In which Passepartout undergoes,
at a speed of twenty miles an
hour,
a course of mormon history
During the night of the 5th
of December, the train ran south-easterly
for about fifty miles; then rose
an equal distance in a north-easterly
direction, towards the Great
Salt Lake.
Passepartout, about nine o'clock,
went out upon the platform to
take the air. The weather was
cold, the heavens grey, but it
was not snowing. The sun's disc,
enlarged by the mist, seemed
an enormous ring of gold, and
Passepartout was amusing himself
by calculating its value in pounds
sterling, when he was diverted
from this interesting study by
a strange-looking personage who
made his appearance on the platform.
This personage, who had taken
the train at Elko, was tall and
dark, with black moustache, black
stockings, a black silk hat,
a black waistcoat, black trousers,
a white cravat, and dogskin gloves.
He might have been taken for
a clergyman. He went from one
end of the train to the other,
and affixed to the door of each
car a notice written in manuscript.
Passepartout
approached and read one of
these notices, which
stated that Elder William Hitch,
Mormon missionary, taking advantage
of his presence on train No.
48, would deliver a lecture on
Mormonism in car No. 117, from
eleven to twelve o'clock; and
that he invited all who were
desirous of being instructed
concerning the mysteries of the
religion of the "Latter Day Saints" to
attend.
"I'll go," said
Passepartout to himself. He
knew nothing of
Mormonism except the custom of
polygamy, which is its foundation.
The news quickly spread through
the train, which contained about
one hundred passengers, thirty
of whom, at most, attracted by
the notice, ensconced themselves
in car No. 117. Passepartout
took one of the front seats.
Neither Mr. Fogg nor Fix cared
to attend.
At the appointed
hour Elder William Hitch rose,
and, in an
irritated voice, as if he had
already been contradicted, said, "I
tell you that Joe Smith is a
martyr, that his brother Hiram
is a martyr, and that the persecutions
of the United States Government
against the prophets will also
make a martyr of Brigham Young.
Who dares to say the contrary?"
No one ventured to gainsay
the missionary, whose excited
tone contrasted curiously with
his naturally calm visage. No
doubt his anger arose from the
hardships to which the Mormons
were actually subjected. The
government had just succeeded,
with some difficulty, in reducing
these independent fanatics to
its rule. It had made itself
master of Utah, and subjected
that territory to the laws of
the Union, after imprisoning
Brigham Young on a charge of
rebellion and polygamy. The disciples
of the prophet had since redoubled
their efforts, and resisted,
by words at least, the authority
of Congress. Elder Hitch, as
is seen, was trying to make proselytes
on the very railway trains.
Then, emphasising his words
with his loud voice and frequent
gestures, he related the history
of the Mormons from Biblical
times: how that, in Israel, a
Mormon prophet of the tribe of
Joseph published the annals of
the new religion, and bequeathed
them to his son Mormon; how,
many centuries later, a translation
of this precious book, which
was written in Egyptian, was
made by Joseph Smith, junior,
a Vermont farmer, who revealed
himself as a mystical prophet
in 1825; and how, in short, the
celestial messenger appeared
to him in an illuminated forest,
and gave him the annals of the
Lord.
Several of
the audience, not being much
interested in the
missionary's narrative, here
left the car; but Elder Hitch,
continuing his lecture, related
how Smith, junior, with his father,
two brothers, and a few disciples,
founded the church of the "Latter
Day Saints," which, adopted not
only in America, but in England,
Norway and Sweden, and Germany,
counts many artisans, as well
as men engaged in the liberal
professions, among its members;
how a colony was established
in Ohio, a temple erected there
at a cost of two hundred thousand
dollars, and a town built at
Kirkland; how Smith became an
enterprising banker, and received
from a simple mummy showman a
papyrus scroll written by Abraham
and several famous Egyptians.
The Elder's story became somewhat
wearisome, and his audience grew
gradually less, until it was
reduced to twenty passengers.
But this did not disconcert the
enthusiast, who proceeded with
the story of Joseph Smith's bankruptcy
in 1837, and how his ruined creditors
gave him a coat of tar and feathers;
his reappearance some years afterwards,
more honourable and honoured
than ever, at Independence, Missouri,
the chief of a flourishing colony
of three thousand disciples,
and his pursuit thence by outraged
Gentiles, and retirement into
the Far West.
Ten hearers only were now left,
among them honest Passepartout,
who was listening with all his
ears. Thus he learned that, after
long persecutions, Smith reappeared
in Illinois, and in 1839 founded
a community at Nauvoo, on the
Mississippi, numbering twenty-five
thousand souls, of which he became
mayor, chief justice, and general-in-chief;
that he announced himself, in
1843, as a candidate for the
Presidency of the United States;
and that finally, being drawn
into ambuscade at Carthage, he
was thrown into prison, and assassinated
by a band of men disguised in
masks.
Passepartout was now the only
person left in the car, and the
Elder, looking him full in the
face, reminded him that, two
years after the assassination
of Joseph Smith, the inspired
prophet, Brigham Young, his successor,
left Nauvoo for the banks of
the Great Salt Lake, where, in
the midst of that fertile region,
directly on the route of the
emigrants who crossed Utah on
their way to California, the
new colony, thanks to the polygamy
practised by the Mormons, had
flourished beyond expectations.
