This was the region of total eclipse. Looking
along this dark strip on the map, each astronomer selected his bit of
darkness on which to locate the light of science.
"But for the distance from the large cities of the country, Colorado
seemed to be a most favorable part of the shadow; it was little subject
to storms, and reputed to be enjoyable in climate and abundant in
hospitality.
"My party chose Denver, Col. I had a friend who lived in Denver, and she
was visiting me. I sought her at once, and with fear and trembling
asked, 'Have you a bit of land behind your house in Denver where I could
put up a small telescope?' 'Six hundred miles,' was the laconic reply!
"I felt that the hospitality of the Rocky mountains was at my feet.
Space and time are so unconnected! For an observation which would last
two minutes forty seconds, I was offered six hundred miles, after a
journey of thousands.
"A journey from Boston to Denver makes one hopeful for the future of our
country. We had hour after hour and day after day of railroad travel,
over level, unbroken land on which cattle fed unprotected, summer and
winter, and which seemed to implore the traveller to stay and to accept
its richness. It must be centuries before the now unpeopled land of
western Kansas and Colorado can be crowded.
"We started from Boston a party of two; at Cincinnati a third joined us;
at Kansas City we came upon a fourth who was ready to fall into our
ranks, and at Denver two more awaited us; so we were a party of
six--'All good women and true.
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