gh for me. I
planted myself on one of the car platforms, linked my arm round the
railing, and with my feet on the steps, sat on the floor, swinging out,
as far as I safely could, to take it all in. Thus, oblivious of the
dust, I sat for an hour, and at last, satiated by the views on views,
returned contented to my seat. Just then a brakeman said to me, "We are
now entering the Royal Gorge." I had almost surfeited myself with the
mere prelude to the repast. The best was brought on, when my appetite
was, so to speak, appeased. But, what did appear, was too good to
neglect, so I was soon at it again as before, and did not leave my
perch until we had passed through all the glories which the Royal Gorge
contained.

The climax was reached in a spot too narrow for a track by the side of
the raging torrent. Our railroad was suspended from the sides of the
towering mountains by a huge iron construction, over which we passed,
until wider space beyond, gave us again a hold on _terra firma_.

Through all this region there is also the evidence of energy and force
of another kind. One sees the deserted huts of the gold-hunters, who
prospected, it may be in vain, or made their "pile and cleared out."

There is a terrible fascination in this eager hunt for wealth, and
those who hunt all their lives, often get least, and die in misery.

I was once in Victor, the next town to Cripple Creek, and while there,
heard, in the most casual way, that Tom Brennan, I think that was his
name, had been found in the mountains, dead, by his own hand. His luck
was gone, starvation stared him in the face, and, old, and hopeless, in
his lone misery, he sought death, alone.

When one sees, away up on some apparently inaccessible height, an
indication of fresh earth, and a black aperture at the top of it, and
realizes that in that spot, some one, or it may be more, are digging
and delving for a wealth that may never come, the thought is inevitable
of possible ruined hopes, or of sudden wealth, as Fortune may frown or
smile. But here, as well as everywhere, and in all relations of life,
the poet's words come true,

"The many fail, the one succeeds."

It is well for us, however, that failures, which may be possible, never
daunt us from effort, and the search, for that which the soul longs
for. We picture to ourselves success ever. Failure, like death, too
often comes, unannounced.

It is the spirit of daring and adventure which still peoples the