Saratoga Springs By LoUIS McHENRY HowE ARATOGA SPRINGS has able. The old chiefs tramped the S been the most famous summer four-mile trail by way of morning resort of America since five constitutional to High Rock Spring, hundred years before the birth of then known as "The Healing Christ. For twenty-five centuries Waters," whose discovery forms this green plateau, nestling between one of the most beautiful legends of the arms of the mighty Adirondacks the Iroquois. that stretch out southward on either The chronology of a nation with­ side to protect it from too biting out monuments and without written winds, from east or west, has been history, is, of course, a matter of the Mecca of tired bodies and fagged conjecture. Indeed, the date of the minds. This may seem a rather founding of the Iroquois Confedera­ startling statement to make con­ tion, which is here quoted at 500 B. cerning a town whose charter c., is merely that given by the In­ dates back only eighty-six years; dians themselves. Scientific stu­ yet there is no legend of the once dents have sought to place it, taking mighty Iroquois Confederation that the legend of an eclipse as their anticipates the time when the Kaya­ starting point, at about 1451 A. D. derosseras was the nearest earthly But be that as it may, no better evi­ ideal of the happy hunting ground, dence of the countless generations and Indian historians claim five of Indian visitors to Saratoga could hundred B. C. as the date of the be found than the fact that on one founding of the great Indian Repub­ of these high bluffs surrounding lic of the Five Nations. Saratoga Lake, which is now the It was to Saratoga in those long­ site of a famous road house, known forgotten, prehistoric springtimes, to all summer visitors as "Arrow­ when the Hudson tore apart its ice head," the ground, although plowed fetters and thrust them down into each spring for a hundred years, the sea, that the bravest and the will still reward a five minutes' feeblest alike of the haughty Iro­ search by the find of a half dozen quois tribe, abandoning their winter perfect arrowheads. Thousands have tepees, made their way over trails been taken away by curious visitors, so firmly trodden down that the thousands apparently yet remain, visitor to-day may trace them, and still the space in which they sometimes, for miles through the have lain is barely three acres in forests surrounding Saratoga. extent. By the time of the planting of the What, it may well be asked, has maize, the high bluffs overlooking been the magnet that has drawn Saratoga Lake were dotted with man to this spot since earliest summter wigwams. The young time? The proud Iroquois, tread­ braves found here game innumer- ing with light moccasin the forest 471 Digitized by Google 472 NEW ENGLAND MAGAZINE trail, would have answered: "Game! plague that was devastating the for so many stately bucks and sleek­ tribe. Science has given a number sided does, fierce wolves and fiercer of theories as to the origin of these panthers, never elsewhere did In­ springs, far less romantic, and so aian see." widely differing from one another "Society," would have been the that any true lover of romance is reply of the famous beauty, Betty well justified in declining to believe Holcomb, travelling to the Spa by any of them, and accepting instead easy stage coach, from far Virginia, the Indian version. crowds assembling at each post It is claimed by reputable au­ station to catch a glimpse of her thority, that Saratoga is built on lovely face. the oldest land of this continent, "The finest racjng in the world," perhaps the oldest in the world. Out would answer the gentleman sports­ of the great primeval sea the huge man of to-day, leaning luxuriously giants of the Laurentian range were lIack in his private car as it tears the first to rear their craggy heads. across the miles that lie between Right on their shore line lay the \Vall Street and the Saratoga Race future Saratoga. Indeed, the visitor Track. All of these answers would of to-day may remove the wind­ have been right so far as they went, blown sand-speck from his eye with IIttt the root of the matter would the consoling knowledge that he has Dot be there, for the last analysis of been made miserable by a bit of Saratoga's greatness will show that what was, perhaps the first sea­ the foundations of her fame lie in beach in the world's history. frer wonderful mineral springs. \Vhen the Laurentian range up­ The history of Saratoga Springs heaved itself from the ocean bed, reads thus: The wild deer