spheres where light is
born.
"Salt Lake City is famous for its sunsets, but to this one was added new
and unusual enchantments by the storm which was wheeling its sable
squadrons in the adjacent mountains.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account