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diff --git a/42842-0.txt b/42842-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5847ebe --- /dev/null +++ b/42842-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7488 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42842 *** + +Transcriber's Note: + + Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the original document have + been preserved. Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. + + Italic text is denoted by _underscores_. + + The Title Page and Table of Contents for this book refer to it as + Volume V. The half-title, and page and chapter numbering is + consistent with this being the first half of Volume III. + + + + +THE OLD BAY STATE. + +VOL. III. + + + + + [Illustration: _The Temperance Outfit_] + + + + + _EDITION ARTISTIQUE_ + + The World's Famous + Places and Peoples + + AMERICA + + BY + JOEL COOK + + In Six Volumes + Volume V. + + MERRILL AND BAKER + New York London + + + + +THIS EDITION ARTISTIQUE OF THE WORLD'S FAMOUS PLACES AND PEOPLES IS +LIMITED TO ONE THOUSAND NUMBERED AND REGISTERED COPIES, OF WHICH THIS +COPY IS NO. 205 + +Copyright, Henry T. Coates & Co., 1900 + + + + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + +VOLUME V + + + PAGE + + FANEUIL HALL, BOSTON 44 + + ALONG THE SHORE AT CAPE ANNE, GLOUCESTER, + MASS. 86 + + STATE CAPITOL, HARTFORD, CONN. 162 + + LOG BRIDGE OVER THE WILD CAT, NEAR + JACKSON, N. H. 212 + + HOUSE OF "THE PEARL OF ORR'S ISLAND," + CASCO BAY, ME. 244 + + ALONG THE COAST OF BAR HARBOR, ME. 270 + + + + +AMERICA, PICTURESQUE AND DESCRIPTIVE. + + + + +XV. + +THE OLD BAY STATE. + + Early Explorations -- John Cabot -- Bartholomew Gosnold -- + The Old Colony -- The Mayflower -- Plymouth -- Plymouth + Rock -- Duxbury --Samoset -- Governor Bradford -- Miles + Standish -- Cape Cod -- Chatham -- Barnstable -- Truro -- + Highland Light -- Provincetown -- The Puritan Compact -- + Quincy -- Marshfield -- Daniel Webster -- Minot's Ledge -- + Nantasket -- Hingham -- Squantum -- Boston -- Shawmut + --Boston Harbor and Islands -- Boston Common -- Beacon Hill + and the State House -- The Codfish -- Boston Attractions -- + Old South Church -- Old State House -- Faneuil Hall -- Old + Christ Church -- Boston Fire -- Boston Development -- The + New West End -- Parks and Suburbs --Brook Farm -- Newton -- + Nonatum Hill -- Natick -- Cochituate Lake --Wellesley -- + Sudbury -- The Wayside Inn -- Charlestown -- Old Ironsides + -- Jackson's Head -- Bunker Hill -- Cambridge -- Harvard + University -- Henry W. Longfellow -- James Russell Lowell + -- Oliver Wendell Holmes -- Margaret Fuller -- Waltham -- + Lexington -- Concord in Middlesex and its Bridge -- Ralph + Waldo Emerson -- Nathaniel Hawthorne -- Henry D. Thoreau -- + The Alcotts -- Massachusetts North Shore -- Lynn -- Nahant + -- Swampscott -- Marblehead -- Salem and the Witches -- + Beverley -- Wenham Lake -- Ipswich -- Andover -- Merrimack + River -- Salisbury -- Concord in New Hampshire -- + Manchester -- Nashua -- Lowell -- Lawrence -- Haverhill -- + Newburyport -- Bridal of Pennacook -- Cape Ann -- + Gloucester -- The Fisheries -- Norman's Woe -- Wreck of + the Hesperus -- Land's End -- Thatcher's Island --Rockport + -- Lanesville -- Granite -- The Fishermen. + + +EARLY EXPLORATIONS. + +John Cabot was the first explorer of the coasts of New England under +British auspices. After Columbus had discovered America, fabulous +tales were told of its outlying islands. The primitive maps +represented the Atlantic Ocean as full of islands, some being very +large, especially the Island of Brazil, and the fabled Island of the +Seven Cities. The latter was said by sailors to be inhabited by +Christians who years before had fled from seven cities of Asia, under +their seven bishops, taking refuge there. Bristol was then the leading +English seaport, and five years after the discovery by Columbus, John +Cabot started from it on a western voyage of exploration in search of +these famous islands. King Henry VII. encouraged the enterprise, and +in May, 1497, Cabot sailed in the little ship "Matthew," with a crew +of eighteen, and going westward he discovered one of these islands, +which he called the New Found Land. It was Cape Breton Island, but +being apparently unproductive and without inhabitants, although some +signs of people were seen, he soon returned to England. The greatest +excitement followed his arrival home, and the report got abroad that +he had discovered the Island of the Seven Cities and the coast of +Asia. Cabot became all the rage in England, and a writer of that time +records that Englishmen called him "the Great Admiral," followed him +about "like madmen," that he was "dressed in silks," and "treated like +a prince." Cabot, feeling his importance, wanted his friends to share +his good fortune, so he appointed some of them governors, and others +bishops over the new world he had discovered, while King Henry was so +delighted at the success of the voyage that he sent Cabot a letter of +thanks and the munificent present of £10. King Henry VII. was always +regarded as being "a little near." + +In 1498, another and larger expedition was fitted out, Cabot planning +to sail westward until he reached the land he had discovered in the +previous year, and then he thought by turning south he would come to +the Island of Cipango (Japan), where he would fill his ships with +spices and jewels, a half-dozen small vessels making up the fleet. +They took a more northerly course than before, got among icebergs, and +where the summer days were so long there was very little night. They +reached Labrador, where the sailors were frightened at the amount of +ice, and turning south, Cabot sailed along the American coast nearly +to Florida, once trying to plant a colony, but being discouraged by +the barren soil, abandoning it. Yet sterile as the land might be, the +waters were filled with fish, so that Cabot called the country the +"Land of the Codfish," there was such an abundance of them. The +explorers recorded that the bears were harmless, they could so easily +get food, describing how they would swim out into the sea and catch +the fish. Then Cabot disappeared from view. Whether he died on the +homeward voyage or after he returned is unknown, as everything about +his subsequent career has faded from history. But his two voyages were +the foundation of the British claim to the Atlantic coast from +Labrador to Florida, and the basis of all the English grants for the +subsequently formed American colonies. + +Bartholomew Gosnold planted the first English colony in the Old Bay +State. Upon Friday, May 14, 1602, after elaborate preparations, he +sailed from Falmouth, England, in the ship "Concord," his party +numbering thirty-two, of whom about a dozen expected to remain in the +new country as settlers. Crossing the ocean and coming into view of +the American coast, he steered south, soon finding his progress barred +by a bold headland, which encircled him about. He had got into the +bight of Cape Cod Bay, and thus discovered that great bended, sandy +peninsula, to which he gave the name from the abundance of codfish he +found disporting in the waters. Many whales were also seen, and vast +numbers of fish of all kinds. He tried to get out of the bay, and +coasting around the long and curiously hooked cape, emerged into the +Atlantic, and then coming down the outer side got into Vineyard Sound, +where he planted his colony on Cuttyhunk Island, but soon abandoned +it. Gosnold returned to England, and in 1607 sailed with Newport's +expedition, carrying Captain John Smith to Virginia. + + +THE OLD COLONY. + +The first English settlement permanently planted in New England was +the famous "Old Colony" at Plymouth. The Puritan Separatists, from the +Church of England, sought refuge from English persecution in Holland, +living in Leyden under their pastor, John Robinson, for eleven years, +when they decided to migrate to America. They arranged with the +Virginia Company to send them across the ocean, and about the middle +of the summer of 1620 the little band of Pilgrims sailed from +Delft-haven, the port of Leyden, on the "Speedwell," in charge of +Elder Brewster. The "Mayflower" joined at Southampton with other +Puritans from England, but the "Speedwell" sprung a leak and they put +into Plymouth roads. Then they decided to go on in the "Mayflower" +alone, and the party left Plymouth early in September. They were +seeking Virginia, but found the land, after a voyage of over two +months, at Cape Cod, anchoring inside the Cape. Then they thanked God, +"who had brought them over the vast and furious ocean, and delivered +them from all the perils and miseries thereof, again to set their feet +on the firm and stable earth." While the ship lay there, the famous +"Mayflower Compact" was drawn up, pledging the signers to obey the +government that it established, and John Carver was chosen the first +Governor, forty-one men signing the compact. After nearly a month +spent in exploration, their shallop going all about the coasts, +Plymouth was selected, and the pioneers landed December 21, 1620, the +day being now annually celebrated as "Forefathers' Day." + +Plymouth has a little land-locked harbor behind a long and narrow sand +beach, projected northward from the ridge of Manomet below, this beach +acting as a protective breakwater to the wharves. The harbor is so +shallow, however, that there is little trade by sea. The town spreads +upon the bluff shores, and on a plateau to the hills in the rear. +There is now a population of about nine thousand, engaged mainly in +manufacturing cordage and textiles, and having a considerable fishery +fleet. While the town is of modern build, yet it is devoted to the +memory which gives it deathless fame, every relic of the Pilgrims +being restored and perpetuated. There is little to be seen that comes +from the olden time, however, outside of the hills and harbor and +original streets, excepting the carefully cherished relics of the +"Mayflower's" passengers, that have been gathered together. The choice +of Plymouth as the landing-place seems to have been mainly from +necessity, when protracted explorations failed to find a better place, +and the coming of winter compelled a landing somewhere. The actual +location was hardly well considered, the Pilgrims themselves being +far from satisfied. After the "Mayflower" anchored inside of Cape Cod, +several weeks were passed in explorations, and finally, upon a Sunday +in December, 1620, a landing was made upon Clark's Island, where +religious services were held, the first in New England. Upon the most +elevated part of this island stands a huge boulder, about twelve feet +high, called from some local circumstance the "Election Rock." Its +face bears the words taken from _Mourt's Relation_, which chronicled +the voyage of the "Mayflower": + + "Upon the Sabbath-Day wee rested, 20 December, 1620." + +Eighteen of the Pilgrims thus "rested," after their shallop, in making +the shore, had been almost shipwrecked. The next day they sailed +across the bay to the mainland, their first landing being then made at +Plymouth, and upon the second day, December 22d, the entire company +came ashore and the settlement began. + +Within the Pilgrim Hall, a fireproof building upon the chief street, +are kept the precious relics of the "Mayflower" and the Pilgrims, with +paintings of the embarkation from Delft-haven and landing at Plymouth, +and old portraits of the leaders of the colony. Among the interesting +documents are autograph writings, establishing a chain of +acquaintanceship connecting the original Pilgrims with the present +time. Peregrine White was the first child of the new colony, the +infant being born on the "Mayflower" after she came into Cape Cod Bay, +in November, 1620, and he was only a month old when they landed. The +baby, surviving all their hardships, lived to a ripe old age, and +"Grandfather Cobb," born in 1694, knew him well. Cobb, in his day, +lived to be the oldest man in New England, his life covering space in +three centuries, for he exceeded one hundred and seven years, dying in +1801. William R. Sever, born in 1790, knew Cobb and recollected him +well, and living until he was ninety-seven years old, died in 1887. +These three lives connected the Pilgrim landing almost with the +present day. The old cradle that rocked Peregrine White on the +"Mayflower," and after they landed, is preserved--an upright, +stiff-backed, wicker-work basket, upon rude wooden rockers. One of the +chief paintings represents the signing of the memorable "Mayflower +Compact." There are also in the hall some of the old straight-backed +chairs of the Pilgrims, with their pots and platters, and among other +relics Miles Standish's sword. In the court-house are the original +records of the colony, the first allotment of lands among the +settlers, their deeds, agreements and wills, and the patent given the +colony by Earl Warwick in 1629. There are also shown in quaint +handwriting, with the ink partly faded out, records of how they +divided their cattle, when it was decided to change from the original +plan of holding them in common. Signatures of the Pilgrims are +attached to many of these documents. Governor Carver died the first +year, William Bradford succeeding, and there is preserved in Governor +Bradford's writing the famous order establishing trial by jury in the +colony. + + +THE PLYMOUTH ROCK. + + "The breaking waves dashed high + On a stern and rock-bound coast." + +Thus begins Mrs. Hemans' beautiful hymn on the landing of the +Pilgrims. Unfortunately for the poetry, however, sand is everywhere +about, and scarcely a rock or boulder can be seen for miles, excepting +the very little one on which they landed. Down near the water-side is +this sacred stone, worshipped by all the Pilgrim descendants, the +retrocession of the sea having left it some distance back. It is a +gray syenite boulder, oval-shaped, and about six feet long. It was +some time ago unfortunately split, and the parts have been cemented +together. At the time of the landing this boulder lay on the sandy +beach, partly embedded, being almost solitary on these sands, for +unlike the verge of Manomet to the southward, and the coast north of +Boston, this sandy shore is almost without rocks of any kind. Dropped +here in the glacial period, and lying partly in the water, the rock +made a boat-landing naturally attractive to the water-weary Pilgrims +when they coasted along in their shallop from Clark's Island, so they +stepped out upon it to get ashore dry-shod. The rock is in its +original location, but has been elevated several feet to a higher +level, is surmounted by an imposing granite canopy, and is railed in +for protection from the relic-hunter. The numerals "1620" are rudely +carved upon its side, and a sort of fissure in its face seems like the +impress of a foot. Surmounting the canopy is a scallop shell, the +distinctive emblem of the pilgrim. The scallop has been called the +"Butterfly of the Sea," and in the time of the Crusades, a scallop +shell fastened in the cap denoted that the wearer had made a +pilgrimage to the Holy Land. Thus it is said in the _Hermit_: + + "He quits his cell, the pilgrim staff he bore, + And fixed his scallop in his hat before." + +Behind the Plymouth Rock rises the bluff shore into Cole's Hill, +having its steep slopes sodded, this having been the place up which +the Pilgrims climbed after the landing. A view to the front shows the +wharves, and across the bay the narrow sandspit protecting the harbor, +while on the right hand is the long ridge of Manomet, and over the +water to the left appear distant sand-dunes along Duxbury Beach. Off +to the northward rises the "Captain's Hill" of Duxbury, surmounted +with the monument to Captain Miles Standish, erected in 1889, rising +one hundred and ten feet. Upon Cole's Hill was the first burial-place +of the Pilgrims, and here were interred about half the intrepid band, +who died from the privations of the first winter. Their bones were +occasionally washed out by heavy rains, or found in digging for the +foundations of buildings, but all have been carefully collected, and, +with several of the dead thus exposed, were again entombed in the +canopy over Plymouth Rock. A little way to the southward is Leyden +Street, running from the water's edge for some distance back up the +slope to the side of the "Burial Hill," the first cemetery. This was +the earliest highway laid out in New England, although it did not +receive its present name until long afterwards. Upon this street the +Pilgrims built their first rude houses, the lots extending southward +from it to the "Town Brook," a short distance beyond, which supplied +them with good water, and was the chief feature inducing them to +select this place for settlement. + +The story of their landing is told in _Mourt's Relation_, written by +one of the actors in this great historical drama. After describing +their explorations and hasty selection of the place, he continues: +"So, in the morning, after we had called on God for direction, we came +to this resolution, to go presently ashore again, and to take a better +view of two places which we thought most fitting for us; for we could +not now take time for further search or consideration, our victuals +being much spent, especially our beer, and it being now the 19th of +December. After our landing and viewing the places so well as we +could, we came to a conclusion, by most voices, to set on a high +ground, where there is a great deal of land cleared, and hath been +planted with corn three or four years ago; and there is a very sweet +brook runs under the hillside, and many delicate springs of as good +water as can be drunk, and where we may harbor our shallops and boats +exceeding well; and in this brook fish in their season; on the further +side of the river also much corn-ground cleared. In one field is a +great hill on which we point to make a platform and plant our +ordnance, which will command all around about. From thence we may see +into the bay and far into the sea, and we may see thence Cape Cod. Our +greatest labor will be the fetching of our wood, which is half a +quarter of an English mile; but there is enough so far off. What +people inhabit here we know not, for as yet we have seen none. So +there we made our rendezvous, and a place for some of our people, +about twenty, resolving in the morning to come all ashore and to build +houses." About a week after landing they began constructing their +first fort on the hill, and allotted the plots of land on their +street, subsequently named Leyden. Thus the town was begun, and behind +it rose two hills, the one now known as the Burial Hill being at the +head of this street, and elevated about one hundred and fifty feet +above the sea. Miles Standish, with his military eye, for he had seen +veteran service in Flanders, selected this hill for the fort, and +here in 1622 was built the square timber block-house that made them +both a fort and a church, the entire settlement as it then existed +being enclosed with a stockade for further protection. This caused the +hill to be named Fort Hill, and it was not until long afterward that +it was used as a cemetery and called Burial Hill, the first interred +being some of the original Pilgrims after the graveyard on Cole's +Hill, down by the waterside, had been abandoned. + +Upon Fort Hill was built the "Watch House," where an outlook was kept +for the Indians. Stones now mark the locations both of the fort and +the watchhouse, and surrounding them are the graves of several of the +"Mayflower" Pilgrims, with many of their descendants, the dark slate +gravestones having been brought out from England. There is a fine +outlook from Burial Hill, far over the sea to the distant yellow +sand-streak of Cape Cod. About a half-mile northward is the other +hill, rising somewhat higher, and upon it is the National Monument to +the Pilgrims, dedicated in 1889. This is a massive granite pedestal +forty-five feet high, surmounted by the largest stone statue in +existence, a colossal figure of Faith, thirty-six feet high, and +adorned by large seated statues emblematic of the principles upon +which the settlement was founded, representing Law, Morality, Freedom +and Education. Upon this great monument are also representations of +the landing of the Pilgrims, their names, and the "Mayflower +Compact." It was into this infant colony of Plymouth, after some weeks +of careful parley and investigation, there strode the stalwart Indian +Samoset, making their acquaintance and paving the way for the +subsequent treaty and alliance with Massasoit, which for many years +was scrupulously observed by both parties, and not broken until after +he died. Canonicus, of the Narragansetts, to the southward, sent to +the colony after Massasoit's death a sheaf of arrows bound with a +rattlesnake's skin as a token of hostility. Governor Bradford did not +want war, but he knew they must maintain a brave outlook, so he +promptly filled the skin with powder and shot and sent it back to +Canonicus, who understood the grim challenge, and fearing the deadly +musketry, prudently restrained the hostile instincts of his tribe. The +privations of the first year, which killed half the settlers, and were +only relieved by succor from England, are said to have originated the +New England Thanksgiving Festival Day, which has since spread over the +whole country. In December, 1621, they had their first Thanksgiving, +upon the arrival of a relief ship from abroad. Such was the dawning of +the ruling race of the American nation. + + +DUXBURY AND MILES STANDISH. + +Upon the upper side of Plymouth Bay, enclosing its northern portion, +is one of those long peninsulas of sand and rocks, abounding upon the +Massachusetts coasts, which projects about six miles southeastward +into the sea and terminates in a high knob, called the Gurnet, with a +hook turned inward. This elongated sand-strip is Duxbury Beach, the +town of Duxbury being upon the mainland inside, a fishing village +probably best known as the terminus of the French Atlantic Cable. It +was at Duxbury that the first regular pastor was Ralph Partridge, whom +Cotton Mather described as having "the innocence of a dove and the +loftiness of an eagle." The Pilgrims allotted this district to Miles +Standish and to their youngest member, John Alden. Standish named it +from Duxbury Hall, in Lancashire, the seat of his English ancestors. +The brave Miles was not a Puritan and did not belong to their church, +but as he was an experienced warrior, they made him the commander of +their standing army of twelve men. Is is said that there have been +only two renowned military chieftains in history who were personally +acquainted with all their soldiers--Julius Cæsar and Miles Standish. +The redoubtable old captain lost his wife Rose soon after the landing, +and he then engaged the fascinating and youthful Alden to do his +courtship for him and woo the gentle Priscilla Mullins, with the usual +result that the maiden preferred the more attractive Alden to the grim +old soldier. Standish has been described as "a short man, very brave, +but impetuous and choleric, and his name soon became a terror to all +hostile Indians." His is the romance of early Plymouth, for he has +been made the hero of Longfellow's poem, and of renowned operas and +many New England tales, while the fair Priscilla gave her name to the +great Long Island Sound steamer. Standish lived upon the "Captain's +Hill," out on the Duxbury peninsula, the highest land thereabout, +rising one hundred and eighty feet, upon a broad point projecting into +Plymouth Bay. His monument is near the site of his house upon the +bare-topped, oval-shaped hill, a rather bleak place, however, to have +selected for a home. Beyond it the projecting Duxbury Beach ends in +the high Gurnet, with twin lighthouses, and then hooks inward to +another bold terminating bulb, the headland of Saquish. To the +northward is Clark's Island, where the Pilgrims first landed, a +similarly round-topped mass rising from the water. Thus is Plymouth +Bay environed, for to the southward its long guarding ridge on that +side, Manomet, projects far into the sea. + + +CAPE COD. + +The Old Bay State presents a front to the rough Atlantic like a +gladiator at bay. She has in Cape Cod one defensive forearm boldly +extended, and she likewise is prepared, if necessary, to thrust out +the other, which keeps close guard upon her rugged granite breast in +Cape Ann. These capes are the portals of Massachusetts Bay, and of the +ocean entrance to Boston. Everyone, in viewing the map, marvels at the +extraordinary formation of Cape Cod. Thoreau, who in days gone by +tramped all over the Cape, says, "A man may stand there and put all +America behind him." This great sandy headland stretches eastward from +the mainland at Sandwich about thirty miles, then turns north and +northwest thirty miles more, finally terminating in a huge hook, bent +around to the south and east again, and forming the spacious +landlocked harbor of Provincetown. At Harwich and Chatham the elbow +sharply bends, the shoulder is at Buzzard's Bay, the wrist at Truro, +and the closing fingers make Provincetown's haven. The Cape is nearly +all white sand, with boulders occasionally appearing, particularly +near the extremity. Thin layers of soil extend as far as Truro, but +the sand is seen through many rents, and the extremity is completely +bare, being a wilderness of sand, kept in partial motion by the winds, +and making constantly shifting dunes. The prevalent northeast winds +and surf are regarded as having made the hooked end of the Cape by +gradually moving the sands upon the shore around to the west and +south. This hooked end impressed the Colonial navigators, and the +ancient Dutch maps call it Staaten Hoeck, and the enclosed waters +Staaten Bay. The extremely white sand, in contrast with the darker +rocks of more northern shores, led Champlain to name it Cape Blanc. +Gosnold, as already announced, from the abundance of codfish named it +Cape Cod, whereof the faithful historian, Cotton Mather, who records +the fact, writes naïvely that he supposes it will never lose its name +"till swarms of codfish be seen swimming on the highest hills." + +This remarkable cape came near being an island, Buzzard's Bay on the +south and Cape Cod bay on the north being so deeply indented that +their waters approach within about seven miles. The isthmus is a low, +broad alluvial valley stretching between, having Monumet River flowing +from Herring Pond south into Buzzard's Bay, and the Scusset River +north from the divide, their headwaters only a thousand yards apart, +so that this narrow neck of land, nowhere elevated more than +twenty-five feet, is all that saves the famous Cape from being an +island. A canal was projected there as early as 1676, and the proposed +"Cape Cod Ship Canal" has been regularly agitated ever since, and may +at some time be constructed, saving the shipping from the long detour +around the Cape. This neck has been called "the collar of the Cape," +and beyond was the Indian domain of Monomoy. Chatham then was Nauset, +and Barnstable was Cummaquid, these, as indeed every village on the +Cape, being famous nurseries of sailors and fishermen. Here is some +agriculture, the farms and towns having roomy old houses, and the +extensive cranberry bogs showing one of the chief industries of the +people. Along the southern shore are Marshpee, Cotuit, and Hyannis, +all changing from fishing-ports to modern fashionable watering-places. +The surface is composed of sharply defined hills of white sand, +having broad sandy levels between that are almost desert plains. There +are some trees, but the growth becomes gradually stunted, as the +journey is made out upon the Cape, and villages are less frequent and +population sparser. Modern cottages crown the hilltops, and the +frequent cranberry bogs are as level as a floor, being thickly grown +with the myriad runners and sombre foliage of the prolific plant. + +Passing Yarmouth and Harwich, the railway turns northward at the elbow +of the cape, where Chatham is on the ocean shore. Brewster is +northward, and Eastham, noted for its fortified church, whose colonial +pastor received by law, for his salary, part of every stranded whale +coming upon the shore. To the left is Welfleet, on the bay shore, and +to the right the triple lighthouses of Nauset Beach, in front of which +the ocean tides divide, moving in opposite directions, one current +south to Nantucket Sound, and the other north, to go around the Cape +into Massachusetts Bay. Northward is the sandy desert of Truro, the +"Dangerfield" of early days, regarded as the most fatal coast in New +England. This town of Truro has been described as "a village where its +able-bodied men are all ploughing the ocean together as a common +field," while in North Truro "the women and girls may sit at their +doors and see where their husbands and brothers are harvesting their +mackerel fifteen to twenty miles off on the sea, with hundreds of +white harvest-wagons." Here, upon the high hill making the ocean +shore, where the headland curves from north around to the west, is the +guardian beacon of Cape Cod, the lofty Highland Light, forty-one miles +southeast of Boston Light, and whose powerful white rays shine for +twenty miles over the ocean without, and the bay within. The tower +stands on a hill one hundred and forty-two feet high, and the light is +elevated nearly two hundred feet. Along here Thoreau walked on the +"sand-bar in the midst of the sea," and as he gazed far over the +ocean, thus reflected: "The nearest beach to us on the east was on the +coast of Galicia in Spain, whose capital is Santiago, though by old +poets' reckoning it should have been Atlantis, or the Hesperides; but +Heaven is found to be farther west now. At first we were abreast of +that part of Portugal _entre Douro e Mino_, and then Galicia and the +port of Pontevedro opened to us as we walked along, but we did not +enter, the breakers ran so high. The bold headland of Cape Finisterre, +a little north of east, jutted toward us next with its vain brag; for +we flung back 'Here is Cape Cod, Cape Land's Beginning.' A little +indentation toward the north--for the land loomed to our imaginations +like a common mirage--we knew was the Bay of Biscay, and we sang, +'There we lay, till next day, in the Bay of Biscay, O!' A little south +of east was Palos, where Columbus weighed anchor, and further yet the +pillars which Hercules set up." + + +THE PURITAN COMPACT. + +At the extremity of Cape Cod is Provincetown, among the sand dunes, a +town with about forty-five hundred inhabitants, encircling the harbor +on its western verge, a long, narrow settlement between the high white +sand-hills and the beach. There are two main streets, one along the +beach and the other parallel to it back among the hills. Upon the +highest hill is the Town Hall, the mariner's landmark entering the +harbor, and from it are good views over ocean and bay, displaying the +curious end of the Cape sweeping grandly around and enclosing the +spacious harbor with room enough for anchoring an enormous fleet. To +the west and south is the great bended hook having Race Point on its +northwesterly verge and a lighthouse on the southern termination, +whence a tongue of beach juts over towards Truro. This is a haven for +many fishermen, and the people, who are among the purest descendants +of the original Puritans, devote their energies largely to catching +mackerel and cod, curing and stacking the fish all around the bay. The +first appearance of Provincetown in history was when the "Mayflower" +entered the harbor with the Pilgrims in November, 1620. Cape Cod was +the first land they saw after leaving the English Channel, then not +bare as now, but wooded down to the shore. They anchored in the bay, +and the men were forced to wade "a bow-shoot" to the shore to make a +landing, and it was this wading and subsequent exposure which gave +them the colds and sickness resulting in the deaths of so many during +the subsequent winter. It is recorded that upon Monday, November 23, +1620, the women went ashore to wash, and thus they inaugurated that +universal institution which has extended all over the country, the +great American Monday washing-day. It was while anchored in +Provincetown harbor the Pilgrims framed and signed the celebrated +Puritan Compact, so long ruling Plymouth, which is regarded as the +foundation of constitutional government. John Quincy Adams said of it: +"This is perhaps the only instance in human history of that positive +original social compact which speculative philosophers imagined as the +only legitimate source of government." It was signed by forty-one +Pilgrims, of whom twenty-one died during the ensuing four months. It +reads: + +"In the name of God, amen. We, whose names are underwritten, the loyal +subjects of our direct sovereign lord King James, by the grace of God, +of Great Britain, France and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, +etc., having undertaken, for the glory of God and advancement of the +Christian faith and honor of our King and country, a voyage to plant +the first colony in the northern parts of Virginia, do by these +presents solemnly and mutually, in the presence of God and of one +another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil body +politic, for our better ordering and preservation, and furtherance of +the ends aforesaid; and by virtue hereof to enact, constitute and +frame such just and equal laws, ordinances, acts, constitutions and +offices, from time to time, as shall be thought most meet and +expedient for the general good of the colony; unto which we promise +all due submission and obedience. In witness whereof, we have +hereunder inscribed our names at Cape Cod, the 11th day of November +(old style), in the year of the reign of our sovereign lord King +James, of England, France and Ireland, the 18th, and of Scotland, the +54th, Anno Domini, 1620." + +Provincetown was a long time afterwards started, and began with a few +fishermen's huts, which grew in the eighteenth century to a small +village with extensive fish-drying flakes. The people top-dressed the +soft sands with clay, shells and pebble, thus making the streets. +There are relics of wrecks all about the extremity of the Cape, and it +has had a sad history, though now, being better lighted and having +life-saving stations, these terrible disasters are rare. The town has +become an attractive summer resort, and has quite a development of +pleasant homes. The visitor mounts High Pole Hill to get the view, and +all around it is over the sea, for, gaze whither one may as the winds +blow freshly across the Cape, the scene is of dazzling white sand or +deeply blue water. + + +APPROACHING MASSACHUSETTS BAY. + +From Plymouth Harbor northward to Massachusetts Bay is but a short +distance. Inland from the coast-line the land rises into the noted +"Blue Hills of Milton," their highest dome-like summit elevated six +hundred and fifty feet and surmounted by an Observatory. These are +granite hills, having the picturesque town of Quincy stretching down +to the sea, with a broad fringe of salt marshes in front. Thus are +named the "Quincy granites," famous for building, and it was to get +these huge stones out that the earliest rude railway in New England +was constructed in 1826, a line three miles long to Neponset River, +the cars being drawn by horses. It is said by the geologists that +these hills of Milton are an older formation than the Alps, and their +earliest English name, designated by King Charles I., was the Cheviot +Hills. Among the salt marshes just north of Duxbury is Marshfield, the +home of Daniel Webster, whose remains lie in an ancient graveyard on +an ocean-viewing hill not far away. Beside him are the graves of his +sons--Edward, killed in the Mexican War, and Fletcher, killed at Bull +Run in the Civil War. An ornamental villa has replaced his old house, +which was burnt, and the homestead has gone to strangers. Close by +Webster's is the grave of the early Pilgrim Governor Winslow, whose +quaint old dwelling is near. Quincy is famous as the home of the +greatest families of the original colony of Massachusetts Bay--Quincy +and Adams. The antique church of Quincy, known as the Adams Temple, +has in the yard the graves of the two Presidents Adams, father and +son. John Hancock, whose bold signature leads the Congress in the +Declaration of Independence, was a native of Quincy. It was among the +earliest Massachusetts settlements, having been colonized by a number +of Episcopalians at Merry Mount, who were such jovial people that the +strict Puritans of Plymouth were aghast at their goings on, and sent +Miles Standish with the whole army against them, and capturing the +leaders shipped them prisoners back to England. This severe treatment +was administered a second time before they were subdued. Thomas +Morton, who was among those twice banished, wrote the _New England +Canaan_, giving this curious account of the aborigines: "The Indians +may be rather accompted as living richly, wanting nothing that is +needful, and to be commended for leading a contented life, the younger +being ruled by the elder and the elder ruled by the Powahs, and the +Powahs are ruled by the Devill; and then you may imagine what good +rule is like to be amongst them." This theory was generally prevalent +among the early colonists, for Cotton Mather was convinced that "the +Indians are under the special protection of the Devill." + +The coast, as Massachusetts Bay is approached, rises into the rocky +shores of Scituate and Cohasset. Here is the dangerous reef of Minot's +Ledge in the offing, guarded by the leading beacon of the New England +waters, about four miles from the shore. The original lighthouse was +washed away in a terrific storm in April, 1851. The catastrophe +occurred in the night, when those on shore heard a violent tolling of +the lighthouse bell, and in the morning the tower was gone, with all +the light keepers, the only relic being a chair washed ashore, which +was recognized as one that had been in the watch-room of the tower. +Scituate was the birthplace of Samuel Woodworth, author of the _Old +Oaken Bucket_. These shores are all lined with villas and attractive +coast resorts, and the noted Jerusalem Road is the chief highway of +Cohasset, following the coast-line around to the westward. Here +projects the narrow and strange peninsula of Nantasket Beach, five +miles out into the sea to Point Allerton, then hooking around and +terminating in the town of Hull, and making one of the most popular +seaside resorts of Bostonians. Farther to the westward, behind it, is +Hingham Harbor, the quaint old village of Hingham on its shores, +settled in 1635, having the oldest occupied church in New England, +dating from 1681. This most ancient church of Yankeedom is a square +building of the colonial style, its steep roof sloping up on all four +sides to a platform at the top surrounded by a balustrade and +surmounted by a little pointed belfry. Still farther westward, and +within the entrance to Boston Harbor, projects the bold bluff of +Squantum, thrust out into the bay, it having been named in memory of +the old sachem who ruled all the country round about when Boston was +first colonized, his home being on an adjacent hill. Sturdy old +Squantum was a firm friend of the colonists, and when he was dying he +besought Governor Bradford to pray for him, "that he might go to the +Englishman's God in Heaven." + + +THE CITY OF BOSTON. + +The approach to the New England metropolis, especially by way of the +harbor, is fine. The city rises gradually ridge above ridge, until the +centre culminates in Beacon Hill, surmounted by the bright gilded dome +and lantern-top of the Massachusetts State House. From all sides the +land, with its varied surfaces of hill and vale, slopes down towards +the water courses, leading into the deep indentation of Boston Harbor. +The pear-shaped peninsula, forming the original town, was the Indian +Shawmut, or the "sweet waters," a name reproduced in many ways in the +modern city. William Blackstone, the recluse Anglican clergyman of +London who could not get on there with the "Lords Bishops" and +emigrated, was the first white inhabitant of Shawmut, coming in 1623. +Governor John Winthrop, of the Massachusetts colony, who came out in +1630 to Salem, removed to Shawmut the same year with Thomas Dudley +and a number of Puritans, crossing over from Charlestown in a search +for good water, which led them to select this place, which, from its +three hills, they called the Tri-mountain, since shortened into +Tremont. Blackstone, having lived there in solitude for several years, +soon tired of having such near neighbors, and in 1634 he sold out the +whole town site to them for about $150, and being disgusted with these +"Lords Brethren," as he had previously been with the "Lords Bishops," +avoided controversy by going farther into the wilderness. Winthrop and +Dudley had come originally from Boston in England, and making this the +capital of the Massachusetts colony, they gave it that name. The +English Boston in Lincolnshire grew around the monastery of the Saxon +St. Botolph, established in the seventh century, and hence its name of +Botolph's Town, which has been condensed into Boston. Some years ago +the English Bostonians presented a Gothic window from the ruins of old +St. Botolph's to Trinity Episcopal Church in Boston. When this +Massachusetts colony was originally established, one of Winthrop's +depressed companions, writing home, described Shawmut as "a hideous +wilderness possessed by barbarous Indians, very cold, sickly, rocky, +barren, unfit for culture, and like to keep the people miserable." Yet +the settlement grew, and, as an early historian says, "Philadelphia +was a forest and New York was an insignificant village long after its +rival, Boston, had become a great commercial town." In 1663 an +English visitor, describing the place, wrote that "the buildings are +handsome, joining one to the other, as in London, with many large +streets, most of them paved with pebble-stones. In the high street +toward the Common there are faire houses, some of stone." The young +colony encouraged commerce and became possessed of many ships, the +earliest built at Boston being the bark "Blessing of the Bay" of +thirty tons, a noted vessel belonging to Governor Winthrop, and +considered a wonder in her time. The first solid wharf was built in +1673. It was Governor Winthrop who put into one of his official +messages this chunk of wisdom: "The best part of a community is always +the least, and of that part the wiser are still less." Anterior to the +Revolution, Boston was the largest and most important American city, +then having twenty-five thousand inhabitants. + +Boston Harbor covers about seventy-five square miles, having various +arms, such as South Boston Bay and Dorchester Bay, and the estuaries +of the Charles, Mystic and Neponset Rivers, which enlarge the +landing-spaces. The outer harbor has great natural beauty, increased +by the improvements and adornments of buildings, the water surface +gradually narrowing towards the city, and dotted with craggy, +undulating islands, having long stretches of bordering beaches, +interspersed with jutting cliffs, broad and bold promontories, and +both low and lofty shores. The adjacent coasts are lined with +villages that gradually merge into the suburbs of the great city. In +this spacious harbor there are at least fifty large and small islands, +and most of these, which were bare in Winthrop's day, are now crowned +with forts, lighthouses, almshouses, hospitals and other civic +institutions, several being most striking edifices, giving a pleasing +variety to the scene. The splendid guiding beacon for the harbor +entrance stands upon Little Brewster or Lighthouse Island, at the +northern edge of Nantasket Roads. This is Boston Light, elevated about +one hundred feet, a revolving light visible sixteen miles. George's +Island, near the entrance and commanding the approach from the sea, +has upon it the chief defensive work of the harbor, Fort Warren, about +two miles west of Boston Light. Farther in, and near the city, off +South Boston, is Castle Island, with Fort Independence, the successor +of the earliest Boston fort, the "Castle," built by Winthrop in 1634. +Opposite and about one mile northward is Governor's Island, containing +Fort Winthrop. This island was originally the "Governor's garden," and +Winthrop paid a yearly rent of two bushels of apples for it. These +forts are nearly all constructed of Quincy granite, but none has seen +actual warfare. Long Island spreads its high crags across the harbor, +outside of the inner forts, and has a lighthouse on its northern end, +while to the eastward is a low, rocky islet, bearing as a warning to +the mariner a curious stone monument, known as Nix's Mate. It was +here the colonists used to hang the pirates caught on the New England +coasts. Upon Deer and Rainsford Islands are hospitals and +reformatories, and upon Thompson's Island, which is fantastically +shaped like an unfledged chicken, is an asylum and farm-school for +indigent boys. Spectacle, Half Moon and Apple Islands received their +names from their shapes. + +At the inward, western extremity of the harbor is the pear-shaped +Shawmut peninsula of Boston, having water ways almost all around it. +Upon the one side is South Boston and upon the other Charlestown, the +comparatively narrow intervening water courses of Fort Point Channel +and Charles River being in parts nearly roofed over with bridges, that +grudgingly open their draws to let through the vessels laden with +lumber and coal. To the northeast, upon another peninsula, which +formerly was an island, is East Boston, having Chelsea beyond to the +northward. Towards the west, across the broadened estuary of Charles +River, is Cambridge, this part of the estuary known as the Back Bay +having been largely encroached upon to create more land for the +crowded and spreading city. To the southward are Roxbury and +Dorchester, and to the westward Brookline, Brighton and Somerville. +Upon the Shawmut peninsula, the original city of Boston covered only +seven hundred and eighty-three acres, but by the reclamations this has +been more than doubled. It absorbed Dorchester Neck to enlarge South +Boston; took in Noddle's Island for East Boston; and annexed about all +the other suburbs, so that the city now covers forty-three square +miles. The hills have been partly levelled and the whole face of the +ancient town altered, these improvements and the great changes wrought +by fires obliterating the older narrow and crooked streets, having +thus wrought a complete transformation. The alignments of the colonial +maps can now hardly be recognized, and scarcely a vestige, beyond the +three old burying-grounds and a few buildings, remains of primitive +Boston. When the first settlers coming from Charlestown saw Shawmut or +the Tri-mountain, it seemed to chiefly consist of the three high hills +which they called Copp's, Beacon and Fort Hills, the highest of these, +the Beacon, being itself a sort of tri-mountain, having three +well-developed surmounting little peaks. These, however, were +afterwards cut down, although the massive elevation of Beacon Hill, +whereon the colonists burnt their signal-fires, remains the crowning +glory of the peninsula. + + +BOSTON COMMON. + +The city of Boston has a population of six hundred thousand, and the +centre around which it clusters is the well-known Boston Common, set +apart in 1634, and always jealously reserved for public uses, the +surface rising upon its northern verge towards Beacon Hill. No matter +by what route approached, the city has the appearance of a broad cone +with a wide-spreading base, ascending gradually to the bulb-like apex +of the gilded State House dome. Occasionally a tall building looms +above the mass, or it is surmounted by church-spires and the fanciful +towers of modern construction, or by a high chimney pouring out black +smoke; but it is a symmetrical scene in the general view, though in +many parts the surface of the actual city is very uneven. The Common +rises towards the State House from the south and west by a graceful +plane interspersed with hillocks. It is crossed by many pleasant +walks, and has broad open spaces used for sports and military +displays. It is rich in noble old trees, and covers nearly fifty +acres, while to the westward is an additional level park of half the +size, known as the Public Garden, separated by a wide street +accommodating the cross-town traffic. This noted Boston Common was the +ancient Puritan pasture-ground, and it is rich in traditions. In the +colonial wars, the captured hostile Indians were put to death here, +their grinning heads impaled on stakes for a public warning. Murderers +were gibbeted, witches burnt and duels fought here. The impassioned +George Whitefield, in the middle of the eighteenth century, preached +here to a congregation of twenty thousand. An English traveller in the +late seventeenth century described the place as "a small but pleasant +Common where the gallants, a little before sunset, walk with their +marmalet-madams till the bell at nine o'clock rings them home." +Sometimes it was a fortified camp, and it was always a pleasure-ground, +while during the great fire of 1872, which destroyed the chief +business section with property valued at $70,000,000, enormous piles +of hastily saved goods filled the eastern portions next to Tremont +Street, bounding it on that side. Beacon Street is the northern border +and Boylston Street the southern, there being rows of stately elms +upon the walks along these streets and the pathways leading across the +Common in various directions. + +Flagstaff Hill, the most prominent eminence, near the centre of the +Common, is surmounted by the Soldiers' Monument, rising ninety feet, +with a colossal statue of America on the apex, overlooking the city. +It was designed by Milmore, and is one of the most imposing memorials +of the Civil War in the country. Nearby stood the "Old Elm," which was +much older than the city, and was blown down in 1876. The adjacent +sheet of water is the noted "Frog Pond" of colonial memory, and dear +to the hearts of all old Bostonians. Near the northeastern boundary +the Brewer Fountain, famous for its magnificent bronzes, the +munificent gift of a prominent citizen, pours out its limpid waters. A +colossal equestrian statue of Washington adorns the Public Garden. +These attractive grounds are additionally embellished by tasteful +little lakes, statues and lovely floral displays. On the southern side +of the Common is the old Central Burying-Ground, which contains the +grave of Gilbert Stuart, the portrait painter, who died in 1828. +Beneath the edge of the Common on the southern and eastern sides is +the great Subway, which crosses Boston, giving needed relief to the +congested traffic, and was completed in 1898 at a cost of nearly +$5,000,000, a most commodious, airy and well-lighted tunnel, +accommodating many lines of electric cars, and providing speedy +transit across the crowded city. + + +THE STATE HOUSE. + +The famous Boston State House, fronting on Beacon Street at the summit +of the hill, stands upon ground which, in the eighteenth century, was +John Hancock's cow-pasture, his residence, for many years alongside, +having been replaced by the ornamental "swell-fronts" of the Somerset +Club. This rounded construction, known as the swell-front, is a +distinctive feature of the old-time Boston residential architecture, +and in many buildings the effect is heightened by the luxuriant +overrunning vines of the Boston ivy, which is especially fine in the +autumn. A Corinthian portico fronts the State House, which was built +about the beginning of the nineteenth century, but has since been +repeatedly enlarged, the latest extension being completed in 1898, so +that the whole building is now four hundred by two hundred and twelve +feet, the lantern on the dome rising one hundred and fifty feet. Upon +the terrace in front are statues of Daniel Webster and Horace Mann. +The eastern side of the last extension has a small park, and here, on +top of Beacon Hill, has been erected a reproduction, practically on +the original site, of the Beacon Monument, which was put there in 1790 +to commemorate the success of the Revolution, but was removed in 1812. +Within the State House is the Memorial Hall, containing the +battle-flags of Massachusetts regiments and other historical relics. +Portraits, busts and statues of the great men of Massachusetts adorn +the interior rooms. From the lantern surmounting the dome is the +finest view of Boston, with the mass of estuaries penetrating the land +on all sides, the harbor and islands, and over the neighboring country +for many miles. In the Representatives' Chamber hangs, high on the +wall, one of the precious relics of the Old Bay State, the noted +carved codfish, typifying a great industry. In the original State +House preceding this one, down on Washington Street, in the heart of +the older town, on March 17, 1785, Representative Rowe--who is also +said to have been the suggester of throwing the tea overboard in +Boston harbor--according to the minutes moved, "That leave might be +given to hang up the representation of a codfish in the room where the +House sit, as a memorial of the importance of the cod-fishery to the +welfare of the Commonwealth, as had been usual formerly." Leave was +accordingly given, and this emblem was brought in time to the present +State House and hung on the wall, and it has always been an object of +interest to visitors, not only as emblematic of sundry fishery +problems that perplex the statesmen, but also as recalling a question +always of lively interest in New England and elsewhere, "Does the +codfish salt the ocean, or the ocean salt the codfish?" Another great +treasure is held by the State Library, which has a hundred thousand +volumes; and the chief of its possessions, exhibited under glass, is +the "History of the Plimouth Plantation," popularly known as the "Log +of the 'Mayflower,'" written by Governor William Bradford. This +manuscript, discovered in London in 1846, was presented to +Massachusetts in 1898. + + +NOTABLE BOSTON ATTRACTIONS. + +A ramble through the older parts of Boston discloses many objects of +interest. Near the northern edge of the Common, at the corner of Park +and Tremont Streets, is the old "Brimstone Corner," where stands the +citadel of orthodoxy, the Puritan meeting-house, Park Street Church. +Adjoining is an ancient graveyard, the "Old Granary Burying-Ground," +where lie the remains of some of the most famous men of Boston, John +Hancock, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, James Otis, Peter Faneuil, many of +the colonial Governors, and also the parents of Benjamin Franklin, a +prominent monument marking the graves of the latter. The rows of +ancient, dark-looking and half-effaced gravestones in this quiet +burial-place, in one of the busiest parts of the city, are an antique +novelty. Many noted buildings are near it--Tremont Temple, the +Horticultural and Music Halls, the Athenæum, and not far away, +fronting Pemberton Square, the massive County Court-house of granite +in Renaissance style, four hundred