The Cecil Whig

THE ISLANDS OF PYRAMID LAKE UTAH.

A gentleman who has visited Pyramid Lake, and explored several of its islands at the season of laying and incubation for the myriads of gulls, ducks, pelicans, and other waterfowl that swarm upon its water, states that at that time the larger islands are literally white with eggs. In walking from the shore toward the centre of the islands it is impossible to proceed fifty feet without stepping upon some of the eggs, so thickly are they strewed over the ground. The fowls inhabiting the islands are described as being exceedingly tame; they hover and flutter upon the ground about the intruder upon their breeding ground, or circle and stream about his head, and with but little show of fear. This absence of fear of man is doubtless to be attributed to the fact that until lately that "feathered biped," man, has never been seen by them upon their islands.

Owing to certain superstitious notions held by them in regard to the lake, the Indians have never, in the memory of their oldest chief, visited any of the islands. Even were they not withheld by the fear of monsters in the lake and upon the islands, they have no boats or canoes, and know nothing even of that rudest of nautical arts—raft navigation.

Among the islands of the lake are two small, rocky ones, near to each other, and at no great distance from the fact that they are alive with rattlesnakes. Huge and lazy old patriarchs of the islands, with long strings of rattles upon their tails, bask in the shade of almost every stone, while younger and more active members of the tribe glide about in all directions, and the intruder upon these islands of snakes is often treated to a serenade by a dozen sets of rattles of various degrees of power and shades of tone. Of course neither whites or Indians would care to tarry long on these islands, nor to cultivate more than a passing acquaintance with their musical inhabitants.

It is supposed that the reason of these two islands being so completely alive and crawling with snakes, is that a few having got on their shores by some accident, and finding convenient dens in the rocks, they have ever since fed and fattened upon the eggs and unfledged young of the brooding water fowl, and have gone on increasing and multiplying, with nothing to decrease or disturb them. We have said above that the Indians have superstitious notions about the lake and islands. These notions appear to have no more definite form than a vague fear of certain black monsters which they say inhabit its waters, having been driven into the lake by the united exertions of their people ages ago, because of their destroying the groves of nut pines. They declare that they have frequently seen the backs of these monster animals protruding above the level of the water far out in the lake.

These stories are doubtless without the slightest foundation in fact. The Indians are not much to blame for these notions, however, for by indulging in them they do not exhibit a greater degree of superstition than is displayed by the white race in all countries. But a short time since, there was published an account of three or four monster serpents—a hundred feet long and some four feet in diameter—having been seen disporting themselves in Owen's Lake—"causing its waters to boil like a pot." These Owen's Lake monsters are vouched for by Colonel Stevens, superintendent of a mining company at Lone Pine, by a party of Mexicans, and by a party of white men. Such stories have been told about lakes in all countries, and the sea has had its monster serpent ever since the Chinese first discovered him, ages and ages ago. The monster or monsters of Pyramid Lake, however, as described by Piutes, are not serpents; they more nearly resemble the mysterious monster of the Lake of Seljord, one of the western Norwegian isles, which, at uncertain intervals, is said to arch its back above the lone waters of the lake, and there remain lying like an islet, till it pleased to sink again, drawing the water from the shores as it goes down, and creating a great commotion. The Piutes have several times tried to point out to white men prospecting in that vicinity the Pyramid Lake monsters; we have never met with any one who was able to see anything more than the swell on the lake, blackened by the shadow of a passing cloud.