It ought not to help to
lay the foundations of an amateur military power that is blind
and irresponsible.
By great good luck the evil-minded train, already delayed twelve
hours by a burned bridge, brought me to the city on a Saturday by
way of that valley which the Mormons, over their efforts, had
caused to blossom like the rose. Twelve hours previously I had
entered into a new world where, in conversation, every one was
either a Mormon or a Gentile. It is not seemly for a free and
independent citizen to dub himself a Gentile, but the Mayor of
Ogden - which is the Gentile city of the valley - told me that
there must be some distinction between the two flocks.
Long before the fruit orchards of Logan or the shining levels of
the Salt Lake had been reached, that mayor - himself a Gentile,
and one renowned for his dealings with the Mormons - told me that
the great question of the existence of the power within the power
was being gradually solved by the ballot and by education.
All the beauty of the valley could not make me forget it. And
the valley is very fair. Bench after bench of land, flat as a
table against the flanks of the ringing hills, marks where the
Salt Lake rested for awhile in its collapse from an inland sea to
a lake fifty miles long and thirty broad.