and fifty feet long, having in its +imposing central hall a statue of Rufus Choate. On Tremont Street was +established the first Episcopal Church in Boston, the King's Chapel, +the present building replacing the original one in 1754. Adjacent is +the oldest burying-place of the colony, where lie the remains of +Governor John Winthrop and his sons, with other early settlers. Most +of the old gravestones in this yard have been taken away from the +graves and reset in strange fashion as edge-stones along the paths. +One of these odd old stones of a greenish hue marked the grave of +William Paddy, dying in 1658. In an unique poetical effusion it +records these quaint words: + + "Hear sleaps that blessed one + Whoes lief God help us all + To live that so when tiem shall be + That we this world must liue, + We ever may be happy + With blessed William Paddy." + +Adjoining this old-time region is the splendid City Hall, grandly +rising beyond the graveyard, in Italian Renaissance, with an imposing +louvre dome. In front, upon School Street, are statues of Benjamin +Franklin and Josiah Quincy. + +Various intricate streets and passages lead eastward from Tremont +Street into Washington Street, these two chief business highways in a +certain sense being parallel. Washington Street is the main +thoroughfare of the city, having prominent theatres, newspaper +offices, many of the largest stores and great office buildings, and it +finally crosses over into the South End, being a wider and straighter +street in this newer portion. Benjamin Franklin was born in a little +old dwelling near Washington Street, where now stands a newspaper +office. Alongside is the "Old South Church," the most famous church of +Boston, but now an historical relic and museum of Revolutionary +antiquities, the congregation having built themselves a magnificent +temple, the "New Old South Church," upon Boylston Street, in the +fashionable quarter of the Back Bay. This ancient church is a curious +edifice of colonial style, built in 1729, when it replaced an earlier +building. It has a tall spire and a clock, to which it is said more +eyes are upturned than to any other dial in New England. The interior +is square, with double galleries on the ends, and its original +condition has been entirely restored. It is brimful of history, and +was the colonial shrine of Boston, wherein were held the spirited +meetings of the exciting days that hatched the Revolution. Within it +were arranged the preliminaries leading to the march from its doors of +the party of disguised men who went down to the Liverpool wharf and +threw the tea overboard in December, 1773. Behind the pulpit is the +famous window through which climbed Dr. Joseph Warren in 1775 to make +the oration on the anniversary of the "Boston Massacre," that had so +much to do with creating the high condition of feeling producing the +final defiance of the British soldiery, culminating in the battle of +Lexington. The British afterwards turned the building into a +riding-school. Franklin was baptized in the original church, and here +Whitefield preached. For nearly two centuries there was delivered, in +this noted church, the annual "election sermon" before the Governor +and Legislature. It was only by the greatest exertions that the +venerable building was saved from the fire of 1872, which halted at +its edge. It now belongs to a patriotic society, who maintain it as a +precious historical relic. + +Also fronting upon Washington Street is the "Old State House," an +oblong and unpretending building at the head of State Street, dating +from 1748, which was the headquarters of the Massachusetts Provincial +Government. The "Boston Massacre," in March, 1770, originating in an +encounter between a British sentry and the crowd, resulting in the +troops firing upon the populace, occurred in the street on its +eastern side. Afterwards Samuel Adams, voicing the public +indignation, made within the building, in an address to the Executive +Council, his memorable and successful demand that the British soldiery +should be removed outside the city. It has been restored as far as +possible to its original condition, even the figures of the British +"Lion and Unicorn," which had been taken down in Revolutionary days, +having been replaced on the wings of the roof over the southern front. +The upper rooms contain a valuable collection of relics and paintings, +and much that is of interest in connection with early Boston history. +Opposite are the tall Ames and Sears Buildings of modern construction, +while State Street extends northeast through the financial district to +the harbor, passing the massive granite dome-surmounted Custom House. + +Dock Square is not far away, and Change Alley and other intricate +passages lead over to the Boston "Cradle of Liberty," Faneuil Hall. +Old Peter Faneuil, a Huguenot merchant, built it for a market and +presented it to the city in 1742, but it was unfortunately burnt, +being rebuilt in 1761. Within it were held the early town-meetings, +and it is still the great place for popular assemblages. It was +enlarged to its present size in 1805. This famous Hall is a plain +rectangular building, seventy-six feet square inside, the lower floor +a market, and the upper portion an assembly room. It is located, with +surmounting cupola, in an open square, and when anything excites the +public it is crowded with standing audiences, there being no seats. +Across the end is a raised platform for the orators, behind which, on +the wall, is Healy's large painting, representing the United States +Senate listening to a speech by Daniel Webster, his noted oration in +the South Carolina nullification days of 1832, when Webster was the +champion of the Union. There are numerous historical portraits on the +walls. The "Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company," dating from +1638, occupy the floor above the Hall, while in front of it and +extending towards the harbor is the spacious Quincy Market. + +At the corner of Washington and School Streets is another ancient +building, its quaint gambrels and gables recalling primitive +architecture--the "Old Corner Book-store," long a favorite literary +haunt. Northward, Washington Street extends to Haymarket Square, and +beyond is Charlestown Street, passing by Copp's Hill, now reduced in +size. Upon this hill is the oldest Boston church,--Christ Church in +Salem Street,--dating from 1723, from whose steeple, on the eve of the +battle of Lexington, in April, 1775, were displayed the lights giving +warning of the movement of the British troops starting from Boston for +Concord. These signals notified Paul Revere, across the Charles River, +who made his famous midnight ride that roused the country. The +silver-plate, service-books and Bible of the church were gifts from +King George II., and in the adjacent burial-ground are the graves +of the three noted Doctors Mather, who had so much to do with colonial +affairs and history--Increase, Cotton and Samuel--the last dying in +1785. The great Boston fire of 1872, which ravaged the district east +of Washington Street for two days, extended over fifty acres, and +destroyed nearly eight hundred buildings. The section was quickly +rebuilt, however, with much finer structures, and is now the chief +wholesale business district of Boston. The elaborate Government +Building, containing the Post-office and Courts, was erected, since +the fire, of Cape Ann granite, at a cost of $7,500,000. In this +district are enormous office-buildings, insurance-offices, banks, +extensive blocks of stores, and the headquarters of the leading trades +of New England, the boot and shoe, cotton and woollen, dry goods, +paper and wool merchants, Boston being the greatest wool mart in the +country. When Boston, having preserved Beacon Hill and reduced in size +Copp's Hill, decided to remove the third eminence of the +"Tri-mountain," Fort Hill, its earth and rocks were used to give +better commercial facilities by filling in and grading the magnificent +marginal highway fronting the harbor, Atlantic Avenue. In front of +this broad street the wharves project many hundreds of feet, having +rows of capacious storehouses in their centres, while on either side +are wide docks for the shipping. Here is conducted an extensive +traffic with all parts of the world, and to these wharves come the +yacht-like fishing-smacks to unload their catch of cod and mackerel, +while there are piles of fish in the stores. Thus is realized the +significance of the emblematic codfish hanging in the State House. + + [Illustration: _Faneuil Hall, Boston_] + + +BOSTON DEVELOPMENT. + +When the great Boston fire had been quenched, and an estimate was +being formed of the enormous losses, the significant statement was +made that "the best treasure of Boston cannot be burnt up. Her grand +capital of culture and character, of science and skill, humanity and +religion, is beyond the reach of flame. Sweep away every store and +house, every school and church, and let the people with their history +and habits remain, and they still have one of the richest and +strongest cities on earth." This is the prominent characteristic of +Boston public spirit. The people take the greatest pride in their +city, its high rank and achievements, and the wealthy and energetic +townsfolk are always alert to extend them. There are more libraries, +schools, colleges, art and scientific collections, museums, +conservatories of music and educational foundations in and near Boston +than in any other American city. Magnificent structures, the homes of +art, science and education, are scattered with prodigality all about. +Next to the Library of Congress, the Boston Public Library is the +largest in America. Bostonians love the fine arts, and the many open +spaces and public grounds are adorned with statues of eminent men and +groups representing historical events. The people seem to be always +studying and investigating, the women as well as the men pursuing the +difficult paths of abstruse knowledge, so that armies of them, fully +equipped, scatter over the country to impart the learning of the +"Modern Athens" to less fortunate communities. There are many fine +churches, especially in the newer parts of the West End, whither have +removed into grand temples of modern artistic construction quite a +number of the wealthy congregations of the older town. Boston is also +full of clubs, in endless variety, formed for every conceivable +purpose, and several of them very handsomely housed. + +To get available room and facilitate business, the city has gathered +the terminals of all the railways into two enormous stations on the +northern and southern sides of the town, and for nearly a half century +it has been filling-in the fens and lowlands to the westward, so that +now this reclaimed West End is the fashionable section, containing the +finest churches, hotels, and residences. Through this splendid +district extends for over a mile the grand Commonwealth Avenue, two +hundred and forty feet wide, its centre being a tree-embowered park +adorned by statues of Alexander Hamilton, John Glover, William Lloyd +Garrison, and Leif Ericson, and having on either side a magnificent +boulevard. The bordering residences are fronted by delicious gardens, +and at regular intervals fine streets cross at right angles, their +names arranged alphabetically, in proceeding westward, with the +well-known English titles, Arlington, Berkeley, Clarendon, Dartmouth, +Exeter, Fairfield, Gloucester, Hereford, etc. Parallel to the Avenue +are also laid out Boylston, Marlborough, Newbury and Beacon Streets +through this favorite residential section. Proceeding out Boylston +Street are passed the stately buildings of the Museum of Natural +History, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, with twelve +hundred students, the leading institution of its kind in America. +Beyond, at the intersection of Dartmouth Street, is Copley Square, +displaying around it the finest architectural group in the city, five +magnificent buildings, three of them churches. Trinity Episcopal +Church, built on the northern side, in free Romanesque, is formed as a +Latin cross, with a massive central tower, two hundred and ten feet +high. It has elaborate interior decoration and fine windows. The +Public Library, on the southern side, is in Roman Renaissance, two +hundred and twenty-eight by two hundred and twenty-five feet, and +sixty-eight feet high, erected at a cost of nearly $2,400,000. It +contains eight hundred thousand volumes, and the interior is +excellently adapted to its uses, being tastefully adorned. The Second +Unitarian Church, on the northern side of the square, built in 1874, +was the church of the three Mathers, and of Ralph Waldo Emerson. The +Museum of Fine Arts, on the eastern side of the square, is constructed +of red brick and terra-cotta, and contains extensive collections. The +fifth building fronting the square is the "New Old South Church," in +Italian Gothic, with a tower rising two hundred and forty-eight feet. + +Beyond this fashionable district, the "Back Bay Fens" have been +skillfully laid out in a series of boulevards and parks, making a +chain extending several miles south and southwest through the suburbs, +Franklin Park, covering nearly a square mile, being the chief. Here, +on grounds with great natural adornments, in Roxbury, Brookline, and +Brighton, is a region of much beauty. The surface is undulating, +finely wooded, dotted with lakes, and displaying many costly suburban +houses, in full glory of garden and foliage. This pleasant region +spreads to Chestnut Hill, where the city has its great water +reservoir, holding eight hundred million gallons, the favorite drive +from Boston being to and around this reservoir, the route giving +splendid views from the hilltop. Jamaica Pond and Jamaica Plain are +near by, two of Boston's attractive cemeteries being beyond the +latter, Mount Hope and Forest Hills. Here is also the famous Arnold +Arboretum, the greatest institution of its kind, now part of the park +system, and having a grand outlook from its central hill. In West +Roxbury is the Martin Luther Orphan Home, which now occupies the noted +"Brook Farm," where a group of cultivated people, led by George +Ripley, and including Hawthorne, Curtis, Dana, Channing, Thoreau, +Emerson, and Margaret Fuller, made their famous attempt to found a +socialistic community in 1841, but found that it would not work. It +was described as an experiment in "plain living and high thinking," +the articles of association calling it the "Brook Farm Institute of +Agriculture and Education," for the establishment of an "agricultural, +literary, and scientific school or college." Pupils were taken, and in +its most successful period there were about one hundred and fifty +persons in the community; "kitchen and table were in common; very +little help was hired, but philosophers, clergymen and poets worked at +the humblest tasks, milking cows, pitching manure, cleaning stables, +etc., while cultivated women cooked, washed, ironed, and waited at +table; all work, manual or intellectual, was credited to members at a +uniform rate of ten cents an hour." Later, it became a Fourieristic +"phalanstery," under the title of the "Brook Farm Phalanx;" then, in +1845, the chief building burnt down, and financial difficulties +following, the experiment, which had excited world-wide comment, was +abandoned in 1847. + + +NONATUM AND SUDBURY. + +To the westward of Brighton is the extensive and wealthy suburban city +of Newton, a favorite place of rural residence for Bostonians. Here +rises, near Newton Corner, the ancient Nonatum Hill, where the +Apostle Eliot first preached to the Indians, the name being now +classically modernized into Mount Ida. Eliot converted these Indians, +who became the Christian tribe of Nonatum and formed their system of +government after the plan set forth in the Book of Exodus, with rulers +of hundreds, of fifties, and of tens. For them the Bible was +translated into the Indian language by Eliot and printed at Cambridge +in 1663. They removed nearer to Charles River, where there were better +soils, at Natick, their village consisting of three streets lined with +little huts and gardens, a large circular fort, and a building for a +church and school, at the same time having a rude bridge constructed +over the river. Natick is now a busy shoemaking town, with about ten +thousand people, and in South Natick is the old Indian cemetery and +Eliot's Oak. To the northward of Natick is Cochituate Lake, the chief +source of Boston's water supply, over three miles long, and having +with tributary ponds nearly a thousand acres area when full of water +in the spring. To the eastward of Natick is Wellesley, where the +famous Wellesley Female College, with seven hundred students, has its +spacious buildings located in a beautiful park. To the northward is +the valley of Sudbury River, into which Lake Cochituate discharges, +and here at Sudbury was the old colonial tavern which Longfellow has +given renown in his "Tales of a Wayside Inn": + + "One autumn night in Sudbury town, + Across the meadows bare and brown, + The windows of the wayside inn + Gleamed red with firelight through the leaves + Of woodbine hanging from the eaves + Their crimson curtains rent and thin. + + "As ancient is this hostelrie + As any in the land may be. + Built in the old Colonial day, + When men lived in a grander way, + With ampler hospitality. + A kind of old Hobgoblin Hall, + Now somewhat fallen to decay, + With weather stains upon the wall, + And stairways worn, and crazy doors, + And creaking and uneven floors, + And chimneys huge, and tiled and tall. + + "A region of repose it seems, + A place of slumber and of dreams, + Remote among the wooded hills!" + +Here Longfellow located his modern Canterbury tales by the landlord, +the student, the theologian, the poet, the musician, and other +sojourners, which have become interwoven so attractively with our +better American literature. + + +CHARLESTOWN AND BUNKER HILL. + +Across the Charles River, northward from the Shawmut peninsula of +Boston, is Charlestown, one of the earliest settled suburbs, a large +part of the river front being occupied by the Navy Yard, which covers +a surface approximating a hundred acres. Here were built many famous +vessels of the older navy, anterior to the change to steel +construction, and the first Government dry-dock in the country was +placed at this yard, which after the war of 1812 became one of the +leading naval stations. Among the historical features of the yard has +been the famous ship "Constitution," familiarly known as "Old +Ironsides," which is again to be rebuilt for preservation. This noted +ship, with others that achieved renown in the war of 1812, was kept at +Charlestown, and all of them having rotted, the Navy Department in +1830 decided to destroy them so as to save further trouble, and an +article announcing this appeared in a Boston newspaper. Little did the +naval authorities, however, appreciate the sentimental love the +country had for the old "Constitution." Two days after the newspaper +announcement, Oliver Wendell Holmes, then twenty-one years of age, +published his poem of "Old Ironsides," which caused such a sensation. + + "Aye, tear her tattered ensign down! + Long has it waved on high, + And many an eye has danced to see + That banner in the sky; + Beneath it rung the battle's shout, + And burst the cannon's roar;-- + The meteor of the ocean's air + Shall sweep the land no more. + + "Her deck--once red with heroes' blood, + Where knelt the vanquished foe, + When winds were hurrying o'er the flood, + And waves were white below-- + No more shall feel the victor's tread, + Or know the conquered knee;-- + The harpies of the shore shall pluck + The eagle of the sea! + + "O, better that her shattered hulk + Should sink beneath the wave; + Her thunders shook the mighty deep, + And there should be her grave: + Nail to the mast her holy flag, + Set every threadbare sail; + And give her to the god of storms, + The lightning and the gale!" + +These stirring lines of earnest protest touched the popular heart, +there was an universal outburst of indignation, and the "Constitution" +was saved. The old ship was rebuilt on her original lines, only a few +timbers, including the keel, being retained, and the former +allegorical figure-head was replaced by one modelled in the image of +Andrew Jackson, then President of the United States. This change was +sanctioned by the Secretary of the Navy, although Commodore Hull, who +had charge of rebuilding the ship, protested against it. The +reconstructed "Constitution" was launched in 1834, and anchored, with +her figure-head, but a short distance from Charlestown bridge. +Politics ran high at the time, and the change caused great +controversy, particularly in and around Boston. One stormy night, +Captain Samuel W. Dewey, then a hardy young sailor, managed without +discovery to saw off Jackson's head, and carried it away. When the +mutilation was disclosed next day there was another great clamor, and +so intense was the excitement that the utmost exertions were vainly +made to find the man who did the daring deed. Dewey kept his secret +for several weeks, but suddenly, under an unexplainable impulse, +decided he would go to Washington and give the sawed-off head to +President Jackson himself. He appeared before the Secretary of the +Navy, and stating that he was the man who had removed the figure-head +from the "Constitution," said he had brought it along to restore it, +exhibiting the grim features tied up in a bandana handkerchief. The +Secretary was indignant, and spoke of having him arrested, but Dewey +said there was no statute that he had violated, and the Secretary, +calming down finally, listened to the man's story of how he took away +the head, and agreed to take it to President Jackson. He took the +mutilated head over to the White House, exhibited it to Jackson, and +repeated to him Dewey's story. When Jackson had heard the tale he +burst out in loud laughter, and pointing at the head, said: "That is +the most infernal graven image I ever saw. The fellow did perfectly +right; you've got him, you say; well, give him a kick and my +compliments, and tell him to saw it off again." Captain Dewey was +afterwards called the "figure-head man," and was given a public dinner +in Philadelphia on his return from Washington. He died at an advanced +age, in 1899. + +The crowning glory of Charlestown is the Bunker Hill Monument, marking +the greatest historical event of Boston, the famous battle fought June +17, 1775, when the British stormed the Yankee redoubt on the hilltop +north of Charles River, which was then open country, but long ago +became surrounded by the buildings of the expanding city, excepting +the small space of the battlefield, now reserved for a park around the +monument. The granite shaft rises two hundred and twenty-one feet, +upon the highest part of the eminence. The Provincial troops had +assembled in large numbers north and west of Boston, mainly in +Cambridge to the westward, and hearing that the British intended to +occupy Bunker and Breed's Hills, in Charlestown, a force was sent +under Colonel William Prescott, a veteran of the old French war, in +the night, to fortify Bunker Hill. Upon crossing over, they hastily +decided that it was better to occupy Breed's Hill, which, while part +of the same ridge, was nearer Boston, and they constructed upon it a +square redoubt. The British ships in Charles River discovered this at +daylight, and began a cannonade; American reinforcements were sent +from Cambridge; and in the afternoon General Gage attacked, his +onslaught being three times repulsed with heavy slaughter, when, the +Americans' ammunition being spent, they could only resist with clubbed +muskets and stones, and had to retreat. Facing Boston, in front of the +monument, the direction from which the attack came, is the bronze +statue of Prescott, the broad-brimmed hat shading his earnest face, +as, with deprecatory yet determined gesture, he uttered the memorable +words of warning that resulted in such terrible punishment of the +British storming column: "Don't fire until I tell you; don't fire +until you see the whites of their eyes." The traces of the hastily +constructed breastworks of the redoubt can be seen on the brow of the +hill, and a stone shows where Dr. Joseph Warren fell, he being killed +in the battle. He came to the fight as a volunteer, and had been made +a General in the Provincial army. The top of the tall monument gives a +splendid view in all directions over the harbor and suburbs of Boston, +with traces of Mount Wachusett far to the westward, and on clear days +a dim outline of the distant White Mountains. The corner-stone of the +monument was laid by Lafayette on his American visit in 1825, and it +was completed and dedicated in 1842, the oration on both occasions +being delivered by Daniel Webster. One of his glowing passages thus +tells the purpose of the monument: + +"We come as Americans to mark a spot which must forever be dear to us +and to our posterity. We wish that whosoever, in all coming time, +shall turn his eye hither, may behold that the place is not +undistinguished where the first great battle of the Revolution was +fought. We wish that this structure may proclaim the magnitude and +importance of that event to every class and every age. We wish that +infancy may learn the purpose of its erection from eternal lips, and +that weary and withered age may behold it and be solaced by the +recollections which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up here +and be proud in the midst of its toil. We wish that in those days of +disaster which, as they come upon all nations, must be expected to +come upon us also, desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, +and be assured that the foundations of our national powers are still +strong." + + +CAMBRIDGE AND HARVARD. + +Various long causeways over the wide expanse of Charles River where it +spreads out to form the Back Bay, and passing in front of the newly +filled-in West End, lead from Boston to the academic city of +Cambridge. This populous city, best known from Harvard University, is +beautifully situated on a plain, has important manufacturing +industries, handsome public buildings, and a large number of elegant +private residences in spacious grounds ornamented with fine old trees, +shrubbery and flower-gardens. Cambridge was settled soon after Boston, +as the "Newe Towne," in 1630. Its Common contains the venerable +"Washington Elm," over three hundred years old, under which, after the +battle of Bunker Hill, General Washington assumed command, July 3, +1775, of the American army besieging Boston. Opposite the southern +end of the Common are old Christ Church, built of materials sent out +from England, and the First Parish Church, with a Gothic steeple, +having between them the burying-ground of the old town. Of these, +Oliver Wendell Holmes has written: + + "Like Sentinel and Nun they keep + Their vigil on the green; + One seems to guard and one to weep + The dead that lie between." + +In the suburbs of Cambridge, adjoining Charles River, is Boston's +chief place of interment, Mount Auburn Cemetery, a romantic enclosure +of hill and vale, covering one hundred and twenty-five acres, with a +grand development of tombs and landscape. The tower upon the summit of +the Mount gives a beautiful outlook over the winding Charles River +valley and the Brookline, Brighton and West Roxbury villa and park +districts beyond, the distant view being closed by the charming Blue +Hills of Milton. In this cemetery are interred many of the famous men +of Massachusetts, including Longfellow, Lowell, Holmes, Everett, +Sumner, Motley, Choate, Quincy, Agassiz and Prescott. + +The great Cambridge institution, however, is Harvard University, the +oldest, largest and wealthiest seat of learning in America. In 1636 +the Massachusetts Legislature founded a school at the "Newe Towne," +voting £400 for the purpose, and in 1638 John Harvard, who had been +for a short time a pastor in Charlestown, died at the age of +thirty-one, and left to this school his library of two hundred and +sixty volumes and half his estate, valued at about £800. Then the +school was made a college and named Harvard, and the town was called +Cambridge by the Legislature. The monument of the youthful patron is +in Charlestown, and, cast in heroic bronze, he now sits in a capacious +chair in front of the Harvard Memorial Hall. This great University far +antedates its rival Yale at New Haven, for its first class was +graduated in 1642, and in 1650 "The President and Fellows of Harvard +College" were incorporated. In fact, Harvard was founded only ninety +years later than the great College of English Cambridge--Emmanuel. +John Harvard and Henry Dunster, who was the first President of +Harvard, and several other prominent Boston colonists, had been +students at Emmanuel, and thus from the older Puritan foundation came +the younger, and it was natural to adopt for the town the name of the +English University city. The first New England printing-press was set +up in 1639 at Cambridge, and in the Riverside Press and the University +Press of to-day it is succeeded by two renowned book-making +establishments. Closely allied, in a scientific way, has also been at +Cambridgeport for many years the works of Alvan Clark & Co., the noted +makers of telescope lenses. + +Harvard University has sent out many thousands of famous graduates, +and Longfellow, Holmes and Lowell have been members of its faculty. It +is liberally endowed, has ample grounds, and there are over sixty +buildings devoted to the purposes of the University, the annual +disbursements exceeding $1,000,000. Its government was formerly a +strictly religious organization, most of the graduates becoming +clergymen, but it was recently secularized so that no denominational +religion is now insisted upon, and comparatively few graduates enter +the pulpit. There are schools of law, medicine, dentistry, divinity, +agriculture, the arts and sciences, all the learned professions being +provided for, but everything is elective. In the various departments +there are more than four thousand students, taught by about four +hundred professors and instructors. It has some seven hundred acres of +land, interest-bearing endowments exceeding $8,000,000, receives, +besides, annual gifts sometimes reaching $400,000, and has a library +of five hundred thousand volumes and almost as many pamphlets. Much +attention is given outdoor sports and athletic training, Harvard +having the finest gymnasium in the country, and an athletic field of +twenty acres south of the river. Among the graduates have been two +Presidents, John Adams and his son John Quincy Adams; also his +grandson, Charles Francis Adams, William Ellery Channing, Edward +Everett, George Bancroft, Jared Sparks, William H. Prescott, Emerson, +Holmes, Sumner, Lowell, Motley and Thoreau. + +The University buildings are in the centre of the old city, enclosing +two large quadrangles shaded by elms. Massachusetts Hall, the oldest +building now standing, dates from 1720, Harvard Hall from 1766, and +University Hall from 1815. The most elaborate modern building is the +Memorial Hall, a splendid structure of brick and Nova Scotia stone, +three hundred and ten feet long, having a cloister at one end and a +massive tower at the other. This was erected in memory of the Harvard +graduates who fell in the Civil War; and in the grand Vestibule which +crosses the building like a transept, having a marble floor and rich +vaulted ceiling of ash, and fine windows through which pours a +mellowed light, there are tablets set in the arcaded sides bearing the +names of the dead. Upon one side of this impressive Vestibule is the +spacious Saunders Theatre, used for the commencements and public +services, having as an adornment the statue of Josiah Quincy, a +President of the College and long the Mayor of Boston. Upon the other +side of the Vestibule is the college Great Hall, one hundred and +sixty-four feet long and eighty feet high, with a splendid roof of +open timber-work and magnificent windows. This is the refectory where +a thousand students can dine, and in it centre the most hallowed +memories of Harvard, portraits and busts of the distinguished +graduates and benefactors adorning it, with the great western window +in the afternoon throwing a flood of rich sunlight over the scene. +Harvard has been patterned much after the original Cambridge, thus +adding to the English vogue of many things seen about Boston. When +Charles Dilke visited America he wrote of Harvard, "Our English +Universities have not about them the classic repose, the air of study, +which belongs to Cambridge, Massachusetts; our Cambridge comes nearest +to her daughter-town, but even the English Cambridge has a breathing +street or two, and a weekly market-day, while Cambridge in New England +is one great academic grove, buried in a philosophic calm, which our +universities cannot rival as long as men resort to them for other +purposes than work." The people at Boston told Dilke, when he was +here, that they spoke "the English of Elizabeth," and they heartily +congratulated him at the same time upon using what they said was "very +good English for an Englishman." + +Adjoining Cambridge Common is Radcliffe College, for women, named in +honor of the English Lady Anne Radcliffe, afterwards Lady Moulson, the +first woman giving a scholarship to Harvard (in 1640). Some four +hundred women receive instruction here from Harvard professors, and +the graduates are granted the college degrees. Near by, in Brattle +Street, is the Craigie House, dating from 1759, which was Washington's +headquarters in 1775-6, and later, for nearly a half century, was the +home of Henry W. Longfellow, until he died in 1882. Longfellow was for +twenty years Professor of Modern Languages in Harvard, being succeeded +in 1854 by James Russell Lowell, whose home of Elmwood, an old +colonial house, is farther out Brattle Street. Lowell was born in +Cambridge in 1819, dying in 1891. Oliver Wendell Holmes was born in +Cambridge in 1809, and being a skillful physician as well as a +_litterateur_, he was Professor of Anatomy and Physiology at Harvard +from 1847 till 1882. He resided in Boston on Beacon Street, dying in +1894. Margaret Fuller, the noted transcendentalist, was born in +Cambridge in 1810, and after writing several books, and achieving fame +as a linguist and conversationalist, she went abroad, marrying the +Marquis d'Ossoli in Rome, and returning to New York, they were both +lost by shipwreck at Fire Island in 1850. + + +LEXINGTON AND CONCORD. + +Following up the Charles River, about ten miles west of Boston is +Waltham, with twenty-two thousand people, noted for the works of the +American Waltham Watch Company, the largest in the world, producing +nearly six hundred thousand watches and movements in a year. The +extensive factory buildings spread along the river, and there are also +large cotton mills. General Nathaniel P. Banks was a native of +Waltham. To the northward and about twelve miles from Boston is the +quiet village of Lexington, chiefly built on one long tree-shaded +street, which terminates at its western end in a broad Green of about +two acres, whereon a plain monument recalls the eight Revolutionary +patriots killed there April 19, 1775. A handsome Memorial Hall of +brick is built on the Green to commemorate the Lexington soldiers who +fell in the Civil War. It also contains statues of John Hancock and +Samuel Adams, and of the "Minute Man of 1775" and the "Volunteer of +1861." + +The British commander in Boston, having learnt that the Massachusetts +patriots had collected arms and military stores at Concord, about +twenty miles northwest of Boston, on the night of April 18, 1775, +despatched a force to destroy them, and incidentally to capture +Hancock and Adams, who were at Lexington. The roads leading westward +out of Boston were picketed to prevent news being carried of the +expedition, but the signals from the old Christ Church on Copp's Hill +enabled Paul Revere to start from Charlestown through Cambridge, and +he made his rapid horseback ride, arriving by midnight at Lexington. +The bells of the village churches rang out the alarm, signal-guns were +fired, and messengers were sent in every direction to arouse the +people. About five o'clock in the morning Major Pitcairn with six +British companies arrived at Lexington, where the patriots, numbering +about seventy, were drawn up in line on the Green. Pitcairn rode +forward and shouted "Disperse, ye rebels; throw down your arms and +disperse!" They held their ground, and a volley was fired over their +heads, when, not dispersing, a second volley was fired, killing eight +and wounding ten men, the first blood shed in the American Revolution. +The American commander, seeing resistance was useless, withdrew and +dispersed his little band, some, as they retired, discharging their +muskets at the British, three of the latter being wounded and +Pitcairn's horse struck. Then the British made a rapid movement to +Concord, and some of the military stores which had not been removed +were found and destroyed. Meanwhile about four hundred Minute Men +gathered near the North Bridge over Concord River, about a mile from +the Common, and under orders they attacked and drove away the British +infantry, who had been placed on guard there. As the morning advanced, +the whole country became aroused, and armed patriots assembled from +every direction, those of Lexington having rallied and placed +themselves along the Concord road. The British commander was greatly +alarmed and ordered a retreat. They marched back to Boston under a +rattling fire, every house, barn and stone wall being picketed by +patriot sharpshooters, so that the road was strewn with dead and dying +British. Passing through Lexington, the British met reinforcements, +but they were still pursued to Cambridge and Charlestown, the +slaughter only ceasing when they had got under protection of the guns +of the fleet. The British loss was about two hundred and seventy, and +the Americans lost one hundred. In Concord the British graves and the +battle monuments are on one side of the historic bridge, and on the +other is a fine bronze statue of the "Minute Man." This Concord fight +was the first organized attack made by the Americans upon the British +in the Revolution, thus beginning the patriot rebellion against +British rule, as the Minute Men were acting under authority of the +Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, assembled in Concord, and +protecting their military stores. + + "By the rude bridge that arched the flood, + Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, + Here once the embattled farmers stood, + And fired the shot heard round the world." + +Concord has about six thousand people, and is also famous for its +literary history and associations. It is near the tranquil Concord +River and the junction of the little Assabet and Sudbury Rivers, a +pleasant tree-embowered quiet place of rural residence. Peter Bulkley, +an English rector, who was oppressed by Archbishop Laud, fled to New +England, and in 1636 buying of the Indians their domain of +Musketaquid, founded the town and church of Concord, thus naming it +because of its peaceful acquisition. In the nineteenth century it +became noted as the home of some of the greatest men of letters in +America. Near Concord bridge is an ancient gambrel-roofed house built +for Parson William Emerson in 1765, and from its windows he watched +the fight. This is the "Old Manse" in which Ralph Waldo Emerson, +himself once a clergyman, and descended from seven generations of +clergymen, was born in 1803. Emerson was known as the "Sage of +Concord," or, as Fredrika Bremer the novelist, who visited him there, +described him, the "Sphinx in Concord," and was the head of the modern +school of transcendental philosophy. He died in 1882. Nathaniel +Hawthorne lived for awhile in the "Old Manse" at Concord, and there +wrote his "Mosses from an Old Manse." The house was afterwards burnt. +Hawthorne died in 1864. Both Emerson and Hawthorne are buried in the +attractive little Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, Emerson's grave being marked +by a large block of pink quartz. Henry D. Thoreau, the eccentric but +profound scholar and naturalist, in 1845 built himself a hut on the +shores of the sequestered Walden Pond near Concord, leading the life +of a recluse, raising a few vegetables, and now and then, to get a +little money, doing some work as carpenter or surveyor. He was +profoundly skilled in Oriental and classic literature, and was an +ardent naturalist, delighting in making long pedestrian excursions to +the forests, lakes and ocean shores of New England. He never voted, +nor paid a tax, nor entered a church for worship, and of himself he +said, "I am as unfit for any practical purpose as gossamer is for +ship-timber." Emerson tells us that "Thoreau dedicated his genius +with such entire love to the fields, hills and waters of his native +town, that he made them known and interesting to all; he grew to be +revered and admired by his townsmen, who had at first known him only +as an oddity." Dying in 1862, he, too, is buried in Sleepy Hollow +Cemetery. In the Orchard House in Concord lived the Alcotts, of whom +Louisa M. Alcott, author of _Little Women_, is so widely known. +Adjacent is the building used by the "Concord School of Philosophy," +established in 1879 by A. Bronson Alcott. They also rest in the little +Cemetery. Thus is Concord famed, and it has well been said of this +historic old place that "it is dangerous to turn a corner suddenly for +fear of running over some first-class saint, philosopher or sage." + + +THE MASSACHUSETTS NORTH SHORE. + +The outer verge of Boston Harbor may be described as protected on the +south by the long projection of Nantasket Beach, while on the northern +side there comes out, as if to meet it, another curiously-formed +peninsula, making the bluffs of Winthrop, and a strip beyond +terminating in the rounded headland of Point Shirley. Deer Island, +almost connected with the Point, stretches farther, and we were +anciently told it was so called "because of the deare who often swim +thither from the maine when they are chased by the wolves." All these +places are popular resorts, and their odd formations assist in making +the Boston surroundings picturesque. Some distance up the coast, and +eleven miles from Boston, is the shoemaking city of Lynn, with seventy +thousand people, the flourishing society of the "Knights of St. +Crispin" ruling the shoemakers' "teams" and largely running the +politics of the town. Most of the work is done by machinery, there +being over two hundred factories, making more women's shoes than any +other place in the country. The first colonists were brought by their +pastor from Lynn-Regis, England, in 1629, and thus the town was named. +It spreads broadly along the water-front, its attractive City Hall +seen from afar, and many ornamental villas adorning the shore. Out +beyond it, thrust into the sea, is the long, low and narrow sand-strip +barely a hundred yards wide, leading for nearly four miles to Nahant. +This is a most curious formation, the name meaning the "Lovers' Walk," +a mass of rocks and soil at the outer end of the sand-strip covering +nearly five hundred acres, and crowned with villas, the neat tower of +a pretty white church rising on the highest part near the centre. The +Bostonians have made Nahant, thus surrounded by the ocean, one of +their most fashionable suburban sections, and it is popularly known as +"Cold Roast Boston." This strange rocky promontory was originally +bought from the Sagamore Poquanum for a suit of clothes, and it is now +valued at over $10,000,000. Many are the poems written about this +curious projection, and N. P. Willis says of it: "If you can imagine a +buried Titan lying along the length of a continent, with one arm +stretched out into the midst of the sea, the spot to which I would +transport you, reader mine, would be, as it were, in the palm of the +giant's hand." Invocations have been addressed to Nahant by +Longfellow, Whittier and Mrs. Sigourney; there Longfellow wrote part +of _Hiawatha_, Motley began his _Dutch Republic_, Prescott wrote his +Spanish histories, and Agassiz composed _Brazil_. + +The region beyond Lynn and Nahant is the famous Massachusetts "North +Shore," stretching to the extremity of Cape Ann, a domain of villas +and summer homes, pleasant sea-beaches, and brisk towns with +interesting past history, now devoted largely to shoemaking and the +fisheries. From Boston State House to the extremity of the Cape at +Halibut Point, or the Land's End, is thirty-one miles, and Lucy Larcom +thus attractively describes the route along the shore: + + "You may ride in an hour or two, if you will, + From Halibut Point to Beacon Hill, + With the sea beside you all the way, + Through pleasant places that skirt the bay; + By Gloucester harbor and Beverley beach, + Salem's old steeples, Nahant's long reach, + Blue-bordered Swampscott, and Chelsea's wide + Marshes laid bare to the drenching tide, + With a glimpse of Saugus' spire in the west, + And Malden Hills in their dreamy rest." + +Saugus, Lynn, Nahant, Swampscott, Salem and Marblehead were originally +the Indian domains of Saugus, Naumkeag and Massabequash. Beyond Lynn, +most of the coast has undergone a modern evolution from fishery +stations to smart summer resorts; and here, around the swamps and +marshes, abounding crags protrude, with many fine villas in another +fashionable Boston suburb, Swampscott, as populous and almost as +famous as Nahant, with huge hotels down by the seaside. Swampscott +merges into Clifton, and then an uneven backbone of granite covering +about six square miles is thrust into the ocean in the direction of +Cape Ann, and is hedged about with rocky islets. On one side this +granite peninsula forms Salem harbor, while on the other a miniature +haven is made by a craggy appendage to the southeastward, attached to +the main peninsula by a ligature of sand and shingle. The quaint old +town of Marblehead occupies most of the surface, and the appendage is +the modern yachtsmen's headquarters, Marblehead Neck. This is a very +ancient place, dating back to the early seventeenth century, and was +once pre-eminently nautical and the second port in Massachusetts; but +the sailors and fishermen are missing, excepting those who man the +summer yacht fleets, and the people, like so many other Massachusetts +communities, have gone largely into shoemaking, the big shoe-factories +being scattered about. The crooked narrow streets run in all +directions among and over the rocks, which appear everywhere and have +gained the mastery. When George Whitefield, the preacher, visited +Marblehead, he gazed in astonishment upon these superabundant rocks, +and asked, in surprise, "Where do they bury their dead?" Out on the +headland is the superannuated little Fort Sewall, once protecting the +port and commanding both harbors, and though the walls are decaying, +it is preserved as a memento of the past. Fine villas are all about, +and the numerous islands add picturesqueness to the sea-view. Elbridge +Gerry, of "Gerrymander" fame, was a native of Marblehead, and its +hardy sailors formed most of the crew of the old ship "Constitution" +when she fought and captured the "Guerriere," and afterwards the +"Cyane" and "Levant." Marblehead was also the scene of "Skipper +Ireson's Ride," which Whittier has made historic: + + "Old Floyd Ireson, for his hard heart, + Tarred and feathered and carried in a cart + By the women of Marblehead!" + +He had refused to take some of his townsmen off a drifting wreck, +because it would cost too much to feed them on the way home. + + +SALEM AND THE WITCHES. + +Westward of the Marblehead peninsula, there stretches into the +mainland another noted haven of the olden time, Salem harbor, +dividing it into two arms, the North and South Rivers, having between +them the town, chiefly built upon a peninsula about two miles long. +This was the Indian domain of Naumkeag, a name preserved in many +titles there, and meaning the "Eel-Land." It was the mother-colony on +Massachusetts Bay, the first house being built in 1626, and old John +Endicott having got a grant from Plymouth for the colony, he came out +and founded the town two years afterwards, calling it Salem, "from the +peace which they had and hoped in it." But despite this peacefulness, +the people soon developed warlike tendencies. They scourged Philip +Ratcliffe, and cut off his ears and banished him soon after the +founding, for "blasphemy against the First Church," and when the port +had got well under way, an annual trade statement showed imports of +$110,000 in arms and cannon, against $90,000 in everything else. The +"First Church," formed in 1629, was the earliest church organization +in New England, and it still exists. There were then ten houses in the +town, besides the Governor's house, which the early history describes +as "garnished with great ordnance;" adding, "thus we doubt not that +God will be with us, and if God be with us, who can be against us?" +John Winthrop was here as Governor, briefly, in 1630, soon migrating +to Shawmut, to found Boston for the capital of the colony. After the +Revolution, Salem was the leading seaport of New England; but its +glory has departed, and the trade has gone to Boston. In 1785 it sent +out the first American vessel that doubled the Cape of Good Hope, and +during a half century afterwards it held almost a monopoly of the East +India and China trade with the United States, having at one time +fifty-four large ships thus engaged. The Salem ships also went to the +Southern seas, Japan and Africa. This trade gave its people great +wealth and influence, and it was said, about 1810, that a Salem +merchant was then the largest shipowner in the world. But this has +retired into the dim past, and now it is a restful city of about forty +thousand people, its leading townsmen, the descendants of the +merchants and captains, living in comfortable mansions surrounding the +Common and along the quiet elm-shaded streets in the residential +section. The rest of the population have gone into shoemaking and +other manufactures. + +George Peabody, the philanthropist, was the most noted citizen of +Salem, born in the suburb of Danvers (since changed to Peabody) in +1795, and, dying in 1869, his remains rest in Harmony Grove Cemetery. +In the Peabody Institute, which he founded in Danvers, is kept as a +sacred relic Queen Victoria's portrait, her gift to him in recognition +of his benefactions. General Putnam, Nathaniel Bowditch, William H. +Prescott, the historian, W. W. Story, the sculptor, and Nathaniel +Hawthorne, were natives of Salem. The East India Marine Hall is its +most noted institution, a fine building filled with a remarkable +Oriental collection, gathered in the many voyages made by Salem ships, +and also having a valuable Natural History Museum, designed to show +the development of animal life. In the Essex Institute are interesting +historical paintings and relics, including the charter given by King +Charles I. to the colony of Massachusetts Bay. Also, carefully kept +near by, is the original "First Church," built in 1634 for the +organization formed in 1629, and of which Roger Williams was the +pastor before the Puritans banished him from the colony. When the +enlarging congregation built a more spacious church, this quaint +little house, with its high-pointed roof, diamond-paned windows and +gallery, which is revered as the shrine of Salem, was removed to its +present location. In Essex Street is also the old "Roger Williams +House," a low-roofed structure with a little shop in front, his home +for a brief period in 1635-36. This house has acquired additional fame +as a relic of the witchcraft days, for in it was held the court trying +some of the witches in 1692, who were afterwards taken to the gallows +or Witch Hill, on the western verge of the town, to be put to death. +The witchcraft delusion began in the Danvers suburb and soon overran +most of New England, the prosecutions continuing more than a year. +Nineteen proven witches were executed, while one, under the ancient +English law, was pressed to death for standing mute when told to +plead. Old Cotton Mather, the historian and pastor, was a leader in +the movement against the witches. + +The North Shore, beyond Salem Harbor, stretches far along the +rock-bound coast of Cape Ann. Here all the old fishing towns have +become modern villa-studded summer resorts, picturesque and attractive +in their newer development. Beverley, Manchester-by-the-Sea and +Magnolia all have grand headlands and fine beaches. Beverley also has +shoe-factories, and is proud of the memory of Nathan Dane, the eminent +jurist, who named Dane Hall, the Harvard Law School. Manchester has +the "Singing Beach," where the white sand, when stirred, emits a +musical sound. Magnolia, on a rocky bluff, is adjoined by the +attractive Crescent Beach, and has around it very fine woodland. To +the eastward is Rafe's Chasm, sixty feet deep and only a few feet +wide, and off shore, almost opposite, is the bleak reef of Norman's +Woe. Inland is Wenham Lake, near Beverley, noted for its ice supply, +upon which all these places depend, while beyond, the Ipswich River +comes down through the pleasant town of Ipswich, covering both banks +with houses, and flowing into Ipswich Bay north of the peninsula of +Cape Ann. To the westward is Andover, where the thrifty Puritan +Fathers, having bought the domain from the Indians "for twenty-six +dollars and sixty-four cents and a coat," established the noted +Andover Theological Seminary of the Congregational Church, where its +ablest divines have been taught in what has been called "the school +of the prophets." Here, on "Andover Hill," abstruse theology has been +the ruling influence and intense religious controversies have been +waged, over three thousand clergymen having been graduated. Mrs. +Harriet Beecher Stowe lived here after publishing _Uncle Tom's Cabin_, +and is buried here. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps was born here, and wrote +_Gates Ajar_ in the venerable "Phelps House." The Seminary buildings, +the local guidebook tells us, cause visitors to wonder "if orthodox +angels have not lifted up old Harvard and Massachusetts Halls and +carried them by night from Cambridge to Andover Hill." Ipswich, too, +has a famous Seminary, but it is for the opposite sex. We are told +that one reason for the popularity of Ipswich Female Seminary is that +its location tends to softening the rigors of study, as this is the +place "where Andover theological students are wont to take unto +themselves wives of the daughters of the Puritans." The indented shore +of Ipswich Bay was ancient Agawam, of which Captain John Smith, +coasting along in 1614, recorded in his narrative that he saw "the +many cornfields and delightful groves of Agawam." The fertile valley +of Ipswich River is a veritable oasis among the rocks, moors and +salt-marshes that environ it. + + +THE MERRIMACK RIVER. + +Near the northern boundary of Massachusetts is the famous Merrimack +River, flowing northeastward into the Atlantic, and noted for the +enormous water-powers it provides for the various mill-towns that line +its banks. It is a vigorous stream, having frequent waterfalls and +carrying a powerful current, the name appropriately meaning "the swift +water." Oliver Wendell Holmes writes of it in _The School Boy_: + + "Do pilgrims find their way to Indian Ridge, + Or journey onward to the far-off bridge, + And bring to younger ears the story back + Of the broad stream, the mighty Merrimack?" + +The Merrimack drains the southern slopes of the White Mountains, and +takes the outflow of Lake Winnipesaukee, a vast reservoir, the waters +being regulated at its outlet to suit the wants of the mills below. It +flows southward through New Hampshire into Massachusetts, turning +northeast to the ocean. The river passes near Salisbury, where Daniel +Webster was born in 1782; then, seventy-five miles northwest of +Boston, comes to Concord, the capital of New Hampshire, which has a +fine Capitol building and quarries of excellent granite; and eighteen +miles below, it reaches Manchester, the chief city of New Hampshire, +having sixty thousand people and many large mills owned by wealthy +corporations. Here are the Amoskeag Falls (the Indian name meaning the +"fishing-place"), the largest on the Merrimack, having fifty-five feet +descent, and their water-power being utilized through two canals. The +chief products are textile goods, locomotives and steam fire-engines. +Eighteen miles farther southward the Nashua River comes up from the +southwest, having passed the industrial town of Fitchburg on the way, +and here at its confluence with the Merrimack is Nashua, another busy +factory town. At Amherst, not far away, Horace Greeley was born in +1811. Crossing the boundary into Massachusetts, the river comes to the +Pawtucket Falls, having thirty-two feet descent, and furnishing the +water-power, twenty-six miles northwest of Boston, for the great mills +of Lowell, the third city of Massachusetts, having a hundred thousand +people, and spreading along the Merrimack at its confluence with +Concord River, coming up from Concord Bridge of Revolutionary fame. +The first mill was built at Lowell in 1823, and its industries have +assumed a wide range and enormous output, though the operatives are +nearly all French Canadians, and the language heard in this once +Yankee mill-town is now mainly French. The Merrimack, having turned +northeast, next comes to Lawrence, where it descends rapids of +twenty-eight feet in the course of a half-mile. Here the Lawrence +family, of which the noted Abbott Lawrence was the chief, established +a town of cotton and woollen mills, utilizing the rapids by +constructing a huge dam nine hundred feet long and thirty feet high, +in 1845, at a cost of $250,000. Here are the great Pacific Mills, +among the largest textile works in the world, and the city has over +sixty thousand inhabitants. Nine miles farther down the river is +Haverhill, another manufacturing town, with forty thousand people, +largely engaged in shoemaking. The poet John G. Whittier was born in +1807 near Lake Kenoza, the scene of his _Snowbound_, on the +northeastern verge of Haverhill. + +Below Haverhill the Merrimack is a navigable, tidal stream, broadening +into a spacious harbor at its mouth in the town of Newbury, where the +"ancient sea-blown city" of Newburyport is built on the southern +shore, while five miles to the westward, on the Pow-wow River, is +Amesbury, long the home of Whittier, who died in 1892, after having +celebrated this whole region in his poems. His house is maintained as +a memorial. Newburyport long since turned its attention from commerce +to making shoes and other manufactures, and it now has about eighteen +thousand population. Its splendid High Street, upon the crest of the +ridge, one of the noted tree-embowered highways of New England, +stretches several miles parallel to the river, down towards the sea, +bordered by the stately mansions of the olden time. The Merrimack +sweeps grandly along in front of them with a broad curve to the ocean, +three miles below. The Newburyport Marine Museum contains foreign +curiosities brought home by the old-time sea captains, and the Public +Library, endowed by George Peabody, occupies an impressive colonial +mansion, which has been flavored by the entertainment of Generals +Washington and Lafayette. The Old South Presbyterian Church has the +body of the famous preacher George Whitefield, who died in Newburyport +in 1770, interred in a vault under the pulpit. In a little wooden +house behind this church, William Lloyd Garrison, the Abolitionist, +was born in 1805. Caleb Cushing the jurist and John B. Gough the +temperance lecturer lived in Newburyport; but its resident who +probably achieved the greatest notoriety in his day was "Lord" Timothy +Dexter, an eccentric merchant of the eighteenth century, who made a +large fortune by singular ventures, among them shipping a cargo of +warming-pans to the West Indies, where they were sold to the planters +at a stiff profit for boiling sugar. + +Whittier's home was on the Merrimack, and he has written for the river +a noble invocation: + + "Stream of my fathers! sweetly still + The sunset rays thy valley fill; + Poured slantwise down the long defile, + Wave, wood, and spire beneath them smile. + + "Centuries ago, that harbor bar, + Stretching its length of foam afar, + And Salisbury's beach of shining sand, + And yonder island's wave-smoothed strand, + Saw the adventurer's tiny sail + Flit, stooping from the eastern gale; + And o'er these woods and waters broke + The cheer from Britain's hearts of oak, + As, brightly on the voyager's eye, + Weary of forest, sea and sky, + Breaking the dull continuous wood, + The Merrimack rolled down his flood. + + "Home of my fathers! I have stood + Where Hudson rolled his lordly flood: + Seen sunrise rest and sunset fade + Along his frowning Palisade; + Looked down the Appalachian peak, + On Juniata's silver streak; + Have seen along his valley gleam + The Mohawk's softly winding stream; + The level light of sunset shine + Through broad Potomac's hem of pine; + And autumn's rainbow-tinted banner + Hang lightly o'er the Susquehanna; + Yet wheresoe'er his step might be, + Thy wandering child looked back to thee: + Heard in his dreams thy river's sound + Of murmuring on its pebbly bound, + The unforgotten swell and roar + Of waves on thy familiar shore." + + +THE BRIDAL OF PENNACOOK. + +It was in the valley of the Merrimack that Whittier located the scene +of his famous poem, the "Bridal of Pennacook." This American epic +tells-- + + "A story of the marriage of the chief + Of Saugus to the dusky Weetamoo, + Daughter of Passaconaway, who dwelt + In the old time upon the Merrimack." + +Winnepurkit was the son of Nanapashemet, or the New Moon, and was the +Sagamore of Saugus, Naumkeag, and the adjoining domain. He was of +noble blood and valor, and for his bride chose the daughter of +Passaconaway, the great chief, ruling all the tribes in the Merrimack +Valley, who lived at Pennacook, now Concord. Not only was Passaconaway +a mighty chief, but he was also the greatest Powah or wizard of his +time, the colonial annalists gravely telling that he could make trees +dance, waters burn, and green leaves grow in winter, through his +necromancy. When Winnepurkit married this wizard's daughter, great was +the feasting at this "Bridal of Pennacook." Then Passaconaway caused a +select party of warriors to escort his daughter to her husband's home +at Saugus, where they received princely entertainment. Not long +afterwards the bride expressed a wish to again see her father and her +home at Pennacook, whereupon her husband sent her thither, escorted by +a trusty band, who were graciously received and rewarded. After some +time Weetamoo desired to return to Saugus, and her father sent word of +this to his son-in-law by messengers, requesting that a suitable guard +be provided to escort her down. But Winnepurkit liked not this method, +and bade the messengers return with this reply, "That when his wife +departed from him he caused his own men to wait upon her to her +father's territories, as did become him; but now that she had an +intent to return, it did become her father to send her back with a +convoy of his own people, and that it stood not with Winnepurkit's +reputation either to make himself or his men so servile as to fetch +her again." This reply, as may be imagined, ruffled the old chief, and +he sent a sharp answer "That his daughter's blood and birth deserved +more respect than to be slighted in such a manner, and therefore, if +Winnepurkit would have her company, he were best to send or come for +her." Neither would yield the point of Indian etiquette, and the +colonial narrator leaves it to be inferred that she then remained with +her father, though it is supposed she subsequently rejoined her +husband. The poet has made good use of the story, illustrating the +scenery of the region with great felicity, but giving the tale a +highly dramatic ending. Whittier makes the heart-broken bride, in her +effort to return to her husband, launch her canoe upon the swollen +Merrimack above the falls at Amoskeag when a spring freshet was +bringing down masses of ice: + + "Down the vexed centre of that rushing tide, + The thick, huge ice-blocks threatening either side, + The foam-white rocks of Amoskeag in view, + With arrowy swiftness sped that light canoe. + + "Sick and aweary of her lonely life, + Heedless of peril, the still faithful wife + Had left her mother's grave, her father's door, + To seek the wigwam of her chief once more! + + "Down the white rapids, like a sere leaf whirled, + On the sharp rocks and piled-up ices hurled, + Empty and broken, circled the canoe, + In the vexed pool below--but where was Weetamoo?" + + +CAPE ANN. + +Out in front of the region we have been describing projects the famous +"ridge of rocks and roses," the gaunt headland of Cape Ann. This is a +ponderous mass of hornblende granite, advanced forward twelve to +fifteen miles into the ocean, with Thatcher's Island beyond, on which +are the twin lighthouses that guard the mariner, forty-two miles north +of the Highland Light on Cape Cod. The granite hills of the iron-bound +headland are fringed with forests, while jagged reefs and rocky islets +surround it, against which the sea beats in perpetual warfare. The +surface is strewn with boulders, many of large size, and beds of the +finest white sand are interspersed. The Indians called this promontory +Wingaersheek, and when Captain John Smith came along he named it Cape +Tragabizonda, in memory of a Moslem princess who had befriended him +when a prisoner in Constantinople, also calling three small islands +off the cape the "Three Turks' Heads." But King Charles I. would have +none of this, however, and called the headland Cape Ann, after his +royal mother, and thus it has remained. The haven on the southern +side, Gloucester harbor, was early sought as a fishing station, being +known in 1624, and it received its name in 1642, most of the early +settlers coming from Gloucester in England. Champlain found it a safe +harbor when in peril, and writes of it as "Le Beau Port." In +August, 1892, this famous fishery port celebrated its two hundred and +fiftieth anniversary with great fervor. + + [Illustration: _Along the Shore, Cape Anne, Gloucester, Mass._] + +The prosperity of Gloucester has come from the fisheries, it being the +greatest cod and mackerel port in America, and having the most +extensive fleet of fishing-boats in the world, exceeding six hundred, +employing over six thousand men. The population approximates thirty +thousand, and it is said their earnings on the fishery product are +over $4,000,000 annually. The earliest form of the Cape Ann +fishing-smack was known as the "Chebacco," two-masted, cat-rigged, and +of ten or twelve tons, made sharp at both ends, and getting the name +from the first place of building, Chebacco Parish, in Ipswich, +adjoining the Cape. From this was developed the popular American build +of vessel known as the schooner, the first one being launched at +Gloucester in 1713. After sliding down the launching-ways, she so +gracefully glided out upon the water that a bystander exclaimed in +admiration, "See how she schoons!" and thus was she unexpectedly +named, for a "schooner" has that style of vessel been ever since +called. Gloucester surrounds its spacious harbor as a broad crescent, +having Ten Pound Island in front sentinelling the entrance to the +inner haven, so named because that was the price said to have been +paid the Indians for it. The deeply indented harbor opens towards the +southwest, being protected from the ocean by the long peninsula of +Eastern Point, having a fort and lighthouse on its extremity. Some +seventy wharves jut out from the circular head of the bay, with +granite hills rising behind, up which the town is terraced. Shipping +of all kinds are scattered about, including large salt-laden ships, +while fishermen and sailors wander through the streets and assemble +around the docks, spinning yarns and preparing for fishing ventures +out to the "Banks." The odd old town around the harbor has seen little +change for years, but the newer portions are greatly improved, having +many imposing buildings, including a fine City Hall. The numerous +churches have gained for it the title of "Many-spired Gloucester," and +no place could disclose more picturesque sea views. + +But the fishery interest pervades the whole town, dwarfing everything +else. The main street winds about the head of the harbor, bending with +the sinuosities of the shore, and from it other streets, without much +regularity, go down to the wharves. Fishing-boats are everywhere, with +new ones building, and on most of the open spaces are "cod-flakes," or +drying-places, where the fish are piled when first landed, preparatory +to being cut up and packed in the extensive packing-houses adjoining +the wharves. Here many hundreds are employed in preparing the fish for +market, both men and women working. The best fish are either packed +whole or cut into squares, so they may be pressed by machinery into +what are known as "cod-bricks," one and two-pound bricks being put +into forty-pound boxes for shipment. When packed whole, the best fish +are known as "white clover," in this stage of what is called the +fishery "haymaking." This fish-packing is an enormous industry, and +the Gloucester product goes to all parts of the world. But the fishery +has its sombre side; the vessels are small, rarely over one hundred +tons, and the crews are numerous, so that wrecks and loss of life are +frequent. Often a tremendous storm will destroy a whole fleet on the +"Banks," with no tidings ever received; and scarcely a family exists +in Gloucester or its neighborhood that has not lost a member at sea. +Sometimes the badges of mourning are universal. + +An enormous development of rocks and boulders is seen everywhere in +and around Gloucester. The houses are built upon rocks, the sea beats +against rocks; but though excellent building-material is here, the +houses are mostly of wood throughout the whole Cape Ann district. +There is almost universally an ocean outlook over a sea of deepest +blue. The outer extremity of the harbor to the westward is a long +granite ridge ending in the popular watering-place of Magnolia Point. +Down on the Eastern Point, alongside its terminating lighthouse, is a +curious granitic formation, the rocks reproducing an elderly dame with +muffled form and apron, known as "Mother Ann," this rude image being +locally regarded as representing, in the eternal granite, the lady +who named the Cape, the royal mother of King Charles I. The white +flashing light upon Ten Pound Island between them is said to have for +one of its chief duties the guiding of the mariner past the +treacherous reefs of Norman's Woe, just west of the harbor entrance, +which Longfellow has immortalized in his poem _The Wreck of the +Hesperus_. One "Goodman Norman" and his son were among the first +settlers near there, and hence the name, but no record is found as to +the "Woe" he may have had. Neither is it known that any wreck ever +occurred on this famous reef. In the winter of 1839 a terrific storm +caused many disasters around Cape Ann, and forty dead bodies, one +being a woman lashed to a spar, were washed on the Gloucester shore. +Longfellow read in a newspaper the story of these wrecks and the +horrible details, one of the vessels being named the "Hesperus," and +he somewhere saw a reference to "Norman's Woe." This name so impressed +him that he determined to write a ballad on the wrecks. Late one +night, as he sat by the fireside smoking his pipe, he conjured up the +vivid scene and wrote the ballad. He retired to bed, but, as he +relates, it was not to sleep; new thoughts crowded his mind, and he +rose and added them to the ballad, and at three o'clock in the morning +had finished his immortal poem. There was no such wreck at the place, +but his genius has associated it with the iron-bound coast of Cape +Ann, and Norman's Woe is a monument consecrated to one of America's +greatest poets. + + "It was the schooner Hesperus + That sailed the wintry sea; + And the skipper had taken his little daughter + To bear him company. + + "And fast through the midnight dark and drear, + Through the whistling sleet and snow, + Like a sheeted ghost the vessel swept + Towards the reef of Norman's Woe. + + "She struck where the white and fleecy waves + Looked soft as carded wool, + But the cruel rocks they gored her sides + Like the horns of an angry bull. + + "Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice, + With the masts went by the board; + Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank, + Ho! ho! the breakers roared! + + "At daybreak on the bleak sea-beach, + A fisherman stood aghast, + To see the form of a maiden fair, + Lashed close to a drifting mast. + + "The salt sea was frozen on her breast, + The salt tears in her eyes; + And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed, + On the billows fall and rise. + + "Such was the wreck of the Hesperus, + In the midnight and the snow! + Christ save us all from a death like this + On the reef of Norman's Woe!" + + +THE LAND'S END. + +The impressive scenery and bold picturesqueness all about attract many +artists, who haunt the rocks and sea views of Cape Ann. The whole +district is full of summer-homes, with flower-gardens and shrubbery +amid the rocks and boulders, and the cliffs and ocean presenting an +endless variety of changing scenery. The outer extremity of the Cape, +long called Halibut Point, has been modernized into the Land's End, +thus being rightly named as the termination of the great Massachusetts +granite ridge, which falls away sharply into the sea. Upon the one +hand Pigeon Cove, with its adjacent Sandy Bay, indents the rocky +buttress, while upon the other side is Whale Cove. Just off the Land's +End is the noted Thatcher's Island, low-lying on the sea, elongated, +narrow and barren, with its tall twin lighthouses, and having nearby, +in front of Whale Cove, the diminutive Milk Island. To the northward, +off Pigeon Cove, is another barren rock surmounted by a lighthouse, +Straitsmouth Island. These three outlying islands were the "Three +Turks' Heads," as originally named by Captain John Smith. Thatcher's +Island has about eighty acres of mainly gravelly surface strewn with +boulders, being named from Anthony Thatcher's shipwreck there in 1635 +in the most awful tempest known to colonial New England. Rockport is a +town of quarries extended around Sandy Bay, protected by breakwaters, +behind which vessels come to load stone almost alongside the quarry. +Pigeon Cove is the port for shipping stone taken out of Pigeon Hill, +where the granite ridge is humped up into a grand eminence. +Lanesville, to the north, is another large exporter of paving-blocks +and building-stone. Alongside is Folly Point, guarding Folly Cove, at +the northeastern extremity of the Cape, and to the westward are the +villages of Bay View and Annisquam, with more quarries, and having, +not far away, flowing out to Ipswich Bay through a lovely valley in +the very heart of the Cape, the attractive little Squam River. The +people of Cape Ann outside of Gloucester are almost all quarrymen, +their product, largely paving-blocks, being shipped to all the +seaboard cities. So extensive is this trade that it is difficult to +decide which now brings the district most profit, the granite or the +fish. There is no doubt, however, that the greatest fame of this +celebrated Cape comes from its fisheries and the venturesome men who +make them so successful. Edmund Burke, in the British House of +Commons, in 1774, thus spoke of these Massachusetts fishermen: "No sea +but what is vexed by their fisheries; no climate that is not witness +of their toils; neither the perseverance of Holland, nor the activity +of France, nor the dexterous and firm sagacity of English enterprise, +ever carried their most perilous mode of hardy industry to the extent +to which it has been pursued by this recent people--a people who are +yet in the gristle, and not yet hardened into manhood." + +For three centuries, almost, this perilous trade has been carried on, +and they are fully as daring and even more enterprising now than in +the colonial days. Thus Whittier describes them: + + "Wild are the waves which lash the reefs along St. George's Bank, + Cold on the shore of Labrador the fog lies white and dank; + Through storm and wave and blinding mist, stout are the hearts + which man + The fishing-smacks of Marblehead, the sea-boats of Cape Ann. + + "The cold North light and wintry sun glare on their icy forms + Bent grimly o'er their straining lines, or wrestling with the + storms; + Free as the winds they drive before, rough as the waves they roam, + They laugh to scorn the slaver's threat against their rocky home." + + + + +THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF + +NARRAGANSETT. + + + + +XVI. + +THE NEIGHBORHOOD OF NARRAGANSETT. + + The State of Rhode Island -- Narragansett Bay -- Point + Judith -- Aquidneck -- Conanicut Island -- Jamestown -- + Beaver Tail Light -- Patience, Hope and Despair Islands -- + The Starved Goat -- Durfee Hill -- Narragansett Indians -- + Canonicus -- Miantonomoh -- The Narragansett Fort Fight -- + Uncas -- Norwich -- Sachem's Plain -- Nanunteno -- Yantic + Falls -- Narragansett Pier -- Commodore Perry -- Stuart the + Artist -- Wickford -- Clams -- Rocky Point -- Blackstone + River -- Seeconk River -- Vinland -- Roger Williams -- What + Cheer Rock -- Providence -- General Burnside -- Malbone's + Masterpiece -- Brown University -- Pawtucket -- Samuel + Slater -- Central and Valley Falls -- William Blackstone -- + Study Hill -- Woonsocket -- Worcester -- George Bancroft -- + Lake Quinsigamond -- Ware -- Mount Hope Bay -- The Vikings + -- Taunton Great River -- Bristol Neck -- Taunton -- + Dighton Rock -- The Skeleton in Armor -- Bristol -- Mount + Hope -- King Philip -- Last of the Wampanoags -- Massasoit + -- Death of Philip -- Fall River -- Watuppa Ponds -- + Newport -- Brenton's Point -- Fort Adams -- William + Coddington -- Bishop Berkeley -- The Cliff Walk -- Newport + Cottages -- The Casino -- Bellevue Avenue -- Judah Touro -- + Touro Park -- The Old Stone Mill -- Buzzard's Bay -- + Acushnet River -- New Bedford -- The Whale Fishery -- + Clark's Point -- Fort Taber -- Nonquitt -- Vineyard Sound + -- Bartholomew Gosnold -- No Man's Land -- Elizabeth + Islands -- Cuttyhunk -- Sakonnet Point -- Hen and Chickens + -- Sow and Pigs -- Gay Head -- Naushon -- Penikese -- + Nashawena -- Pasque Island -- James Bowdoin -- Wood's Holl + -- Martha's Vineyard -- Vineyard Haven -- Thomas Mayhew -- + Cottage City -- Edgartown -- Chappaquidick Island -- Cape + Poge -- Nantucket -- Manshope -- Thomas Macy -- Wesco -- + Whaling -- Nantucket Sound -- Nantucket Shoals -- Nantucket + Town -- Siasconset -- Wrecks. + + +THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND. + +Narragansett Bay is one of the finest harbors on the New England +coast. It stretches thirty miles inland, the rivers emptying into it +making the water-power for the numerous and extensive textile +factories of Rhode Island, which embraces the shores surrounding and +the islands within the bay. It opens broadly, having beautiful shores, +lined with pleasant beaches which dissolve into low cliffs and +water-worn crags; for the character of the coast gradually changes +from the sandy borders of Long Island Sound to the rocks of New +England. Its western boundary, stretching far out into the sea, is the +famous Point Judith, a long, low, narrow and protruding sandspit +thrust into the Atlantic, a headland dreaded by the traveller, to whom +"rounding Point Judith" and its brilliant flashing beacon, thus +changing the course over the long ocean swells, when voyaging upon a +Sound steamer, means a great deal in the way of tribute to Neptune. +This headland was always feared by the mariner, and we are +romantically told that in the colonial days a storm-tossed vessel was +driven in towards this shore, her anxious skipper at the wheel, when +suddenly his bright-eyed daughter, Judith, called out, "Land, father, +I see the land!" His dim vision not discerning it, he shouted, "Where +away? Point, Judith, point!" She pointed; he was warned; and quickly +changing the course, escaped disaster. This story was often repeated, +so that in time the sailors gave her name to the headland. It is an +interesting tale, but there are people, more prosaic, who insist that +the Point was really named after Judith Quincy, wife of John Hull, the +coiner of the ancient "pine-tree shillings," who bought the land there +from the Indians. But, however named, and whoever the sponsor, Judith +is usually well-remembered by those circumnavigating the dreaded +Point. + +Within Narragansett Bay, the chief island is Aquidneck, or Rhode +Island, about fifteen miles long and of much fertility, having the +best farm land in New England, and at the southern end the noted +watering-place of Newport. This island furnishes the first half of the +long official title of the little State--"Rhode Island and Providence +Plantations." The memory of the old Narragansett chieftain, Canonicus, +is preserved in Conanicut Island, west of Rhode Island, and seven +miles long, there being between the two islands the capacious +anchorage-ground of Newport Harbor. This island in 1678 was named +Jamestown in honor of King James, and at its southern end, near the +ruins of an old British fort, is the famous Beaver Tail Light, the +guide into Newport harbor, the oldest lighthouse in America, dating +from 1667. Roger Williams, who founded the "Providence Plantations," +distributed various names to the other islands, several of them now +popular resorts, among these titles, which represent the varying +phases of his early emotions, being Prudence, Patience, Hope and +Despair, while some later colonists with different ideas, evidently +named Dutch Island, Hog Island, and the Starved Goat. Rhode Island is +the smallest State in the Union, though among the first in +manufactures, and in wealth proportionately to population. It has +barely twelve hundred square miles of surface, of which more than +one-eighth is water, and the highest land, Durfee Hill, is elevated +only eight hundred feet. + + +THE LAND OF THE NARRAGANSETTS. + +The region back of Point Judith and around Narragansett Bay was the +home of the Narragansett Indians, who were early made, by Roger +Williams, the friends of the white man. When the Pilgrims landed at +Plymouth, there were said to be thirty thousand of them, but they were +afterwards wasted by pestilence, and when Williams fled to Providence +and was received by them, he said they had twelve towns within twenty +miles, and five thousand warriors. They fought the Pequots, to the +westward, but were friendly with the tribes of Massachusetts, to which +they really gave the name, for, living in a comparatively flat +country, they described these tribes as belonging "near the great +hills or mountains," which is the literal meaning of the word, they +telling Williams it meant the many hills of that State, including the +"blue hills of Milton." Canonicus and Miantonomoh were the great +chiefs of the Narragansetts, described by the early colonists as wise, +brave and magnanimous. The former made the grant of the lands at +Providence to Roger Williams, and was his firm friend. The latter, the +nephew and successor of Canonicus, joined the Puritans under Mason at +Pequot Hill in the attack and defeat of the Pequots. In their original +theology they looked forward to a mystic realm in the far southwest +where the gods and pure spirits dwelt, while the souls of murderers, +thieves and liars were doomed forever to wander abroad. Their +friendship with the whites ended in 1675, however, when King Philip +incited them to join in his war, and the colonists attacked them on a +hill in a pine and cedar swamp near Kingston, west of Narragansett +Bay, where scanty remains still exist of their fortifications. It was +in December, amid the winter snows, and after a furious struggle their +wigwams were fired, and in the most blinding confusion a band of +warriors dashed out and covered the retreat of fully three thousand of +their people, leaving the whites in possession. Both sides had heavy +losses, but the result was the scattering and final annihilation of +the tribe. This was the famous "Fort Fight in Narragansett," of which +the memorial of the Connecticut Legislature says, "The bitter cold, +the tarled swamp, the tedious march, the strong fort, the numerous and +stubborn enemy they contended with for their God, King and country, +be their trophies over death." + +To the westward, beyond the Rhode Island border, lived Uncas, the +enemy of Miantonomoh. His domain extended to the river Thames, and he +had been a chief of the Pequots, who revolted in 1634 against the +Sachem Sassacus and joined the Mohicans, being chosen their chief +sachem. He was friendly to the colonists, and by sagacious alliances +with them increased the power of his tribe, which had previously been +in a relatively subordinate position. He helped defeat the Pequots, +and became so strong that he was described as the "most powerful and +prosperous prince in New England." He sold the shores of the Thames +River to the whites, reserving a small tract on the river bank, and in +1660 disposed of the present site of Norwich, Connecticut, to a +nomadic church from Saybrook, for £70. He held his people friendly to +the colonists, even in King Philip's war, frequently visited their +capitals at Hartford and Boston, and after reigning nearly fifty +years, died in 1683. He is described as crafty, cruel and rapacious, +but, as the head of a savage people, far-sighted and sagacious; +skillful and fearless as a military leader. His holding aloof from the +Indian alliances adverse to the colonists and fighting with the whites +against the powerful hostile tribes, are regarded as having really +saved colonial New England. His quarrel with Miantonomoh resulted in +the battle of Sachem's Plain, on the outskirts of Norwich, in 1643. +This was then a Mohican village, and Miantonomoh marched to attack it +with nine hundred Narragansetts, Uncas defending with five hundred +warriors. By a preconcerted plan, Uncas invited him to a parley, and +while it was going on, and the Narragansetts were off their guard, the +Mohicans made a sudden onslaught, defeating and pursuing them for a +long distance. Hundreds of the Narragansetts were slain, and +Miantonomoh, being captured, was taken prisoner to the English at +Hartford. He was ultimately surrendered back to Uncas, who took him +again to the Sachem's Plain, where he was put to death, the historian +says, "by the advice and consent of the English magistrates and +elders." A monument marks the place of execution, inscribed +"Miantonomoh, 1643." His son, Nanunteno, who succeeded, led the tribe +into King Philip's war, as he hated the colonists, and being captured, +he declined to treat with them for a pardon, saying, when threatened +with death, "I like it well; I shall die before my heart is soft or I +have spoken anything unworthy of myself," whereupon he was shot. He +was "acting herein," says old Cotton Mather, "as if, by a Pythagorean +metempsychosis, some old Roman ghost had possessed the body of this +Western Pagan, like Attilius Regulus." + +A few miles south of Norwich is the ancient fortress of Uncas on a +hill, and a handful of weak half-breeds are all that remain of his +famous people. In the city, on Sachem Street, near the Yantic Falls, +is a little cemetery in a cluster of pine trees. This, centuries ago, +was the burial-place of the Mohican chiefs, and the whole line of +sachems is here interred, down to the last of them, Mazeen, buried in +1826 in the presence of a small remnant of the tribe. Ancient stones +mark their graves, and in the centre is an obelisk in memory of Uncas, +of which President Andrew Jackson laid the foundation-stone. The +Yantic and Shetucket Rivers unite at Norwich to form the Thames, and +the town has arisen around their admirable water-powers, which serve +many mills. The city has about twenty thousand people, being in a +beautiful situation between and on the acclivities adjoining the two +rivers. The praises of the Yantic Falls were sung by Mrs. Sigourney +and others, but their glory has departed, for the stream has been +diverted into another channel, leaving a deep cutting in the hard +rock, the bottom filled with curiously-piled and water-worn boulders. + + +ASCENDING NARRAGANSETT BAY. + +On the western shore of Narragansett Bay, just inside of Point Judith, +stood the little fishing village of Narragansett Pier, originally +named from its ancient, sea-battered and ruined pier, built for a +breakwater in early times, which has since become one of the most +fashionable New England coast resorts, having many large hotels +spreading in imposing array along the shore. The smooth sands of its +bathing-beach look out upon Newport far over the bay and behind +Conanicut Island in front. Upon the southern border of this beach +there are precipitous cliffs against which the Atlantic Ocean breakers +dash, the last rocks on the coast of the United States until the +Florida reefs are reached. The famous Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry +was a native of this town, born in 1785, a midshipman in the war with +Tripoli, and the victor in the naval battle on Lake Erie in 1813. His +brother, Commodore M. C. Perry, born in Newport in 1794, commanded the +noted expedition to Japan in 1852-54, and concluded the treaty with +that country, cementing the friendly relations with the United States +ever since existing. The celebrated portrait painter Gilbert Stuart +was also a native of this place, born in 1755, his portrait of +Washington being regarded as the best existing. The western shores of +the bay north of the Pier are lined with coast resorts. Here is quaint +old Wickford, on Coweset Bay, which has a ferry twelve miles across to +Newport, and still exhibits the "Rolling Rock," where Canonicus and +Roger Williams are said to have signed their compact, and the old +Blockhouse built for a defense in 1641. Farther northward is the +ancient Shawomet, whither Samuel Gorton came, changing its name to Old +Warwick in honor of his friend and patron, the Earl of Warwick. It +appears that Gorton, a layman, who had a penchant for theological +disputation, made himself obnoxious to the Plymouth Puritans in the +early colonial time, and they banished him in 1637. He went to Newport +and expressed his opinions too freely, and was banished thence in +1641. Wandering to Providence, he was driven from there to Cranston, +nearby, the next year, and again expelled from Cranston a few months +later, and he finally settled at Shawomet. But they still pursued him, +and in 1643 a detachment of troops came from Boston and took him and +ten others back as prisoners, and they were tried and sentenced as +"damnable heretics" to banishment from America. Gorton sought +Warwick's protection, and the Earl sent him back to Shawomet, where he +lived undisturbed, but, after changing its name, spent the rest of his +life in publishing pamphlets attacking Massachusetts and Rhode Island, +among them being the "Antidote Against Pharisaic Teachers" and +"Simplicitie's Defence against Seven-Headed Policy." The next thing of +note occurring in Warwick was the disfranchisement, in 1652, of the +clerk of the unfortunate town on seven charges: first, calling the +officers of the town rogues and thieves; second, calling all the town +rogues and thieves; third, threatening to kill all the mares in town, +etc. In 1676 the Indians attacked and burnt it, and since, it has had +little history. General Greene was a native of Warwick, born in 1742. + +In sailing up Narragansett Bay, one is struck with the universality +of the prolific crop of these waters,--the clam. Many of the +inhabitants seem to spend much of their time gathering them; men and +boys in boats are dredging all the coves and shallows for the clams, +seizing enormous numbers by the skillful use of their handy double +rakes. These people are proud of their home institution, the Rhode +Island "clam-bake," which is a main-stay of all the shore resorts, and +is considered a connecting link, binding them to the Narragansetts, +who originated it. To properly conduct the "clam-bake" a wood fire is +built in the open air, upon a layer of large stones, and when these +are sufficiently heated, the embers and ashes are swept off, the hot +stones covered with sea-weed, and clams in the shells, with other +delicacies, put upon it, being enveloped by masses of sea-weed and +sail-cloths to keep in the steam. The clams are thus baked by the +heated stones, and steamed and seasoned by the moisture from the salt +sea-weed. The coverings are then removed, the clams opened, and the +feasting begins. With appetite whetted by the delicious breezes coming +over the bright waters of the bay, the meal is relished beyond +description. There are millions of clams thus consumed, but their +growth is enormous, and the supply seems perennial. The chief of these +places is Rocky Point, a forest-covered promontory, the favorite +resort of the population of the Rhode Island capital, where the +"clam-bakes" have acquired great fame. + + +ROGER WILLIAMS. + +There flows southeastward out of Massachusetts the Blackstone River +into Rhode Island, and going over Pawtucket Falls it then becomes for +a brief space the Pawtucket River, and finally, at its mouth, the +Seeconk River, making part of Providence harbor and one of the heads +of Narragansett Bay. The shores of this river swarm with industrial +operatives, for its valley is one of the greatest regions of textile +mills in the world, and half the people of Rhode Island live in the +chief city on its banks, Providence. Nine centuries ago the Norsemen +are said to have sailed up into this region, which they called +Vinland, but the first settlement was not made until 1636. The brave +and pious Welshman, Roger Williams, the heretical Salem preacher whom +the Puritans in 1635 banished from Massachusetts, went afoot through +the forest to the Seeconk Plains along the lower Blackstone River, and +halting there, lived with the Narragansetts, who were always his firm +friends. But the wrathful Puritans would not long permit this, and +ordered him to move on, so that in the spring of 1636, with five +companions, he embarked in a log canoe and floated down the Seeconk +River, his movements being watched by Indian groups upon the banks. He +crossed over the stream finally, and landed on what has since been +called "What Cheer Rock," on the eastern edge of Providence, thus +named because, when Williams stepped ashore, some of the Indians +saluted him with the pleasant greeting, "What cheer, Notop?" +(friend)--words that are still carefully preserved throughout +Providence and the State in the names of banks, buildings, and various +associations. He regarded this as a decidedly good omen, and started a +settlement, calling it Providence, "in grateful acknowledgment of +God's merciful providence to him in his distress." His exalted piety +was beyond question, and not only is the religious spirit in which the +city was founded indicated by its name, but even in the titles of the +streets are incorporated the cardinal virtues and the higher emotions, +as in Joy Street, Faith Street, Happy Street, Hope Street, Friendship +Street, Benefit Street, Benevolent Street, and many more. We are told +that his early colonists adopted the Indian foods, such as parched +corn, which the aborigines called "anhuminea," from which has come the +name of hominy, and the famous Narragansett mixture of corn and beans, +the "m'sickquatash," which has become succotash. + +Roger Williams in Rhode Island, in 1639, became a Baptist, and the +"Society of the First Baptist Church," which he founded that year in +Providence, claims to be the oldest Baptist organization in America. +But Williams seems to have been somewhat unstable, for he only +remained with this church as pastor four years, then withdrawing, as +he had grave doubts of the validity of his own baptism. It appears +that when this church was started, a layman, Ezekiel Holliman, first +baptized Williams, and then Williams baptized Holliman and the others. +When he withdrew, it was not only from the pastoral relation, but he +ceased worshipping with the brethren, and his conscientious scruples +finally brought him to the conclusion that there is "no regularly +constituted church on earth, nor any person authorized to administer +any church ordinance, nor could there be until new apostles were sent +by the great Head of the Church, for whose coming he was seeking." +During many years thereafter he held his religious meetings in a +grove. This venerable Baptist society which Roger Williams founded +built a new church in 1726, and in its honor they had a "grand +dinner." The elaborate banquet of those primitive days consisted of +the whole congregation dining upon one sheep, one pound of butter, two +loaves of bread, and a peck of peas, at a cost of twenty-seven +shillings. Their white wooden church, with its surmounting steeple, +overlooks the city from a slope rising above Providence River. + + +THE CITY OF PROVIDENCE. + +Providence is beautifully situated on the hills at the head of +Narragansett Bay, and its centre is a fine new Union Railway Station, +completed in 1897. Near by is the massive City Hall, one of the chief +public buildings in Rhode Island, a granite structure costing +$1,500,000. In high relief upon its front is a medallion bust of the +founder of the little State, Roger Williams, wearing the typical +sugar-loaf hat. A feature of this impressive building is the +magnificent stair-hall, lighted from above; and from the surmounting +tower there is a wide view over the city and suburbs, and far down the +bay towards the ocean. In front is the public square, with a stately +Soldiers' and Sailors' Monument of blue Westerly granite, bearing the +names of nearly seventeen hundred men of Rhode Island who fell in the +Civil War, and guarded by well-executed bronze statues representing +the different arms of the service. Facing it is a statue in heroic +bronze of the Rhode Island General Burnside, who died in 1881. These +works are artistic, but the priceless art gem in Providence is the +exquisite little picture of "The Hours," painted on a sheet of ivory +six by seven inches, in London, by the great portrait and miniature +painter, Edward Greene Malbone, of Newport--the three Grecian nymphs, +Eunomia, Dice and Irene, representing the Past, Present and Future. +The President of the Royal Academy said of it, "I have seen a picture, +painted by a young man of the name of Malbone, which no man in England +could excel." This is his masterpiece, one of the most admired +paintings in America, and is kept carefully in the Athenæum (to which +it was presented by a public subscription in 1853), a solid little +granite house built on the hillside, not far from the Baptist church. + +Farther up this hill are the campus and rows of buildings of Brown +University, the great Rhode Island Baptist College with seven hundred +students, founded in 1764, and bearing the name of one of the leading +families of the wealthy manufacturing house of Brown & Ives. The +campus is shaded with fine old elms, and some of the newer buildings +are handsome and elaborate structures. Around this university, and all +through the extensive suburbs, are the splendid homes of the +capitalists and mill-owners of the State, who have made this hill, +rising between the Providence and Seeconk Rivers, the most attractive +residential section. Benefit Street, on the hill, is lined with the +palaces of these textile millionaires. Providence is, in fact, a city +of many hills, and its houses are mostly of wood. Extensive sections +can be traversed without seeing a single brick or stone building. +There is a large railway traffic, but only a small trade by sea, +beyond bringing coal and cotton, though the city formerly enjoyed an +extensive China trade. Like all the Rhode Island towns it has many +mills and much wealth, and there are thirty or forty banks to take +care of its money. Besides textiles, its mills make locomotives and +Corliss steam-engines, silverware and jewelry, cigars, rifles and +stoves, gimlet-pointed wood-screws, tortoise-shell work and cocoanut +dippers, cottonseed and peanut oils, and many other things, not +overlooking the famous "Pain-killer," for the ills of humanity, which +is consumed by the hundred thousand gallons in all parts of the world. +The "Pain-killer" factory was always one of the lions of the town, +although now the new Rhode Island State House, finished in 1898, also +commands great public admiration. This is a huge dome-surmounted +building in Renaissance, constructed of Georgia marble and pink +granite. But Providence, above everything else, reveres the memory of +Roger Williams, who died in 1683, and is interred in the old North +Burying Ground. On Abbott Street is carefully preserved, as a precious +relic, a small old house with quaint peaked roof, built in the +seventeenth century, and reverenced as the place where he held some of +his religious meetings. His bronze statue ornaments the Roger Williams +Park to which Broad Street leads, a beautiful tract of about one +hundred acres, surrounding the quaint gambrel-roofed house in which +lived his great-great-granddaughter, Betsy Williams, for many years, +who gave this domain to the city in 1871, as her tribute to his +memory. Here are refreshments served at "What Cheer Cottage." But the +most treasured memorial of the founder is his original landing-place +of "What Cheer Rock," where the Indians greeted him alongside the +Seeconk River,--a pile of slaty rocks, enclosed by a railing, near the +foot of Williams Street, down by the waterside. + + +PROVIDENCE TO WORCESTER. + +We ascend the Seeconk River to Pawtucket, about five miles distant, a +busy manufacturing town of thirty thousand people, noted as the place +where Samuel Slater introduced the cotton manufacture into the United +States in 1790, the original Slater mill still standing. The Pawtucket +Falls of fifty feet give the valuable water-power which has made the +place, and here are some of the greatest thread factories in the +world. The town extends up into the villages of Central and Valley +Falls, and the enormous power furnished by the river is drawn upon at +different levels from several dams. All sorts of cotton textiles, +muslins and calicoes are made, and the slopes running up from the +valley, with the plateaus above, are covered with the operatives' +houses. This town has the most attractive situation on the Blackstone +River, which here changes its name to the Pawtucket, and finally to +the Seeconk. Samuel Slater, who started it, was a native of Belper, in +Derbyshire, England, having worked there for both Strutt and +Arkwright, the fathers of the textile industries. Learning that +American bounties had been offered for the introduction of Arkwright's +patents in cotton-spinning, he crossed the ocean, landing at Newport +in 1789. Here he heard that Moses Brown had attempted cotton-spinning +by machinery in Rhode Island. He wrote Brown, telling what he could +do, and received a reply in which Brown said his attempt had been +unsuccessful, and added: "If thou canst do this thing, I invite thee +to come to Rhode Island and have the credit and the profit of +introducing cotton manufacture into America." Slater went to +Pawtucket, and on December 21, 1790, he started three carding-machines +and spinning-frames of seventy-two spindles. He afterwards became very +prominent, building large mills at Pawtucket and elsewhere, and the +impetus thus given the place made it the leading American +manufacturing centre for a half-century. The Indian name of the falls +was retained by the city. + +The Blackstone River was named after the recluse Anglican clergyman, +Rev. William Blackstone, who, as heretofore stated, first settled +Boston about 1625. When he found, after a brief experience, that he +could not get on with the Puritan colonists, who came in there too +numerously, he sold out and "retired into the wilderness." He wandered +for over forty miles into the forests, and during more than forty +years made his home on the banks of this stream among the Indians, not +far above Pawtucket Falls. He lived there in his hermit home at Study +Hill among his books, the river rushing by, and the Providence and +Worcester Branch of the New Haven Consolidated Railroad now cuts its +route deeply through his hill, running among the dams, and in some +cases over them, on its way up the busy valley of this very crooked +river. Its waters, which do such good service for so many mills, +become more and more polluted as they descend, so that its lower +course is a malodorous and dark-colored stream. The river is about +forty-five miles long, rising in the hills adjacent to Worcester and +flowing in winding reaches towards the southeast, descending over five +hundred feet to Providence. The mills, however, have grown vastly +beyond its capacity as a water-power, so that auxiliary steam is now +largely used. Numerous ponds and other feeders accumulate a vast +amount of water for the Blackstone in Southern Massachusetts, and its +lower course for nearly thirty miles is a succession of dams, canals +and mills, making one of the greatest factory districts in existence. +Over a half-million people work and live in this busy valley, the +operatives being chiefly French Canadians, Swedes, and the various +British races, the French preponderating in some of the towns. The +Yankees long ago left, seeking better pay elsewhere, being replaced by +a more contented people satisfied to work in mills. Most of the huge +factories lining the river are owned by wealthy corporations having +their head offices in Boston or Providence, and it is said that, the +buildings being without signs or names, many of the operatives +actually do not know who they work for. These mills are four and five +stories high, often a thousand feet long, with hundreds of windows and +ponderous stairway-towers. + +Ascending the river, the factory settlements of Lonsdale, Ashton, +Albion and Manville are passed, and we come to Woonsocket Hill, one of +the highest in Rhode Island. Here the river goes around various bends +admirably arranged for conducting its waters through the mills, and +the town of Woonsocket is built where twenty thousand people make +cotton and woollen cloths, the noted "Harris cassimere" having been +long the chief manufacture at the Social Mills. To the northward, +Woonsocket spreads into the towns of Blackstone and Waterford, also +industrial hives; and finally, having followed the river up to its +sources, the route leads to Worcester, the second city of +Massachusetts, forty-five miles west of Boston, styled the "heart of +the Commonwealth," with a population of over one hundred thousand +people. Its chief newspaper, the _Massachusetts Spy_, is noted as +having actually started as a spy upon the royalists in the exciting +times preceding the Revolutionary War, and is still a prosperous +publication. It was at a Worcester banquet in 1776 that the "Sons of +Freedom" drank the noted toast: "May the freedom and independence of +America endure till the sun grows dim with age and this earth returns +to chaos; perpetual itching without the benefit of scratching to the +enemies of America!" Worcester is a great manufacturing city, but has +almost lost its New England population from the steady Yankee +migration westward, they being replaced in its numerous mills by +French Canadians, Swedes and Irish, the latter predominating. It has a +noble Soldiers' Monument, a splendid railway station, and the fine +buildings of the Massachusetts Lunatic Asylum standing on the highest +hill in the suburbs. Its new white marble City Hall, completed in +1898, is an imposing edifice. The huge Washburn & Moen Wire Works are +on Salisbury Pond, in the outskirts. Among the interesting old +dwellings is the Bancroft House, where the historian, George Bancroft, +was born, in 1800, dying in 1891. The great attraction of Worcester is +Lake Quinsigamond, on the eastern verge, a long, deep, narrow loch, +stretching among the hills four miles away, with little gems of +islands and villa-bordered shores. Scattered over the distant rim of +enclosing hills are several typical Yankee villages, with their +church-spires set against the horizon. Worcester had a chequered +colonial career, the Indians repeatedly driving out the early +settlers, until they built a fortress-like church on the Common, where +each man attended on the Sabbath, carrying his musket. These resolute +colonists were Puritans, bent on enforcing their own ideas, for when a +few Scotch Presbyterians came in 1720, and built a church of that +creed, it was declared a "cradle of heresy" and demolished. A +considerable number of the French Acadians, exiled from Nova Scotia in +the eighteenth century, came to Worcester, and their descendants are +now among its prominent people. + +New England, as is well known, was forced to adopt manufacturing, +because the inhabitants could not extract a living from the soil. It +is difficult to say where is the most sterile region, but in +Massachusetts it seems to be generally agreed that the town of Ware, +on the Ware River, northwest of Worcester, is hard to beat in this +respect. It is a picturesquely located mill-village, with a soil that +is stony and sterile. The original grant of the land was made to +soldiers as a reward for bravery in King Philip's War. They thankfully +accepted the gift and went there, but after examination left, and sold +all their domain at the rate of about two cents an acre. President +Dwight, of Yale College, rode through the town, but never wanted to +see it again, saying regretfully, in describing the land: "It is like +self-righteousness; the more a man has of it, the poorer he is." +Someone wrote a poem describing the creation of the place, of which +this a specimen stanza: + + "Dame Nature once, while making land, + Had refuse left of stone and sand. + She viewed it well, then threw it down + Between Coy's Hill and Belchertown, + And said, 'You paltry