"And this," added Elder William
Hitch, "this is why the jealousy
of Congress has been aroused
against us! Why have the soldiers
of the Union invaded the soil
of Utah? Why has Brigham Young,
our chief, been imprisoned, in
contempt of all justice? Shall
we yield to force? Never! Driven
from Vermont, driven from Illinois,
driven from Ohio, driven from
Missouri, driven from Utah, we
shall yet find some independent
territory on which to plant our
tents. And you, my brother," continued
the Elder, fixing his angry eyes
upon his single auditor, "will
you not plant yours there, too,
under the shadow of our flag?"
"No!" replied
Passepartout courageously,
in his turn retiring
from the car, and leaving the
Elder to preach to vacancy.
During the lecture the train
had been making good progress,
and towards half-past twelve
it reached the northwest border
of the Great Salt Lake. Thence
the passengers could observe
the vast extent of this interior
sea, which is also called the
Dead Sea, and into which flows
an American Jordan. It is a picturesque
expanse, framed in lofty crags
in large strata, encrusted with
white salt-- a superb sheet of
water, which was formerly of
larger extent than now, its shores
having encroached with the lapse
of time, and thus at once reduced
its breadth and increased its
depth.
The Salt Lake, seventy miles
long and thirty-five wide, is
situated three miles eight hundred
feet above the sea. Quite different
from Lake Asphaltite, whose depression
is twelve hundred feet below
the sea, it contains considerable
salt, and one quarter of the
weight of its water is solid
matter, its specific weight being
1,170, and, after being distilled,
1,000. Fishes are, of course,
unable to live in it, and those
which descend through the Jordan,
the Weber, and other streams
soon perish.
The country around the lake
was well cultivated, for the
Mormons are mostly farmers; while
ranches and pens for domesticated
animals, fields of wheat, corn,
and other cereals, luxuriant
prairies, hedges of wild rose,
clumps of acacias and milk-wort,
would have been seen six months
later. Now the ground was covered
with a thin powdering of snow.
The train reached
Ogden at two o'clock, where
it rested
for six hours, Mr. Fogg and his
party had time to pay a visit
to Salt Lake City, connected
with Ogden by a branch road;
and they spent two hours in this
strikingly American town, built
on the pattern of other cities
of the Union, like a checker-board, "with
the sombre sadness of right-angles," as
Victor Hugo expresses it. The
founder of the City of the Saints
could not escape from the taste
for symmetry which distinguishes
the Anglo-Saxons. In this strange
country, where the people are
certainly not up to the level
of their institutions, everything
is done "squarely"--cities, houses,
and follies.
The travellers,
then, were promenading, at
three o'clock,
about the streets of the town
built between the banks of the
Jordan and the spurs of the Wahsatch
Range. They saw few or no churches,
but the prophet's mansion, the
court-house, and the arsenal,
blue-brick houses with verandas
and porches, surrounded by gardens
bordered with acacias, palms,
and locusts. A clay and pebble
wall, built in 1853, surrounded
the town; and in the principal
street were the market and several
hotels adorned with pavilions.
The place did not seem thickly
populated. The streets were almost
deserted, except in the vicinity
of the temple, which they only
reached after having traversed
several quarters surrounded by
palisades. There were many women,
which was easily accounted for
by the "peculiar institution" of
the Mormons; but it must not
be supposed that all the Mormons
are polygamists. They are free
to marry or not, as they please;
but it is worth noting that it
is mainly the female citizens
of Utah who are anxious to marry,
as, according to the Mormon religion,
maiden ladies are not admitted
to the possession of its highest
joys. These poor creatures seemed
to be neither well off nor happy.
Some--the more well-to-do, no
doubt-- wore short, open, black
silk dresses, under a hood or
modest shawl; others were habited
in Indian fashion.
Passepartout
could not behold without a
certain fright these
women, charged, in groups, with
conferring happiness on a single
Mormon. His common sense pitied,
above all, the husband. It seemed
to him a terrible thing to have
to guide so many wives at once
across the vicissitudes of life,
and to conduct them, as it were,
in a body to the Mormon paradise
with the prospect of seeing them
in the company of the glorious
Smith, who doubtless was the
chief ornament of that delightful
place, to all eternity. He felt
decidedly repelled from such
a vocation, and he imagined--perhaps
he was mistaken-- that the fair
ones of Salt Lake City cast rather
alarming glances on his person.
Happily, his stay there was but
brief. At four the party found
themselves again at the station,
took their places in the train,
and the whistle sounded for starting.
Just at the moment, however,
that the locomotive wheels began
to move, cries of "Stop! stop!" were
heard.
Trains, like time and tide,
stop for no one. The gentleman
who uttered the cries was evidently
a belated Mormon. He was breathless
with running. Happily for him,
the station had neither gates
nor barriers. He rushed along
the track, jumped on the rear
platform of the train, and fell,
exhausted, into one of the seats.
Passepartout, who had been
anxiously watching this amateur
gymnast, approached him with
lively interest, and learned
that he had taken flight after
an unpleasant domestic scene.
When the Mormon had recovered
his breath, Passepartout ventured
to ask him politely how many
wives he had; for, from the manner
in which he had decamped, it
might be thought that he had
twenty at least.
"One, sir," replied the Mormon,
raising his arms heavenward --"one,
and that was enough!"
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