Clme, something had to give way, and as licked eagerly the salty springs and a matter of fact, the whole under­ came in ever increasing throngs lying strata of the sea bed was lifted zgain. Pursuing the deer, followed and tilted several hundred feet the Iroquois. Likewise finding the above the surrounding sea. springs pleasant to taste, and heal­ According to one theory, where ing of body. they also came again. Saratoga now stands along the Then the white man, pursuing the edge of this "fault" in the strat", Iroquois. learned the secret of the some of the old Silurian ocean by waters and. with his fellows re­ some freak of nature, was im­ turned again. The first visitors of prisoned, and Saratoga is exporting our own race were seekers after to-day bottles full of this same pre­ lIealth. then followed fashion, and historic sea, after fashion, wealth, until to-day According to another theory, the two hundred thousand people count sub-drainage of the Laurentian a visit to the Springs a necessity of range, flowing along the underlying the summer season. strata as through some huge water According to the Iroquois, the main, is stopped short in its course, springs of Saratoga were created in clnd effectually dammed up by tht: answer to the prayer of a despairing "fault" at Saratoga. Both of these Mohawk chief seeking a cure for theories are at fault. If Saratoga's ~s beloved, who lay dying from a springs are merely veins of water Digitized by Google SARATOGA SPRINGS 473 that have become impregnated with apart, show totalIy different min­ various salts from the decomposing erals in their composition l rocks through whuse veins thev Be this as it may, it is certain flow they do not account for thos'e that the springs are there; also • greaL pockets of natural carbonic that there is no likeliho09 of their acid' gas at the southern end of the giving out. Indeed new springs town so large in extent that of late are discovered frequently. Only years huge gasometers have been last year, when boring for water to erected, and the gas, under a pres­ supply the boilers at the Strong San­ sure of two thousand pounds to the itarium on the crest of the hill over- BROADWAY IN JULY square inch, is being shipped away looking the narrow valIey, where all in steel cylinders, by the Natural the previous springs have been Carbonic Acid Gas Company, for found, water was indeed discovered, the use of soda water fountains all at a depth of four hundred feet, but over the w6rld. (Carbonic gas as not such as any self-respecting well as its water is also shipped by boiler would think of swallowing, the Lincoln Spring in large quanti­ so heavily was it charged with min­ ties.) Again, if Saratoga lies over erals and carbonic acid gas; and in a reservoir of the old sea, why do consequence a new mineral spring two springs, not . a hundred feet was added to the list. Saratoga's Digitized by Goog Ie ENTRANCE TO WOODLAWN PARK temporary and more widely adver­ center the water bubbled up, as tised attractions will doubtles!> from the crater of a miniature vol­ change in the future as they have in cano. Johnson stayed a few days, the past, to meet the fickle fashions so far recovered as to be able to of the hour. But, as has been said, walk back to Schenectady, and the first visitor to Saratoga came to promptly published the marvellouli drink the water, and the last will qualities of the waters abroad. doubtless be there for the same pur­ Saratoga did not wait long for pose, in the uncounted ages to other distinguished visitors. In come. 1783, George Washington, accom­ In 1767, the Mohawks determined panied by Alexander Hamilton and in solemn council to reveal to Sir Governor George Clinton, visited 'William Johnson, who was suffering the Spring. Washington was so from a wound received in the battle favorably impressed with its virtues of Lake George, the wonderful heal­ that he made inquiries with a view ing powers of the High Rock. Tak­ to acquiring the land and building ing their "beloved brother" (this thereon a summer home, although was more than a figure of speech at that time the spring lay in the for Johnson married Mol1ie Brant, sister of the famous Indian warrior) heart of the wilderness, and one log on a litter, they carried him about hut sheltered all the inhabitants of twenty miles north of Schenectady. the place. From this time on the Here he found a curious formation rise of the town was very rapid. where a spring, heavily charged and by 1815, it had been visited by with minerals, had built up a cone upwards of two thousand persons.