stuff, lie there, + And make a town, and call it Ware.'" + + +MOUNT HOPE BAY. + +On the northeastern verge of Narragansett Bay is Mount Hope Bay, its +shores attractive alike in lovely scenery and the most interesting +tradition. It is also a region of most venerable antiquity in +America. Hither came the ancient Norsemen Vikings, who explored it, +and sojourned there almost a thousand years ago. These wandering +Norsemen, early colonizing Iceland and Greenland, are said to have +discovered the mainland of North America in the tenth century, the +energetic Leif, a son of Eric the Red, afterwards, in the year 1001, +sailing along the American coast, and finding first, Helluland, or the +"Flat Land," supposed to be Newfoundland, then Mark Land, or the "Wood +Land," now Nova Scotia, and Vinland, or the "Vine Land," being the +coasts of Massachusetts and Rhode Island, and wintering in +Narragansett and Mount Hope Bays. The next year Leif's brother, +Thorvald, came along these coasts with thirty men, and also passed a +winter in Mount Hope Bay. The following season he sent a party of +explorers hither, and in the year 1004 he again came personally, and +was killed in a skirmish with the Indians, his companions returning to +Greenland. There seem to have been subsequent Norsemen visits, and the +name of Vinland was given by them on account of the profusion of vines +growing on the shores and islands, which was a novelty to these +wanderers from the far north. + +Mount Hope Bay is the broadening estuary of Taunton Great River, and +the elongated peninsula of Bristol Neck divides it from Narragansett +Bay to the westward, stretching up to Providence. Upon Taunton Great +River is a magnificent water-power which has produced the success of +Taunton, a busy manufacturing town of thirty thousand people, where +they make locomotives and tacks, bricks, screws and britannia ware, +its name coming from Taunton in Somersetshire, its founder having been +Elizabeth Pool, a pious Puritan lady of that place. When the first +settlers explored the river they made a wonderful antiquarian +discovery. Upon the shore, below Taunton, and opposite what are now +the gardens and pleasure-grounds of Dighton, was found the famous +"Writing Rock," lying partly submerged by the waterside, and when the +tide is out, presenting a smooth face slightly inclined towards the +river. It is a large greenstone boulder, the color changed to dusky +red by the elements, and it now has the faint impression of +hieroglyphics on its surface that have been almost effaced by the +action of the water. In the early colonial days these marks were very +distinct, and even after the beginning of the nineteenth century they +could be plainly distinguished from the deck of a passing vessel. +These inscriptions on the Dighton rock excited much wonder, and were +generally attributed to the Norsemen. Old Cotton Mather described it, +saying that among the "curiosities of New England, one is that of a +mighty rock, on a perpendicular side whereof, by a river which at high +tide covers part of it, there are very deeply engraved, no man alive +knows how or when, about half a score lines, near ten foot long and a +foot and a half broad, filled with strange characters." Another +learned man speaks of them as "Punic inscriptions which remain to this +day," made by the Phoenicians. Below, and near Fall River, many +years ago, there was exhumed a skeleton in sitting posture, wearing a +brass breast-plate and a belt of brass armor. Much marvel resulted +from this important discovery, which was thought to have produced a +veritable dead Viking, and it is said to have inspired Longfellow's +poem of "The Skeleton in Armor": + + "Speak! speak! thou fearful guest! + Who, with thy hollow breast + Still in rude armor drest, + Comest to daunt me! + + "Wrapt not in Eastern balms, + But with thy fleshless palms + Stretched, as if asking alms, + Why dost thou haunt me?" + +Thus he answers: + + "I was a Viking old! + My deeds, though manifold, + No Skald in song has told, + No Saga taught thee! + + "Take heed, that in thy verse, + Thou dost the tale rehearse, + Else dread a dead man's curse; + For this I sought thee." + +And then the poet unfolds his weird and romantic history. Despite the +Norsemen traditions, however, it is regarded as more probable that +both the hieroglyphics and the skeleton were of Indian origin. + + +KING PHILIP. + +Upon the western shore of Mount Hope Bay is the town of Bristol, +quiet, with wide, grassy, tree-shaded streets leading down to the +waterside, now a pleasant summer-resort, having a ferry over to Fall +River. Farther up the peninsula is Warren, with its factories. In +Bristol rises the splendid isolated eminence of Mount Hope, which +gives the bay its name. Its rounded summit is a mass of quartzite +rock, almost covered by grass. It is hardly three hundred feet high, +but being the most elevated spot anywhere around, has a grand outlook, +every town in Rhode Island being visible from it, and all the islands +of Narragansett Bay, while far to the southward, upon distant +Aquidneck, Newport gleams in the sunlight. Eastward, across Mount Hope +Bay, the city of Fall River, with its rising terraces of huge granite +mills, is built apparently into the sloping side of a ledge of rocks. +Upon this mountain lived the famous chief, King Philip, and from it, +with his warrior band, he sallied forth to carry slaughter and rapine +among the Puritan settlements. The eastern side of Mount Hope falls +off precipitously to the bay, and when he was finally surprised by the +colonists in his lair, he is said to have rolled down this steep +declivity like a barrel. The mountain top is now known as "King +Philip's Seat;" there is a natural excavation in the mountain side, +called "King Philip's Throne;" and from the foot the waters of +"Philip's Spring" flow away, a little purling brook, out to Taunton +River. One disgruntled early colonial annalist described the place as +"Philip's Sty at Mount Hope." The greatest tradition of this region +tells of the ambush, surprise and death of this famous sachem, the +"Last of the Wampanoags." + +The name of Wampanoag means "the men of the East Land," or the Indians +to the eastward of Narragansett Bay. When the Pilgrims landed at +Plymouth, the noted Massasoit was the Grand Sachem of the Wampanoags, +or Pokanokets, whose territory embraced most of the country from +Narragansett Bay to Cape Cod. The tribe had previously numbered thirty +thousand, but a pestilence had reduced them to a small figure, barely +three hundred, not long before the arrival of the "Mayflower." +Massasoit felt his weakness and made friends with the colonists, his +treaties of peace being faithfully kept for a half-century. The old +sachem lived north of Mount Hope, at Sowamset, now the town of Warren, +where his favorite "Massasoit Spring" still pours out its libations. +He died in 1661, at the age of eighty, leaving two sons, Mooanum and +Metacomet. Shortly after his death, these sons went to Plymouth to +confirm the treaties with the whites, and were so much pleased with +their reception that they asked to be given English names. The +colonial court accordingly conferred upon them the names of Alexander +and Philip. The former was chief sachem, but died within a year, +Philip succeeding. During the next decade he lived in comparative +friendliness, but was always unsatisfied and restless. He grew to +distrust the colonists, and never could be made to comprehend their +religion. When John Eliot, the Indian apostle, who converted so many, +preached before him, Philip pulled a button off Eliot's doublet, +saying in contempt that he valued it more than the discourse, a remark +which led pious old Cotton Mather to exclaim, in horror, "the +monster!" It was not long before the peaceful relations were broken, +and, after 1671, Philip travelled among the tribes throughout New +England, exciting them to a crusade against the colonists, and forming +a powerful league, including the Narragansetts, who had been friendly. +The result was the most desolating Indian war from which the colonies +ever suffered. The whites were everywhere attacked, but made heroic +defense, and in 1675-6 they defeated all the tribes, the Narragansetts +and Wampanoags being practically annihilated. + + +KING PHILIP'S DEATH. + +Defeated, and left without resources, the savage king was then hunted +from one place to another, finally seeking refuge in his eyrie on +Mount Hope, with a handful of followers. Here Captain Church attacked +him, and on August 12, 1676, he was killed by a bullet fired by an +Indian. In Church's annals of that terrible war the story is told of +the death of this chief, the last of his line. Philip was ambushed and +completely surprised on the mountain, and running away, rolled down +its side, the Indians trying to escape through a swamp at the foot. +The attacking party was posted around the swamp in couples, hidden +from view. Philip, partly clad, ran directly towards two of the +ambush, an Englishman and an Indian. The former fired, but missed him; +then the Indian fired twice, sending one bullet through his heart and +the other not more than two inches from it. Philip fell dead upon his +face in the mud and water; most of his companions escaped. In Church's +recital is told what followed: + +"Captain Church ordered Philip's body to be pulled out of the mire on +to the upland. So some of Captain Church's Indians took hold of him by +his stockings, and some by his small breeches, being otherwise naked, +and drew him through the mud to the upland; and a doleful, great, +naked, dirty beast he looked like. Captain Church then said that, +forasmuch as he had caused many an Englishman's body to lie unburied +and rot above ground, not one of his bones should be buried. And, +calling his old executioner, bid him behead and quarter him. +Accordingly he came with his hatchet and stood over him, but before he +struck, he made a small speech, directing it to Philip, and said 'he +had been a very great man, and had made many a man afraid of him, but +so big as he was, he would now chop him in pieces.' And so went to +work and did as he was ordered. Philip having one very remarkable +hand, being very much scarred, occasioned by the splitting of a pistol +in it formerly, Captain Church gave the head and that hand to +Aldermon, the Indian who shot him, to show to such gentlemen as would +bestow gratuities upon him, and accordingly he got many a penny by it. +This being on the last day of the week, the Captain with his company +returned to the island (Aquidneck), tarried there until Tuesday, and +then went off and ranged through all the woods to Plymouth, and +received their premium, which was 30 shillings per head for the +enemies which they had killed or taken, instead of all wages, and +Philip's head went at the same price. Methinks it is scanty reward and +poor encouragement, though it was better than what had been some time +before. For this much they received four shillings and sixpence a man, +which was all the reward they had, except the honor of killing +Philip." + +When the party brought Philip's head to Plymouth, the Puritan meeting +was celebrating a solemn thanksgiving, and quoting, again, the words +of old Cotton Mather, "God sent them in the head of a leviathan for a +thanksgiving feast." This head was exposed on a gibbet at Plymouth for +twenty years, as the arch-enemy of the colony. But things were +different afterwards. The "monster" of the seventeenth century became +a martyr in the nineteenth century. Irving wrote King Philip's +biography; Southey was his bard; and Edwin Forrest nobly impersonated +him. Thus the great Metacomet, in the light of history, is regarded as +sinned against as well as sinning, for he was trying to drive the +invader from his native land. The resistless westward march of the +white man overcame him, the first of a long line of famous Indians to +fall in front of American colonization. + + +FALL RIVER. + +Across Mount Hope Bay is Fall River, in Massachusetts, now the leading +American city in cotton-spinning and the manufacture of print cloths. +Its huge granite mills stand in ranks, like the platoons of a marching +regiment, upon the successive rising terraces of the eastern shore. +Nestling among the hills above the town are the extensive Watuppa +ponds, long and narrow lakes, spreading eight or ten miles back upon +the higher plateau. These, with other tributary ponds, cover about +twelve square miles surface, discharging through a comparatively small +stream, yet one carrying a large volume of water. This is the Fall +River, dammed at the outlet of the ponds, and barely two miles long, +but running so steeply down hill that within about eight hundred yards +distance it descends one hundred and thirty-six feet, thus being +appropriately named, and in turn giving its name to the town gathered +around this admirable water-power. The mills, however, have grown so +far beyond the ability of the water-wheels that they now run chiefly +by steam, and Fall River has a population approximating one hundred +thousand. The prolific granite quarries in the surrounding hills have +furnished the stone for these imposing mills, and also for the chief +buildings. Although a New England manufacturing city of the first +rank, it is not a Yankee settlement, for the operatives are chiefly +English, Irish, Welsh and French Canadians. When the settlement began, +it was called Freetown, and afterwards Troy, but the name of the +stream finally became so popular that the others were discarded, and +Fall River was adopted officially upon its incorporation as a city. +The rocky environment enabled it to cheaply construct the grand mill +buildings, and thus had much to do with its success. + + +NEWPORT OF AQUIDNECK. + +The eastern side of Narragansett Bay is chiefly occupied by Aquidneck, +or Rhode Island, upon which is the queen of American seaside resorts, +Newport. Aquidneck is the Indian "Isle of Peace," the word literally +meaning "floating on the water," and its southwestern extremity +broadens into a wide peninsula of almost level and quite fertile land, +making a plateau elevated about fifty feet above the sea. The island +is fifteen miles long and from three to four miles wide, and this +plateau rests upon rock, the strata making cliffs all around it, with +coves worked into them by the waters, presenting smooth sand beaches +having intervening bold promontories. The southeastern border of this +plateau, facing the Atlantic, has an irregular front of little bays +and projections, with the waves dashing against the bases of the +cliffs and among the rocks profusely strewn beyond them. Behind the +western extremity of the island is Brenton's Point, projecting in such +a way as to protect the inner harbor of Newport. Here are the wharves, +facing the westward, and the ancient part of the town, its narrow +streets and older houses covering considerable surface. The harbor is +protected by a breakwater, and beyond is Conanicut Island. This was +"Charming Newport of Aquidneck," as the colonial histories recorded +it, then a leading seaport of New England. Thames Street, fronting it, +was, in the eighteenth century, one of the busiest highways of +America. Protecting the harbor entrance, upon Brenton's Point, is Fort +Adams, which was a formidable fortification before modern-gunnery +improvements superseded the old systems, and, next to Fortress Monroe, +it is the largest defensive work in the United States, having +accommodations for a garrison of three thousand men. It was built +during the Presidency of John Adams, and named for him, being then +hurried to completion as a defense against French attacks, war with +that country seeming to be imminent, and the French particularly +desiring to possess Newport. All around the ancient town, and +spreading over the plateau, to which the surface slopes upward in +gentle ascent from the harbor, is the modern Newport of the American +nineteenth century multi-millionaires. From the older town, southward +across the plateau, stretches the chief street, Bellevue Avenue, +through the fashionable residential district. + +William Coddington, whose name is preserved in various ways, but whose +descendants are said to have been degenerate, founded Newport. He led +a band of dissenters from the Puritan church in Massachusetts and +bought Aquidneck from the Indians, starting his colony in 1639. Most +of the earlier settlers, in fact, were people of various religious +sects driven out of the strictly Puritan New England towns. Having +abandoned England because they objected to a State Church, we are told +that the Puritans forthwith proceeded to set up in Massachusetts what +was very like a State Church of their own, and soon made it hot for +the unbelievers. They drove out both William Blackstone and Roger +Williams. Blackstone, when he had to go over the border and establish +his hermitage at Study Hill on Blackstone River, said: "I came from +England because I did not like the Lords Bishops, but I cannot join +with you, because I would not be under the Lords Brethren." After +Blackstone and Williams, many others came to Rhode Island and settled +at Newport, for there they enjoyed the completest liberty of +conscience. The Quakers were unmolested and came in large numbers; the +Baptists flocked in and built a meeting-house; the Hebrews came, solid +business men, originally from Portugal, and established the first +synagogue in the United States; the sternest doctrines of the +Calvinists were preached; the Moravians held their impressive +love-feasts; and orthodox Churchmen fervently prayed for the English +King. There were all shades of belief, and dissenters of all ilks, and +many having no belief at all, so that the fair town on Aquidneck was +pervaded with such an atmosphere of religious toleration and +cosmopolitan irregularity that it became famous for its sharp contrast +with the stern rigidity of New England. Hence it was not unnatural +that at the opening of the nineteenth century President Dwight should +have declared that an alleged laxity of morals in Stonington was due +to "its nearness to Rhode Island." But despite these peculiarities the +Newport colony got on well, so that the growing settlement on the +"Isle of Peace" in time came to be designated as the "Eden of +America." Dean Berkeley, afterwards Bishop, visited Newport in 1729, +remaining several years, and gave the colony an elevated literary +tone. An Utopian plan for converting the Indians brought him over from +England, but he soon discovered that it was impracticable, and went +back home to become a Bishop. His favorite resort is shown at the part +of the Newport Cliffs called the "Hanging Rocks," and it is said he +there composed his _Alciphron, or the Minute Philosopher_, and the +noble lyric closing with the famous verse proclaiming the patriotic +prophecy which Leutze made the subject of his grand mural painting in +the Capitol at Washington: + + "Westward the course of empire takes its way." + + +NEWPORT DEVELOPMENT. + +Newport, before the Revolution, was a most important seaport. When +Dean Berkeley was there it had about forty-five hundred inhabitants, +and they had grown to twelve thousand when the Revolution began. The +preceding half-century was the era of its greatest maritime +prosperity, when Newport ships circumnavigated the globe. The +salubrity of the climate and advantages of the harbor providing safe +anchorage but a few miles from the ocean attracted many merchants and +a large trade, and in those days the Quakers and the Hebrews were the +leading citizens. In 1770 Boston alone surpassed Newport in the extent +of its trade, which then was much greater than that of New York. It +was about this time that a visitor to New York wrote back to the +_Newport Mercury_ that "at its present rate of progress, New York will +soon be as large as Newport." The Revolutionary War, however, almost +ruined the town, and annihilated its commerce. The port was at first +held by the English, and afterwards by the French, both battering and +maltreating it, so that it emerged from the conflict in a dilapidated +condition, with the population reduced to barely five thousand. The +French learned to love the attractive island, and sought earnestly +after the war to have it annexed to France, in return for the aid +given the Americans, but Washington strongly opposed this and +prevented it. The trade was gone, never to return, the merchants went +away to Providence, New York and Boston, and it existed in quiet and +uneventful neglect until the nineteenth century had made some +progress, when people began seeking its pleasant shores for summer +recreation. In 1840 two hotels were built, and this began the +_renaissance_. The Civil War made vast fortunes, and their owners +sought Newport, and it has since become the great summer home of the +fashionable world of America, where they can, in friendly rivalry, +make the most lavish displays possible for wealth to accomplish at a +seaside resort. + +Unlike most American watering-places, Newport is not an aggregation of +hotels and lodging-houses, but it is pre-eminently a gathering of the +costliest and most elaborate suburban homes this country can show. +Built upon the extensive space surrounding the older town, and between +it and the ocean, south and east, modern Newport is a galaxy of large +and expensive country-houses, each in an enclosure of lawns, +flower-gardens and foliage, highly ornamental and exceedingly well +kept. Many of them are spacious palaces upon which enormous sums have +been expended; and in front of their lawns, for several miles along +the winding brow of the cliffs that fall off precipitously to the +ocean's edge, is laid the noted "Cliff Walk." This is a narrow +footpath at the edge of the greensward that has the waves dashing +against the bases of the rocks supporting it, while inland, beyond the +lawns, are the noble palaces of Newport. Each is a type of different +architecture, and no matter how grand and imposing, each is called a +"cottage." The greatest rivalry has been shown in construction, and +the styles cover all known methods of building--Gothic, Elizabethan, +Tudor, Swiss, Flemish, French, with every sort of ancient house in +Britain or Continental Europe, imitated and improved upon, and in some +cases widely varying systems being condensed together. Some of these +"cottages" have thus become piles of buildings, with all sorts of +porticos, doorways, pavilions, dormers, oriels, bow-windows, bays and +turrets, towers, chimneys, gambrel roofs and gables, the whole being +charmingly elaborated into wide-spreading, imposing and sometimes +astonishing houses. Occasionally the villa is elongated into the +stable, in an extended house, which includes the family, horses, +hounds, domestics and grooms, all living under the same roof. A low +and rambling style of architecture, with many gables and prominent +colors, is the favorite for various Newport cottages. To the southward +of the town are the Ocean Avenue and Ocean Drive, skirting the whole +lower coast of the island for some ten miles, and displaying fine +marine views. + +There have been lavished upon these palaces of Newport, in +construction and decoration, large portions of the greatest incomes of +the multi-millionaires of New York and Boston, and hither they hie to +enjoy the summer and early autumn in a sort of fashionable +semi-seclusion, mingling only in their own sets, and rather resenting +the excursions occasionally made by the plebeian folk into Newport to +look at their displays. These princes of inherited wealth have made +Newport peculiarly their own, and, their expenditures being on a scale +commensurate with their millions, the growth and improvement of the +newer part of the place have been extraordinary. Land in choice +locations is quoted above $50,000 an acre, and a Newport "cottage" +costs $500,000 to $1,000,000 to build, with more for the furnishing. +Once, when I asked what was the qualification necessary to become a +director of one of the great banks of New York, I was told that it was +the ownership of ten shares of stock and a cottage at Newport. The +sense of newness is sometimes impressive in gazing at these Aladdin +palaces, for while the architecture reproduces quaint and ancient +forms, the ancestral ivy does not yet cling to the walls, and the +trees are still young. But there are older sites in Newport, back from +the sea-front, where some of the estates, existing many years, have +smaller and more subdued houses with signs of maturity, where the ivy +broadly spreads and the trees have grown. Some of the foliage-embowered +lanes, leading through the older suburbs, are charming in leafy +richness and make scenes of exquisite rural beauty. + +The Casino is the fashionable centre of Newport, a building in Old +English style, fronting on Bellevue Avenue, having reading-rooms, a +theatre, gardens and tennis-court, and here the band plays in the +season, and there are concerts and balls. During the fashionable +period, Bellevue Avenue is the daily scene of a stately procession of +handsome equipages of all styles, as it is decreed that the great +people of Newport shall always ride when on exhibition, and they thus +pass and repass in the afternoons in splendid review. In the earlier +times the town's chief benefactor was Judah Touro, who gave it Touro +Park. His father was the rabbi of Newport synagogue, which now has no +congregation. Judah spent fifty years in New Orleans amassing a +fortune, which was bequeathed to various charities. He also liberally +aided the fund for building Bunker Hill Monument. The synagogue, with +the beautiful garden adjacent, the Jewish Cemetery, is maintained in +perfect order. Touro Park is a pretty enclosure in the older town, +containing statues of Commodore M. C. Perry and William Ellery +Channing, who were natives of Newport, and a statue of the former's +brother, Commodore Oliver H. Perry, the victor of Lake Erie, is also +at the City Hall, not far away. In Touro Park is the great memorial +around which the antiquarian treasures of this famous place are +clustered, the "Old Stone Mill," a small round tower, overrun with ivy +and supported on pillars between which are arched openings. Its origin +is a mystery, and this is the antiquarian shrine at which Newport +worships. Longfellow tells weirdly of it in his _Skeleton in Armor_, +and some of the wise men suggest that it was built by the Norsemen +when they first came this way and found Vinland so long ago. But the +more practical townsfolk generally incline to the belief that an early +colonist put it up for a windmill to grind corn, the weight of the +evidence appearing to favor the theory that it was erected by Governor +Benedict Arnold, of the colony, who died in 1678, and described it in +his will as "my stone-built wind-will." It is, however, of sufficient +antiquity and mystery to have a halo cast around it, and is the great +relic of the town. The seacoast rocks that make the Newport Cliffs +show some wonderful formations of chasms and spouting rocks. A fine +fleet of yachts is usually in Newport water, and it is a favorite +naval rendezvous, having the Training Station, War College and Torpedo +Station, and a new Naval Hospital. This most famous of American +seaside watering-places has a permanent population approximating +twenty-five thousand, considerably increased by the summer visitors. + + +NEW BEDFORD. + +To the eastward of Narragansett another bay is thrust far up into the +land of Massachusetts, Buzzard's Bay, which almost bisects the great +defensive forearm of Massachusetts, Cape Cod. This bay is thirty miles +long and about seven miles wide. Between it and Narragansett are the +tree-clad hills of the sparsely-settled regions which the Indians +called Aponigansett and Acoaksett, out of which the Acushnet River +runs down to its broadening estuary, now the harbor of New Bedford. +Originally this city was peopled by Quakers of the English Russell +family, of which the Duke of Bedford is the head, so that the colony +was named from his title. A numerous Portuguese migration to the early +settlements has caused one of the suburbs to still retain the name of +Fayal. New Bedford stretches two miles along the western river-bank +and far back upon the gradually ascending surface, and the population, +including the opposite suburb of Fairhaven, numbers seventy thousand. +Early a shipping port, it grew into celebrity with the advance of the +whale fishery, which became its chief industry, and it was then said +to be the wealthiest city in the country in proportion to population, +having in 1854 four hundred and ten whaling ships, with ten thousand +sailors, its fleets patrolling the remotest seas. When this fishery +died out, the people went to manufacturing, and now they have numerous +large mills busily spinning cotton, its noted product being the +Wamsutta muslins. There still remain a few of the little bluff-bowed +and flush-decked old whalers rotting at the wharves, with huge +overhanging davits, and still redolent of oil--the relics of an almost +obsolete industry. The ample fortunes originally gathered in the +fishery enabled the marine aristocracy of the town to build their +stately and comfortable old mansions which now enjoy an honorable +repose in ample grounds along the quiet streets on the higher plateau +back from the river. + +When Samuel de Champlain came into the St. Lawrence River, he wrote +that whales were killed by firing cannon-balls at them, and later +explorers described how the Indians captured them. The colonists early +began the fishery along the New England coasts, and New Bedford sent +out its first ships in 1755. The period of greatest success in whaling +was between 1820 and 1857. The advent of gas and petroleum, financial +reverses, the gradual extermination of the whales, which had been +pursued to the remotest regions, the substitution of steel for +whalebone, and the use of hard rubber, all contributed to the decline +of the business, and it was given its death-blow by the ravages of the +Confederate privateers among the Pacific whaling fleets. Its memory +is kept alive, however, by many romances of the sea, it having +furnished an extensive and interesting literature. Not long ago it was +related that the unfortunate sculptor who had carved the figure-heads +for the whaleships was since compelled to earn a precarious livelihood +by chopping out rude wooden idols for the South Sea islanders. +Acushnet River is dammed in its upper waters, making an immense +reservoir, furnishing power to the extensive mills. The harbor +gradually broadens as it opens into Buzzard's Bay, and Clark's Point +stretches far into the bay, having on the extremity an old-time square +stone fort, with bastions at the corners, formerly the trusted +defender of the harbor and the town, Fort Taber. Now, its only use is +to furnish, on the outer corner, a foundation for a lighthouse +lantern. The whaling fleet it formerly guided is all gone, but now it +is the beacon for an enormous trade in coal, landed here for +distribution by railway throughout New England. Another little stone +fort is also built on the opposite side of the harbor, on a rock at +the lower end of Fairhaven. Outside is the broad surface of the bay, a +noble inland sea, with irregular and generally thinly populated +shores, but with attractions that have drawn to it, in various +localities, a large summer population, with many ornate villas of +modern fashion. Just below Clark's Point is villa-studded Nonquitt, +upon an upland among the undulating hills, where lived General Philip +Sheridan, and to which he was brought home in a United States warship +to die, in July, 1888. They tell us that when the venturesome Norsemen +came along here, the bay was given the name of the Straum Fiord, but +the antiquary is at a loss to find a satisfactory derivation for the +present name of Buzzard's Bay. Far over its waters, as seen from +Clark's Point, is the low, dark, gray forest-clad eastern shore, +stretching down to the distant strait of Wood's Holl, leading out of +the bay into Vineyard Sound. Spread across the bay entrance to the +southward, and protecting it from the open sea, are the Elizabeth +Islands. + + +VINEYARD SOUND. + +After Captain Bartholomew Grosnold had discovered Cape Cod in May, +1602, he coasted along its shores, and coming down into what is known +as Vineyard Sound, found himself in an archipelago of islands. He +halted at the one called "No Man's Land," and gave it the name of +Martha's Vineyard, which is now applied to the largest of these +islands. Who his favorite Martha was, and why she should have been +immortalized, old Bartholomew never told, thus disappointing many +industrious people who have vainly sought the lady's personal history. +"The Vineyard," as it is familiarly called, lies southeast of +Buzzard's Bay, across which is the extended and narrow range of the +Elizabeth Islands, trending far away to the southwestward, and ending +with Cuttyhunk, where the first English spade was driven into New +England soil. It was upon this, the outermost island, that Gosnold +landed and planted his colony, naming it Elizabeth, in honor of his +queen, a title afterwards given the entire range. The island had a +pond in which was a rocky islet, and here, as they feared the Indians, +the colonists built a fort and resided while they gathered a cargo of +sassafras for their ship, that being then a much-prized specific in +Europe. The settlement was brief; frightened by savage threats and +rent by quarrels, they soon abandoned the place, loading their ship +and returning to England disheartened. This settlement antedated by +eighteen years the arrival of the "Mayflower" at Plymouth. + +The Elizabeth group is a range of sixteen islands, stretching in a +long line from the Cape Cod shore for eighteen miles southwest to the +extremity of Cuttyhunk. It makes the southeastern boundary of +Buzzard's Bay, with Martha's Vineyard beyond, there being between them +the long and rather narrow channel of Vineyard Sound. The mariner +going eastward out of Long Island Sound passes Sakonnet Point at the +eastern verge of Narragansett Bay, and finds in front a chain of +beacons posted across the route. Two of these are lightships, marking +reefs to which are given the bucolic names of the "Hen and Chickens" +and the "Sow and Pigs." If the shipmaster wishes to enter Buzzard's +Bay for New Bedford, he sails between these two unromantic shoals, +passing a lightship on either hand, and being further guided by a +lighthouse on the extremity of Cuttyhunk. But if he wishes to follow +the great maritime route to the eastward around Cape Cod, he gives the +"Sow and Pigs" a wide berth to the northward and passes between it and +the splendid flashing red and white beacon on Gay Head, the western +extremity of Martha's Vineyard, south of Cuttyhunk. Gosnold was the +first Englishman who saw the brilliant and variegated coloring of this +remarkable promontory when the sun shone upon it, and appropriately +called it the Gay Head. Its magnificent Fresnel lens, the most +powerful in this region, is elevated one hundred and seventy feet +above the sea, and is thirty miles east of Point Judith. The breadth +of the entrance to Vineyard Sound from this lighthouse across to the +lightship is about seven miles. + +The northeastern extremity of the Elizabeth Islands is Naushon, and +between it and the main land of Cape Cod are the strait and harbor +formerly known to the sailor as Wood's Hole, but now refined into +Wood's Holl, just as "Holmes's Hole," another popular harbor over on +"the Vineyard," has since become Vineyard Haven. Both of these +"holes," and particularly the latter, have always been favorite places +for schooner skippers to run into and avoid adverse winds. The +Elizabeth group has four large islands, the others being small. Narrow +and often tortuous channels separate them. Cuttyhunk is about two and +one-half miles long, and the present successor of Gosnold's +ill-starred colony is a club from New York who have a seaside +establishment there. Not far away, to the northward, is Penikese +Island, covering about one hundred acres, which was formerly the +location of Professor Agassiz's "Summer School of Natural History." +East of Cuttyhunk is Nashawena, three miles long, and next comes +Pasque Island, also the abiding-place of an attractive club +comfortably housed. Naushon is the largest island, eight miles long, +stretching from Pasque almost to Wood's Holl, and having opposite each +other, on its northern and southern shores, two noted harbors of +refuge, the Kettle and Tarpaulin Coves. Upon Naushon, early in the +nineteenth century, lived James Bowdoin, the diplomatist and +benefactor of Bowdoin College in Maine, which was named for his +father. Naushon is a very pretty island, and was described in those +days by a distinguished English lady traveller as "a little pocket +America, a liliputian Western world, a compressed Columbia." +Clustering around its northeastern extremity are some of the smaller +islets of the group--the Ram Islands, and Wepecket, Uncatina and +Nonamesset. The strait at Wood's Holl forms a rocky gateway leading +from Buzzard's Bay into Vineyard Sound, and just beyond, on the Cape +Cod shore, is its guiding beacon on the point of Nobska Hill. Wood's +Holl has but a small harbor on the edge of the contracted and +tortuous passage, which is full of rocks, difficult to navigate, and +generally having the tide running through like a millrace. The +settlement is small, displaying attractive cottages on the adjacent +shores, and here are located the station and buildings of the United +States Fish Commission and the Marine Biological Laboratory. + + +MARTHA'S VINEYARD. + +Between the Elizabeth Islands and Martha's Vineyard is the great route +of vessels passing to and from New England waters, and the lighthouse +keeper at the entrance has counted more than a thousand of them +passing in a single week. Aquatic birds skim the waters, and all about +the Sound are islands great and small, their granite coasts +contrasting with the blue waters they protect from the severity of +ocean storms. A tale is told of the origin of the names of some of the +islands, which is original, if apocryphal. The story comes as a +tradition from the "oldest inhabitant" of these parts, who is said to +have been the owner of all these islands, and who determined, before +he died, to bestow the chief ones upon his four favorite daughters. +Accordingly, Rhoda took Rhode Island; Elizabeth took hers; Martha was +given "the Vineyard;" and there was left for Nancy the remaining large +island--so "Nan-took-it." + +Martha's Vineyard is shaped much like a triangle, and is twenty-three +miles long and about ten miles broad in the widest part. Vineyard +Haven, its chief harbor, is deep and narrow, opening like a pair of +jaws at the northern apex of the triangle, the entrance being guarded +by the pointed peninsulas of the East Chop and West Chop, each +provided with a lighthouse. Within is one of the most fairly +constructed natural harbors ever seen, a spacious haven of protection, +often crowded with vessels, which run in there to escape rough +treatment outside. Here is the pleasant village of Vineyard Haven, +prettily located upon the sloping banks of a small cove inside, and +having down at the end of the harbor a Government Marine Hospital. +"The Vineyard's" famous western promontory of Gay Head is composed of +ponderous cliffs, falling off steeply to the water, and presents an +interesting geological study. The inclined strata rise about two +hundred feet above the sea, being gaily colored in tints of red, +white, yellow, green, and black. About forty-five hundred people +reside on this island, including fishermen, sailors and farmers, but +mostly gaining a livelihood by ministering to the wants of the large +population of summer visitors. The first colonist was Thomas Mayhew, a +Puritan from Southampton, who came in 1642, being then the grantee +both of Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket. + +Cottage City is the chief settlement, built upon the eastern ocean +shore of "the Vineyard," a wonderful place attracting twenty to thirty +thousand people in the summer. The bluff shore rises precipitously +for thirty feet from the narrow beach forming the verge of the sea, +and there are myriads of cottages, many hotels, and a complete summer +town spreading over a large surface. Here are held the great Camp +Meetings which are the attraction in August--one Methodist and the +other Baptist. The former is the "Martha's Vineyard Camp Meeting +Association," first established and meeting in the Wesleyan Grove, +back from the sea. The other is the "Oak Bluffs Association," out by +the ocean's edge. This place, thoroughly alive in summer, is dormant, +however, for nearly nine months of the year. From it a railroad runs +several miles southward along the shore to the little village of +Edgartown, the place of original colonization, and the county-seat of +Dukes County, Massachusetts, which is composed of all these islands. +Towards the southeast, out of sight, is the distant island of +Nantucket. Nearer is seen the misty outline of old Chappaquadick +Island, called "the Old Chap," for short, with its long terminating +extremity of Cape Poge. To the northward is the hazy mainland of Cape +Cod, a streak upon the horizon, whence, long ago, these islands are +supposed to have been sliced off during the glacial epoch, and going +adrift, were thus anchored out in the ocean. + + +NANTUCKET. + +The island of Nantucket, dropped in the Atlantic, everyone has heard +of, but few visit. We are told by tradition that it was originally +formed by the mythical Indian giant, Manshope, who, when he was tired +of smoking, emptied here into the sea the ashes from his pipe. It was +also the smoke from this pipe which created the fogs so plentifully +abounding around the place. These fogs are very dense, and it is said +of a certain noted Nantucket skipper going away on a long voyage that +he marked one of them with his harpoon, and returning to the harbor +three years later, at once recognized the same fog by his private +mark. Old Manshope, the giant, was the tutelary genius of all the +Indian tribes on the islands of Vineyard Sound and the adjacent +mainland, and his home was on the cliffs of Gay Head, in an ancient +extinct volcanic crater, now called the Devil's Den. He feasted here +on the flesh of whales, which he broiled on live coals, obtaining fuel +by uprooting huge trees. His firelight, thus made, is said to have +been the earliest beacon seen by superstitious sailors passing the +headland, and as it flickered in his midnight orgies, they solemnly +shook their heads, saying, "Old Manshope is at it again." This +powerful giant seems to have waded around Vineyard and Nantucket +Sounds and regulated all the affairs of the neighborhood. But finally +the sailors and colonists became so numerous that he waxed very wroth. +With a single stroke of his ponderous club he separated "No Man's +Land" from "the Vineyard," and then transformed his children into +fishes. His wife lamented this cruelty, and he seized and threw her +over to the mainland on Sakonnet Point, where she still lies, a +misshapen rock. Then the disgusted giant vanished forever. + +The Norsemen first named the island Nautikon, appropriately meaning +the "Far Away Land." From this, on an early map, it appears as +Natocko, then as Nantukes, and finally it became Nantucquet, from +which the present name is derived. When Gosnold came along in 1602, he +first saw its great eastern promontory, Sankaty Head, describing the +island as covered with oak trees and populous with Indians. After the +original grant was made to Thomas Mayhew, he sold it in 1659 to the +"ten original purchasers" for £30 and two beaver hats, one for himself +and one for his wife, he reserving one-tenth. These purchasers +colonized the island, Thomas Macy, a Quaker who fled from Puritan +persecution in New England, beginning the first settlement, and Peter +Foulger, who came there somewhat later, had a daughter, who was the +mother of Benjamin Franklin. John G. Whittier, the good Quaker poet, +thus sings of Macy's flight to the island: + + "Far round the bleak and stormy cape + The vent'rous Macy passed, + And on Nantucket's naked isle + Drew up his boat at last." + +Macy landed at the site of the town of Nantucket, then the Indian +village of Wesco, or the "White Stone," which lay on the shore of the +harbor, and afterwards had a wharf built over it. The whale fishery, +which made Nantucket's prosperity, began early, in boats from the +island, and the population had increased by the Revolution to about +forty-five hundred, Sherburne, as it then was called, being the chief +whaling port in the world, with one hundred and fifty whale ships. The +island was covered with trees, but they were all destroyed during the +Revolution, and it was then made almost a desert, losing also the +greater part of its population and much of the fishery fleet. There +was a revival subsequently, and Nantucket reached its maximum +prosperity in 1840, with nearly ten thousand population. Afterwards +came the final decline of whaling, and the sandy, almost treeless +island now has about three thousand people, who depend for a living +chiefly on the summer visitors. It is without a whaleship, but it has +many snug cottages, and those going for health and rest can well say, +with Whittier: + + "God bless the sea-beat island! + And grant forever more + That charity and freedom dwell, + As now, upon her shore." + +Nantucket is southeast of Martha's Vineyard and south of Cape Cod, the +sea between them being known as Nantucket Sound. The island is an +irregular spherical triangle, sixteen miles long and three to four +miles wide, the outer coast bent around like a bow, as the Gulf +Stream currents wash the shores. To the south and east are the great +Nantucket Shoals, dangerous to the navigator, but acting as a +breakwater, preventing the island being entirely washed away by the +sea, which makes constant encroachments. The harbor of Nantucket town +presents sandy beaches and bluff shores, rising with some boldness +from the water, the sand dunes stretching away in regular lines behind +them. The town is snugly located at the bottom of a deep and secure +harbor, having a breakwater outside, and its chief daily event is the +arrival of the steamboat from the mainland, from which it is +frequently cut off for days together by winter ice and stormy weather. +There are various ancient and dilapidated wharves, fronting a +collection of strange-looking old gabled houses, many having raised +platforms on top of the peaked roofs, where the former inhabitants +used to go up to watch for vessels. It is a healthy place, with modern +hotels, tree-lined, pleasant streets, many gardens, and a magnificent +climate, the winter rigors corrected by the closeness of the Gulf +Stream. The surrounding country, outside the town, is almost +everywhere a flat prairie-land, with the one horizon all around, of +the distant blue sea. A narrow-gauge railroad leads over to the +southeastern coast at Siasconset, the quaint original gem of the +island, familiarly called 'Sconset, a curious little village of +fishermen's huts, existing now about the same as in the primitive +days. Its outlook is over the South Shoals, but not a sail is to be +seen, for these shoals are the grave of every vessel getting upon +them. It is a dismal reminder of vanished maritime prestige to see +about the Nantucket coasts the gaunt ribs of the old hulks, half +sunken in the sands where they have been cast ashore, as year by year +they gradually break up in the great storms and slowly disappear. In +the Boston _Daily Advertiser_ a poet plaintively mourns the fate of +these marine skeletons seen "at midnight off the coast": + + "Half-tombed in drifting sands upon the shore + Are ye, and heedless lashed by angry seas, + As through your blackened ribs the breeze + Exultant plays, and crested breakers roar, + And screeching sea-gulls round thee, prostrate, soar. + Wert thou allured by sighs of moaning trees, + As sirens sought to charm with songs like these + Ulysses and his brave companions o'er + To reefs deep hidden, silent, save in storm? + The rolling thunder of the sullen surge, + The mournful sobbing of the gathering gale, + Plain answer make, as round the spectre form + Of these gaunt skeletons they ceaseless scourge + The giant's battered coat of oaken mail!" + + + + +THE CONNECTICUT RIVER AND + +WHITE MOUNTAINS. + + + + +XVII. + +THE CONNECTICUT RIVER AND WHITE MOUNTAINS. + + The Long Tidal River -- Middletown -- Wethersfield -- Blue + Hills of Southington -- Meriden -- Berlin -- Hartford -- + The Charter Oak -- Samuel Colt and the Revolver -- New + Britain -- Enfield Rapids -- Windsor Locks -- Agawam -- + Springfield and the Armory -- Westfield River -- Brookfield + -- Chicopee Falls -- Hadley Falls -- Holyoke -- Mount Tom + -- Mount Holyoke -- Nonotuck -- Northampton -- Old Hadley + and its Street -- The Ox-Bow -- Goffe and Whalley -- Mount + Holyoke College -- Amherst -- Deerfield River and Old + Deerfield -- Greenfield -- Shelburne Falls -- Brattleboro' + -- Ashuelot River -- Keene -- Mount Monadnock -- Williams + River -- Bellows Falls -- Lake Sunapee -- Windsor, Vermont + -- Ascutney Mountain -- White River -- Olcott Falls -- + Hanover -- Dartmouth College -- Mooseilauke -- Newbury -- + Wells River -- Littleton -- Passumpsic River -- St. + Johnsbury -- Lake Memphramagog -- Dixville Notch -- Lake + Umbagog -- Rangeley Lakes -- Connecticut Lakes -- Source of + the Connecticut -- White Mountains -- Ammonoosuc River -- + Bethlehem -- Gale River -- Sugar Hill -- Franconia Notch -- + Coös -- Echo Lake -- Profile Lake -- Old Man of the + Mountain -- Pemigewasset River -- Flume and Pool -- North + Woodstock -- Plymouth -- Squam Lake -- Ethan's Pond -- + Thoreau and the Merrimack -- White Mountain Notch -- Israel + River -- Jefferson -- Lancaster -- Fabyan's -- Crawford's + -- The Presidential Range -- Saco River -- Willey Slide -- + View from Mount Willard -- Giant's Grave -- Mount + Washington -- Grand Gulf -- The Summit and View -- + Tuckerman's Ravine -- The Glen -- Pinkham Notch -- Peabody + River -- Gorham -- Androscoggin River -- Ellis River -- + Jackson -- Lower Bartlett -- Intervale -- North Conway -- + Mount Kearsarge -- Pequawket -- Madison -- Ossipee -- Lake + Winnepesaukee -- Sandwich Mountains -- Chocorua -- + Wolfboro' -- Weirs -- Alton Bay -- Centre Harbor -- Red + Hill -- Whittier's Poetry on the Lake and the Merrimack. + + +THE LONG TIDAL RIVER. + +The greatest New England river, the Connecticut, was first explored by +the redoubtable Dutch navigator, Captain Adraien Blok. When he made +his memorable voyage of discovery from New Amsterdam along Long Island +Sound, Blok ascended the Connecticut to Enfield Falls. Its source is +in the highlands of northern New Hampshire upon the Canadian boundary, +at an elevation of twenty-five hundred feet, and it flows four hundred +and fifty miles southward to the Sound. Its Indian title was +Quonektakat, or "the long tidal river," from which the name has been +derived. It is noted for beautiful scenery and has many cataracts, the +chief being Olcott Falls, at Wilder in Vermont, South Hadley in +Massachusetts, and Enfield in Connecticut. The soils of its valley are +extremely fertile, making a garden-spot in the otherwise generally +sterile New England, the most luxuriant crop being the tobacco-plant, +known as "Connecticut seed-leaf," used largely for cigar-wrappers, and +often yielding two thousand pounds to the acre. Steamboats navigate +the river to Hartford, about fifty miles from the Sound. The blazing +red beacon of the Cornfield Point Lightship is the outer guide for the +mariner entering its mouth, while the white lights of Saybrook guard +the inner channel. The lower Connecticut flows through a region of +farms, enriched by copious dressings of manures made from the fish +caught in the stream, and it passes picturesque shores and pleasant +villages in the domain of Haddam, an extensive tract which the Indians +originally sold to Hartford people for thirty coats. + +Middletown, the "Forest City," at a great bend in the lower river, has +many mills making pumps, tapes, plated wares, webbing and +sewing-machines, its shaded streets leading up the hill-slopes, +bordering the water, that have in them valuable quarries of rich brown +Portland stone. The county Court-house of Middletown is a quaint +little miniature of the Parthenon. The Wesleyan Methodist College, +having three hundred students, is located here, the chief buildings +being the Memorial and Judd Halls, built of the native Portland stone, +the latter the gift of Orange Judd. The large buildings of the +Connecticut Insane Hospital, also of Portland stone, overlook the +river from a high hill southeast of the city, and are in a spacious +park. To the northward of Middletown, level green and exceedingly +fertile meadows adjoin the river, their product being the noted onion +crops of Wethersfield, which permeate the whole country. This was the +earliest Connecticut settlement in 1635, and here in the next year +convened the first Connecticut Legislature to make the arrangements +for the war against the Pequots which annihilated that tribe. In one +of its old mansions General Washington had his headquarters, where, in +conjunction with the French officers, the plans were prepared for the +campaign closing the Revolution by the victory at Yorktown. + +To the westward of the river are the famous "Blue Hills of +Southington," the most elevated portion of the State of Connecticut, +and nestling under their shadow is Meriden, the hills rising high +above its western and northern verge, in the West Peak and Mount +Lamentation. Here are gathered over thirty thousand people in an +active factory town, the neat wooden dwellings of the operatives +forming the nucleus of the city adjacent to the extensive mills, and +having as a surrounding galaxy the attractive villas of their owners, +scattered in pleasant places upon the steep adjacent hills. They are +industrious iron and steel, bronze, brass and tin workers, and the +Meriden Britannia and electro-plated silver wares are famous +everywhere. The Meriden Britannia Company has enormous mills, and is +the greatest establishment of its kind in the world. Meriden and +Berlin, a short distance northward, have long been the headquarters of +the peripatetic Connecticut tin-pedler, who goes forth laden with all +kinds of pots and pans, and other bright and useful utensils, to +wander over the land, and charm the country folk with his attractive +bargains. Berlin began in the eighteenth century the first American +manufacture of tinware. There are scores of villages about, cast +almost in the same mould. Each has the same beautiful central Public +Green, the charm of the New England village, shaded by rows of stately +elms; the tall-spired churches; the village graveyard, usually on a +gently-sloping hillside, with the lines of older white gravestones, +supplemented in the modern interments by more elaborate monuments; the +attractive wooden houses nestling amid abundant foliage, and +surrounded by gardens and flower-beds, that are the homes of the +people, and the huge factories giving them employment. Some of these +villages are