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

Twelve Mormon Homes, page 134

My geological friend reassured me, saying that we were al- most at the top of the "mesa." The Spanish word was a novelty; and I fancied that it expressed the peculiar coping of the escarp- ment, until I remembered that it simply meant "table," and applied to the level above, which was supported by this fortress- wall. In a few minutes we had penetrated a gap, and were rolling smoothly along the sandy plain. Not all the carriages, however. A halloo from the men at the gap stopped us abruptly, as the last vehicle emerged on the summit, canted ludicrously to one side, its white canvas curtains flapping at every jolt like the wings of a great bird in distress. Poor Mrs. Jane's wagon was the wounded albatross. The jarring of the ascent had proved too much for it. While wheelwright straps and bandages were put on with Mormon ingenuity,- of course, precisely as prescribed by Brigham Young,- we alighted and walked ahead. Efforts were made to point out to me, in the dreamland under the hori- zon, the snowy peaks called Kolob. "Kolob" is the Mormons' "Land of Beulah." Somewhere, much nearer to us, but hidden by a black ridge, they said, was an isolated hill, known to the Indians as the Sacred Mountain? The Pi-edes tell that God and his saints came down in the days of their forefathers, more than a hundred years ago, and encamped on the summit, whence they descended to converse with men. To the disgust of the Mor- 66Mrs. Kane's description of an "isolated hill" sounds like Navajo Mountain on the east side of the Colorado River. It is isolated and is a sacred mountain of the Navajos. However, when she says the mountain was nearer to her than Kolob, she must have been speaking of the Great White Throne or the Temple of Sinewava in Zion National Park, both of which played a role in Piute worship. See Angus M. Woodbury, "A History of Southern Utah and Its National Parks," Utah Historical Quarterly 12 (1944) : I I I-15. I34