Twelve Mormon Homes : Twelve Mormon homes visited in succession on a journey through Utah to Arizona.

Twelve Mormon Homes, page 107

the hills dotted with unpicturesque stunted cedars. Coming toward the city, we saw long fissures in the earth, five to ten feet across, and ten to fifteen feet deep, the result of drought. To compare large things with small, the plain was a grossly magni- fied representation of the undrained hollows on our country roads, where, after the puddles have dried up in summer, the clay is seamed with unpleasing cracks over which the yellow butterflies delight to sport. Next we came to a ruined foundry, where the Mormons had made an attempt to flux the ores of the neighborhood.55 Much money has been made in Utah, but there are enough evidences of abandoned enterprises to show how faithfully the Mormons have endeavored to utilize the resources of the country and not dishonestly protect its manufactures. The best of the people wear homespun, and use inferior tools, and produce goods that return them but one per cent on the capital invested, rather than look outside the promised land "for benefits the Lord has given them in it; if they could but exercise faith strongly enough to work with patience, and in spite of failure and disappointment, until mistakes are corrected by repeated experiments, and persever- ance attains its end." Brigham Young is expected to put some of his capital into every good work, and this seems only fair. I believe that the foundry at Cedar City is to be reconstructed now that they have succeeded in finding a coal suitable for their pur- 55The story of the Mormon attempt at self-sufficiency in iron making is one of heartbreak and frustration. One of the participants, Henry Lunt, indicated it was a test of their faith to try to produce iron in the face of numerous obstacles-poor coking coal, floods, lack of capital, etc. Vernon Lunt and Rachel Petty Lunt, camps., Life of Henry Lunt (Cedar City, Utah: n.p., Ig++), p. Ig passim.