larger than others, thus covering more space, but +excepting in size, all are substantially alike. + + +HARTFORD. + +The high gilded dome of the Capitol at Hartford and the broad fronts +of the stately buildings of Trinity College surmounting Rocky Hill, +above a labyrinth of factories, are seen rising on the Connecticut +River bank to the northward. This is the noted city, with about +seventy thousand people, which has reproduced in New England the name +in the mother country of the ancient Saxon village just north of +London at the "Ford of Harts," whence some of its early settlers came. +The brave and pious Thomas Hooker led his flock from the seacoast +through the wilderness in 1636 to Hartford, to establish an English +colony at the Indian post of Suckiang, the Dutch three years before +having built a fort and trading-station at a bend of the Connecticut, +where the little Park River flowing in gave a water-power which +turned the wheels of a small grist-mill, to which all the country +around afterwards brought grain to be ground. Cotton Mather, the +quaint historian, described Hooker as "the renowned minister of +Hartford and pillar of Connecticut, and the light of the Western +churches." Hartford is known as the "Queen City," and its centre is +the attractive Bushnell Park, fronting on the narrow and winding Park +River. An airy bridge leads from the railway station over this little +stream, to the tasteful Park entrance, a triumphal brownstone arch +with surmounting conical towers, erected as a memorial to the soldiers +who fell in the Civil War. A grand highway then continues up the hill +to the Connecticut State Capitol, which cost $2,500,000 to build, one +of the finest structures in New England, an imposing Gothic temple of +white marble, three hundred feet long, the dome rising two hundred and +fifty feet, and all the fronts elaborately ornamented with statuary +and artistic decoration. The statue of General Putnam, who died at +Hartford in 1790, is in the Park, and his tombstone, battered and +weatherworn, is kept as a precious relic in the Capitol. The "Putnam +Phalanx" is the great military organization of Hartford. In the east +wing of the Capitol is the bronze statue of Nathan Hale, whom the +British hanged as a spy in the Revolution. It is a masterpiece, the +almost living figure seeming animated with the full vigor of +earnest youth, as with outstretched hands he actually appears to speak +his memorable words: "I only regret that I have but one life to lose +for my country." The Connecticut law-makers of to-day who meet in this +sumptuous Capitol are milder legislators than their ancestors who made +the "blue laws" of the olden time, when the iron rule of the Puritan +pastors governing the colony enacted a Draconian code, inflicting +death penalties for the crimes of idolatry, unchastity, blasphemy, +witchcraft, murder, man-stealing, smiting parents, and some others, +with savage punishment for Sabbath-breaking and the use of tobacco. + + [Illustration: _State Capitol, Hartford, Conn._] + +The celebrated Charter Oak is the great memory of Hartford. In 1856 +the old tree was blown down in a storm, and a marble slab marks where +it stood. The remains of the tree were fashioned into many precious +relics, and our friend of humorous memory, Mark Twain, who lives in +Hartford, says he has seen all conceivable articles made out of this +precious timber, there being, among others, "a walking-stick, +dog-collar, needle-case, three-legged stool, bootjack, dinner-table, +tenpin alley, toothpick, and enough Charter Oak to build a plank-road +from Hartford to Great Salt Lake City." This ancient tree concealed +the royal charter of the Connecticut colony, granted by the King, +when, in 1687, the tyrannical Governor Andros came to Hartford with +his troops and demanded its surrender. While the subject was being +discussed in the Legislature, the lights were suddenly put out, and in +the darkness a bold colonist seized the precious document, and running +out, concealed it in the hollow of the oak. The fine statue +surmounting the Capitol dome and overlooking the city is now, with +extended arm, crowning the municipality with a wreath of Charter Oak +leaves, and the oak leaf is repeated in many ways in the decoration of +the Capitol and of many other buildings in the city. The Charter Oak +Bank and Life Insurance Company are also flourishing institutions. In +proportion to population, Hartford is regarded as the wealthiest city +in America, and it is financially great, particularly in Life and Fire +Insurance Companies, whose business is wide-spread. It has many +charitable foundations, book-publishing houses, banks, manufacturing +establishments and educational institutions, the most noted of the +latter being Trinity College, in the southern part of the city, its +brownstone Early English buildings having a grand view across the +intervening valley to the hills of Farmington and Talcott Mountain, +nine miles westward. + +Picturesque suburbs adorned by magnificent villas environ the built-up +parts of Hartford, making a splendid semi-rural residential section, +where arching elms embower the lawn-bordered avenues, many localities +being adorned by superb hedges. There is a fine artistic and +historical collection in the Wadsworth Atheneum, where, among other +precious relics, are kept General Putnam's sword and the Indian King +Philip's club. Mrs. Harriet Beecher Stowe, and Mrs. Sigourney, the +poetess, were long residents of Hartford. The citizen whom it holds in +steadfast memory, however, is Colonel Samuel Colt, who invented the +revolving pistol. He was born in Hartford, and his remains rest under +a fine monument in Cedar Hill Cemetery. His widow built as his +memorial a beautiful little brownstone chapel, the Church of the Good +Shepherd, which is not far away from the huge works of the Colt Arms +Company, the chief industrial establishment of the city. Colt, when a +boy, ran away from home and went to sea, and is said to have there +conceived the idea of his great invention. He sought vainly during +several years to establish a factory to make it, but did not prosper +until 1852, when he started in Hartford; and with the great demand for +small-arms then stimulated by the opening of the California gold mines +and the exploration of the Western plains, afterwards expanded by the +Civil War, his factory grew enormously. The heraldic "colt rampant" +adopted by the inventor is stamped on all the arms and reproduced in +all the decorations of these vast works. Among other large factories +is also the Pope bicycle works. A short distance west of Hartford is +New Britain, where there are twenty thousand people engaged in making +hardware, locks and jewelry, its noted resident having been Elihu +Burritt, the "Learned Blacksmith," who was born there in 1810 and died +in 1879. + + +SPRINGFIELD AND THE ARMORY. + +To the north of Hartford is a fertile intervale, the rich meadows of +Mattaneag, where the Connecticut River pours down the Enfield Rapids, +and the diverted water flows through a canal formerly used to take the +river-craft around the obstruction, but now giving ample power to many +paper and other mills at Windsor Locks. The original colony was +started here by John Warham, said to have been the first New England +pastor who used notes in preaching. He sustained the "blue laws," but +his colony to-day is a great tobacco-growing section, through which +the Farmington River flows down from the western hills. At South +Windsor, John Fitch, the steamboat inventor, was born. The Hazardville +Powder Works, one of the greatest gunpowder factories in the world, +are beyond, and also Thompsonville, a prodigious maker of carpets, and +then the boundary is crossed into Massachusetts. Just north of the +line, the Connecticut River sweeps grandly around in approaching +Springfield, built on the eastern bank, and spreading for a long +distance up the slopes of the adjacent hills. It is a busy +manufacturing city, with sixty thousand population and an important +railway junction, where the roads along the river cross the route from +Boston to Albany and the West. This was the Indian land of +Agawam--"fish-abounding"--to which the Puritan missionary William +Pynchon led his hardy flock in 1636, and the statue of Miles Morgan, a +noted soldier of the early time, representing the "Puritan," stands, +matchlock in hand, in heroic bronze on the Public Square. Springfield +is noted for its great firearms factories, having the extensive works +of the Smith & Wesson Company, and also the United States Armory. This +enormous Government factory, making rifles for the army previously on +a large scale, quadrupled its output during the Spanish War of 1898. +It occupies an extensive enclosure on Armory Hill, up to which the +surface gradually slopes from the river, giving an admirable view over +the city. The chief buildings stand around a quadrangle, making a +pleasant stretch of lawn, with regular rows of trees crossing it. +There are a few old cannon planted about, giving a military air, and +here are made the Springfield rifles. During the Revolution most of +the arms for the American army were made here, and the cannon were +cast that helped defeat Burgoyne at Saratoga. In the Civil War the +main works were constructed, and they ran day and night for four +years, making nearly eight hundred thousand rifles for the Union +armies. The Arsenal, a large building on the western side of the +quadrangle, contains two hundred and twenty-five thousand arms, +tastefully arranged, and rivalling the collection at the Tower of +London. This armory is the chief industrial establishment of +Springfield, and Longfellow has thus described its great Arsenal: + + "This is the Arsenal. From floor to ceiling, + Like a huge organ rise the burnished arms; + But from their silent pipes no anthem pealing + Startles the villages with strange alarms. + + "Ah! what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary, + When the death-angel touches those swift keys! + What loud lament and dismal Miserere + Will mingle with their awful symphonies! + + "I hear even now the infinite fierce chorus, + The cries of agony, the endless groan, + Which, through the ages that have gone before us, + In long reverberations reach our own. + + * * * * * + + "Were half the power that fills the world with terror, + Were half the wealth bestowed on camps and courts, + Given to redeem the human mind from error, + There were no need of arsenals or forts: + + "The warrior's name would be a name abhorred! + And every nation that should lift again + Its hand against a brother, on its forehead + Would wear for evermore the curse of Cain! + + "Down the dark future, through long generations, + The echoing sounds grow fainter and then cease; + And like a bell, with solemn, sweet vibrations, + I hear once more the voice of Christ say 'Peace!' + + "Peace! and no longer from its brazen portals + The blast of war's great organ shakes the skies! + But beautiful as songs of the immortals, + The holy melodies of Love arise." + +At Springfield the Agawam River flows from the westward into the +Connecticut, and along its broad bordering meadows comes the Boston +and Albany Railroad. This is one of the Vanderbilt lines, crossing +Massachusetts from the Berkshires to Boston, and it was among the +earliest railways built in New England, being in construction from +1833 to 1842. The project while zealously pushed was then generally +derided as chimerical, the Boston _Courier_ of that time saying the +road could only be built at "an expense of little less than the market +value of the whole territory of Massachusetts, and, if practicable, +every person of common sense knows it would be as useless as a +railroad from Boston to the moon." Yet it was built, and prospered so +much that, to break its profitable monopoly, Massachusetts had +afterwards to bore the costly Hoosac Tunnel on the only available +route, to provide a competing line. The railroad climbs up the +Taghkanic range from the Hudson River Valley, crosses the Berkshire +Hills, going through Pittsfield and over Hoosac Mountain at an +elevation of fourteen hundred and fifty feet, then coming down a wild +and picturesque defile made by a mountain brook flowing into Westfield +River, which in turn flows into the Agawam. It is a route of +magnificent scenery, gradually leading from a mountain gorge to a +broadening intervale, where it passes the fertile Indian domain of +Woronoco and the pleasant town of Westfield, noted for its whips and +cigars. Then the winding reaches of the Agawam lead through broad +meadows and past many mills to Springfield. The various streams around +the Armory City, like so much of the clear waters elsewhere in +Massachusetts, are largely devoted to paper-making, and eastward from +Springfield the railroad ascends the valley of the swift-flowing +Chicopee, meaning the "large spring," among more paper-mills. This is +a vast industry developed by the pure, clean waters of Central +Massachusetts. Farther eastward, however, the character of the mills +changes, and at Brookfield shoemaking villages appear, while elsewhere +there are textile and leather factories. Brookfield was the +birthplace, in 1818, of the noted female agitator Lucy Stone, its +Quaboag Pond furnishing the water turning the mill-wheels, and then +flowing off through Podunk meadows by the Sashaway River to the +Chicopee. At Spencer, not far away, was born in 1819 Elias Howe, the +inventor of the sewing-machine. Farther eastward the railway route +leads to Worcester, and thence to Boston. + + +THE LAND OF NONOTUCK. + +The valley of the Connecticut north of Springfield is a hive of busy +industries where are made most of the finer papers used in the United +States. All the tributary water-courses teem with factories. Four +miles above Springfield the Chicopee flows in from the eastern hills, +there being a population of twenty thousand, and the mills, served by +the power from its falls two miles eastward, working cotton and wool, +brass and bronze, as well as making paper. Chicopee Falls was the home +of Edward Bellamy, author of _Looking Backward_, who died in 1898. A +few miles above the Chicopee, on the Connecticut, are the Hadley +Falls, the greatest water-power of New England, and the creator of +Holyoke, with fifty thousand people, the chief manufactory of fine +papers in the world. In a little more than a mile the river descends +sixty feet in falls and rapids, and by a system of canals the water is +led for three miles along the banks, thus serving the factories, which +have great advantages of position, as the river winds around them on +three sides, and its flow is also supplemented by steam-power. The +water, from its great descent, is used several times over. The main +Hadley fall descends thirty feet, and to prevent erosion is aproned +with stout timbers sheathed with boiler iron. The river is bridled by +a huge dam one thousand feet long, and has a boom to catch the +floating logs. + +The scenery above the Hadley Falls grows more attractive; the hills +approach nearer the river and rise sharply into mountains; the river +winds about their bases, and, abruptly turning, goes through a gorge +between them. Upon the western side is the Mount Tom range, and upon +the eastern bank Mount Holyoke, with inclined-plane railways ascending +both, Mount Tom rising twelve hundred and fifteen feet, and Mount +Holyoke nine hundred and fifty-five feet. The Connecticut flows out +between them from the extensive valley above. These guardian peaks of +Tom and Holyoke bear the names of two pioneers of the valley, who are +said to have first discovered the pass, and the tradition is that the +broad and fertile plain above, spreading almost to the northern +Massachusetts boundary, was once a lake with the outlet towards the +west, behind Mount Tom, until the waters broke a passage through the +ridge, and made the Connecticut River route to the Sound. The origin +of these mountains was evidently volcanic, being built up of trap-rock +lifting its columned masses abruptly from the level floor of the +valley, and almost without foothills to dwarf the greater elevation. +The broad vale beyond is the fertile land of Nonotuck, bought from the +Indians in 1653 for "one hundred fathoms of wampum and ten coats." +Here to the westward of the river is Northampton, a most lovely and +attractive town, well described as "the frontispiece of the book of +beauty which Nature opens wide in the valley of the Connecticut." The +fairest fields surround it, with thrifty farmers cultivating their +rich bottom-lands, and the people have a splendid outlook in front of +their doors, in the glorious panorama of the noble mountains, with the +river flowing away through the deep gorge. The place was named +Northampton because most of the original settlers came from that +English town. Solomon Stoddart was the sturdy Puritan pastor, ruling +the flock at Nonotuck for over a half-century, the village being for +protection surrounded by a palisade and wall. The little church in +which he preached measured eighteen by twenty-six feet, being built in +1655 at a cost of $75, and the congregation were summoned to meeting +armed and by the blasts of a trumpet: + + "Each man equipped on Sunday morn + With psalm-book, shot and powder-horn, + And looked in form, as all must grant, + Like th' ancient, true Church militant." + +This renowned pastor was of majestic appearance, and as good a fighter +as he was a preacher. He never hesitated to lead his people in their +Indian wars, and once he is said to have got into an ambush, but the +awestruck savages, impressed by his noble bearing, hesitated to shoot +him, telling their French allies, "That is the Englishman's god." The +present stone church is the fifth built on the original site. During +nearly a quarter-century the noted Jonathan Edwards was the +Northampton pastor, but he was dismissed in 1750, because, owing to +the growing laxity of church members, he insisted upon "a higher and +purer standard of admission to the communion-table." Northampton is +famed for its educational development, the chief institution, endowed +by Sophia Smith in 1871, being Smith College for women, having a +thousand students and possessing fine buildings, with an art gallery, +music hall and gymnasium. There are various attractive public +buildings, including an Institution for Mutes and the State Lunatic +Asylum. The level land of Nonotuck raises much tobacco, the +Connecticut River winding in wide circular sweeps among the fields and +meadows, but making little progress as it goes around great curves of +miles in circuit. Upon an isthmus thus formed, with the broad river +loop stretching far to the westward, is "Old Hadley," the Connecticut +having made a five-mile circuit to accomplish barely one mile of +distance. Across the level isthmus from the river above to the river +below, stretching through the village, is the noted "Hadley Street," +the handsomest highway in natural adornments in the Old Bay State. +Over three hundred feet wide, this street is lined by two double rows +of noble elms, with a broad expanse of greenest lawn between, and +nearly a thousand ancient trees arching their graceful branches over +it. This very quiet street has perfect greensward, for it is almost +untravelled, and its inhabitants grow tobacco and make brooms. Another +of these wayward river loops is the great "ox-bow" of the Connecticut, +where the river used to flow around a circuit of nearly four miles and +accomplished only one hundred and fifty yards of actual distance, +until an ice-freshet broke through the narrow isthmus and made a +straight channel across it, which has become the course of the river. +The abandoned channel of the "ox-bow" is now usually stored with logs +awaiting the sawmill. Hadley was the final home and burial-place of +Goffe and Whalley, the regicides, who fled there from New Haven. When +their house was pulled down, it was said the bones of Whalley, who +died in 1679, were found entombed just outside the cellar-wall. It was +the house of the pastor, and they were concealed in it fifteen years, +from 1664 to 1679, their presence known only to three persons. Once, +during the hiding, Indians attacked the town, and after a sharp fight +the people gave way, when there suddenly appeared "an ancient man with +hoary locks, of a most venerable and dignified aspect," who rallied +them to a fresh onslaught, driving the Indians off. He then +disappeared, the inhabitants attributing their deliverance to a +"militant angel." This was Goffe, and the tale is the chief legend of +"Old Hadley." General Joseph Hooker of the Civil War was born in +Hadley. At South Hadley is the Mount Holyoke College for girls, almost +under the shadow of the mountain, amid magnificent scenery, a noted +institution with four hundred students, where, during the past +century, have been educated many missionary women for their labors in +distant lands. + + +MOUNT HOLYOKE AND BEYOND. + +There is a grand view from the summit of Mount Holyoke, spreading +almost from Long Island Sound to the White Mountains, and from the +Berkshire Hills in the west to the cloud-capped mountains Monadnock +and Wachusett, fifty miles to the eastward. This is regarded as the +finest view in New England, for the wide and highly cultivated valley +of the Connecticut, with its wayward, winding stream flowing +apparently in all directions over the rich bottom-lands cut up into +diminutive farms and fields like so many "plaided meadows," gives a +charm that is lacking in most other mountain views. The grand panorama +displays parts of four New England States. Off to the northeast +several miles is seen the town of Amherst, with four thousand people, +the seat of another noted educational institution, Amherst College, +having over four hundred students and a fine archæological museum. + +The Hoosac Mountain range in the Berkshires sends down various streams +on its eastern slopes through wild and romantic gorges into the +Connecticut Valley, and one of these is Deerfield River, coming into +the main stream some distance north of Mount Holyoke. Here is the +village of "Old Deerfield," settled in 1670, on the Indian domain of +Pocomtuck, and named from the abundance of deer found in the forests. +Its streets often ran with blood in King Philip's and the later Indian +Wars, and its young men were then described by the quaint Puritan +chronicler as "the very flower of Essex County, none of whom were +ashamed to speak with the enemy in the gate." Its guardian peaks are +the Sugar Loaf, rising seven hundred and ten feet, and on the +opposite eastern side of the river Mount Toby, nearly thirteen hundred +feet high. King Philip, in his attack upon the settlers here in 1675, +made the tall and isolated Sugar Loaf his lookout station, whence he +directed the movements of his forces, and a crag on the top is yet +called "King Philip's Chair." Nearby, a monument marks the battlefield +of Bloody Brook in 1675, where the Indians killed Captain Lathrop and +eighty young men of Essex County. The Fitchburg Railroad from Boston +through Fitchburg comes across the Connecticut Valley, and passing the +village of Greenfield, takes advantage of the winding canyon of +Deerfield River to ascend westward to the wall of Hoosac Mountain, +where the great tunnel is pierced. The route is in a wild and +picturesque defile, in the heart of which is the pleasant village of +Shelburne Falls, where the stream glides down a series of cataracts +and rapids having one hundred and fifty feet descent. Here are mills +making cutlery, hooks, gimlets and other things, and there are +sheep-pastures on the mountain sides, and the people also tap the +maple trees for sugar. There are more villages among these mountains +farther up the gorge, where it may broaden to give a little arable +land, and at one of these, under the shadow of the great Pocomtuck +Mountain, was born in 1797 Mary Lyon, the devout and noted teacher who +founded Mount Holyoke College for girls. Finally the railway reaches +the Hoosac wall, and leaving the little Deerfield River which comes +down from the north, disappears westward in the tunnel. + +The Connecticut River beyond the Massachusetts northern boundary +divides the States of New Hampshire and Vermont, and its scenery, as +ascended, becomes more romantic and mountainous. At Northfield, near +the boundary, lived Dwight L. Moody, the evangelist. Above the +boundary, the Massachusetts colony, as a protection to the river +settlements, in 1724 built Fort Dummer, which was often attacked by +the French and Indians in their forays from Canada, but never +captured, and near it was made the first settlement in Vermont, a +village named in 1753 Brattleborough, in honor of Colonel Brattle of +Boston, one of the landowners. The Whetstone Brook flows in, making a +fine water-power, and the town, now having six thousand people, is +charmingly situated on an elevated plateau, surrounded by lofty hills. +Brattleboro' is the centre of the Vermont maple-sugar industry, and it +has the largest organ-works existing, those of the Estey Company. Just +south of the town rises Cemetery Hill, overlooking it with a fine +view, and here is the grand monument erected in memory of the +notorious James Fisk, Jr., who was a native of the place. It bears +emblematic female statues representing Railroads, Commerce, Navigation +and the Drama, and was executed by Larkin G. Mead, the sculptor, also +a native of the town. It is recorded that when a lad, Mead worked one +long winter night on a snow figure at the head of the Main Street, and +next morning, the people were surprised to see there a beautiful +figure of the Recording Angel, modeled in the purest snow. Southwest +of Brattleboro' is Sadawga Lake, in the town of Whitingham, near +which, in a poor log hut, Brigham Young was born in 1801. He was a +farmer's son, educated in the Baptist Church, and afterwards +emigrating to Ohio, joined the Mormons there when about thirty years +old. When Rudyard Kipling had his home in Vermont, it was about three +miles north of Brattleboro'. + +From the eastern highlands of New Hampshire the Ashuelot River flows +into the Connecticut below Brattleboro', and to the northeast in its +alluvial valley is Keene, the centre of an agricultural district, and +having about eight thousand people, some of whom make leather goods, +furniture and wooden ware. The Ashuelot means a "collection of many +waters," and the place was named before the Revolution in honor of Sir +Benjamin Keene, a British friend of Governor Wentworth of New +Hampshire, in consequence of which the colonial historian recorded +that "Keene is a proud little spot." To the southeast boldly rises +Mount Monadnock, its high and rugged top elevated nearly thirty-two +hundred feet, and having a hotel half-way up its side. This mountain +is about eighty miles from Boston, and the town of Jaffrey, at its +southeastern base, has an old church, the frame of which was raised on +the day of the battle of Bunker Hill, the workmen claiming that they +heard the cannonading. The Williams River, coming from the slopes of +the Green Mountains, flows into the Connecticut on the Vermont side, +at Bellows Falls, a picturesque summer resort located at the river +rapids, where there is a descent of forty-two feet in about a +half-mile, the power being availed of for various factories. Above, at +Claremont, the Sugar River flows in from New Hampshire, and to the +eastward is the charming Lake Sunapee, nine miles long, and surrounded +by wooded highlands, which has been often called the American Loch +Katrine. Over on the Vermont side, north of Claremont, is Windsor, +where it is recorded that during a fearful thunder-storm, and with the +appalling news of the loss of Fort Ticonderoga ringing in their ears, +the deputies of Vermont adopted the State Constitution, July 2, 1777. +Southwest of the village rises Ascutney Mountain, its Indian name +meaning the "Three Brothers," being supposed to refer to three +singular valleys running down the western slope. Its summit is +elevated thirty-three hundred and twenty feet. William M. Evarts, who +was a native of Boston, has his summer home Runnymede near Windsor, +and at Cornish, nearby, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase was born in +1808, emigrating to Ohio in 1830. + + +HANOVER TO MEMPHRAMAGOG. + +The White River, coming out from the Green Mountains, flows into the +Connecticut at a noted railway junction, while a short distance above +is the Olcott Falls, a cataract amid picturesque surroundings which +provides power for large paper-mills at Wilder, Vermont. To the +northward is Hanover, in New Hampshire, the seat of the most famous +educational foundation of northern New England, Dartmouth College, +having some seven hundred students. Rev. Eleazer Wheelock began it in +1770, and his name is preserved in the chief hotel. He started a +school in the forest to educate missionaries for the Indians, having +twenty-four students domiciled in rude log huts. He also educated +several Indians, giving them Master's degrees; but after some of them +had returned to savage life he changed his plan, and this object was +subordinated to the purposes of general and higher education, the +College, which was named for the Earl of Dartmouth, entering upon a +successful career subsequently to the Revolution. Among the graduates +have been Daniel Webster, Amos Kendall, Levi Woodbury, Benjamin +Greenleaf, George P. Marsh, George Ticknor, Rufus Choate, Thaddeus +Stevens and Salmon P. Chase. There are numerous buildings surrounding +an extensive elm-shaded campus, and also a spacious college park. The +Connecticut River above Hanover winds about the level fertile +intervale, making numerous "ox-bow" bends, and there appear numerous +mountain peaks which are outlying sentinels of the Franconia Mountains +to the eastward. The best known of these is Moosilauke, rising +forty-eight hundred feet, which formerly was the "Moose Hillock" of +the colonists. On the western river bank is the Vermont town of +Newbury, founded by General Bailey of Massachusetts. It is related +that during the Revolution a detachment of British troops came there +to capture him, but a friend who learned their object went out where +he was ploughing and dropped in the furrow a note, saying, "The +Philistines be upon thee, Samson!" Bailey, returning down the long +furrow, saw the note, took the hint and escaped. The crooked little +Wells River flows out of the Green Mountains and falls into the +Connecticut at the village of Wells River, nestling in a deep basin +among the high hills; and here is another important railway junction, +with routes going westward to Lake Champlain, northward to Canada, and +eastward to the White Mountains. The latter route is up the Ammonoosuc +River valley, past Littleton, with its glove factories and summer +boarding-houses, on the edge of the mountain district, and thence to +Bethlehem and into the heart of the White Mountain region. + +The Passumpsic River flows from Vermont into the Connecticut a few +miles above, and about ten miles up that winding and hill-environed +stream is the picturesque town of St. Johnsbury, with about seven +thousand people, noted as the location of the extensive Fairbanks +Scale Works. St. John de Crevecoeur, the French Consul at New York, +was very popular in the Revolutionary times and a benefactor of +Vermont, and this town, settled in 1786, was named in his honor. It is +related that in 1830, when there was a good deal of excitement about +hemp-culture in the United States, the Fairbanks Brothers established +a hemp-dressing factory here, and one of them conceived the idea of a +platform-scale to weigh the hemp, which construction was the origin of +their extensive business, the works sending scales all over the world. +The railroad route to Montreal and Quebec ascends the Passumpsic, +crosses the watershed, passing Lake Memphramagog at Newport, and then +enters Canada. This noted lake is on the national boundary, more than +two-thirds of it being in Canada, and is thirty miles long. +Memphramagog means the "beautiful water," and the mountain ranges +enclosing it with their wooded slopes present fine views. The national +boundary is marked by clearings in the forests on either side of the +lake. The massive rounded summit of the Owl's Head rises thirty-three +hundred feet on the western shore in imposing magnificence, and many +other peaks are sentinelled all around. Steamboats ply on the lake +from Newport to Magog at the foot, where its waters discharge +northward into Magog River and thence flow over the vast plain of +Canada, which is so conspicuously contrasted with the mountains to the +southward, until at Sherbrooke they reach St. Francis River, and +finally the St. Lawrence. Lake Memphramagog has its Indian legends of +massacre and escape, but its chief modern tradition is of a noted +smuggler named Skinner, who in the early nineteenth century performed +prodigious feats of skill in eluding the revenue officers. Near the +boundary is Skinner's Island, having a spacious cavern on its +northwestern side. The smuggler usually disappeared near this island, +which came in time to be named for him, and it is related that one +night the officers, having had a long chase, found his boat on this +island and turned it adrift on the lake. The smuggler never appeared +afterwards, but some years later a fisherman, seeking shelter from a +squall under the lee of the island, discovered the cave hidden under +foliage and explored it. + + "And what do you think the fisherman found? + Neither a gold nor a silver prize, + But a skull with sockets where once were eyes; + Also some bones of arms and thighs, + And a vertebral column of giant size; + How they got there he could not devise, + For he'd only been used to commonplace graves, + And knew naught of 'organic remains' in caves; + On matters like those his wits were dull, + So he dropped the subject as well as the skull. + 'Tis needless to say + In this latter day, + 'Twas the smuggler's bones in the cave that lay: + All I've to add is--the bones in a grave + Were placed, and the cavern was called 'Skinner's Cave.'" + + +SOURCES OF THE CONNECTICUT. + +The Connecticut River comes from the northeast to its confluence with +the Passumpsic, a stream of reduced volume, flowing down rapids. There +is only sparse population above, and in New Hampshire, some distance +east of Colebrook, is the famous Dixville Notch. This is an attractive +ravine about ten miles long, cut through the isolated Dixville Range. +It is not a mountain pass in the usual sense, but a wonderful gorge +among high hills, the cliffs being worn and broken down into strange +forms of ruin and desolation. Theodore Winthrop describes the Dixville +Notch as "briefly, picturesque--a fine gorge between a crumbling, +conical crag and a scarped precipice--a place easily defensible, +except at the season when raspberries would distract sentinels." +Approached from Colebrook to the westward, the view is disappointing, +as it is entered at a high level, but after an abrupt turn to the +right, the tall columnar sides are seen frowning at each other across +the narrow chasm; cliffs of decaying mica slate presenting a scene of +shattered ruin that is mournful to behold. To the right of the Notch, +Table Rock rises five hundred and sixty feet above the road, being +elevated nearly twenty-five hundred feet above the sea, and is +ascended by a rude stairway of stone blocks called Jacob's Ladder. Its +summit is a narrow pinnacle only eight feet wide, with precipitous +sides. It gives an extensive view over the Connecticut Valley +northward to the Connecticut Lakes, and over the upper Androscoggin +Valley to the southeastward. Its most impressive sight, however, is +much nearer, the narrow dreary chasm immediately below, with its +broken palisades that seem almost ready to fall. Beyond is the Ice +Cave, a deep ravine where snow and ice remain throughout the summer. +Washington's Monument and the Pinnacle, remarkable rock formations, +rise high on the north side of the Notch. Beyond the Notch +southeastward is the Androscoggin, which small steamboats ascend to +Lake Umbagog on the Maine boundary. Still farther eastward and deep in +the Maine forests are the noted fishery waters of the Rangeley Lakes, +which have polysyllabic names, such as Mooselucmaguntic, +Mollychunkamunk, and Welokenebacook. They are elevated fifteen hundred +feet above the sea and cover eighty square miles of surface. + +We have now ascended the picturesque Connecticut River to its mountain +sources. It has become only a brook, and having followed it up to the +Canadian boundary of Vermont, it is found to come out of Northern New +Hampshire, flowing westward from the Connecticut Lakes. The main lake +of this group is twenty-five miles northeast of Colebrook, covering +about twelve square miles, a favorite haunt of anglers, and navigated +by a small steamboat. The second lake, four miles farther northeast +through the forest, has about five square miles of surface, and the +third lake is to the northward, covering two hundred acres. The +Canadian northern boundary of New Hampshire is a low mountain range, +and on its southern slope is the fourth and highest lake, at +twenty-five hundred feet elevation above the sea, a pond of about +three acres, in which the great New England river has its head. These +Connecticut Lakes are in an almost unbroken forest. + + +THE WHITE MOUNTAINS. + +To the eastward of the Connecticut River, which we have explored from +its mouth to the source, lies one of the most attractive regions in +America, the White Mountain district. It covers about thirteen hundred +square miles, stretching forty-five miles eastward from the +Connecticut to the Maine boundary, and being thirty miles wide from +the Ammonoosuc and Androscoggin on the north to the base of the +Sandwich range on the south. There are some two hundred of these +mountains rising from a plateau elevated generally sixteen hundred +feet above the sea. They cluster mainly in two groups, separated by a +broad table-land ten to twenty miles wide, the western group being the +Franconia Mountains and the eastern group the Presidential range, or +White Mountains proper. Their great mass is of granite, overlaid by +mica slate; their scenery is varied and beautiful; and the country has +nowhere a more popular resort than these mountains in the summer. They +send out from their glens and notches various rivers, westward to the +Connecticut, eastward to the Androscoggin and Saco, and southward to +the Merrimack. The Indians called the White Mountains Agiochook, +meaning "the Mountains of the Snowy Forehead and Home of the Great +Spirit," and held them in the utmost reverence and awe. They rarely +ascended the peaks, as it was believed no intruder upon these sacred +heights was ever known to return. The legend was that the Great Spirit +once bore a blameless chief and his squaw in a mighty whirlwind to the +summit, while the world below was overspread by a flood destroying all +the people. It was said that the great Passaconaway, the wizard-king +at Pennacook, was wont to commune with celestial messengers on the +summit of Agiochook, whence he was finally borne to heaven. The first +white man who visited these mountains was Darby Field, who came up +from Portsmouth on the seacoast in June, 1642, by the valley of the +Saco. The Indians tried to dissuade him, saying he would never return +alive, but he pressed on, attended by two seashore Indians, passing +through cloud-banks and storms, reaching the highest peak, whence he +saw, as he related, "the sea by Saco, the Gulf of Canada, and the +great lake Canada River came out of;" and he found many crystals that +he thought were diamonds, from which the range long bore the name of +the "Chrystal Hills." Towards the close of the eighteenth century +colonists began moving into the outlying glens; in 1792 Abel Crawford +lived on the Giant's Grave, now Fabyan's; in 1803 a small inn was +built there; and in 1820 a party of seven ascended and slept on the +summit of Mount Washington, giving the principal peaks the names they +now have. + +From the Connecticut River the chief route of entrance to the White +Mountain region is by railway up the Ammonoosuc River alongside its +swift-flowing amber waters, and through the villages of North Lisbon +and Littleton, then coming to Bethlehem Junction, whence a short +narrow-gauge railroad leads steeply up the hill-slope westward to +Maplewood and Bethlehem. This is one of the most populous resorts of +the district--Bethlehem Street--a well-kept highway, stretching two +miles along a plateau upon the northern hill-slope at an elevation of +almost three hundred feet above the river. When old President Dwight, +in his early wanderings over New England, first saw this place, it was +known as the "Lord's Hill," and he recorded it as remote and sterile, +having "only log huts, recent, few, poor and planted on a soil +singularly rough and rocky," but he saw "a magnificent prospect of +the White Mountains and a splendid collection of other mountains in +this neighborhood." It is now an aggregation of fine hotels and summer +boarding-houses, the whole "Street" having a grand view of the +imposing Presidential range, seen nearly twenty miles to the eastward +over the Ammonoosuc Valley, while other mountain ranges are to the +north and west, so that Bethlehem is in a vast amphitheatre, +presenting, when the clouds permit, an environment of unsurpassed +magnificence. To the southward, the visitors climb Mount Agassiz, +rising twenty-four hundred feet, formerly known as the Peaked Hill, +and get an unrivalled view of mountains all around the horizon, the +Green Mountains of Vermont being plainly visible beyond the +Connecticut River to the westward. The southern flanks of Mount +Agassiz are drained by the pretty little Gale River, flowing through a +deep glen westward to the Ammonoosuc at North Lisbon. Down in this +glen, to the southwest of Bethlehem, is the village of Franconia, with +numerous hotels and boarding-houses, while to the southwest of the +glen rises Sugar Hill, another popular resort, with its great hotels +set high on the hilltop, and having superb views of the Franconia and +White Mountains to the eastward, and far away westward over the +Connecticut Valley where the horizon is enclosed by the long line of +the Green Mountains. It is a breezy and health-giving place. + + +THE OLD MAN OF THE MOUNTAIN. + +To the southward of Bethlehem is the Franconia group, of which Mount +Lafayette is the crowning peak, its pyramidal summit rising fifty-two +hundred and seventy feet. A notch is cut down into the group, and +through this, the Franconia or Profile Notch, another narrow-gauge +railway going up-hill for ten miles in the forest, traverses the +flanks of Lafayette and leads to the Echo Lake and Profile House, the +most extensive hotel in the region. This is in Coös County, the +mountain county of northern New Hampshire, getting its strangely +pronounced name from the Indian word _cooash_, meaning the "pine +woods," with which almost the whole country was then covered. Here +lived the Abenaqui tribe, known as the "swift deer-hunting Coosucks." +At the highest part of the Notch, where its floor broadens +sufficiently for a few acres of smooth surface between the enormous +enclosing mountains, is built the hotel and its attendant cottages, +standing between two long, narrow lakes at the summit of the pass, the +waters flowing out respectively north and south, from the one, Echo +Lake to Gale River and the Ammonoosuc, and from the other, Profile +Lake to the Pemigewasset, seeking the Merrimack. The Pemigewasset +means "the place of the Crooked Pines," and Profile Lake used to be +called the "Old Man's Washbowl." On its western side rises Mount +Cannon, forty-one hundred feet high, on the southeastern face of +which is the "Old Man of the Mountain," the noted Franconia Profile. +The mountain rises abruptly from the edge of the lake, and twelve +hundred feet above the water is this "Great Stone Face," about which +Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote so famously. It is a remarkable semblance of +the human countenance, and can be properly seen from only one +position. Move but a short distance either north or south from this +spot, and the profile becomes distorted and is soon obliterated. It is +composed of three distinct ledges of granite projecting from the face +of the mountain, one forming the forehead, another the nose and upper +lip, and a third the chin. These three ledges are in different +vertical lines, the actual length of the profile being forty feet, and +they make an overhanging brow, a powerful and clearly-defined nose, +and a sharp and massive projecting chin, the very mark of complete +decision of character, so that the realism of the profile is almost +startling. The Old Man's severe and somewhat melancholy gaze is +directed towards the southeast over the lake, as if looking earnestly +down the Notch. + +The white man's discovery of this profile was made in the early +nineteenth century by two road-makers, mending the highway through the +Notch. Stooping to wash their hands in the lake, just at the right +spot, they casually looked up and saw it, being struck instantly by +the wonderful facial resemblance. "That is Jefferson," said one of +them, Thomas Jefferson then being President of the United States, and +the stern countenance certainly looks like some of his portraits. +There he is, gazing far away, with sturdy, unchanging expression, as +he has done for thousands of years. Thomas Starr King, who has so well +described these mountains, regards the "Great Stone Face" as "a piece +of sculpture older than the Sphinx--an imitation of the human +countenance which is the crown of all beauty, that was pushed out from +the coarse strata of New England, thousands of years before Adam." Yet +a slight change from the proper position for view greatly alters the +profile. Move a few paces northward, and the nose and face are +flattened, only the projecting forehead finally being seen. Go a short +distance to the southward, and the Old Man's decisive countenance +quickly deteriorates into that of a toothless old woman wearing a cap, +and soon the lower portion of the face is so distorted that the human +profile is obliterated. The Cannon Mountain bearing the famous profile +is a majestic ridge named from a spacious granite ledge on its steep +slope, presenting, when observed from a certain position below, the +appearance of a cannon ready for firing. Its summit rises seven +hundred feet above the profile. + +From the Profile Lake, the Pemigewasset River flows southward, deep +down in the narrow Franconia Notch, the stream descending over five +hundred feet in five miles. Here is the "Flume," and beyond it the +gorge widens, giving a view which Thomas Starr King has described as +"a perpetual refreshment," for it extends far away southward over the +broadening intervale, one of the fairest scenes in nature, stretching +many miles to and beyond Plymouth. The "Flume" is made by a brilliant +little tributary brook dashing along the bottom of a fissure for +several hundred feet, bordered by high walls rising sixty to seventy +feet above the torrent and only a few feet apart. The water rushes +towards the Pemigewasset between these smooth granite walls, and the +awe-struck visitor walks through in startled admiration. The "Pool" is +beyond, a deep, dark basin, into which the Pemigewasset falls, +surrounded by a high rocky enclosure, making an abyss over a hundred +feet across and one hundred and fifty feet deep. There is also another +pellucid green basin below, into which the river tumbles by a pretty +white cascade, this being a huge pothole originally ground out by the +action of boulders whirled around in it by the current. A galaxy of +peaks environ this pleasant glen in the Franconia and Pemigewasset +ranges, the highest of them, Mount Lincoln, rising fifty-one hundred +feet, and having Mount Liberty, a lower peak, to the southward. + + +TO PLYMOUTH AND BEYOND. + +Emerging from the Franconia Notch, the broadened valley reaches the +attractive village of North Woodstock, another cluster of hotels and +summer boarding-houses in an attractive location. The Pemigewasset +receives its eastern branch, passes other villages, is swollen by the +brisk torrent of the Mad River, and then, amid lower mountains and +broader vales, but still with the most delicious views, comes to the +typical White Mountain outpost town of Plymouth, at the confluence of +the Pemigewasset and Baker Rivers, the latter coming in from the +northwest. Captain Baker with a company of Massachusetts rangers, +early in the eighteenth century, attacked an Indian village here, and +his name was given the tributary stream. The Puritan colonists, +however, did not actually settle Plymouth until 1764. The town is full +of summer cottages and boarding-houses, is noted for its manufacture +of fine buckskin gloves, and has as its chief relic the little old +building, then the court-house, in which Daniel Webster made his first +speech to a jury. It was here that Nathaniel Hawthorne suddenly died +in May, 1864. He was travelling with his intimate friend, ex-President +of the United States Franklin Pierce, and stopping overnight at a +hotel, was found dead in his room next morning, having passed quietly +away while sleeping. Far away beyond Plymouth the bright Pemigewasset +flows, receiving the outlets of the Waukawan Lake, and of the +beautiful and island-dotted Squam Lake, its enclosing hills being most +superb sites for summer villas. This is the "mountain-girdled Squam" +of which Whittier sings, and a giant pine tree is pointed out on its +banks where the poet used to sit and watch the lake by hours, and in +honor of which he wrote the _Wood Giant_, one of his most admirable +poems. The Pemigewasset joins the outlet stream of Lake Winnepesaukee +at Franklin, and they together form the noble Merrimack, which, in its +useful flow to the sea, turns so many New England mill-wheels. The +Pemigewasset and its branches drain the southern slopes of the +Franconia ranges in a vast primeval forest, whose inner solitudes are +rarely explored. Upon its eastern verge, far up on the southwestern +slope of Mount Willey, is Ethan's Pond, said to be the most elevated +source of the Merrimack, twenty-five hundred feet above the sea. Its +most remote source is the Profile Lake, at the head of the +Pemigewasset, over which the "Great Stone Face" mounts guard. Thus +writes Thoreau of the Merrimack: + +"At first it comes on, murmuring to itself, by the base of stately and +retired mountains, through moist, primitive woods, whose juices it +receives, where the bear still drinks it and the cabins of settlers +are far between, and there are few to cross its stream; enjoying in +solitude its cascades still unknown to fame; by long ranges of +mountains of Sandwich and of Squam, slumbering like tumuli of Titans, +with the peaks of Moosilauke, the Haystacks and Kearsarge reflected in +its waters; where the maple and the raspberry, those lovers of the +hills, flourish amid temperate dews; flowing long and full of meaning, +but untranslatable as its name, Pemigewasset, by many a pastured +Pelion and Ossa, where unnamed muses haunt, tended by Oreades, Dryads +and Nereids, and receiving the tribute of many an untasted Hippocrene: + + "'Such water do the gods distil, + And pour down every hill, + For their New England men. + A draught of this will nectar bring, + And I'll not taste the spring + Of Helicon again.' + +"Where it meets the sea is Plum Island, its sand ridges scalloping +along the horizon like the sea-serpent, and its distant outline broken +by many a tall ship, leaning, still, against the sky. Standing at its +mouth, looking up its sparkling stream to its source,--a silver +cascade which falls all the way from the White Mountains to the +sea,--and behold a city on each successive plateau, a busy colony of +human beavers around every fall. Not to mention Newburyport and +Haverhill, see Lawrence and Lowell, and Nashua and Manchester and +Concord, gleaming one above the other." + + +THE WHITE MOUNTAIN NOTCH. + +The most remarkable pass in this attractive mountain district is the +great White Mountain Notch, through the heart of the range. The +valley of the Ammonoosuc, farther ascended from Bethlehem Junction, +soon becomes an enormous chasm, cut deeply down, and sweeping grandly +around from the south towards the east, disclosing in magnificent +array the splendid galaxy of Presidential Peaks as it is carved along +their western bases. This Notch is formed by the headwaters of the +Ammonoosuc rising among the foothills of Mount Washington, flowing out +towards the west, and by the Saco River, flowing southeast to the +Atlantic. The Maine Central Railway avails of this remarkable pass to +get through the White Mountains, and bring the traffic of northwestern +New England and Canada down to the sea. To the northward arises the +Owl's Head, around which this railway circles after emerging from the +western portal of the Notch, and on the northern flanks of this +mountain are the head-streams of Israel River, over beyond which is +Mount Starr King. Here is Jefferson, another gathering of hotels and +cottages, enjoying one of the finest views of the White Mountain +range, a popular resort, from which there are grand drives around the +northern side of the Presidential range, seventeen miles eastward to +Gorham on the Androscoggin. It was on this route that the famous view +of these mountains was painted by George L. Brown--the "Crown of New +England," owned by the Prince of Wales. Jefferson Hill has been +described by Starr King as "the _ultima thule_ of grandeur in an +artist's pilgrimage among the New Hampshire mountains." Seven miles +northwest, down the Israel River, is Lancaster, with nearly four +thousand people, another favorite resort, though with more distant +mountain views. + +Where the Ammonoosuc, now become so small, curves around from the east +towards the south at the western portal of the Notch, is Fabyan's, and +here are located some of the great hotels of the district, right in +front of Mount Washington. Between Fabyan's and Crawford's, four miles +southward, the Presidential Range is the eastern border of the Notch +and is passed in grand review. The headspring of the Ammonoosuc is on +the slope of the mountain alongside Crawford's, where the floor of the +valley is at its highest elevation, nineteen hundred feet above the +sea and three hundred and thirty feet above Fabyan's. Higher than this +the massive walls of the Notch rise some two thousand feet farther, +and then slope backward up to the mountain summits, which are much +higher, but invisible from the bottom of the valley. In front of +Crawford's, where there is a rather broader space, one looks southward +at the little oval lake which is the source of Saco River. Just beyond +is the "Gate of the Notch," where the rocky projections of the huge +mountains on either hand come out and almost close the passage, +leaving an opening of only a few feet width for the diminutive Saco, +here a mere rill, to start on its career, soon becoming a vigorous +mountain torrent, leaping and bounding down the canyon. Upon the left +hand of the stream the rocks have been cut out to give the wagon-road +room, and on the right hand the railroad has hewn its route through +the granite, the three being closely compressed between the high +cliffs towering above. The Elephant's Head, formed of dark rocks, with +trunk and eye well fashioned, looks down upon this "Gate," and just +beyond, another cliff presents the semblance of an Indian papoose +clinging to its mother's back. The little Saco soon cuts the Notch +deeply down, such is its steep descent, so that in a short distance it +becomes a vast ravine. Thus, with the railway high up on a gallery +upon the mountain side, and the road deep down by the Saco, the ravine +is cleft between Mounts Webster and Willard, the latter, as the chasm +bends, falling sharply off, a tremendous precipice of steep and bare +rock, when Mount Willey appears beyond. Thus the Notch deepens and +broadens, becoming an enormous chasm, with the rapid river down in the +bottom, constantly increasing in volume. The Saco is said to have been +thus named by the Indians because of the mass of water it brings down, +the word meaning "pouring out." + +About three miles below the "Gate," the Notch broadens into a sort of +basin enclosed by the bare walls of Mount Willard to the westward and +Mount Willey to the south, curving around the long crescent-shaped +slope of Mount Webster, which makes the northern border. Here is the +Willey House, the scene of the Willey Slide, the great tragedy of the +Notch, a small and antiquated inn, now adjoined by a modern hotel. In +August, 1826, there was a terrific landslide down the slope of Mount +Willey behind the old house, then kept by Samuel Willey, from whom the +mountain was afterwards named. A heavy storm after a long drouth had +made a flood in the Saco, and Willey, fearing an overflow, deserted +his house in the night, with his family of nine persons, to seek +higher ground. Suddenly the slide came down the mountain and the +flight was fatal, the avalanche of rocks and dirt overwhelming them +all, while a convenient boulder behind the house so deviated it that, +although almost covered with rubbish, the building was uninjured. A +traveller who afterwards came through the Notch found the half-buried +inn deserted, with the doors open, the supper-table spread, and a +Bible lying open upon it, with a pair of spectacles on the page, +evidently just as they had been left in the sudden flight. Owing to +the bend in the Notch there is an unrivalled view down it from the +summit of Mount Willard, which thus stands practically at the head of +the deep pass. The southern face of this mountain is a vast and almost +perpendicular precipice, out on the brow of which the observer stands +to look down the deep valley stretching far away, and enclosed +between mountains rising nearly two thousand feet above him on either +hand, so that the view has a singular individuality, as if one were +looking at it through a camera. The depth of the gorge and the +precipitous front of the mountain make the Notch a tremendous gulf. +The deeply concave chasm is scooped out like an immense cylinder, +having the inside covered with dense green foliage, and grandly +bending around to the left until lost afar off behind the distant +projecting slope of Mount Webster. The railroad stretches, a streak of +brown, along the right-hand wall of the valley, twisting in and out +about the promontories. Down in the bottom the thick forest hides the +wagon-road and the bed of the Saco until they come out in a flat +cleared green spot in front of the Willey House. The towering mountain +slopes are scratched and scarred where slides have come down, and two +or three bright little ribbons of white water are suspended on their +sides, making cascades that help fill the river beneath. Beyond the +outlet of the Notch, the eastern background is a vast sea of mountain +ranges and billowy peaks, having the bold, white, pyramidal crown of +proud Chocorua rising behind them. This splendid scene, regarded by +many as the finest in the White Mountains, had a peculiar charm for +Anthony Trollope on his American visit. He did not usually view +America with favor, but he emphatically wrote: "Much of this scenery, +I say, is superior to the famed and classic lands of Europe," adding +"I know nothing, for instance, on the Rhine equal to the view from +Mount Willard and the mountain Pass called the Notch." Most +experienced observers are convinced that as an impressive exhibition +of a deep mountain canyon with an enchanting background, this is not +surpassed in Switzerland. + + +MOUNT WASHINGTON. + +The Fabyan House, in front of Mount Washington, stands upon the +location of the "Giant's Grave," which was an elongated mound of sand +and gravel formed by the waves of an ancient lake, reacting from the +adjacent mountain slopes, and rising about fifty feet. Being high, +long and wide, it was just the place for a house. The tradition is +that once a fierce-looking Indian stood upon this mound at night, +waving a flaming torch and shouting "No paleface shall take root here; +this the Great Spirit whispered in my ear." The successive burnings of +hotels on this site would seem to indicate this as prophetic, and in +fact no hotel did stand there any length of time until the projectors +of the present large building, after the last one was burnt, as if to +avoid fate, had the mound making the "Giant's Grave" levelled and +obliterated. Here was built the earliest inn of the White Mountains in +1803 by a sawmill owner on the Ammonoosuc River, named Crawford. His +grandson, Ethan Allen Crawford, the famous "White Mountain Giant," was +the noted guide who made the first path to ascend Mount Washington +and built the first house on its summit. Now, the mountain is ascended +from this western side by an inclined-plane railway, reached by an +ordinary railway extending from Fabyan's five miles across to the base +of the mountain. The railway to the summit is about three miles long, +with an average gradient of thirteen hundred feet to the mile, the +maximum being thirteen and one-half inches in the yard. It is worked +by a cog-wheel locomotive acting upon a central cogged rail, and the +ascent is accomplished in about ninety minutes. It is an exhilarating +ride up the slope, for, as the car is elevated, the horizon of view +widens decidedly to the west and northwest, while the trees of the +forest get smaller and smaller, and their character changes. The +sugar-maples, yellow birches and mossy-trunked beeches, with an +occasional aspen or mountain ash, are gradually left behind in the +valley, being replaced on the higher slope by white pine and hemlock, +white birch, and dark spruces and firs hung with gray moss. These +gradually becoming smaller, soon the only trees left are a sort of +dwarf fir intertangled with moss. Then, rising above the limit of +trees, there is only a stunted arctic vegetation, and this permits a +grand and unobstructed view all around the western horizon. + +The route of the railway goes over and up various steep trestles, the +most startling of all being "Jacob's Ladder," elevated about thirty +feet and having the steepest gradient. Here is a perfect arctic +desolation, the surface being broken blocks and rough stones of schist +and granite, cracked, honeycombed and moss-grown, having endured the +storms and frosts of centuries. There is a little vegetation where it +may get root, the reindeer-moss, saxifrage clumps and sandwort of +dreary Labrador or Greenland. The view covers a wide expanse far away +westward to the Green Mountains, the landscape being everywhere dark +forests and peaks, with the massive slopes of Mount Clay nearer to the +northward, and the whole Presidential range, Mounts Jefferson, Adams +and Madison, stretching beyond. As one looks over the vast, dark, +undulating wilderness of peaks, it can be realized how the flood of +emotion made an entranced observer exclaim, in the hearing of Mr. +Starr King, "See the tumultuous bombast of the landscape." Nearing the +summit, the railway gradient is less steep, and here an opportunity is +given to peer over the edge of the "Great Gulf," a profound abyss on +the eastern mountain slope between Washington, Clay and Jefferson. +This hollow gulf, its sides and bottom covered with dark trees, +relieved by a little glistening pond at the bottom, stretches out to +the narrow valley along the eastern base of the range, known as the +Glen, down into which one can look at an angle of about forty-five +degrees. Rounding the mountain summit, the train halts at a broad +platform in front of the Summit Hotel. + +The top of Mount Washington is the highest elevation in the United +States east of the Rockies and north of the Carolinas. It is what may +be described as an arctic island, elevated sixty-two hundred and +ninety feet, in the temperate zone, and displaying both arctic +vegetation and temperature, the flora and climate being alike that of +Greenland. An observatory gives a higher view over the tops of the +buildings, and the first great impression of it is that the view seems +to be all around the world, limited only by the horizon. In every +direction are oceans of billowy peaks, the whole enormous circuit of +almost a thousand miles, embracing New England, New York, Canada and +the sea. The grand scene is at the same time gloomy. The almost +universal forests overspread everything with a mournful pall of sombre +green. The summit is spacious, and the contour of the mountain can on +all sides be plainly seen. Its slope to the westward, like all of the +Presidential range, is steeper than to the eastward, down which a +wagon-road zigzags into the Glen. Upon the eastern side, two long +spurs seem to brace the mountain, though profound ravines are there +cut into it. The southern slope of the summit pitches off suddenly, +while to the north there is a more gradual descent, both the railway +and wagon-road approaching that way. The original Tip-Top House, the +first inn erected, is preserved as a curiosity, a low and damp +structure built of the rough stones gathered on the mountain. The +newer hotel is of wood, with a steep roof, and is chained down to the +rocks to prevent the gales from blowing it over. There is a +weather-signal station at the summit, one of the most important posts +in the country. + + +THE GRAND MOUNTAIN VIEW. + +The Indians always held the White Mountains in reverent awe. They were +the religious shrine of the Pennacooks, who roamed over the region +between the mountains and the sea. The early historian Josselyn in the +seventeenth century recorded, of these Indians: "Ask them whither they +go when they dye; they will tell you, pointing with their finger, to +Heaven, beyond the White Mountains." Passaconaway, the great +wizard-chief of the Pennacooks, who was finally converted to +Christianity by the Apostle Eliot, is said to have lived to the great +age of one hundred and twenty years, and then to have been translated. +The Pennacook tradition was that in the cold of mid-winter he was +carried away from them in a weird sleigh drawn by wolves, that took +him to the summit of Mount Washington, whence he was straightway +received into Heaven: + + "Far o'er Winnepiseogee's ice, + With brindled wolves all harnessed then and there, + High seated on a sledge made in a trice + On Mount Agiochook of hickory, + He lashed and reeled and sang right jollily, + + And once upon a car of flaming fire, + The dreadful Indian shook with fear to see + The King of Pennacook, his chief, his sire, + Ride flaming up to Heaven, than any mountain higher." + +The first house on the mountain, built by Ethan Allen Crawford in +1821, was a small stone cabin having the floor covered with moss for +bedding, the only furniture being a chest to contain blankets, and a +stove; a roll of sheet-lead serving as the "register," on which the +guests scratched their names and the date of visit. This cabin was +swept away by a terrific storm in August, 1826. Some time later an +eccentric individual took possession of the summit, naming it "Trinity +Height," and called himself the modern "Israel of Jerusalem," +proposing to inaugurate in this exalted place a new Order, styled "The +Christian or Purple and Royal Democracy." With an eye to business, he +put toll-gates on the bridlepaths and taxed each visitor a dollar. +There were bitter quarrels about the ownership for years afterwards, +and the first winter ascent was made by a sheriff, who went up to +serve a writ in 1858, and found frost over a foot thick enveloping +everything. The lawsuits, however, were ultimately fought out and +settled, and the present owners have been undisturbed for years. + +The view from the summit is widespread. The most distant objects that +have been recognized are Mount Beloeil, northwest in Canada, and +Mount Ebeeme, northeast beyond the Moosehead Lake in Maine, each one +hundred and thirty-five miles away. These distant mountain tops are +said to be brought into view only by the aid of atmospheric +refraction, in raising them, as they are actually below the horizon. +Also northeast is Mount Abraham, sixty-eight miles away; and were it +not for this, Maine's greatest mountain, Katahdin, in the wilderness +of the upper Penobscot, might be seen, but Abraham obstructs the view. +Katahdin, rising nearly fifty-four hundred feet, is one hundred and +sixty-five miles northeast. Saddleback, at the head of the Rangeley +Lakes, is seen sixty miles away, and Bald Mountain, to the right, one +hundred miles off in Maine. To the eastward is seen Mount Megunticook, +in the Camden range, on Penobscot Bay, one hundred and fifteen miles +off. To the east and southeast for many miles is the ocean between +Casco Bay and Cape Ann. The sea, however, is never well viewed from +Mount Washington, because it is so nearly the color of the sky at the +horizon as to be difficult of acute discernment. The moving vessels, +however, can be readily seen by the aid of a glass. The bright waters +of Sebago Lake are to the southeast, and beyond are the shores of +Casco Bay and the city of Portland, sixty-seven miles off. The low +round swell of Mount Agamenticus shows faintly above the horizon, +seventy-nine miles south-southeast, and to the right there is also a +faint trace of the Isles of Shoals, ninety-six miles off. To the +southeast, twenty-two miles, is the sharpest and noblest peak of all +in the galaxy of view, the high, white, pyramidal top of Chocorua, +having the broad island-studded Lake Winnepesaukee to the right, with +the distant double peak of Mount Belknap seen over its clear waters. +Just to the west of south, and one hundred and four miles distant, is +the faint rounded summit of Mount Monadnock, near the southwest corner +of New Hampshire, and nearer is Mount Kearsarge, seventy miles off, +and appearing much similar. The Nelson Pinnacle, farther away, is to +the right of Kearsarge. The most distant mountain discernible in that +direction is Mount Wachusett, one hundred and twenty-six miles off. To +the southwest are seen Ascutney and the twin Killington Peaks, near +Rutland, Vermont, eighty-eight miles away. To the west are seen +plainly the two Green Mountain peaks of Mansfield and the Camel's +Hump, seventy-eight miles off, and over the northern slope of the +latter can be faintly detected the great Adirondack Mount Whiteface, +one hundred and thirty miles distant. Such is the splendid circuit of +mountains forming the horizon for Mount Washington. Among the striking +objects in the view are the deep river valleys as they go out from the +Presidential range. The Peabody flows through the Glen north to the +Androscoggin, which can be traced far northeast. The Ellis flows south +to the Saco, which goes out through the Notch and away southeast. The +valley of the Ammonoosuc runs off westward, where along the horizon is +the great trough of the Connecticut Valley stretching all across the +scene. Lakes and ponds are studded among the dark summits, and at the +observer's feet are the springs feeding many great rivers of New +England, the Merrimack, to the southward, also having its sources in +this great wilderness of mountains, which on all sides sends out +babbling brooks and silvery cataracts to bear their waters down to old +ocean. + + +THE GLEN AND NORTH CONWAY. + +The wagon-road from Mount Washington summit down to the base, is on +the eastern side, and is a little more than eight miles long, with an +average gradient of one to eight, descending into the Glen and +displaying magnificent views. The descent occupies about one hour, and +the ascent five hours. On the southeastern side of the mountain is +Tuckerman's Ravine, a huge gorge enclosed by rocky walls a thousand +feet high. This ravine usually displays the "Snow Arch" until late in +August, formed by a stream flowing out from under the huge masses of +snow piled up in winter, until it gradually melts away and collapses. +The main Glen is formed by the deep and thickly-wooded Pinkham Notch +at the eastern base of Mount Washington, its floor being at two +thousand feet elevation, and this Notch continues north and south in +deeply-carved stream beds, the Peabody River flowing northward to the +Androscoggin at Gorham and the Ellis River southward to the Saco. The +Peabody descends rapidly to the Androscoggin, entering it at about +eight hundred feet elevation, the active town of Gorham being located +here in a beautiful situation, and having two thousand people, at the +northern gateway to the White Mountains. The Androscoggin, having +drained the eastern mountain slopes, flows away into the State of +Maine to seek the Kennebec, and thence the sea. In the Glen, in the +coaching days, the old Glen House was the headquarters at the foot of +the road down Mount Washington, but it was burnt in 1894, and has not +been rebuilt. To the eastward, bounding the Glen, rise the Wild Cat +Ridge and the impressive Carter Dome, which would be a grand mountain +elsewhere, but here is dwarfed by the overshadowing Presidential range +on the western side. From the Pinkham Notch the little Ellis River +goes southward, and below the outlet of Tuckerman's Ravine is the +beautiful Crystal Cascade, where it pours down eighty feet over +successive step-like terraces. Another lovely cataract it makes is the +Glen Ellis Fall, which is considered the finest in the White +Mountains, on the slope of the Wild Cat Ridge. The stream slides down +an inclined plane of twenty feet over ledges, and then falls seventy +feet through a deep groove, twisted by bulges in the rocks and making +almost a complete turn. Thus sliding, foaming and falling, the +stream leaps nearly a hundred feet into a dark green pool beneath. The +Glen broadens as it progresses southward, and soon becomes a widened +intervale, having many houses for summer boarders. + + [Illustration: _Log Bridge over the Wild Cat, near Jackson, N. H._] + +Here is the pleasant village of Jackson in a broad basin, surrounded +by low mountains, making splendid views in all directions. There are +the Tin, Iron, Thorn and Moat Mountains, with others, the intervale +being almost covered with hotels, boarding-houses, and the accessories +of a popular summer resort, and having pretty cottages perched on the +hill-slopes all about. This pleasant resting-place was originally +called New Madbury, but at the opening of the nineteenth century it +was named in honor of President John Adams. It continued contentedly +as Adams until his son John Quincy became President, and in 1828, when +politics ran high and John Quincy Adams was again a candidate, it +happened that all the votes in the town of Adams but one were given to +his competitor, Andrew Jackson, who was elected, whereupon the town +changed its name to Jackson. Since then it has had a quiet history +excepting once, when, in 1875, they were building the railroad through +the White Mountain Notch, and the bears, scared by the powder-blasts +of the builders, came in droves to Jackson and almost captured the +town from the frightened inhabitants. Just beyond Jackson, in Lower +Bartlett, the Ellis flows into the Saco in a magnificent environment, +the Ellis and the Eastern Branch from the Carter range coming in +together, and making the Saco a great river. This is another paradise +for the seeker after the picturesque. From the little church of the +village, looking down over the Saco intervales, when flooded with +sunset light, gives a most fascinating view. An enraptured visitor has +written of this landscape seen from the church door: "One might +believe that he was looking through an air that had never enwrapped +any sin, upon a floor of some nook of the primitive Eden." Bartlett +was named in honor of Josiah Bartlett, a signer of the Declaration of +Independence, and its pioneer settler, John Poindexter, came eighty +miles on foot through the wilderness from Portsmouth, dragging his few +household effects on a hand-sled, his wife riding an old horse, with +the feather-bed for a saddle, and carrying the baby in her arms. + +The Saco Valley broadens below, and Intervale, another summer village, +is passed, and then North Conway, one of the most popular of the White +Mountain resorts. It spreads along a low sloping terrace on the +eastern verge of the widening valley, and looks out upon the river +with the elongated and massive ridge of Moat Mountain grandly rising +beyond. The town is largely built along a pleasant tree-bordered +street, having the Presidential range spread in magnificent array to +the northwest, sixteen miles away. To the southward the valley opens +over long stretches of fertile lowlands until the Saco turns sharply +to the eastward, seeking the sea. To the northward, the immediate +guardian of the valley is Mount Kearsarge, sometimes called Pequawket, +rising thirty-three hundred feet. Kearsarge means the "pointed pine +mountain," and its name was given the famous warship which fought and +sunk the privateer "Alabama." It is the beauty of the surroundings +which gives North Conway its charm, and the valley is called the +"Arcadia of the White Hills," where the harshness of the granite +ramparts beyond are in strange contrast with the genial repose of +these meadows, and the delicate curves of the long, swelling hills. +The restfulness of the scene is its attraction, everything +contributing to its serenity; even distant Mount Washington is said to +"not seem so much to stand up as to lie out at ease across the north; +the leonine grandeur is there, but it is the lion, not erect, but +couchant, a little sleepy, stretching out his paws and enjoying the +sun." Proud Chocorua, which is not far away, is also said to even +appear "a little tired," as seen from North Conway, and as if looking +wistfully down into + + "A land + In which it seemed always afternoon." + +These Conway intervales of the Saco were the Indian valley of +Pequawket, and its people have long been known as the Pigwackets. An +Indian village first occupied the site of North Conway, gradually +giving place to the rude huts of the colonists. It progressed greatly +by the trade through the mountain district, before the advent of the +railway, and was the chief stage-coach headquarters in those days. Now +it is quiet and restful, the excitements of the coaching times being +gone. Three miles below, the magnificent valley makes its grand bend +to the eastward, and the swelling Saco flows out through the State of +Maine and to the sea at the twin towns of Saco and Biddeford. + + +LAKE WINNEPESAUKEE. + +The southern verge of the White Mountains has many lower peaks and +ridges, including the Ossipee and Sandwich ranges, and finally they +all run off into the serrated shores of the extensive and beautiful +Lake Winnepesaukee, cut by long, sloping promontories and abounding in +islands. Thirteen miles southward from North Conway, near Madison, is +the largest erratic boulder of granite known to exist, which was +brought down and dropped there by the great glacier and is estimated +to weigh eight thousand tons. It is seventy-five feet long, forty +wide, and from thirty to thirty-seven feet high. Lake Winnepesaukee +washes all the southeastern flanks of the mountain region, and has +many peaks in grand array around its northern borders. The Indians +were so impressed with the attractive scenery of the lake that they +gave it the poetical name, meaning "the Smile of the Great Spirit." +The Sandwich Mountains are spread across its northern horizon, +showing the rocky summit of Mount Tecumseh, rising over four thousand +feet; Tripyramid and its great "Slide," marked along its face, where a +vast mass of rocks and forest went down the slope in the rainy season +of 1869, moving over a distance of two miles and falling twenty-one +hundred feet; the broad, rounded summit of the Sandwich "Dome;" the +sharp peak of Whiteface, also scratched by a wide landslide on its +southern slope; the lofty top of Passaconaway, rising forty-two +hundred feet; and the proud apex of Chocorua, regarded as the most +picturesque of all these mountains. Its much-admired peaks do not rise +as high as some of the others, thirty-five hundred feet, but are built +of a brilliant crystalline labradorite, called Chocorua granite, +presenting a striking appearance, and being entirely denuded of trees. +Chocorua was an Indian prophet of the Pequawkets, whose family was +slain by the whites, and he took a terrible revenge. A reward was +offered for his scalp, and his pursuers followed him to the mountain +top and shot him down. When dying, he invoked the curses of the Great +Spirit upon them, and the mountain now bears his sonorous name. For +years afterwards the curses came true; pestilence raged in the +adjacent valleys, cattle could not be kept, for they all died, and the +people submitted humbly to the affliction, believing it to be the +realization of the Indian's imprecation. But one day a scientific +fellow wandered that way, and being of an investigating turn, he soon +found the sickness was due to muriate of lime in the water. After that +discovery the Indian's curse went for naught. Now the whole country +roundabout is healthy, and filled with the balsamic atmosphere which +invigorates the admiring thousands who come to see the noble mountain. +Thus sings Whittier of it in _Among the Hills_, after a storm: + + "Through Sandwich Notch the west wind sang + Good morrow to the cotter; + And once again Chocorua's horn + Of shadow pierced the water. + + "Above his broad Lake Ossipee, + Once more the sunshine wearing, + Stooped, tracing on that silver shield + His grim armorial bearing. + + "For health comes sparkling in the streams + From cool Chocorua stealing: + There's iron in our northern winds; + Our pines are trees of healing." + +Lake Winnepesaukee, thus magnificently outstretched in front of these +lofty hills, is twenty-five miles long and in the centre about seven +miles wide, covering a surface, exclusive of its many islands, of +seventy square miles. It has wonderfully transparent water, being fed +by springs, and its outline is very irregular, pierced by deep, +elongated bays, and having broad peninsulas or necks of land +stretching far out from the mainland. The shores are composed mostly +of rocks, myriads of boulders being piled up along the water's edge as +if for a wall, making an attractive rocky border with the foliage +growing out of it. An archipelago of islands of all sizes and +characters is dotted over the lake, there being two hundred and +seventy-four of them, several having inhabitants. These are what Starr +King calls "the fleet of islands that ride at anchor on its +bosom--from little shallops to grand three-deckers." This attractive +lake is the storage-reservoir for the many mills on the Merrimack, +keeping their water-supply equable throughout the year by a dam at the +Weirs, the western outlet, raising the surface six feet and making its +level about five hundred feet above the sea. The railroads approach +the lake both at the Weirs and at Wolfboro' on the eastern verge, and +steamboats take the people over the lake to the various settlements on +its shores. Wolfboro' was named after the British General Wolfe who +fell on the Plains of Abraham, and is the largest town on the lake, +having three thousand people. It has a beautiful outlook over the +water from the adjacent high hills of Copple Crown and Tumble-Down +Dick, the latter getting its name from an unfortunate blind horse +"Dick," who once fell over a cliff on its side. + +The steamboat journey upon the lake discloses its beauties, the gentle +tree-clad shores with higher hills and mountains behind them, the many +pleasant cottages, and the wonderfully clear green waters. It is a +curious place, all arms and bays and great protruding necks of land, +the open spaces dotted with islands, so that everywhere there are long +vista views across the water and far up into the inlets of the shores, +while the large double peak of Mount Belknap stands up massive and +impressive at the southwestern border, and opposite in the northeast +is the proud white summit of Chocorua. Edward Everett, speaking of his +extensive travels in Europe, says, "My eye has yet to rest on a +lovelier scene than that which smiles around you as you sail from +Weirs Landing to Centre Harbor." The Weirs Landing is at the head of a +deep bay made by the outlet stream, and is a popular summer +camping-ground, the edge of the water fringed with cottages and the +adjacent groves used by the camps. Many fish ascended the outlet +stream in the early times seeking the clear waters, and the shallows +at the outlet were availed of by the Indians to set their nets, so +that it naturally got the name of the Weirs. Here, adjoining the +shore, is the ancient "Endicott Rock," which was marked by the first +surveyors sent up by Governor Endicott of Massachusetts to find the +source of the Merrimack. The outlet stream goes through a region of +many ponds and lakes bordered by large icehouses, the chief of these +waters being Lake Winnisquam, and all these extensive reservoirs help +to supply the great river of mill-wheels. The longest fiord indented +in the southern shore of Winnepesaukee is narrow and five miles long, +called Alton Bay, and it has a most attractive environment, with Mount +Belknap rising to the westward twenty-four hundred feet high. + +Upon the northern shore, grandly encircled by the Sandwich Mountains, +the most extensive bay running up into the land is Centre Harbor, and +here is a popular place of summer sojourn. Its background is a grand +mountain amphitheatre from Red Hill to the westward around to the dark +Ossipee range to the east, while in front, over the lake, is one of +the most charming views in nature, with its many islands, long arms, +deep bays, and strangely protruding elongated necks of wooded land. +Thus the delicious water scene stretches for over twenty miles away, +having in the distance the twin peaks of Belknap and the long and wavy +summits of the attendant ridges nestling low and blue at the southern +horizon. Climbing to the top of Red Hill, rising over two thousand +feet, this magnificent view is got in a way which one charmed observer +says "defies competition, as it transcends description; it is the +perfection of earthly prospects." Whittier, who was passionately fond +of this whole region, after admiring it from Red Hill, wrote the noble +invocation: + + "O, watched by silence and the night, + And folded in the strong embrace + Of the great mountains, with the light + Of the sweet heavens upon thy face-- + + "Lake of the Northland! keep thy dower + Of beauty still, and while above + Thy silent mountains speak of power, + Be thou the mirror of God's love." + +Far over to the westward can be traced the outlet stream, flowing past +many lakes and seeking the great river where these pellucid waters do +such useful work. Thus has Whittier, from this mountain outlook, sung +of the Merrimack: + + "O child of that white-crested mountain whose springs + Gush forth in the shade of the cliff-eagle's wings, + Down whose slopes to the lowlands thy cold waters shine, + Leaping gray walls of rock, flashing through the dwarf pine. + + "From that cloud-curtained cradle, so cold and so lone, + From the arms of that wintry-locked mother of stone, + By hills hung with forests, through vales wide and free, + Thy mountain-born brightness glanced down to the sea." + + + + +GOING DOWN EAST. + + + + +XVIII. + +GOING DOWN EAST. + + Salisbury, Hampton and Rye Beaches -- Portsmouth -- Kittery + -- Newcastle Island -- Wentworth House -- Isles of Shoals + -- Appledore -- Star Island -- Pirates' Haunts -- Boon + Island -- Nottingham Wreck -- Agamenticus -- York Beach -- + Cape Neddick -- Wells -- Kennebunk River -- Saco River -- + Biddeford and Saco -- Old Orchard -- Scarborough -- Casco + Bay -- Portland -- Cape Elizabeth -- "Enterprise" and + "Boxer" Fight -- Sebago Lake -- Poland Springs -- + Androscoggin River -- Rumford Falls -- Livermore Falls -- + Lewiston Falls -- Brunswick -- Bowdoin College -- Merry + Meeting Bay -- Kennebec River -- Moosehead Lake -- Mount + Kineo -- Norridgewock -- Mogg Megone -- Father Rale -- + Skowhegan Falls -- Taconic Falls -- Waterville -- Augusta + -- Lumber and Ice -- Bath -- Sheepscott Bay -- Monhegan -- + Pemaquid -- Fort Frederick -- Wiscasset -- Penobscot River + -- Norumbega -- Sieur de Monts -- Acadia -- Pentagoet -- + Baron de Castine -- The Tarratines -- Muscongus -- Camden + Mountains -- Rockland -- Islesboro' -- Penobscot + Archipelago -- Belfast -- Bucksport -- Bangor -- Mount + Desert Island -- Bar Harbor -- Somes' Sound -- Fogs -- + Mount Desert Rock -- Passamaquoddy Bay -- Grand Manan -- + Quoddy Head -- Lubec -- Campobello -- Eastport -- St. Croix + River -- Calais and St. Stephen -- New Brunswick -- Bay of + Fundy -- High Tides -- St. John City -- Madame La Tour -- + River St. John -- The Reversible Cataract -- Grand Falls -- + Tobique River -- Pokiok River -- Frederickton -- + Maugerville -- Gagetown -- Kennebecasis Bay -- Digby Gut -- + Annapolis Basin -- Digby Wharf -- Yarmouth -- Annapolis + Royal -- Basin of Minas -- Land of Evangeline -- Grand Pré + -- Cape Blomidon -- The Acadian Removal -- Cape Split -- + Glooscap -- Chignecto Ship Railway -- Windsor -- Sam Slick + -- The Flying Bluenose -- Halifax -- Chebucto -- Seal + Island -- Tusket River -- Guysborough -- Cape Canso -- + Sable Island -- Truro -- Pictou -- Prince Edward Island -- + Charlottetown -- Summerside -- Canso Strait -- Cape Breton + Island -- The Arm of Gold -- Isle Madame -- St. Peter's + Inlet -- The Bras d'Or Lakes -- Baddeck -- Sydney -- + Spanish Bay -- Cape Breton -- English Port -- Louisbourg -- + The Great Acadian Fortress -- Its Two Surrenders -- Its + Destruction -- Magdalen Islands -- Gannet Rock -- Deadman's + Isle -- Tom Moore's Poem. + + +NEWBURYPORT TO PORTSMOUTH. + +We will start on a journey towards the rising sun, searching for the +elusive region known as "Down East." Most people recognize this as the +country beyond New York, but when they inquire for it among the +Connecticut Yankees they are always pointed onward. Likewise in +Boston, the true "Down East" is said to be farther along the coast. +Pass the granite headland of Cape Ann, and it is still beyond. Samuel +Adams Drake tells of asking the momentous question of a Maine +fisherman getting up his sail on the Penobscot: "Whither bound?" +Promptly came the reply: "Sir, to you--Down East." Thus the mythical +land is ever elusive, and finally gets away off among the "Blue Noses" +of the Canadian maritime provinces. We cross the Merrimack from +Newburyport in searching for it, and enter the New Hampshire coast +border town of Seabrook, where the people are known as the +"Algerines," and where salt-marshes, winding streams, forests and +rocks vary the view with long, sandy beaches out on the ocean front, +having hotels and cottages scattered along them. Here are noted +resorts--Salisbury Beach, Hampton Beach and Rye Beach--all crowded +with summer visitors. For over two centuries on a certain day in +August, the New Hampshire people have visited Salisbury Beach by +thousands, to keep up an ancient custom. Here Whittier pitched his +_Tent on the Beach_ he has so graphically described. It was at Hampton +village in 1737, that occurred the parley which resulted in giving the +infant colony of New Hampshire its narrow border of seacoast. +Massachusetts had settled this region, and that powerful province was +bound to possess it, though the King had made an adverse grant. Into +Hampton rode in great state the Governor of Massachusetts at the head +of his Legislature, and escorted by five troops of horse, formally +demanding possession of the maritime townships. He met the Governor of +New Hampshire in the George Tavern, and the demand was refused. The +latter sent a plaintive appeal to the King, declaring that "the vast, +opulent and overgrown province of Massachusetts was devouring the +poor, little, loyal, distressed province of New Hampshire." The royal +heart was touched and the King commanded Massachusetts to surrender +her claim to two tiers of townships, twenty-eight in number, thus +giving New Hampshire her present scant eighteen miles of coast-line. +Rye Beach is the most popular of these seashore resorts, and not far +beyond is Piscataqua River, the New Hampshire eastern boundary. + +Here is the quaint and quiet old town of Portsmouth, three miles from +the sea, and having about ten thousand people. Opposite, on +Continental Island, adjoining the Maine shore, is the Kittery Navy +Yard, where the warship "Kearsarge" was built. Commerce has about +surrendered to the superior attractions of a summer resort at +Portsmouth, and the comfortable old dwellings in their extensive +gardens show the wealth accumulated by bygone generations. To this +place originally came the "founder of New Hampshire," Captain Mason, +who had been the Governor of the Southsea Castle in Portsmouth harbor, +England, and at his suggestion, the settlement, originally called +Strawberry Bank, from the abundance of wild strawberries, was named +Portsmouth. The Piscataqua is formed above by the union of the Salmon +Falls and Cocheco Rivers, both admirable water-powers, serving large +factories, and the whole region adjacent to Portsmouth harbor is +bordered by islands and interlaced with waterways, some of them yet +displaying the remains of the colonial defensive forts. At Kittery +Point, near the Navy Yard, was born and is buried the greatest man of +colonial fame in that region, Sir William Pepperell, the famous leader +of the Puritan expedition that captured Louisbourg from the French in +1745. The noted "Mrs. Partington," B. P. Shillaber, was born in +Portsmouth in 1814. + +Adjoining the harbor, and with a broad beach facing the sea, is +Newcastle Island, incorporated for the annual fee of three +peppercorns, by King William III. and Queen Mary in the seventeenth +century. Here lived in semi-regal state the Wentworths, who were the +colonial governors, their memory now preserved by the vast modern +Wentworth Hotel, whose colossal proportions are visible far over land +and sea. The old Wentworth House at Little Harbor, wherein was held +the provincial court, still remains--an irregular, quaint but +picturesque building--its most noted occupant having been the courtly +and gouty old Governor Benning Wentworth, who named Bennington in +Vermont, and whose wedding on his sixtieth birthday has given +Longfellow one of his most striking themes, the "Poet's Tale" at _The +Wayside Inn_. The poet tells of the appearance one day in Queen +Street, Portsmouth, of Martha Hilton, + + "A little girl, + Barefooted, ragged, with neglected hair, + Eyes full of laughter, neck and shoulders bare, + A thin slip of a girl, like a new moon, + Sure to be rounded into beauty soon, + A creature men would worship and adore, + Though now, in mean habiliments, she bore + A pail of water, dripping, through the street, + And bathing, as she went, her naked feet." + +The buxom landlady at the inn, "Mistress Stavers in her furbelows," +felt called upon to give her sharp reproof: + + "'O Martha Hilton! Fie! how dare you go + About the town half-dressed, and looking so!' + At which the gypsy laughed, and straight replied: + 'No matter how I look; I yet shall ride + In my own chariot, ma'am.'" + +The old Governor was a widower and childless, and in course of time +Martha came to be employed at Wentworth House as maid-of-all-work, not +wholly unobserved by him, as the sequel proved. He arranged a feast +for his sixtieth birthday, and all the great people of the colony were +at his table. + + "When they had drunk the King, with many a cheer, + The Governor whispered in a servant's ear, + Who disappeared, and presently there stood + Within the room, in perfect womanhood, + A maiden, modest and yet self possessed, + Youthful and beautiful, and simply dressed. + Can this be Martha Hilton? It must be! + Yes, Martha Hilton, and no other she! + Dowered with the beauty of her twenty years, + How lady-like, how queen-like she appears; + The pale, thin crescent of the days gone by + Is Dian now in all her majesty! + Yet scarce a guest perceived that she was there + Until the Governor, rising from his chair, + Played slightly with his ruffles, then looked down, + And said unto the Reverend Arthur Brown: + 'This is my birthday; it shall likewise be + My wedding day; and you shall marry me!' + + "The listening guests were greatly mystified, + None more so than the rector, who replied: + 'Marry you? Yes, that were a pleasant task, + Your Excellency; but to whom? I ask.' + The Governor answered: 'To this lady here;' + And beckoned Martha Hilton to draw near. + She came, and stood, all blushes, at his side. + The rector paused. The impatient Governor cried: + 'This is the lady; do you hesitate? + Then I command you as chief magistrate.' + The rector read the service loud and clear: + 'Dearly beloved, we are gathered here,' + And so on to the end. At his command, + On the fourth finger of her fair left hand + The Governor placed the ring; and that was all: + Martha was Lady Wentworth of the Hall!" + + +THE ISLES OF SHOALS. + +Out in the Atlantic Ocean, six miles off the harbor entrance, and ten +miles from Portsmouth, is one of the strangest places existing, the +collection of crags and reefs known as the Isles of Shoals, their dim +and shadowy outline lying like a cloud along the edge of the horizon. +There are nine islands in the group, the chief being Appledore, rising +from the sea much like a hog's back, and hence the original name of +Hog Island. It covers about four hundred acres, and the whole group +does not have much over six hundred acres. Star Island is smaller; +Haley's or Smutty Nose, with Malaga and Cedar, are connected by a sort +of breakwater; and there are four little islets--Duck, White's, +Seavey's and Londoner's--and upon White Island is the lighthouse for +the group, with a revolving light of alternating red and white +flashes, elevated eighty-seven feet and visible fifteen miles at sea. +A covered way leads back over the crags from the tower to the +keeper's cottage. To this light there come answering signals from the +Whale's Back Light at the Piscataqua entrance, from solitary Boon +Island out at sea to the northward, and from the twin beacons of +Thatcher's Island off Cape Ann to the south. As darkness falls, one +after another these beacons blaze out as so many guiding stars across +the waters. One of the noted sayings of John Quincy Adams was that he +never saw these coast lights in the evening without recalling the +welcoming light which Columbus said he saw flashing from the shore, +when he discovered the New World. + + "I lit the lamps in the lighthouse tower, + For the sun dropped down and the day was dead; + They shone like a brilliant clustered flower, + Two golden and five red." + +The Isles of Shoals are a remarkable formation--rugged ledges of rock +out in the ocean bearing scarcely any vegetation; and on some of them +not a blade of grass is seen. Four islands stretching in a line make +the outside of the strange group--bare reefs, with water-worn, flinty +surfaces, against which the sea beats. Not a tree grew anywhere until +a little one was planted on Appledore, in front of the hotel, and +another dwarf was coaxed to grow in the little old graveyard on Star +Island. Their best vegetation was low huckleberry bushes, until +someone thought of gathering soil enough to make grass patches for a +cow or two. The utter desolation of these rocks, thus cast off +apparently from the rest of the world, can hardly be realized, yet +they have their admirers. Celia Thaxter, the poetess, was the daughter +of the White's Island lightkeeper, and to her glowing pen much of +their fame is due. She died on Appledore in 1894. The curious name of +these islands first appears in the log of their discoverer, Champlain, +who coasted along here in 1605. They were always prolific fishery +grounds, and the name seems to have been given them from "the shoaling +or schooling of the fish around them." In a deed from the Indians in +1629 they are called the Isles of Shoals. Captain John Smith visited +and described them in 1614, and with his customary audacity tried to +name them "Smith's Islands," but without success. The boundary-line +dividing Maine and New Hampshire passes through the group between Star +and Appledore. The peculiar grouping makes a good harbor between these +two, opening westward towards the mainland, and amply protected from +the sea by the smaller islands outside. These rugged crags resemble +the bald and rounded peaks of a sunken volcano thrust upward from the +sea, with this little harbor forming its crater. When Nathaniel +Hawthorne visited them, he wrote: "As much as anything else, it seems +as if some of the massive materials of the world remained superfluous +after the Creator had finished, and were carelessly thrown down here, +where the millionth part of them emerge from the sea, and in the +course of thousands of years have become partially bestrewn with a +little soil." Their savagery during violent storms, when surrounded by +surf and exposed to the ocean's wildest fury, becomes almost +overwhelming, and they actually seem to reel beneath the feet. + +Star Island originally had a village of fishermen, until they were +sent away to make room for the summer hotel. It was the town of +Gosport, and its little church and tiny bell-tower are visible from +afar over the water. The original church was built of timbers from the +wreck of a Spanish vessel in 1685, and the present little stone church +is as old as the nineteenth century. It had several faithful pastors, +who were buried on the island, among them Rev. John Brook, of whom the +quaint historian Cotton Mather tells the anecdote illustrating the +efficacy of prayer: A child lay sick and so nearly dead those present +believed it had actually expired, "but Mr. Brook, perceiving some life +in it, goes to prayer, and in his prayer used this expression: 'Lord, +wilt thou not grant some sign before we leave prayer that thou wilt +spare and heal this child? We cannot leave thee till we have it.' The +child sneezed immediately." On the highest part of Star Island is the +broken monument to John Smith, put up by some of his admirers not long +ago, bearing the three Moslem heads representing the Turks he had +slain, but vandals have ruined it. The diminutive fort defending Star +Island in colonial times has been abandoned more than a century, and +nestling beneath it is the old graveyard, part of the walls remaining, +and a few dilapidated gravestones. All the original inhabitants of the +island are dead, their descendants scattered, and fashionable +pleasuring now dominates this reef and its restless waters. + +As might be expected, a place like these islands was a favorite haunt +for pirates in the colonial days. Around them cruised Captain Kidd, +the notorious Blackbeard, and Hawkins, Phillips, Low, Ponad, and other +famous pirates, and in fact the ghost of one of Kidd's men is said to +still haunt Appledore. Many and bold were the gentry who in those days +hoisted the "Jolly Roger" flag, with its grinning skull and +cross-bones, and cruised in this picturesque region for glory and +plunder. It was near the route between Boston and the Provinces and to +Europe, and hence the valuable prey that allured them. Here sailed +Captain Teach of ferocious countenance, piercing black eyes and +enormous beard, who came to be familiarly known and feared as +"Blackbeard." He was said to be "in league with the Devil and the +Governor of North Carolina," and had an uncomfortable habit of firing +loaded pistols in the dark, without caring much who got hit. In fact, +it is recorded he once told his trusty crew he had to kill a man +occasionally merely to prove he was captain. He also kept a diary, +making characteristic entries, such as these: "Rum all out; our +company somewhat sober; rogues a-plotting; confusion among us; so I +looked for a prize." And this next day: "Took a prize with a great +deal of liquor on board; so kept the ship's company hot, and all went +well again." Blackbeard is supposed to have buried treasures on these +islands, and the fishermen tell how they have seen the ghost of his +mistress, gazing intently seaward, on a low, projecting point of White +Island, a tall and shapely figure wrapped in a long cloak. Blackbeard +ruled these waters until Lieutenant Maynard, with two armed sloops, +went after him, captured his ship, met him in single combat, and after +a hand-to-hand fight, in which both received fearful wounds, finally +pinned the pirate to the deck with his dagger, closing his interesting +career. + +Captain Kidd, who sailed in these parts, was not so ferocious as +Blackbeard. It is said that at first he always swore-in his crew on +the Bible, but afterwards finding this interfered with business, he +buried his Bible in the sand. Captain Low captured a fishing-smack off +these islands, but disappointed of booty, had the crew flogged, and +then gave each man the alternative of being hanged or of three times +vigorously cursing old Cotton Mather, which latter, it is recorded, +"all did with alacrity." It is probable this punishment was inflicted +by the pirate because it was the custom of the Puritan clergymen, +when pirates were condemned, to have them brought into church, and as +a proper preliminary to the hanging, preach long and powerful sermons +to them on the enormity of their crimes and the torments awaiting in +the next world. This same Captain Low is said to have once captured a +Virginia vessel, and was so pleased with her captain that he invited +him to share a bowl of punch. The Virginian, however, demurred, having +scruples about drinking with a pirate, whereupon Low presented a +cocked pistol to his ear and a glass of punch to his mouth, pleasantly +remarking: "Either take one or the other." The captain took punch. +Another rover of the seas, Phillips, captured the Dolphin, a +fishing-vessel, and made all her crew turn pirates. John Fillmore, one +of them, started a mutiny, killed Phillips, and took the Dolphin back +to Boston. His great-great-grandson was President Millard Fillmore. +There was also at one time a famous woman pirate in this region--Anne +Bonney, an Irish girl from Cork, who fell in love with Captain +Rockham, a pirate, who was afterwards captured and hanged. Before the +capture she fought bravely, and, as she expressed it, "was one of the +last men left upon the deck." There was much that was fascinating in +the desperate careers of the lawless buccaneers who swept the New +England coasts in the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. They +were for years masters of the ocean, and they even sent defiance to +the King himself: + + "Go tell the King of England, go tell him thus from me, + Though he reigns king o'er all the land, I will reign king at sea." + +All around the Isles of Shoals, when the sun sinks and twilight +comes-- + + "From the dim headlands many a lighthouse gleams, + The street lamps of the ocean." + +Far away to the northeast a single white star appears eleven miles +off, on the solitary rock of Boon Island, out in mid-ocean, where not +a pound of soil exists, excepting what has been carried there. One of +the worst wrecks of modern times occurred on this rock before the +lighthouse was built. The "Nottingham," from London, was driven +ashore, the crew with difficulty gaining the island when the ship +broke up. They had no food; day by day their sufferings from cold and +hunger increased; the mainland was in full view and they built a raft +of pieces of wreck to try and get there, but it was swamped; they +signalled passing vessels, but could not attract attention. Gradually +they sank into hopelessness, but thought to make a final effort by +constructing another rude raft, on which two of them tried to reach +the shore. It too was wrecked, being afterwards found on the beach +with a dead man alongside. Then hope entirely failed them, and to +sustain life they became cannibals, living on the body of the ship's +carpenter, sparingly doled out to them by the captain. Eventually the +survivors were rescued, the wrecked raft being their preserver. When +it was found, the people on shore started a search for the builders, +and they were discovered and taken off the island, after twenty-four +days of starvation. Then the lighthouse was built on Boon Island, and +its steady white star gleams in nightly warning: + + "Steadfast, serene, immovable, the same + Year after year, through all the silent night, + Burns on for evermore that quenchless flame, + Shines on that inextinguishable light! + + "A new Prometheus chained upon the rock, + Still grasping in his hand the fire of Jove, + It does not hear the cry nor heed the shock, + But hails the mariner with words of love. + + "'Sail on!' it says, 'sail on, ye stately ships! + And with your floating bridge the ocean span; + Be mine to guard this light from all eclipse; + Be yours to bring man nearer unto man!'" + + +MOUNT AGAMENTICUS TO OLD ORCHARD. + +Beyond the Piscataqua River is the famous "Pine-Tree State," noted for +its noble forests and its many splendid havens. This is Whittier's +"hundred-harbored Maine," and such are the sinuosities of its +remarkable coast, that while its whole distance from Kittery Point to +Quoddy Head is two hundred and seventy-eight miles, the actual length +of the shore-line stretches to twenty-five hundred miles, and if +straightened out would reach across the Atlantic. The great landmark +of this coast beyond Kittery, standing in gloomy isolation down by the +shore, is the "sailor's mountain," Agamenticus, rising six hundred and +seventy-three feet, a sentinel visible far out at sea. It is a +solitary eminence, lifted high above the surrounding country and +having three summits of almost equal altitude, the sides clothed with +dark forests. This graceful and imposing mountain gave James Russell +Lowell an attractive theme in his _Pictures from Appledore_: + + "He glowers there to the north of us, + Wrapt in his mantle of blue haze, + Unconvertibly savage, and scorns to take + The white man's baptism on his ways. + Him first on shore the coaster divines + Through the early gray, and sees him shake + The morning mist from his scalplock of pines; + Him first the skipper makes out in the west + Ere the earliest sunstreak shoots tremulous, + Plashing with orange the palpitant lines + Of mutable billow, crest after crest, + And murmurs 'Agamenticus!' + As if it were the name of a saint." + +Almost under the shadow of the mountain is the quiet old town of York, +the "ancient city of Agamenticus," founded by Sir Ferdinando Gorgues +in the early seventeenth century as Gorgeana, the place of first +settlement in Maine. Now it is a summer-resort, with York Beach +stretching along the coast, having Cape Neddick at its northern end +thrust out into the sea, with the curious rocky islet of the Nubble, +and surmounting lighthouse, off its extremity. Four miles beyond, +there projects the frowning promontory of the Bald Head Cliff and its +lofty Pulpit Rock, an almost perpendicular wall rising ninety feet, +with the breakers beating at its base. Farther along, the coast is a +succession of magnificent beaches all the way to Casco Bay, and the +broad road they furnish is the chief highway. Wells is a popular +summer resort, and beyond it the charming little Kennebunk River comes +down through the hills and woods and over falls, past Kennebunkport to +the sea. Then the broader Saco River is reached, its ample current +drawn from the White Mountains, plunging down a cataract of fifty-five +feet around which are gathered the mills of the twin towns of +Biddeford and Saco, having the river between them, and a population of +over twenty thousand. Their steeples rise above the trees, and one of +these, a French Catholic church in Biddeford, has little trees growing +out of its spire. Sawmills and cotton-mills largely use the ample +power of the Saco Falls. The beach fronting Saco gradually dissolves +into the noted Old Orchard Beach, stretching nearly ten miles to +Scarborough River, the finest beach in New England, over three hundred +feet wide and named from an apple orchard that once stood there, of +which the last ancient tree died before the Revolution. There are +numerous hotels and boarding-houses scattered along this broad beach, +and its people completed in 1898 one of the longest ocean piers +existing, which extends nearly two thousand feet into the sea. +Scarborough Beach is beyond, and around the broad end of Cape +Elizabeth is the entrance to Casco Bay, marked by the "Two Lights" on +the eastern extremity of the cape, these powerful white beacons being +about nine hundred feet apart. Almost under their shadow, in 1862, the +Allan Line steamer "Bohemian" was wrecked with fearful loss of life. +Within Casco Bay is an archipelago of over three hundred and fifty +islands, stretching eastward for twenty miles to the mouth of the +Kennebec. Many of these islands are favorite summer resorts, and their +surrounding waters are always haunts for yachts, the bay being an +admirable yachting ground. + + +PORTLAND. + +The city of Portland, with over forty thousand people, is the +metropolis of Maine and the winter port of Canada, which has to use it +when the river St. Lawrence is frozen. It is built upon an elevated +and hilly peninsula projecting eastwardly into Casco Bay, and having +commanding eminences at each extremity,--the western being Bramhall's +Hill and the eastern Munjoy's Hill,--spacious promenades having been +made around both for outlooks. The city being almost surrounded by +water, and the bold shores of the bay enclosing so many beautiful +tree-clad islands, there are magnificent views in every direction. +The streets are finely shaded, mostly with elms, so that it is often +called the "Forest City." This was the Indian land of Machigonne, to +which the English first came in 1632, and there yet remain some +stately trees of that time, which are among the charms of the pleasant +park of the Deering Oaks at the West End, from which State Street +leads into the best residential section, bordered by double rows of +elms, making a grand overarching bower. Here, in a circle at the +intersection of Congress Street, is an impressive bronze statue of +Longfellow, who was born in Portland in 1807, the poet sitting +meditatively in his chair. Among the other distinguished citizens have +been Commodore Edward Preble, Neal Dow, N. P. Willis, Mrs. Parton +(Fanny Fern) and Thomas B. Reed, who long represented Portland in +Congress. The city has an air of comfort, and its broad-fronted, +vine-covered homes look enticing. From its hills the outlook is +superb, particularly that from the Eastern Promenade encircling +Munjoy's Hill, where the view is over Casco Bay and its many arms and +forest-fringed rocky islands. On the eastern side, Falmouth Foreside +stretches out to the distant ocean, while the western shore is the +broad peninsula terminating in Cape Elizabeth. This hill has a +commanding prospect over one of the most bewitching scenes in +nature,--the island-studded Casco Bay, having the famous Cushing's +Island at the outer verge of the archipelago protecting most of the +harbor from the ocean waves. Upon other islands down the bay are three +old forts, two of them abandoned, while the flag floats over the more +modern works of Fort Preble. Portland was originally called Falmouth, +not receiving the present name till 1786. In a beautiful spot on +Munjoy's Hill is the monument to the founder, its inscription being +"George Cheeves, Founder of Portland, 1699." Upon this hill is the old +cemetery containing Preble's grave. He commanded the American squadron +in the war against Tripoli in 1803, and died in Portland in 1807. Also +in this cemetery rest alongside each other two noted naval officers of +the War of 1812-14 with England--Burrows and Blythe. They commanded +rival warships, the American "Enterprise" and the British "Boxer," +that fought on Sunday, September 5, 1814, off Pemaquid Point, near the +mouth of the Kennebec, the adjacent shores being covered with +spectators. The "Enterprise" captured the "Boxer" and brought her a +prize into Portland harbor. Both commanders were killed in the fight, +and their bodies were brought ashore, each wrapped in the flag he had +so bravely served, and the same honors were paid both in the double +funeral. Longfellow recalls this as one of the memories of his youth: + + "I remember the sea-fight far away, + How it thundered o'er the tide! + And the dead captains, as they lay + In their graves, o'erlooking the tranquil bay, + Where they in battle died." + + [Illustration: _House of "The Pearl of Orr's Island," Casco Bay, Me._] + + +THE ANDROSCOGGIN. + +Maine has more than fifteen hundred lakes, scattered everywhere +through its extensive forests. Seventeen miles northwest of Portland +is Sebago Lake, one of the most attractive, an islet-dotted expanse, +fourteen miles long and ten miles wide, its Indian name meaning "the +stretch of water." Into it flows the rapid and devious Songo River, +discharging Long Lake, a little over two miles distant, but the boat +journey on the river to that lake is for six miles and around +twenty-seven bends. Thirty-eight miles northwest of Portland is Poland +Springs, the chief inland watering-place of Maine, with pure air, the +finest waters and large hotels. To the northward the Androscoggin +River, flowing from the flanks of the White Mountains, sweeps +eastwardly across the State, and then turns southward to unite its +current with the Kennebec in Merry Meeting Bay. Not far from the New +Hampshire boundary it pours down the Rumford Falls, one of the finest +of cataracts, the river making three or four leaps over ragged, +granite ledges, aggregating one hundred and sixty feet descent, the +final fall being nearly seventy feet, making a great roaring, heard +for a long distance. Here is a town of textile and paper-mills, with +three thousand people. Having turned to the southward, the river comes +to the Livermore Falls, another manufacturing village on the Indian +domain of Rockomeka, or the "great corn land." Here were born the +famous brothers Israel, Elihu B. and Cadwalader C. Washburne, who were +so long in the public service, representing Maine, Illinois and +Wisconsin. A handsome Gothic public library built of granite has been +erected as their memorial. Farther along is Leeds, the birthplace of +General Oliver O. Howard, and then some distance below the river +plunges down the Lewiston Falls of fifty-two feet at the second city +in Maine, the towns of Auburn and Lewiston having twenty-five thousand +population, chiefly employed in the manufacture of textiles, there +being large numbers of French Canadians in the mills. Bates College, +with two hundred students, is one of the chief buildings of Lewiston. + +Eastward from Casco Bay to the Androscoggin is a rough wooded country +becoming, however, rather more level as the river is approached. The +Androscoggin having come down from the north, sweeps around to the +northeast to enter Merry Meeting Bay, and at the bend, about thirty +miles from Portland, is Brunswick, at the head of tidewater, with over +six thousand population, largely employed in its mills. The river +falls forty-one feet here in three separate cataracts, giving an +enormous water-power. This was the Indian Pejepscot, where the English +built Fort George in 1715, known as "the key of Western Maine." The +city is chiefly noted now as the seat of Bowdoin College, the chief +educational institution of Maine, incorporated in 1794, and opened in +1802 with an endowment by the State. It has nearly four hundred +students and attractive buildings, the most conspicuous one being +surmounted by twin spires, which are seen from afar in approaching the +town, rising above the trees with a thick growth of pines behind them. +This college had President Franklin Pierce, Hawthorne, Longfellow and +Chief Justice Fuller among its graduates, and Longfellow was its +professor of modern languages until 1835, when he was called to +Harvard. Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote _Uncle Tom's Cabin_ in Brunswick +in 1851-2, when her husband was in the Bowdoin College faculty. Pierre +Baudouin, a Huguenot refugee from La Rochelle, came to Portland in +1687; and his grandson, who was Governor of Massachusetts in 1785-6, +had his name given the college, the great-grandson, James Bowdoin 2nd, +the noted diplomatist, having been most liberal in his gifts to it. +Beyond Brunswick the Androscoggin broadens into Merry Meeting Bay, +which is finally absorbed by the Kennebec. + + +THE KENNEBEC. + +The Kennebec River, the Indian "large water place," is one of the +greatest streams of Maine, having its source in its largest lake, +Moosehead, surrounded by forests. This lake is at an elevation of over +a thousand feet, is thirty-five miles long, and has a surface of two +hundred and twenty square miles. The shores are generally monotonous, +excepting where the long peninsula of Mount Kineo is projected from +the eastern side so far into the lake as to narrow it to little more +than a mile width. Mount Kineo is nine hundred feet high, rising +abruptly on the south and east, but sloping gradually to the water on +the other sides. To the northeast, Spencer Mountain is seen rising +four thousand feet, with Katahdin, the Indian "greatest mountain," in +the distance. This magnificent summit, the highest in Maine, rises +nearly fifty-four hundred feet. All about Moosehead Lake and far to +the northward over the Canadian border is a vast forest wilderness, +full of lakes and streams, visited chiefly by the timber-cutters and +sportsmen, and one of the favorite hunting and angling regions of the +country. From the southwestern extremity of the lake the Kennebec +River flows out towards the sea, and in a winding course of a hundred +miles descends a thousand feet of rapids and cataracts, until it +reaches the tidal level at Augusta. It narrows at Solon to only forty +feet as it goes over the Carrituck Falls of twenty feet. Then it +passes Old Point and comes to Norridgewock, where several ancient elms +of enormous size border the street along the river bank. This is the +scene of Whittier's poem of _Mogg Megone_, and along here lived the +ancient Norridgewocks. At Old Point was their chief town, and as early +as 1610 French missionary priests sent out from Quebec settled among +them, the famous Jesuit, Sebastian Rale, coming about 1670 and living +there over forty years, being not only the spiritual but finally the +political head of the tribe. He was a man of high culture, and had +been professor of Greek at the College of Nismes, in France. The tribe +belonged to the Canabis branch of the Abenaquis nation, and he +prepared a complete dictionary of their language (now preserved in +Harvard University), which he described as "a powerful and flexible +language--the Greek of America." + +In the early eighteenth century wars broke out between these Indians +under the French flag and the Puritans of New England. It is said that +Father Rale had a superb consecrated banner floating before his +church, emblazoned with the cross, and a bow and sheaf of arrows. This +was often borne as a crusading flag against the Puritan border +villages. Norridgewock was destroyed by a sudden raid in 1705, and +peace following, an envoy was sent to Boston to demand an indemnity, +and also that workmen be sent to rebuild the church. Both were +promised on condition that they would accept a Puritan pastor, but +this was declined. The Indians rebuilt their village, and it was again +destroyed by a plundering raid in 1722, and in revenge they then made +a fearful ravaging expedition in which the Maine coast towns paid +dearly. The English seacoast colonists consequently decided that for +protection Norridgewock must be taken and the tribe driven away, a +price being set upon Rale's head. In August, 1724, a strong party of +New England rangers marched secretly and swiftly, and, before their +presence was known, had surrounded the village and began firing +through the wigwams. A few Indians escaped, but nearly the whole +tribe--men, women and children--were massacred. Charlevoix writes of +it that "the noise and tumult gave Père Rale notice of the danger his +converts were in, and he fearlessly showed himself to the enemy, +hoping to draw all their attention to himself, and to secure the +safety of his flock at the peril of his life. He was not disappointed. +As soon as he appeared the English set up a great shout, which was +followed by a shower of shot, when he fell dead near to the cross +which he had erected in the midst of the village. Seven chiefs, who +sheltered his body with their own, fell around him." His mutilated +body was afterwards found at the foot of the cross and buried there. +The place lay desolate for a half-century, when English settlers came +in 1773, and in 1833 a granite memorial obelisk was erected on the +site of the ancient church. Thus Whittier describes the tragedy: + + "Fearfully over the Jesuit's face, + Of a thousand thoughts, trace after trace, + Like swift cloud shadows, each other chase. + One instant, his fingers grasp his knife, + For a last vain struggle for cherished life,-- + The next, he hurls the blade away, + And kneels at his altar's foot to pray; + Over his beads his fingers stray, + And he kisses the cross, and calls aloud + On the Virgin and her Son; + For terrible thoughts his memory crowd + Of evils seen and done,-- + Of scalps brought home by his savage flock + From Casco and Sawga and Sagadahock + In the Church's service won. + + "Through the chapel's narrow doors, + And through each window in the walls, + Round the priest and warrior pours + The deadly shower of English balls. + Low on his cross the Jesuit falls: + While at his side the Norridgewock + With failing breath essays to mock + And menace yet the hated foe,-- + Shakes his scalp-trophies to and fro + Exultingly before their eyes,-- + Till cleft and torn by shot and blow, + Defiant still, he dies." + +The Kennebec, turning grandly to the eastward, five miles below pours +over the falls of Skowhegan, descending twenty-eight feet upon rough +ledges, having a picturesque island ending at the crest of the +cataract, with the stream beyond compressed within the high, rocky +walls of a canyon. Here are numerous factories and a population of six +thousand. Eighteen miles beyond, the river, having resumed its +southern course, tumbles down the Taconic Falls at Waterville, a town +of seven thousand people and extensive cotton-mills, also having the +Colby College of the Baptist Church where General Benjamin F. Butler +was a student. Farther down the Kennebec are the ruins of Fort +Halifax, near the confluence with Sebasticook River, draining various +lakes to the northeastward. This was one of the chain of forts built +in the middle eighteenth century to defend the Puritan coast towns +from French and Indian raids, and large Indian settlements formerly +occupied the broad intervales in the neighborhood. Twenty miles below +Waterville is Augusta, the Maine capital, situate at the head of +navigation, the city being beautifully located upon the high hills and +their slopes bordering the river. Just above the town is the great +Kennebec dam, built at an expense of $300,000 to make an admirable +water-power, and rising fifteen feet above high water. Here are over +ten thousand people, among whom lived for many years James G. Blaine, +who died in 1893. There are large textile factories giving employment +to the inhabitants, and the chief building is the State House, of +white granite, fronted by a Doric colonnade, standing upon a high hill +and surmounted by a graceful dome. Across the Kennebec is the fine +granite Insane Hospital in extensive ornamental grounds, while down by +the bank are the remains of Fort Western, built as a defensive outpost +in 1754, being then surrounded by palisaded outworks garnished with +towers. It was here that Benedict Arnold gathered his expedition +against Quebec in 1775, going up the Kennebec, crossing the border +wilderness and enduring the greatest hardships, before he appeared +like an apparition with his army of gaunt heroes under the walls of +that fortress. + +Below Augusta is the quiet town of Hallowell, and then Gardiner, and +beyond, the Kennebec spreads out in the broad expanse of Merry Meeting +Bay, where it receives the Androscoggin coming up from the southwest. +Along here are seen to perfection the two great crops of these +rivers--the lumber and the ice. The largest icehouses in existence +line the banks, and the prolific ice-crop of these pure waters, thus +gathered by the millions of tons, is shipped by sea from Gardiner and +Bath throughout the coast and over to Europe. The people seem to saw +logs all summer and cut ice all winter. The river next passes Bath, +formerly a great ship-building port, and still doing much work in the +construction of steel vessels, though the population has rather +decreased of late years. The town, with its front of shipyards and +kindred industries, fringes the western river-bank for two or three +miles, and on either hand the rocky shores slope steeply down to the +water. A clergyman from Salem bought this domain in 1660 from +Damarine, the old sachem of Sagadahoc, whom the whites called Robin +Hood, but the place did not grow much until after the Revolution, when +extensive shipbuilding began. It is about thirteen miles from the +sea, the Kennebec entering the Atlantic through Sheepscott Bay, an +irregular indentation of the coast studded with many attractive +islands. At Bath, more than anywhere else in New England, has been +practically realized Longfellow's invocation: + + "Build me straight, O worthy master! + Staunch and strong, a goodly vessel, + That shall laugh at all disaster, + And with wave and whirlwind wrestle!" + + +ANCIENT PEMAQUID. + +Eastward from the Kennebec the long peninsula of Pemaquid Point +stretches to the sea, between John's Bay and Muscongus Bay, and far +out beyond it, off the western entrance to Penobscot Bay, is Monhegan, +the most famous island on the New England coast. It is twelve miles +off the Point, and the surface rises into highlands. Monhegan appears +upon the earliest charts made by the first navigators, Champlain +naming it in 1604 and Weymouth coming there the next year to trade +with the Indians of Pemaquid before he ascended the great river, which +he said was called Norumbega, and about which there was long so much +mystery and wonder in Europe. Smith was there in 1614, it was +colonized in 1618, in 1621 it sent succor to the starving Pilgrims at +Plymouth, and in 1626 two proprietors bought the island for £50. It +had a stirring colonial history, and on account of its location its +grand flashing beacon-light is a landmark for the mariners coasting +along Maine or entering the Penobscot. Yet it has barely a hundred +people to-day, mostly fishermen, though its isolation has manifest +advantages, for it is said to have no public officials, and to be the +one place where there are no taxes. In fair sight of each other, over +the blue sea, are the highlands of Monhegan and the rocks and coves of +Pemaquid Point, the great stronghold of early British colonial power +in Maine. Rival French and English grants covered the whole of Maine, +and at the outstart the English took possession of the Kennebec, and +the French of the Penobscot. The colonists were in almost constant +enmity, as also were the Indians upon the two rivers, the warfare +continuing a hundred and fifty years, until after the Revolution. The +English made Pemaquid Point their fortified outpost, while the French +established old Fort Pentagoet, afterwards Castine, as their +stronghold on the Penobscot. The earliest settlement at the mouth of +the Kennebec was made in 1607 by Chief Justice George Popham, who came +there with one hundred and twenty colonists in two ships, named the +"Mary and John" and the "Gift of God." They founded Fort St. George, +and built the first vessel on the Kennebec, the "Virginia" of thirty +tons, but Popham dying the next year, they became discouraged and +abandoned the colony. + +Pemaquid saw constant disturbances. Weymouth, when he traded there in +1605, kidnapped several Indians and carried them back to England. The +fierce Abenaquis from Penobscot Bay attacked the place in 1615 and +massacred all the Wawenock Indians who lived there. Then the old +Sagamore Samoset appeared upon the scene, the same who welcomed the +Pilgrims to Plymouth. He lived near Pemaquid, and told them at +Plymouth his home was distant "a daye's sayle with a great wind, and +five dayes by land." He sold Pemaquid to the first English colonists +in 1625 by deed, his sign manual upon it being a bended bow with an +arrow fitted to the string, ready to shoot. They saw the strategic +importance of the place and built a small fort in 1630. Then a pirate +came along, captured and plundered the settlement, holding it until an +armed ship from Massachusetts recaptured it in 1635, the pirate being +hanged. Then stronger forts were built, and Fort Charles was +constructed in 1674, but in King Philip's War the French and Indians +attacked it, driving out the people, who escaped by boats to Monhegan. +Again, in 1689, the Abenaquis from old Pentagoet, under their chief +Madockawando, captured it with great slaughter, destroying the works. +The English in 1693 once more took possession, this time building a +stone fort regarded as impregnable and said to be the finest work then +in New England. French frigates soon attacked it and were repulsed, +and its fame was great throughout the colonies. But the French and +the Abenaquis were bound to defeat its possessors, and in 1696 the +former with a fleet and the latter under Baron de Castine again +attacked, and captured it with a horrible massacre, all the survivors +being carried into captivity. The English did not reoccupy the Point +for some time, but in 1724 they repaired the ruined fort, and deciding +that a place of so much importance must be held at all hazards, in +1730 Fort Frederick, the great defensive work of Pemaquid, was built, +and a town grew around it. The French and Indians made unsuccessful +attacks in 1745, and again in 1747. Thus fiercely raged the battle +between the rival possessors of the Penobscot and the Kennebec, and +the ruins of this last and greatest work, Fort Frederick, have been +the place where for years the antiquarians have been delving for +relics, much as they do in Pompeii. It was an extensive exterior +fortress with an interior citadel, located upon a slope rising from a +rocky shore and controlling the approach from the sea. A high rock in +the southeastern angle, forming part of the magazine, is the most +prominent portion of the ruins. A martello tower stood in front on the +sea-beach, but is now pulverized into broken fragments. A graveyard, +several paved streets, and cellars of buildings have been disclosed. +The final destruction of Fort Frederick was by the Americans in the +Revolution, to prevent its becoming a British stronghold, and its last +battle was in 1814, when a force in boats from a British frigate +attacked the Point, but were repulsed with heavy loss. Its present +condition is thus described in the mournful ballad of _Pemaquid_: + + "The restless sea resounds along the shore, + The light land breeze flows outward with a sigh, + And each to each seems chanting evermore + A mournful memory of the days gone by. + + "Here, where they lived, all holy thoughts revive, + Of patient striving, and of faith held fast; + Here, where they died, their buried records live, + Silent they speak from out the shadowy past." + + +THE PENOBSCOT. + +The peninsula between the Kennebec and the Penobscot River is +traversed by a railway route through the forests of Lincoln and Knox +Counties, named after two famous Revolutionary Generals. It crosses +the Sheepscott and St. George Rivers and skirts the head of Muscongus +Bay, amid a goodly crop of rocks, passing Wiscasset, Damariscotta +(near the lake of that name, which got its title from the old Indian +chief, Damarine), Waldeboro' and Thomaston to Rockland, upon the +deeply indented Owl's Head Bay looking out upon the Penobscot. This +peninsula is serrated by more of the numerous bays and havens of which +Whittier sings: + + "From gray sea-fog, from icy drift, + From peril and from pain, + The homebound fisher greets thy lights, + O hundred-harbored Maine!" + +We have now come to the chief river of Maine, the Penobscot, draining +the larger portion of its enormous forests, and emptying into the +ocean through a vast estuary, which is the greatest of the many bays +upon this rugged coast. Three centuries ago this was the fabulous +river of Norumbega, enclosing unknown treasures and a mysterious city, +as weirdly described by the Spaniards and Portuguese, who were the +first visitors to the prolific fishing-grounds of America. At that +time Europe knew of no river that was its equal, and no bay with such +broad surface and enormous tidal flow. Hence many were the tales about +wonderful Norumbega. The Penobscot estuary, with its connecting +waters, embraces an archipelago said to contain five hundred islands, +making a large portion of the Maine coast, which in many respects is +the most remarkable in the country. It is jagged and uneven, seamed +with deep inlets and guarded by craggy headlands, projecting far out +into the ocean, while between are myriads of rocky and in many cases +romantic islands. This coast is composed almost wholly of granites, +syenites and other metamorphic rocks that have been deeply scraped and +grooved ages ago by the huge glacier which, descending from Greenland +and extending far into the sea, was of such vast thickness and +ponderous weight as to plough out these immense valleys and ravines in +the granite floor. The chief of these ridges and furrows lie almost +north and south, so that the Maine shore-line is a series of long, +rocky peninsulas separated by deep and elongated bays, having within +and beyond them myriads of long islands and sunken ledges, with the +same general southern trend as the mainland. Large rocks and boulders +are also strewn over the land and upon the bottom of the sea, where +they have been left by the receding glacier. These fragments are piled +in enormous quantities in various places, many of the well-known +fishing-banks, such as George's Shoals, being glacial deposits. These +rocks and sunken ledges are covered with marine animals, making the +favorite food of many of the most important food-fishes. The Penobscot +from its source to the sea flows about three hundred miles. The wide +bay and wedge-shape of the lower river, by gathering so large a flow +of tidal waters, which are suddenly compressed at the Narrows just +below Bucksport, make a rapidly-rushing tide, and an ebb and flow +rising seventeen feet at Bangor, sixteen miles above. When Weymouth +came in 1605 he set up a cross near where Belfast now stands, on the +western shore of the bay, and took possession for England, and he +marvelled greatly at what he saw, writing home that "many who had been +travellers in sundry countries and in most famous rivers affirmed them +not comparable to this--the most beautiful, rich, large, secure +harboring river that the world affordeth." The Indians whom he found +on its shores were the Tarratines, an Abenaquis tribe, who inhabited +all that part of Maine. The Jesuit missionaries early came among them +from Canada, and they were firm friends of the French. They called the +great river Pentagoet, or "the stream where there are rapids," while +its shores were the Penobscot, meaning "where the land is covered with +rocks." + + +PENTAGOET AND CASTINE. + +Pierre du Guast, Sieur de Monts, as a reward for his faithfulness, was +given, in 1602, by the French King Henry of Navarre, a grant of all +America from the 40th to the 46th parallels of latitude. He came out +and founded a colony on Passamaquoddy Bay, and finding that the +Indians called the region Acadie, or the "land of plenty," he named +his domain Acadia. The French afterwards extended their explorations +westward along the Maine coast, claiming under this grant, and this +was the source of the many subsequent conflicts. Coming into Penobscot +Bay, they made their outpost and stronghold upon the peninsula of +Pentagoet on its eastern shore, marking the western limit of Acadia. +Their famous old Fort Pentagoet, from which the French and Indian +raiders for more than a century swooped down upon the English border +settlements, is now the pleasant summer resort of Castine. Originally, +the English from Plymouth established a trading-post there, but the +French captured it, and then in the French religious conflicts it was +alternately held by the Catholic and Huguenot chieftains sent out to +rule Acadia. Sometimes pirates took it, and once some bold Dutchmen +came up from New York and were its captors. But the French held it for +a full century, though repeatedly attacked, until just before the +Revolution, when the English conquered and held it throughout that +war, again seizing it in the War of 1812. This noted old fort was +captured and scarred in wars resulting in no less than five different +national occupations. The present name is derived from Baron Castine, +who came with his French regiment to Acadia, and gave Pentagoet its +great romance. He was Vincent, Baron de St. Castine, lord of Oléron in +the French Pyrenees, who arrived in 1667, and inspired by a chivalrous +desire to extend the Catholic religion among the Indians, went into +the wilderness to live among the fierce Tarratines. As Longfellow +tells it in the Student's Tale at _The Wayside Inn_: + + "Baron Castine of St. Castine + Has left his château in the Pyrenees + And sailed across the Western seas." + +Pentagoet then was a populous town ruled by the Sachem Madockawando, +and the young Baron, tarrying there, soon found friends among the +Indians. The sachem had a susceptible daughter, and this dusky belle, +captivated by the courtly graces of the handsome Baron, fell in love: + + "For man is fire, and woman is tow, + And the Somebody comes and begins to blow." + +The usual results followed, so that it was not long before-- + + "Lo! the young Baron of St. Castine, + Swift as the wind is, and as wild, + Has married a dusky Tarratine, + Has married Madocawando's child!" + +This marriage made him one of the tribe, and he soon became their +leader. The restless and warlike Indians almost worshipped the +chivalrous young Frenchman; he was their apostle, and led them in +repeated raids against their English and Indian foes. But ultimately +tiring of this roving life in the forests, he returned to "his château +in the Pyrenees," taking his Indian bride along. They were welcomed +with surprise and admiration: + + "Down in the village day by day + The people gossip in their way, + And stare to see the Baroness pass + On Sunday morning to early mass; + And when she kneeleth down to pray, + They wonder, and whisper together, and say, + 'Surely this is no heathen lass!' + And in course of time they learn to bless + The Baron and the Baroness. + + "And in course of time the curate learns + A secret so dreadful, that by turns + He is ice and fire, he freezes and burns. + The Baron at confession hath said, + That though this woman be his wife, + He hath wed her as the Indians wed, + He hath bought her for a gun and a knife!" + +Then there was trouble, but it seems to have been soon cured by a +Christian wedding: + + "The choir is singing the matin song, + The doors of the church are opened wide, + The people crowd, and press and throng, + To see the bridegroom and the bride. + They enter and pass along the nave; + They stand upon the father's grave; + The bells are ringing soft and slow; + The living above and the dead below + Give their blessing on one and twain; + The warm wind blows from the hills of Spain, + The birds are building, the leaves are green, + And Baron Castine of St. Castine + Hath come at last to his own again." + +In course of time the son of the Baron by his Tarratine princess +became chief of the tribe and ruled it until in a raid in 1721 he was +captured by the English and taken to Boston. When brought before the +Council there for trial he wore his French uniform, and was accused of +attending an Abenaqui council-fire. He sturdily replied, "I am an +Abenaqui by my mother; all my life has been passed among the nation +that has made me chief and commander over it. I could not be absent +from a council where the interests of my brethren were to be +discussed. The dress I now wear is one becoming my rank and birth as +an officer of the Most Christian King of France, my master." After +being held prisoner several months, he was released, and finally also +returned to the ancestral château in the Pyrenees. His lineal +descendants are still at the head of the tribe, which has dwindled to +almost nothing. Pentagoet honoring the memory, afterwards became +Castine. Remains of the old fort and batteries are preserved, and a +miniature earthwork commands the harbor. The Tarratines and all the +Abenaqui tribes were firm friends of the Americans in the Revolution; +there are remnants of them in Canada, but the best preserved is the +Indian settlement on Indian Island, in the Penobscot River, above +Bangor. For fealty in the Revolution they were given a reservation, +where a few hundred descendants now live in a village around their +church, having a town hall and schools, with books printed in their +own Abenaqui language, and ruled by their tribal officials. This last +remnant of a warlike nation with such an interesting history gets a +modest subsistence by catching fish and lobsters, and rafting logs on +their great river of Norumbega. + + +ASCENDING THE PENOBSCOT. + +The Penobscot drains an immense territory covered with pine, spruce +and hemlock forests. Two hundred millions of feet of lumber will be +floated down it in a single season. Its bold western bay shore rises +into the Camden Mountains, and both sides of the bay were embraced +for thirty miles in the Muscongus Patent, a grant of King George I. +which came to the colonial Governor Samuel Waldo, of Massachusetts, +and afterwards, by descent through his wife, to General Henry Knox. +Thus Knox became the Patroon of Penobscot Bay, building a palace at +Thomaston, where he lived in baronial state and spent so much money in +princely hospitality that he bankrupted himself and almost ruined his +Revolutionary compatriot, General Lincoln, who became involved with +him. On this western shore, Rockland, with nine thousand people, is a +town of sea-captains, fishermen and lime-burners, its rocks making the +best lime of the district, and a hundred kilns illuminating the hills +at night. Adjacent are Dix Island, and to the southward Vinalhaven +Island, producing fine granites shipped abroad for building. To the +northward is Camden, under the shadow of Mount Megunticook, its two +peaks rising fourteen hundred feet above the harbor. Out in front is +an archipelago of pretty islands, the chief being "the insular town of +Islesboro," stretching about thirteen miles along the centre of +Penobscot Bay, its ten square miles of irregular contour having of +late developed into a region of cottages built in all the pleasant +places and making a very popular resort. To the northeastward the +massive Blue Hill stands up an isolated guardian behind the peninsula +of Castine, where the attractive white houses are spread over the +broad and sloping point enclosing its deep harbor, and its +church-spire rises sharply among the trees. In the eastern archipelago +of Penobscot Bay are the Fox Island group of about one hundred and +fifty islands, and the larger islands of North Haven and Vinalhaven +are to the southward, beyond which are the shores of Cape Rosier, +making the eastern border of the bay, while through a vista looms up +the distant Isle au Haut, an outer guardian upon the ocean's edge. At +the eastern horizon behind the cape rise the hazy, bisected, +round-topped peaks of Mount Desert, thirty miles away. + +Belfast is another maritime town of Penobscot Bay on a deeply-indented +harbor under the shadow of the Camden Hills, the place where Weymouth +in 1605 landed and set up the cross. It was settled and named by +Scotch-Irish Presbyterians in 1770, and it looks out pleasantly across +the broad bay upon Castine. Above are Searsport and Fort Point, with +the ruins of the colonial Fort Pownall, and then the river is quickly +contracted into the Narrows, where the swift tides run at Bucksport. +The upper river is sinuous and picturesque, and at the head of +navigation, sixty miles from the sea, is Bangor, with twenty thousand +people, finely located on commanding hills, its chief industry being +the sawing and shipment of lumber. The sawmills line the shores and +the log-booms extend for miles along the river. The chief assembly +room of the city is the Norumbega Hall, and there also is a +Theological Seminary of high standing. It is said that the settlement, +which had languished during the Revolution, in 1791 ordered Rev. Seth +Noble, its representative in the Legislature, to have it incorporated +under the name of Sunbury, but he, being very fond of the old tune of +Bangor, wrote that name inadvertently, and it thus was given the town. +Thirteen miles northward is Oldtown, another great gathering-place for +logs and sawmills, and having the Tarratine Indian settlement on the +island in mid-stream. The Penobscot River receives various tributaries +above, which drain the extensive northern forests of Maine--the +Piscataquis coming from the westward, the Mattawamkeag from the +northeast, and the Seboois. The main stream rises near the western +Canada border of Maine and flows eastward into Chesuncook Lake, whence +its general course to the sea is southeast and south. The river thus +drains a broad basin, embracing myriads of lakes in the northern Maine +forests, and it has an enormous water-power, as yet only partially +utilized. + + +MOUNT DESERT ISLAND. + +Beyond the archipelago, eastward from the Penobscot estuary, is the +noted island, presenting the only land along the Atlantic coast where +high mountains are in close proximity to the sea. It appears to-day +just at it did to Champlain when he first saw it in September, 1604, +and, being impressed with its craggy, desolate summits, named it the +_Isle des Monts déserts_, the "Island of Desert Mountains." He then +wrote of it, "The land is very high, intersected by passes, appearing +from the sea like seven or eight mountains ranged near each other; the +summits of the greater part of these are bare of trees, because they +are nothing but rocks." In approaching from the southwestward by sea, +the distant gray recumbent elephant that has been lying at the horizon +gradually resolves its two rounded summits into different peaks; but +the finer approach is rather from the northward by the railway route, +which is the one most travelled. The quick advance of the train +unfolds the separate mountain peaks, and the whole range is well +displayed, there being apparently eight eminences, but upon coming +nearer, others seem to detach themselves. Green Mountain is the +highest, rising over fifteen hundred feet, near the eastern side, +while Western Mountain terminates the range on the other side, and at +the eastern verge is Newport Mountain, having the fashionable +settlement of Bar Harbor at its northern base. There are several +beautiful lakes high up among these peaks, the chief being Eagle Lake. +Beech and Dog Mountains have peculiarities of outline, and a wider +opening between two ponderous peaks shows where the sea has driven-in +the strange and deeply carved inlet of Somes' Sound, six miles from +the southern side, to almost bisect the island. Hung closely upon the +coast of Maine, in Frenchman Bay, this noted island, the ancient +Indian Pemetic, is about fifteen miles long, of varying width, and +covers a hundred square miles. It has many picturesque features, its +mountains, which run in roughly parallel ridges north and south, +separated by narrow trough-like valleys, displaying thirteen distinct +eminences, the eastern summits being the highest, and terminating +generally at or near the water's edge on that side in precipitous +cliffs, with the waves dashing against their bases. Upon the +southeastern coast, fronting the ocean, as a fitting termination to +the grand scenery of these mountain-ranges, the border of the Atlantic +is a galaxy of stupendous cliffs, the two most remarkable being of +national fame--Schooner Head and Great Head--the full force of old +ocean driving against their massive rocky buttresses. Schooner Head +has a surface of white rock on its face, which when seen from the sea +is fancied to resemble the sails of a small vessel, apparently moving +in front of the giant cliff. Great Head, two miles southward, is an +abrupt projecting mass of rock, the grim and bold escarpment having +deep gashes across the base, evidently worn by the waves. It is the +highest headland on the island. Castle Head is a perpendicular +columned mass, appearing like a colossal, castellated doorway, flanked +by square towers. + + [Illustration: _Along the Coast at Bar Harbor, Me._] + +For more than a century after Champlain first looked upon this island, +the French made ineffectual attempts at settlement, but it was +not until 1761 that any one succeeded in establishing a permanent +home. Then old Abraham Somes, a hardy mariner from Cape Ann, came +along, and entering the Sound that bears his name, settled on the +shore, and his descendant is said to still keep the inn at Somesville +on the very spot of his earliest colonization. After the little colony +was planted, the cultivation of the cranberry and the gathering of +blueberries kept the people alive, these being almost the only +food-products raised in the moderate allowance of soil allotted the +island. The population grew but slowly, though artists and summer +saunterers came this way, and about 1860 it began to attract the +pleasure-seekers. When the island, in its early government, was +divided into towns, the eastern portion was called, with a little +irony, Eden. Bar Harbor, an indentation of Frenchman Bay, having a bar +uncovered at low tide, which named it, being easy of access, the +village of East Eden on its shores became the fashionable resort. It +has a charming outlook over the bay, with its fleets of gaily-bannered +yachts and canoes and the enclosing Porcupine Islands, but there is +not much natural attractiveness. It is a town of summer hotels and +boarding-houses, built upon what was a treeless plain, the outskirts +being a galaxy of cottages, many of great pretensions. Here will +congregate ten to twenty thousand visitors in the season, and Bar +Harbor has become one of the most fashionable resorts on the Atlantic +coast. Its bane, however, is the fog, a frequent sojourner in the +summer, though even fogs, in their way, have charms. There are days +that it lies in banks upon the sea, with only occasional incursions +upon the shore, when under a shining sun the mist creeps over the +water and finally blots out the landscape. But light breezes and warm +sunshine then soon disperse it and the view reappears. The fog-rifts +are wonderful picture-makers. Sometimes the mist obscures the sea and +lower shores of the attendant islands, leaving a narrow fringe of +tree-tops resting against the horizon, as if suspended in mid-air. +Often a yacht sails through the fog, looking like a colossal ghost, +when suddenly its sails flash out in the sunlight like huge wings. +Thus the mist paints dissolving views, so that the fogs of Mount +Desert become an attraction, and occasionally through them appears the +famed mirage which Whittier describes: + + "Sometimes in calms of closing day + They watched the spectral mirage play; + Saw low, far islands looming tall and high, + And ships, with upturned keels, sail like a sea the sky." + +Somes Sound has off its entrance on the southern side of Mount Desert, +the group of Cranberry Islands with a lighthouse on Baker's Island, +the outermost of the cluster. These make a picturesque outlook for the +summer settlements which have grown around the spacious indentations +of North East Harbor and South West Harbor, on either side of the +entrance to the Sound. To the eastward is another indentation in the +southern coast, Seal Harbor, also a popular resort, having one of the +finest beaches on the island. The five high rocky Porcupine Islands +partially enclosing Bar Harbor get their names from their bristling +crests of pines and spruces, one of them, the Bald Porcupine, having +some stupendous cliffs. The visits to the cliffs along the shores and +the ascent of the mountains are the chief excursions from Bar Harbor. +Four miles southward is the summit of Green Mountain, its sides being +rugged, and the charming Eagle Lake to the westward nestling among the +mountain peaks. The view from the top is fine, over the deeply-cut +Somes Sound, penetrating almost through the island, and the grand +expanse of Maine coast, seen, with its many bays and islands, +stretching from the Penobscot northeast to Quoddy Head. All around to +the southward and eastward spreads the open ocean bounded by the +horizon, and like a speck, to the south-southeast, twenty miles away, +is the lighthouse upon the bleak crag known as Mount Desert Rock, far +out at sea, the most remote beacon, in its distant isolation, upon the +New England coast. + + +ENTERING THE MARITIME PROVINCES. + +The Maine coast beyond Mount Desert has more deep harbors and long +peninsulas. Here are Englishman's Bay, Machias Bay, Cutler Harbor and +others, and finally Passamaquoddy Bay, opening into the Bay of Fundy. +Grand Manan Island lies off this Bay, the first land of the British +Maritime Provinces, twenty-two miles long and distant about nine miles +from the coast of Maine, the frowning yet attractive precipices of its +western verge rising four hundred feet. Over opposite in Maine, as the +strait between the two narrows, are dark, storm-worn crags, which end +with a promontory bearing a conspicuously red and white-striped +lighthouse tower. This is the termination of the coast of Maine and of +the United States at Quoddy Head, and the entrance to St. Croix River +to the northward, the boundary between New England and the Canadian +Province of New Brunswick. Quoddy Head is a long peninsula, with +Campobello Island directly in front. Just beyond is another peninsula, +bearing a village of white cottages, rising on the slopes of a high +rounded hill having a church with a tall spire perched upon its +pinnacle. This is Lubec, the easternmost town of the United States. +Out in front upon Campobello lived for many years the eccentric old +sailor, William Fitzwilliam Owen, a retired British Admiral, who built +there on the rocks a regulation "quarter-deck" of a man-of-war, +whereon he solemnly promenaded in full uniform and issued orders to a +mythical crew. Finally he died, and as he had desired, was buried by +candlelight in the churchyard of the little chapel he had built on +the island. Campobello is now a summer resort, with numerous hotels +and cottages. All these waters are filled with wicker-work fish-weirs, +wherein are caught the herring supplying the Eastport sardine-packing +establishments. This is another town of white houses on an island +adjoining the mainland, having a little fort and a prominent display +of the sardine-factories in front, with a background of fir-clad hills +in Maine. + +St. Croix River falling into Passamaquoddy Bay is, for its whole +length of one hundred and twenty-five miles, the national boundary. +Upon Neutral Island near its mouth was made the first unfortunate +settlement of Acadie by the Sieur De Monts in 1604. He named both the +island and river St. Croix because, just above, various bends of the +river and its branches form a cross. The St. Croix discharges the +noted Schoodic Lakes far up in the forest on the boundary, which have +become a favorite resort of sportsmen and anglers. It brings down many +logs, and the sawmills have made the prosperity of the twin towns of +Calais and St. Stephen on its banks, which represent the two nations, +and being very friendly, are connected by a bridge. Upon a peninsula +near the mouth of the river is St. Andrews, in New Brunswick, which +like most other places in this pleasant region is developing into a +summer resort. When De Monts came and landed, he named the country +Acadie because that was what the Indians called it. The Indians, +however, in pronouncing it made the sound like "a-quoddy," and from +this is derived Passamaquoddy, the name of the bay into which the St. +Croix flows, the word _Pesmo-acadie_ meaning the "pollock place of +plenty," as these fish were prolific there. It is at North Perry in +Maine, a village on the western verge of the bay and between Eastport +and Calais, that the Government has erected the obelisk marking the +forty-fifth parallel of north latitude, midway between the equator and +the pole. + +The Canadian Province of New Brunswick into which we have now come in +the journey "Down East" is described as "a region of ships, of pine +trees, salmon, deals, hemlock bark and most excellent red granite." +The first impression upon entering it is made by the highways, where +the change from the United States to the British methods is shown in +the reversal of the usual "rule of the road," from right to left. The +vehicles all "keep to the left," and hence the appropriate proverb: + + "The rule of the road is a parodox quite, + In driving your carriage along, + If you keep to the left you are sure to go right, + If you keep to the right you go wrong." + +We have also got into the region of the Bay of Fundy, the Portuguese +_Bayo Fondo_, or "deep bay," with its high tides. This huge inlet of +the Atlantic is about one hundred and seventy miles long, thrust up +between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, stretching from thirty to +fifty miles wide between them. Its eastern extremity branches into two +arms, the northern, Chignecto Bay, about thirty miles long, and the +southern, Minas Channel, opening into the Minas Basin. Besides the St. +Croix, this bay also receives St. John River, the greatest in the +Maritime Provinces. The bay is remarkable for its tides, which are +probably the highest in the world, owing to the concentration of the +tidal wave by the approach of the shores and the gradual shoaling of +the bottom. The very moderate tides of the Massachusetts coast +increase to about nine feet rise at the mouth of the Kennebec. The +configuration of the Maine coast to the northeast further increases +this to fifteen or twenty feet rise at Eastport. Beyond this the Bay +of Fundy is a complete _cul-de-sac_, and the farther the tide gets in +the higher it rises. In St. John harbor it becomes twenty-one to +twenty-three feet, and farther up it is greater, in Minas Basin the +rise reaching forty feet, and in Chignecto Bay, near the upper +extremity, sixty feet. These tremendous tides cause peculiar +phenomena; they make the rivers seem to actually run up-hill at times, +while the tidal "bore" or wall of water, which is the advance of the +flood, moves up the streams and across the extensive mudflats with the +speed of a railway train, often catching the unsuspecting who may be +wandering over them. The elaborate wharves made for boat-landings are +built up like three-story houses, with different floor-levels, so as +to enable the vessels to get alongside at all stages of the tide. + + +THE CITY OF ST. JOHN. + +Upon St. John's Day, June 24, 1604, De Monts piloted by Champlain, +coasting along the monotonous forest-clad shores of New Brunswick, +sailed into the mouth of the River St. John, and named it in memory of +the day of its discovery. Off the entrance is Partridge Island, now +surmounted by a lighthouse and what is said to be the most powerful +fog-siren in the world, whose hoarse blasts can be heard thirty miles +away, a necessity in this region, where fogs prevail so generally. +From the Negro Head, a high hill on the western shore, a breakwater +extends across the harbor entrance, and within is the city covering +the hills running down to the water as the inner harbor curves toward +the westward. Timber being the great export, lumber-piles and +timber-ships fill the wharves, sawdust floats on the water, and +vessels are anchored out in the stream loading deals from lighters. + +De Monts found some Micmac Indians at St. John, but he did not remain +there, and it was not until 1634 when Claude de St. Estienne, Sieur de +la Tour, a Huguenot who had been granted Acadie by King Charles I. of +England, came out with his son and built a fort at the mouth of St. +John River, the son Charles de la Tour for some years afterwards +holding it and enjoying a lucrative trade. The French King, however, +had made a rival grant of Acadie, which had come into possession of +Charles de Menon, Sieur d'Aulnay Charnisay, who made a settlement at +Annapolis Royal over in Nova Scotia, where De Monts took the remnant +of his unfortunate colony from St. Croix River. D'Aulnay envied La +Tour his prosperity, provoked a quarrel, accused him of treason, and +finally came over and blockaded the mouth of the St. John with six +ships. La Tour, anticipating this attack, had implored aid from the +Huguenots in France, and they sent out the ship "Clement" with one +hundred and forty men, which remained in the offing. One cloudy night +La Tour and his wife slipped out of the harbor on the ebb tide in a +boat and got aboard the ship, which carried them to Boston, where +additional help was sought. Old Cotton Mather records that the +Puritans hearkened unto him and searched the Scriptures to see if +there was Divine sanction for interference in a French quarrel. They +found sundry texts that were interpreted as possibly forbidding such +action, but they nevertheless concluded "it was as lawful for them to +give La Tour succor as it was for Joshua to aid the Gideonites against +the rest of the Canaanites, or for Jehoshaphat to aid Jehoram against +Moab." So they quickly started five Massachusetts ships that way, with +which La Tour raised the blockade and drove D'Aulnay across the Bay +of Fundy back to his own post of Annapolis Royal. D'Aulnay did not +rest content under defeat, however, but two years later again attacked +the fort. Two spies, who had gained entrance in the disguise of monks, +informed him La Tour was absent, the fort being under command of his +wife. Expecting easy victory, he ordered an assault, but was met by +Madame La Tour at the head of the little garrison and defeated with +heavy loss. He awaited another opportunity, and in 1647 when La Tour +was away on a trading expedition, leaving but a small force, he again +attacked. During three days his assaults were repulsed, but a +treacherous sentry admitted the enemy within the fort. Even then the +brave woman fought with such intrepidity that she was given her own +terms of capitulation. No sooner had she surrendered, however, than +D'Aulnay violated his agreement and hanged the garrison, compelling +Madame La Tour to witness it with a halter around her neck. This so +preyed upon her mind that a few days afterwards she died of a broken +heart. Whittier has woven this story into his romantic poem _St. +John_, describing La Tour returning to the fort and expecting his +wife's greeting, but instead he found its walls shattered and the +buildings burnt. A priest appearing, La Tour seizes him, demanding an +explanation, and thus spoke the priest: + + "'No wolf, Lord of Estienne, has ravaged thy hall, + But thy red-handed rival, with fire, steel and ball! + On an errand of mercy, I hitherward came, + While the walls of thy castle yet spouted with flame. + + "'Pentagoet's dark vessels were moored in the bay, + Grim sea-lions roaring aloud for their prey.' + 'But what of my lady?' cried Charles of Estienne: + 'On the shot-crumbled turret, thy lady was seen: + + "'Half-veiled in the smoke-cloud, her hand grasped thy pennon, + While her dark tresses swayed in the hot breath of cannon! + But woe to the heretic, evermore woe! + When the son of the Church and the Cross is his foe! + + "'In the track of the shell, in the path of the ball, + Pentagoet swept over the breach of the wall! + Steel to steel, gun to gun, one moment--and then + Alone stood the victor, alone with his men! + + "'Of its sturdy defenders, thy lady alone + Saw the cross-blazoned banner float over St. John.' + 'Let the dastard look to it,' cried fiery Estienne, + 'Were D'Aulnay King Louis, I'd free her again.' + + "'Alas for thy lady! No service from thee + Is needed by her whom the Lord hath set free: + Nine days in stern silence her thraldom she bore, + But the tenth morning came, and Death opened her door!'" + +La Tour returned, but hardly in the manner justifying the revenge +indicated in the poem. D'Aulnay died shortly afterwards, whereupon La +Tour recaptured his fort and domain in 1653, but not at the head of an +army, diplomatically accomplishing his victory by marrying D'Aulnay's +widow. This post was known as Fort La Tour until the British conquest +in the eighteenth century, when it was changed to Fort Frederick. It +then became a fishing station, and was plundered in the Revolution. +Afterwards, in 1783, about ten thousand exiled tories from the United +States were landed there, this being the "Landing of the Loyalists" +commemorated on May 18th as the founding of St. John, the charter +dating from that day in 1785. Benedict Arnold was one of these +refugees, he living in St. John for several years from 1786. A +Monument in King Square commemorates the landing of the loyalists and +the grant of the charter. Being built largely of wood, the city +suffered from many disastrous fires, the worst being in June, 1877, +when one-third of the place was burnt, involving a loss of over +sixteen hundred buildings and nearly $30,000,000. St. John rose from +the ruins with great vitality, the new construction being largely of +brick and stone. The population now exceeds forty thousand. + + +THE RIVER ST. JOHN. + +The great curiosity of St. John is the "reversible cataract" in the +river, caused in the gorge just west of the city by the enormous tides +of the Bay of Fundy. The great river above the city is a wide estuary, +but before entering the harbor it is compressed into a short, deep and +narrow gorge, barely one hundred and fifty yards wide in some places, +and obstructed by several rocky islets. As this is the best +crossing-place, two bridges are thrown side by side over the chasm, +one for a railway and the other for a street, resting upon the +limestone cliffs a hundred feet above the water. As the tide ebbs and +flows, the rushing river currents make the reversible cataract, almost +under the bridges, with the water pouring down both ways at different +tidal stages. Through this contracted pass the entire current of the +vast St. John valley finds its outlet to the sea. When the ebb tide +quickly empties the harbor below, the accumulated river waters cannot +get into the gorge fast enough to reduce as rapidly the level of the +broad basin above, and they consequently rush down, a cataract, +swelling sometimes to ten or twelve feet at the upper entrance to the +gorge, and make whirling, seething rapids below. When the tide turns, +this outflow is gradually checked by the rise in the harbor, but soon +the tremendous incoming flood from the Bay of Fundy overpowers the +river current, fills up the gorge, and rapidly rising in the gorge +rushes inward to the broad basin, thus making the cataract fall the +other way. Twice every day this ever-changing contest is fought, and +were it not for the obstruction made by this narrow, rocky gateway, +these enormous tides would rush along in full force and overflow a +large surface of the very low-lying interior of New Brunswick. The +river makes a sharp bend just at the outlet of the gorge, turning from +south to northeast around a rocky cape protruding far into the stream; +then it broadens out into a rounded bay, and a short distance beyond +sharply bends again into the harbor of St. John. Vessels are taken +through the gorge at proper tidal stages, guided by tugs and floating +at high speed with the rushing current. This is one of the most +remarkable exhibitions made of the curious influence of these enormous +Bay of Fundy tides. + +The River St. John, flowing out of the vast forests of Maine, +stretches four hundred and fifty miles from its sources to the sea. +The Micmac Indians of its upper reaches called it Ouangondie, while +the Etechemins of the lower waters and the St. Croix valley named it +Looshtook, or the "Long River." Its sources interlock in the Maine +forests, at two thousand feet elevation, with those of the Penobscot +flowing south and the Chaudiere flowing north to the St. Lawrence, +near Quebec. At first the St. John flows northwest, then east and +southeast to its Grand Falls, then by a winding southern course to the +Bay of Fundy. For a long distance its upper waters are the national +boundary between Maine and Canada. It receives several large +tributaries and drains a valley embracing seventeen millions of acres. +The immense forest wilderness of Maine, wherein are the sources of +these streams, is seven times the size of the famous "Black Forest" of +Germany. Upon the upper St. John waters are various villages of French +Acadians, the descendants of those who were driven out of Nova Scotia +in the eighteenth century. It receives the Allegash, St. Francis, +Madawaska, Grand and St. Leonard's Rivers, and thus comes to its +cataract with augmented waters--the Grand Falls. Above, the stream +expands into a broad basin, flowing from which its enormous current is +compressed into a narrow rock-bound canyon, and after running down a +moderate incline suddenly plunges over the front and sides of an +abyss. This is about sixty feet deep and formed of slate, the water +falling into the cauldron below, and also over the outer ledges in +minor cascades. Then, with lightning rapidity the foaming current +dashes through another canyon of two hundred and fifty feet width for +three-fourths of a mile, the walls, of dark, rugged rock, being one +hundred and fifty feet high. Within this terrific chasm there is a +descent of sixty feet more, in which the waters do not rush along as +in the rapids below Niagara, but are actually belched and volleyed +forth, as if shot out of ten thousand great guns, with enormous +boiling masses hurled into the air and huge waves leaping high against +the enclosing cliffs. This ungovernable fury continues throughout most +of the passage, the stream at times heaping itself all on one side, +and giving brief glimpses of the rocky bed of the chasm. Finally an +immense frothy cataract flows over into a lower basin, said to be +unfathomable, where the stream becomes tranquil and then goes along +peacefully between its farther banks. Majestic scenery surrounds +these Grand Falls, there being high mountains in all directions. + +Like all great cataracts, this one has its romance and tragedy. +Alongside the final unfathomable basin rises a towering precipice two +hundred feet high, its perpendicular wall as smooth as glass. Down it +the ancient Micmacs hurled their captives taken in war. The implacable +foes of these Micmacs, as of all the tribes allied to the French, were +the New York Iroquois, and particularly the Mohawks. Once a party of +Mohawks penetrated all the way to this remote region, surprising and +capturing a Micmac village with a fearful massacre. One young squaw, +who promised obedience, they spared, because they wanted her to guide +them down the river. She was put in the foremost canoe, and the +fatigued Mohawks lashed their canoes together to float with the +current in the night, and then went to sleep. The girl was to guide +them to a safe landing above the cataract, so they could land and next +day go around the portage. She steered them into the mid-stream +current instead, and dropping quietly overboard swam ashore. They +floated to the brink of the cataract, and when its thunders awoke +them, too late for safety, the whole party were swept over and +perished. This was the last Mohawk invasion of the region. Twenty +miles below, the Tobique River comes into the St. John, and is +regarded as the most picturesque stream in New Brunswick, being noted +for its lumber camps and good angling. Here is Andover, a little +village supplying the lumbermen, and also Florenceville and Woodstock, +with busy sawmills. For miles the river shores are lofty and bold, +affording charming scenery. The Meduxnekeag flows in from the Maine +forests, bringing down many logs, and below the Meduntic Rapids are +passed. Then the Pokiok, its Indian name meaning the "dreadful place," +flows to the St. John through a sombre and magnificent gorge four +hundred yards long, very deep and only twenty-five feet wide. The +little river, after plunging down a cataract of forty feet, rushes +over the successive ledges of this remarkable pass until it reaches +the St. John. For a long distance the great river passes villages +originally settled by disbanded British troops after the Revolution +and now peopled by their descendants, and then it winds through the +pastoral district of Aukpaque, which was held by Americans within New +Brunswick for two years after the Revolution began, they finally +retreating in 1777 over the border into the wilderness of Maine, and +reaching the coast at Machias. Seven miles below is Frederickton, the +New Brunswick capital, a small city, quiet and restful, with broad +streets lined by old shade trees, and covering a good deal of level +land adjoining the river. It has a fine Parliament House, a small but +attractive Cathedral, with a spire one hundred and eighty feet high, +and on the hills back of the town is the University of New Brunswick. +The Nashwaak River flows in opposite among sawmills and cotton-mills, +and there was the old French Fort Nashwaak where the Chevalier de +Villebon, who was sent in 1690 to govern Acadie, fixed his capital +(removing it from Annapolis Royal), and used to fit out expeditions +against the Puritans in New England, they attacking him once in +retaliation, but being beaten off. The St. John passes through a +pleasant intervale below, the garden-spot of the Province, where at +Maugerville was the earliest English settlement on the river, +colonized from New England in 1763, after the French surrender of +Canada. Then the St. John receives Jemseg River, the outlet of Grand +Lake, where a French fort was built as early as 1640 and was fought +about for more than a century. This is a deep, slow-winding stream in +a region of perfect repose, having opposite its outlet Gagetown, a +pretty place with a few hundred people, and said to be the most +slumbrous village of all this sleepy region: + + "Oh, so drowsy! in a daze, + Sleeping mid the golden haze; + With its one white row of street + Carpeted so green and sweet, + And the loungers smoking, still, + Over gate and window sill; + Nothing coming, nothing going, + Locusts grating, one cock crowing, + Few things moving up or down; + All things drowsy--Drowsytown!" + +The St. John below is much like a broad and placid lake flowing +through a pastoral country, having long tributary lakes and bays, +including the extensive and attractive Kennebecasis, which is the +favorite rural resort of the St. John people and the scene of their +aquatic sports. The river farther down broadens into Grand Bay, and +then passing the narrow gorge of the "reversible cataract," makes the +expansive harbor of St. John, and is ultimately swallowed up by the +Bay of Fundy. + + +ANNAPOLIS AND MINAS BASINS. + +From St. John River across the Bay of Fundy to Digby Gut in Nova +Scotia is forty-five miles. For one hundred and thirty miles, the +North Mountain Ridge, elevated six hundred feet, stretches along the +bay upon the Nova Scotia shore, sharply notched down at Digby Gut, the +entrance to Annapolis Basin. This strait, barely a half-mile wide, is +cut two miles through the mountain ridge, having a tidal current of +six miles an hour, and within is a magnificent salt-water lake, +surrounded by forests sloping up the hillsides, and one of the +pleasantest sheets of water in the world. It is no wonder that De +Monts, when his colonists abandoned the dreary island in St. Croix +River, sought refuge here, and that his companion, Baron de +Poutrincourt, obtained a grant for the region. It is one of the most +attractive parts of Acadia, and as the old song has it: + + "This is Acadia--this the land + That weary souls have sighed for; + This is Acadia--this the land + Heroic hearts have died for." + +Digby is within the Gut, fronted by a long and tall wooden wharf that +has to deal with fifty feet of tide, its end being an enormous square +timber crib, built up like a four-story house. The town is noted for +luscious cherries and for "Digby Chickens," the most prized brand of +herrings cured by the "Blue-noses," and it has also developed into +quite an attractive watering-place. To the southwestward a railway +runs to Yarmouth, at the western extremity of Nova Scotia, a small but +very busy port, having steamer lines in various directions. To the +northeastward Annapolis Basin stretches sixteen miles between the +enclosing hills, gradually narrowing towards the extremity. Here, on +the lowlands adjoining Annapolis River, is the quaint little town of +Annapolis Royal and the extensive ramparts of the ancient fort that +guarded it, covering some thirty acres. This was the original French +capital of Acadia, and the first permanent settlement made by +Europeans in America north of St. Augustine, De Monts founding the +colony in 1605. He named it Port Royal, but the English Puritans a +century later changed this, in honor of their "good Queen Anne," to +Annapolis Royal. Almost from the first settlement to the final capture +by the Puritan expedition from Boston in 1710, its history was a tale +of battles, sieges and captures by many chieftains of the rival +nations. As the Marquis of Lorne in his Canadian book describes it: +"This is the story which is repeated with varying incidents through +all the long-drawn coasts of the old Acadia. We see, first, the forest +village of the Red Indians, with its stockades and patches of maize +around it; then the landing from the ships, under the white flag sown +with golden lilies, of armored arquebussiers and spearsmen; the +skirmishing and the successful French settlement; to be followed by +the coming of other ships, with the red cross floating over the +high-built sterns, and then the final conflict and the victory of the +British arms." Now everything is peaceful, and the people raise +immense crops of the most attractive apples for shipment to Europe. + +East of Annapolis is the "Garden of Nova Scotia." The long ridge of +the North Mountain on the coast screens it from the cold winds and +fogs, while the parallel ridge of the South Mountain stretches for +eighty miles, and between these noble ranges, which are described as +"most gracefully moulded," is a broad and rich intervale extending to +the Basin of Minas and the land of Evangeline, which Longfellow has +made so sadly poetical. Good crops of hay grow on the fertile red +soils, which the farmers gather with their slowly-plodding ox-teams; +and of this region the poet sang mournfully: + + "This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks, + Bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight, + Stand like Druids of old, with voices sad and prophetic, + Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms, + Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep-voiced neighboring ocean + Speaks, and in accents disconsolate, answers the wail of the forest." + +To-day, however, "the murmuring pines and the hemlocks" are not there, +excepting in stunted growth in occasional thickets, the land being +meadow and grain fields, with many orchards. Upon a low-lying +peninsula, washed by the placid waters of the Basin of Minas, is the +"Great Meadow," the Grand Pré of the unfortunate Acadians, where in +that early time they had reclaimed from the enormous tides some three +square miles of land, while south of the meadow, on somewhat higher +ground, was their little village. Beyond it the dark North Mountain +ridge stretches to the promontory of Cape Blomidon, dropping off +abruptly six hundred feet into the Basin of Minas. The contented +French lived secluded lives here, avoiding much of the ravages of the +wars raging elsewhere around the Bay of Fundy, and when France ceded +Nova Scotia to England in 1713 they numbered about two thousand. They +took the oaths of loyalty to the British crown, but in the subsequent +French and Indian wars there was much disaffection, and it was +determined in 1755 to remove all the French who lived around the Bay +of Fundy, numbering some eight thousand, so that a loyal British +population might replace them. In September the embarkation began from +Grand Pré, one hundred and sixty young men being ordered aboard ship. +They slowly marched from the church to the shore between ranks of the +women and children, who, kneeling, prayed for blessings upon them, +they also praying and weeping and singing hymns. The old men were sent +next, but the wives and children were kept till other ships arrived. +These wretched people were herded together near the sea, without +proper food, raiment or shelter for weeks, until the transports came, +and it was December before the last of them had embarked. In one +locality a hundred men fled to the woods, and soldiers were sent to +hunt them, often shooting them down. Many in various places managed to +escape, some getting to St. John River, while not a few went to +Quebec, and others found refuge in Indian wigwams in the forests. +There were seven thousand, however, carried on shipboard from the Bay +of Fundy to the various British colonies from New Hampshire to +Georgia, being landed without resources and having generally to +subsist on charity. To prevent their returning, all the French +villages around the Bay of Fundy were laid waste and their homes +ruined. In the Minas district two hundred and fifty houses and a +larger number of barns were burnt. Edmund Burke in the British +Parliament cried out against this treatment, saying: "We did, in my +opinion, most inhumanly, and upon pretences that, in the eye of an +honest man, are not worth a farthing, root out this poor, innocent, +deserving people, whom our utter inability to govern or to reconcile +gave us no sort of right to extirpate." The sad story of Grand Pré and +of Evangeline was historic before Longfellow's day, but he made it +immortal. + + +MINAS TO HALIFAX. + +The Basin of Minas, in the Micmac Indian tradition, was the +beaver-pond and favorite abiding-place of their divinity, Glooscap. On +the great promontory of Cape Blomidon, which stretches northward to +enclose the Basin on its western side, he had his home. The ridge of +the cape turns sharply to the westward and ends in Cape Split, +alongside the Minas Channel. This formation has been compared to the +curved handle of a huge walking-stick, the long North Mountain +stretching far away being the stick. The Micmacs tell us that this +ridge, now bent around to the westward, was Glooscap's beaver-dam, +which he beneficently swung open, so that the surplus waters might run +out and not overflow the meadows around the Basin of Minas. In +swinging it around, however, the terminal cliff of Cape Split was +broken off, and now rises in a promontory four hundred feet high just +beyond the main ridge. Glooscap, we are told, began a conflict in the +Basin with the Great Beaver, and threw at him the five vast rocks now +known as the Five Islands on the northern shore to the eastward of +Parrsboro'. The Beaver was chased out of the Basin, westward through +the Minas Channel, and as a parting salute Glooscap threw his kettle +at him, which overturning, became Spencer's Island, on the northern +shore beyond Cape Split. The enormous tides run through the Minas +Channel at eight miles an hour, and they helped to drive the Great +Beaver over to St. John, where Glooscap finally conquered and killed +him. + +The formation around the head of the Bay of Fundy is largely of rich +and fertile red lowlands, marsh and meadow, much of it being reclaimed +by dyking. The same formation is carried over the Chignecto isthmus, +east of the bay, where the Nova Scotia Peninsula is joined to the +mainland. This is only seventeen miles wide, and across it has been +projected the "Chignecto Ship Railway," designed to shorten by about +five hundred miles the passage of vessels around the Nova Scotia +Peninsula into the St. Lawrence. It is a system of railway tracks on +which the design was to carry ships over the isthmus. Vessels of two +thousand tons were to be lifted out of the water, placed in a huge +cradle, and drawn across by locomotives. The project, estimated as +costing $5,000,000, was stopped in partial completion for want of +funds. On the meadow land to the southward of the Basin of Minas is +Windsor on the Avon, a small shipping town, in which the most famous +building near the river is a broad and oddly-constructed one-story +house, called the Clifton Mansion, which was the home of the author of +_Sam Slick_--Judge Thomas C. Haliburton, a native of Windsor, who died +in 1865. Beyond is Ardoise Mountain, rising seven hundred feet and +having on its northern verge the great Aylesford sand-plain whereof +_Sam Slick_ says: "Plain folks call it, in a gin'ral way, the Devil's +Goose Pasture. It is thirteen miles long and seven miles wide; it +ain't just drifting sands, but it's all but that, it's so barren. It's +uneven or wavy, like the swell of the sea in a calm, and it's covered +with short, thin, dry, coarse grass, and dotted here and there with a +half-starved birch and a stunted, misshapen spruce. It is just about +as silent and lonesome and desolate a place as you would wish to see. +All that country thereabout, as I have heard tell when I was a boy, +was once owned by the Lord, the king and the devil. The glebe-lands +belonged to the first, the ungranted wilderness-lands to the second, +and the sand-plain fell to the share of the last--and people do say +the old gentleman was rather done in the division, but that is neither +here nor there--and so it is called to this day the Devil's Goose +Pasture." Over this sand-plain and the rocky, desolate ridge beyond, +runs the great railway train of the Provinces, on the route between +St. John and Halifax--dignified by the title of the "Flying Bluenose." +It crosses the bleak flanks of Ardoise Mountain and Mount Uniacke, +with its gold mines, through a region which the local chronicler +describes as having "admirable facilities for the pasturage of goats +and the procuring of ballast for breakwaters;" and then comes to the +pleasant shores of Bedford Basin, running several miles along its +beautiful western bank down to Halifax harbor. + + +THE GREAT BRITISH-AMERICAN FORTRESS. + +The city of Halifax is the stronghold of British power in North +America, and is said to be, with the exception of Gibraltar, the best +fortified outpost of the British empire. It is a fortress and naval +station of magnificent development upon an unrivalled harbor. This is +an arm of the sea, thrust for sixteen miles up into the land, and the +Indians called it Chebucto, meaning the "chief haven." A thousand +ships can be accommodated on its spacious anchorages. Its Northwest +Arm, a narrow waterway opening on the western shore just inside the +entrance, makes a long peninsula with water on either side, which in +the centre rises into Citadel Hill, two hundred and fifty-six feet +high. Upon its eastern slopes, running down to the harbor and +spreading two or three miles along it, is the narrow and elongated +town, having the Queen's Dockyard at the northern end. Covering the +broad hilltop is the spacious granite Citadel of Fort George, its +green slopes, covered with luxuriant grass, being now devoted to the +peaceful usefulness of a cow-pasture. Along the harbor and across in +the suburb of Dartmouth are the streets and buildings of the town, +containing forty thousand people. To the southward is the modern +green-covered Fort Charlotte on St. George's Island, commanding the +entrance and looking not unlike a sugar-loaf hat, and both shores are +lined with powerful batteries and forts that make the position +impregnable. The Citadel was begun by the Duke of Kent, Queen +Victoria's father, when he commanded the British forces in Canada in +the latter part of the eighteenth century, and it has since been +enlarged and strengthened. At the entrance gate, grim memorials of the +past, are mounted two old mortars, captured at the downfall of +Louisbourg, on Cape Breton, in 1758. + +Halifax did not have an early settlement, though in the Colonial times +the French came into Chebucto to refit their ships. The Massachusetts +Puritans, who had long been fighting the French and Indians, first +recognized its importance, and in 1748 they sent a petition to +Parliament urging the establishment of a post there, and $200,000 was +voted for a colonizing expedition, of which the English "Lords of +Trade," George Montagu, Earl of Halifax, being the chief, took charge, +hoping for commercial as well as military advantage. Lord Edward +Cornwallis commanded the expedition, which brought twenty-five +hundred colonists, largely disbanded soldiers, into Chebucto, landing +June 21, 1749, and founding Halifax, named in honor of the Chief Lord +of Trade. They were soon attacked by the French and Indians, the +suburbs being burnt, and they were harassed in many ways, leading to +the erection of stockades and forts for defense; but they held the +place, and it was the control of this fine harbor which finally +enabled the British to secure Canada. The fleets and armies were +concentrated here that took and destroyed the famous fortress of +Louisbourg, which, with Quebec, held the Dominion for the French, and +here was also organized the subsequent expedition under Wolfe that +captured Quebec and ended a century and a half of warfare by the +cession of Canada to England. In the American Revolution, Halifax was +a chief base of the British operations, and when that war ended, large +numbers of American loyalists exiled themselves to Halifax. There is +now maintained a garrison of two thousand men and a strong fleet at +Halifax, and the sailor and the soldier are picturesque features of +the streets. The city has pleasant parks and suburbs, but everything +is subordinated to the grim necessities of the fortress, although in +all its noted career Halifax has never been the scene of actual +warfare. + +The Atlantic coast of Nova Scotia is indented by numerous bays that +are good harbors, most of them having small towns and fishery +stations. The western portal of Halifax harbor is Chebucto Head and +Cape Sambro, with dangerous shoals beyond. There have been many +serious wrecks in steering for this entrance during fogs, one of the +most awful being the loss of the steamship "Atlantic" in 1873, when +five hundred and thirty-five persons were drowned. Westward from +Sambro are the broad St. Margaret's and Mahone Bays, and beyond, +Lunenburg on its spacious harbor, a shipping and fishery town of four +thousand people. To the westward are Bridgewater, Liverpool and +Shelburne, with Cape Sable Island at the southwestern extremity of +Nova Scotia, having behind it Barrington within a deep harbor. Off +shore is Seal Island, with its great white guiding light, this being +called, from its position, the "Elbow of the Bay of Fundy," and then +around the "Elbow" is reached the broad estuary of the Tusket River +and the beautiful archipelago of the Tusket Islands. The Tusket is one +of the noted angling and sporting districts of the Province, this +river draining a large part of the lake region of southwestern Nova +Scotia, and having a succession of lakes connected by rapids and +carrying a large amount of water down to the sea. There are eighty of +these lakes of varying sizes. The salmon in the spring run up +numerously, and the trout seek the cool recesses of the forests, while +the rapids, the many islands and the charming woodlands are all +attractive. In the archipelago of the estuary are some three hundred +islands, the group extending out into the sea and having the powerful +tidal currents flowing through their tortuous passages with the +greatest velocity. These islands vary from small and barren rocks up +to larger ones rising grandly from the water and thickly covered with +trees, the channels between being narrow and deep. Among these islands +are some of the best lobster fisheries in America. + +Eastward from Halifax are more deep bays and good harbors, but the +shores are only sparsely peopled, being mostly a wilderness yet to be +permanently occupied, though the venturesome fishermen have their huts +dropped about in pleasant nooks. Here are Musquidoboit and Ship +harbors, with Sherbrooke village in Isaac's harbor. Beyond, the long +projecting peninsula of Guysborough terminates in the famous Cape +Canso, the eastern extremity of Nova Scotia. This peninsula was named +in honor of Sir Guy Carleton, and has the deep indentation of +Chedabucto Bay on its northern side. Here is a village of a few +hundred sailors and fishermen, where the French had a fort in the +seventeenth century, until the Puritans under Sir William Phips came +from Boston in 1690, drove them out and burnt it. Off this coast and +ninety miles out at sea to the southward is the dreaded Sable Island, +a long and narrow sandspit without trees, producing nothing but salt +grass and cranberries. A lighthouse stands at either end, and there +are three flagstaffs for signals at intervals between them, with also +a life-saving station, and the bleaching bones of many a wreck +imbedded in the sands. It has few visitors, excepting those who are +cast away, and everyone avoids it. Yet, strangely enough, the first +American explorers were infatuated with the idea of planting a colony +on this bleak and barren sandbar, and its history has mainly been a +record of wrecks. Cabot originally saw this island, and in 1508 the +first futile attempt was made to settle it, the colony being soon +abandoned, though some live-stock were left there. Sir Humphrey +Gilbert in 1583 lost his ship "Delight" here, with a hundred men, and +going home on her consort, he lost his own life on the Azores. It was +on this fateful voyage that Sir Humphrey, on his storm-tossed vessel +"Squirrel," sweeping past the other, shouted to her crew: "Courage, my +lads, we are as near Heaven by sea as by land." In 1598 a colony of +forty French convicts was placed on the island and forgotten for seven +years, when they were hunted up and twelve survivors found, whom the +King pardoned, and they were then carried back to France dressed in +seal-skins and described as "gaunt, squalid and long-bearded." This +seems to have ended the attempts to colonize Sable Island. The +Spaniards sent out an expedition to settle Cape Breton, but the fleet +was dashed to pieces on this island. The great French Armada, sailing +to punish the Puritans for capturing Louisbourg, suffered severely on +its shoals. The French afterwards lost there the frigate +"L'Africaine," and later the steamer "Georgia" was wrecked. It is a +long, narrow island, bent in the form of a bow, spreading twenty-six +miles including the terminating bars, and nowhere over a mile wide. A +long, shallow lake extends for thirteen miles in the centre. There is +the French Garden, the traditionary spot where the convicts suffered +during their exile, and a graveyard where the shipwrecked are buried. +Wild ponies gallop about, the descendants of those left by the first +settlers, seals bask on the sands, and ducks swim the lake. Such +to-day is Sable Island. + + +PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND. + +From Halifax a railroad leads northward across Nova Scotia to Pictou. +It passes through the gold-digging regions of Waverley, Oldham and +Renfrew, then over the rich red soils of the head of the Bay of Fundy +and down the Shubenacadie River, meaning the "place of wild potatoes," +and reaches Truro, an active manufacturing town of over five thousand +people near the head of Cobequid Bay. Beyond, through forests and +hills, it crosses the peninsula to the Pictou coal-fields and comes +out on Northumberland Strait at Pictou harbor. The coal is sent here +for shipment, the name having come from the Indian word _Pictook_, +meaning "bubbling or gas exploding," in allusion to the boiling of the +waters near the coal-beds. Over across the Strait is Prince Edward +Island, its red bluff shores along the edge of the horizon surmounted +by a fringe of green foliage. The Micmacs recognized its peculiarity, +calling it Epayquit, or "Anchored on the Wave." It is one hundred and +thirty miles long and rather narrow, having deep bays, sometimes +almost bisecting the island. The surface is low and undulating, with +fertile soils mostly derived from the old red sandstone. The French +first called it the Isle de St. Jean, but after the cession to England +an effort was made to call it New Ireland, as Nova Scotia was New +Scotland, and finally in 1800 it was given the present name in honor +of Queen Victoria's father. It raises horses, oats, eggs and potatoes, +and relatively to size is the best populated of all the Maritime +Provinces. Charlottetown, inside of Hillsborough Bay,--called +popularly "Ch-town," for short,--is the capital, a quiet place with +about eleven thousand population, the Parliament House being its best +building. A narrow-gauge railway is constructed through the island, +near its western terminal being Summerside, on Bedeque Bay, where +there is a little trade and three thousand people, probably its most +active port. + + +THE ARM OF GOLD. + +The eastern boundary of Nova Scotia is the Canso Strait, separating it +from Cape Breton Island. At Canso, its southern entrance, various +Atlantic cables are landed, while others go off southward to New +York. This strait is a picturesque waterway, fifteen miles long and +about a mile wide, a highway of commerce for the shipping desirous of +avoiding the long passage around Cape Breton, and it is called by its +admirers "The Golden Gate of the St. Lawrence Gulf." The geologists +describe it as a narrow transverse valley excavated by the powerful +currents of the drift period. As it leads directly from the Atlantic +Ocean into the Gulf, more vessels are said to pass it than any other +strait excepting Gibraltar. It has several villages upon the shores, +mainly with Scottish inhabitants, the chief being Port Hawkesbury, +Port Mulgrave and Port Hastings, the latter a point for gypsum export. +Cape Breton Island is about one hundred miles long and eighty miles +wide, its greatest natural feature being the famous "Arm of Gold," +thus named in admiration by the early French explorers. Nearly +one-half the surface of the island is occupied by the lakes and swamps +of this "Bras d'Or," an extensive and almost tideless inland sea of +salt water, ramifying with deep bays and long arms through the centre, +having two large openings into the sea at its northeastern end, and +almost communicating with the Atlantic on its southwestern corner. +This "Arm of Gold" has fine scenery, and presents within the rocky +confines of the island a large lake, the Great Bras d'Or, where the +mariner gets almost out of sight of land. To the southward of Cape +Breton Island is Arichat, or the Isle Madame, having the Lennox +Passage between, this Isle being inhabited by a colony of French +Acadian fishermen. Originally this region was colonized by the Count +de Fronsac, Sieur Denys, the first French Governor of Cape Breton, in +whose honor they always called the Canso Strait the Passage Fronsac, +though since then its present title was adopted, being derived from +the Micmac name of Camsoke, meaning "facing the frowning cliffs." Each +little French settlement here, as on the St. Lawrence, has the white +cottages clustering around the church with the tall spire, and the +curé's house not far away, usually the most elaborate in the +settlement. From the Lennox Passage a short canal has been cut through +the rocks into the southwestern extremity of the Bras d'Or, thus +actually dividing Cape Breton into two islands. + +The village of "St. Peter at the Gate" is passed, and the lake entered +at St. Peter's Inlet, a beautiful waterway filled with islands making +narrow winding channels. Several of these islands are a Government +reservation for a remnant of the Micmacs, and they have a small white +church upon Chapel Island, where they gather from all parts of Cape +Breton for their annual festival on St. Anne's Day. Beyond, the Great +Bras d'Or broadens, an inland sea, the opposite shore almost out of +vision, for the lake is eighteen miles across and fully fifty miles +long. The banks come together at the Grand Narrows, making the +contracted Strait of Barra, and then they expand again into another +lake, neither so long nor so wide, the Little Bras d'Or to the +northeastward, but still nearly fifty miles long, including its +northeastern prolongation of St. Andrew Channel. This in turn opens by +a wider strait into yet another lake to the northward, upon the +farther shore of which is Baddeck. To the westward this lake spreads +into St. Patrick's Channel, and to the northeastward there are thrust +out in parallel lines the two "Arms of Gold" connecting with the sea. +An island over thirty miles long and varying in width separates these +two curious arms. These strangely-fashioned lakes present varied +scenery; the shores in some places are low meadows, in others +gently-swelling hills, and elsewhere they rise into forest-clad +mountains. In the pellucid waters swim jelly-fish of exquisite tints. +The atmosphere blends the outlines and colors so well that it smoothes +the roughness of the wilder regions, and casts a softness over the +scene which adds to its charms. Beyond the bordering mountains, to the +northward, is a dreary and almost uninhabited table-land stretching to +the Atlantic Ocean, where the long projection of remote Cape North +stands in silent grandeur within seventy-five miles of Newfoundland. + +Upon the verge of the northern Bras d'Or Lake, in a charming +situation, is the little town of Baddeck, its houses scattered over +the sloping hillsides and the church spires rising among the trees. A +pretty island stands out in front as a protective breakwater, for +storms often sweep wildly across the broad waters. This is the chief +settlement of the lake district, the Highland Scottish inhabitants +having twisted its present name out of the original French title of +Bedique, there being a population of about one thousand. At the +eastern extremity of Cape Breton Island, on an inlet from the +Atlantic, and near the terminating arms of the Bras d'Or, is the +coal-shipping port of Sydney, with a population of twenty-five +hundred, though excepting coal-piers and colliers there is not much +there to see. This is the port for the Sydney coal-fields, covering +nearly three hundred square miles of the island, and the +mine-galleries being prolonged in various places under the ocean. +These were the first coal deposits worked in America, the French +having got coal out of them in the seventeenth century. They are now +all controlled by the wealthy Dominion Coal Company of Boston. Sydney, +C. B., is a seaport known from its coaling facilities throughout the +world, and while prosaic enough now, it saw stirring scenes in the +Colonial times. The early name for its admirable harbor was Spanish +Bay, because Spanish fishermen gathered there. It was a favorite +anchorage for both French and English fleets in their preparations, as +the tide of battle turned, for attacking New England or Acadia in the +long struggle for supremacy. In 1696 the French assembled in Spanish +Bay for a foray upon Pemaquid. In 1711 Admiral Hovenden Walker, +returning from his unsuccessful expedition against Quebec, his ships +having been dispersed by a storm, collected in this capacious +roadstead the most formidable fleet it had seen, forty-two vessels. +The doughty British Admiral felt so good about it that he set up on +shore a large signboard made by his carpenters, whereon was inscribed +a pompous proclamation claiming possession of the whole country in +honor of his sovereign Queen Anne. The French soon came along, +however, and smashed his signboard, built their fortress of +Louisbourg, and there was a half-century of warfare before the +proclamation was made good and England had undisputed possession. The +settlement on Spanish Bay was not named after Lord Sydney and made the +Cape Breton capital until 1784, when exiled loyalists came from the +United States to inhabit it. + + +THE GREAT ACADIAN FORTRESS. + +Upon the seacoast, twenty-five miles southeast of Sydney, is a low +headland with a dark rocky island in the offing. This headland is Cape +Breton, originally named for the Breton French fishermen who +frequented it, and it in turn named Cape Breton Island. Just west of +Cape Breton is an admirable harbor which, being frequented in the +early days by English fishermen, the French named the _Havre aux +Anglais_, or the "English Port." Upon Point Rochefort, on its western +side, stood the famous French fortress and town of Louisbourg, which +was called "the Dunkirk of America." While grass-grown ruins and some +of the ramparts are still traceable, and visitors find relics, yet +little is left of this great fortress, once regarded as the "Key to +New France," or of the populous French town on the harbor which in the +eighteenth century had a trade of the first importance. It was twice +captured, after remarkable sieges and battles of world-wide renown, +causing the most profound sensations at the time, and now absolutely +nothing is left of the original place but an old graveyard on the +point, where French and English dust commingle in peace under a mantle +of dark greensward. There is at present a settlement of about a +thousand people around the harbor, mainly engaged in the fisheries. +The Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 transferred Newfoundland and Acadia from +France to England, but the French held Cape Breton Island, and many of +their refugees came hither. It was not long before the French King, +Louis XIV., stirred by Admiral Walker's proclamation and anxious about +Canada, determined to fortify the "English Port" and make a commercial +depot there, and in 1714 the plan was laid out, the name being changed +to Louisbourg. In 1720 work began on a prodigious scale, the intention +being to make it the leading fortress in America, and for more than +twenty years France devoted its energy and resources to the completion +of the stupendous fortifications, attracting inhabitants to the place +by bounties, and creating a brisk trade by sea which soon drew +inhabitants for a large town. When completed, this town stood upon the +neck of land on the southwest side of the harbor enclosed by stone +walls having a circuit of nearly three miles. These walls were +thirty-six feet high and forty feet thick at the base, with a ditch +outside eighty feet wide. The fortress was constructed in the first +system of the noted French engineer, Vauban, and required a large +garrison. A battery of thirty guns was located on Goat Island, at the +harbor entrance, and at the bottom of the harbor opposite the entrance +was another, the Royal Battery, also of thirty guns. The land and +harbor sides of the town were defended by ramparts and bastions on +which eighty guns were mounted, the land side also having a deep moat +and projecting bastions, the West Gate on that side being overlooked +by a battery of sixteen guns. There was a ponderous Citadel, and in +the centre of the town the stately stone church of St. John de Dieu, +with attendant nunnery and hospitals. The streets crossed at right +angles, and five gates in the walls on the harbor side communicated +with the wharves. Such was the greatest stronghold in North America in +1745, the famous Louisbourg fortress. + +The people of New England, whose commerce was being preyed upon by +privateers which found refuge in its harbor, and whose frontiers were +harassed by forays thence directed, we are told by the historian, +"looked with awe upon the sombre walls of Louisbourg, whose towers +rose like giants above the northern seas." But the Puritans were not +wont to lie still under such inflictions, nor to confine their efforts +to prayers alone. Massachusetts planned an attack, and the command of +the expedition was given William Pepperell of Kittery, a merchant +ignorant of the art of war. Then followed one of the most +extraordinary events in history. A fleet of about a hundred vessels +carried a force of forty-one hundred undisciplined militia upon a +Puritan crusade, which was started with religious services, the +eloquent preacher, George Whitefield, imploring a blessing and giving +them the motto, _Nil desperandum, Christo duce_. They rendezvoused at +Canso, meeting there Commodore Warren and the British West Indian +fleet by arrangement, and landing at Gabarus Bay, west of Louisbourg, +April 30, 1745. They did not know much about war, but they set fire to +some storehouses, and the black smoke drove down in such volumes upon +the Royal Battery at the bottom of the harbor that its scared French +defenders spiked the guns and fled in the night. The Puritans took +possession, beat off the French who attacked them, got smiths at work, +who drilled out the spikes, and soon from this, the key to the +position, they turned the guns upon the town. Then began a regular +siege, though most unscientific in manner. They captured a French ship +with stores and reinforcements, and by June had breached the walls +twenty-four feet at the King's Bastion, dismounted all the neighboring +guns, made the Goat Island Battery untenable, and ruined the town by +showers of bombs and red-hot balls. Upon June 15th the British fleet +of ten ships was drawn up off the harbor entrance for an attack, and +the land forces were arrayed to assault the West Gate, when the French +commander, knowing he could hold out no longer, decided to surrender, +and on June 17th, the forty-ninth day of the siege, he capitulated. + +Thus the grand fortress fell, as the Puritan historian describes it, +upon the attack of "four thousand undisciplined militia or volunteers, +officered by men who had, with one or two exceptions, never seen a +shot fired in anger in all their lives, encamped in an open country +and sadly deficient in suitable artillery." He continues: "As the +troops, entering the fortress, beheld the strength of the place, their +hearts for the first time sank within them. 'God has gone out of his +way,' said they, 'in a remarkable and most miraculous manner, to +incline the hearts of the French to give up and deliver this strong +city into our hands.'" The capture was the marvel of the time, and +caused the greatest rejoicings throughout the British Empire; while +Pepperell, who was made a Baronet, attributed his success, not to the +guns nor the ships, but to the constant prayers of New England, daily +arising from every village in behalf of the absent army. This victory +at Louisbourg gave them an experience to which is attributed the +American success at Bunker Hill thirty years afterwards. Colonel +Gridley, who planned Pepperell's batteries, is said to have laid out +the hastily constructed entrenchments on Bunker Hill, and the same old +drums that beat in the siege of Louisbourg were at Bunker Hill, the +spirit which this great victory imparted to the Yankee soldiers having +never deteriorated. + +The French were terribly chagrined at the loss of their great +fortress, and in 1746 they sent out the "French Armada" of seventy +ships under the Duc d'Anville, instructed to "occupy Louisbourg, +reduce Nova Scotia, destroy Boston, and ravage the coast of New +England." But storms wrecked and dispersed the fleet, and the vexed +and disappointed commander died of apoplexy, his Vice-Admiral killing +himself. Then a second expedition of forty-four ships was sent under +La Jonquiere to retake Louisbourg, but the English squadrons attacked +and destroyed this fleet off Cape Finisterre, Admirals Warren and +Anson gaining one of the greatest British naval victories of the +eighteenth century. The fortress which thus could not be retaken by +arms was, however, to the general astonishment, surrendered back to +France by diplomacy. The peace of Aix la Chapelle in 1748 ended the +war by restoring Louisbourg and Cape Breton Island to France, and the +historian bluntly records that "after four years of warfare in all +parts of the world, after all the waste of blood and treasure, the war +ended just where it began." France then rebuilt, improved and +strengthened the idolized fortress, sending it a powerful garrison. + +War was renewed in 1755,--the terrible French and Indian War. Halifax +was then the base of British-American operations, and fleets soon +blockaded Louisbourg. The French had twelve warships in the harbor and +ten thousand men in the garrison, but the British, bewailing the +shortsightedness that gave it up by treaty, were bound to retake it at +all hazards. They sent a fleet of one hundred and fifty-six warships +and transports from Spithead, the most powerful England had down to +that time assembled, carrying thirteen thousand six hundred men, with +Admiral Boscawen commanding the navy and General Amherst the army, the +immortal Wolfe being one of the brigadiers. Rendezvousing at Halifax, +this great force sailed against Louisbourg May 28, 1758, the troops +landing at Gabarus Bay, and beginning the attack June 8th, with Wolfe +leading. The French commander sank five of his warships to blockade +the harbor entrance. Wolfe closely followed Pepperell's method, got +batteries in position to bombard the city, and silenced the Goat +Island Battery by his tremendous cannonade. In time he had destroyed +the West Gate, the Citadel and barracks, and burnt three of the French +ships by his red-hot balls. Two more ships ran out of the harbor in a +fog to escape, and one was captured. Two French frigates alone +remained, and a daring attack in boats was made on these, and both +were destroyed. Breaches were rent in the walls, so that the place +became untenable, and finally, after forty-eight days of terrific +siege, Louisbourg, on July 26th, again surrendered to the British. +Then more rejoicings came throughout the Empire, Wolfe was made a +Major General, and the gain to ocean commerce by the downfall of the +fortress, which had been a refuge for privateers, was seen in an +immediate decline in marine insurance rates from thirty to twelve per +cent. The next year the great British fleet and army sailed away from +Louisbourg under Wolfe for the capture of Quebec and the final +conquest of Canada. Then went forth the edict of the conqueror that +the famous French fortress should be utterly destroyed. It was found +as a seaport to be inferior to Halifax, where the admirable harbor is +never closed by ice, and where the forts could make the place +impregnable. The Louisbourg garrison was withdrawn, and the people +scattered, many going to Sydney. All the guns, stores and everything +valuable went to Halifax. In 1760 a corps of sappers and miners +worked six months, demolishing the fortifications and buildings, +overthrowing the walls and glacis into the ditches, leaving nothing +standing but a few small half-ruined private houses, and thus the +proud Acadian fortress was humbled into heaps of rubbish. The merciful +hand of time, left to complete the ruin, has during the centuries +healed most of the ghastly wounds with its generous mantle of +greensward, and the neighboring ocean sounds along the low shores the +eternal requiem of proud Louisbourg. + + +THE MAGDALEN ISLANDS. + +We have come to the uttermost verge of the Continent in quest of "Down +East," and find it elusive and still beyond us. There is yet the +remote island of Newfoundland, and we are pointed thither as still +"Down East." To the northward, lying in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, are +the group of Magdalen Islands, where a steamer calls once a week, +sailing from Pictou, these probably being about as far away as one +would wish to go in his search. There are thirteen in the group, sixty +miles off the extremity of Cape Breton Island, the bleak Cape North. +Acadian fishermen live there, the population being about three +thousand, and New England fishery fleets visit them for cod, mackerel +and seals, with lobsters and sea-trout also abundant, so that these +islands have come to be called in the Provinces the "Kingdom of Fish." +Amherst Island is the chief, having the village and Custom House, the +surface of this and other islands rising in high hills seen from afar. +Coffin Island is the largest of the group, named after Admiral Sir +Isaac Coffin, the original owner. Coffin was a native of Boston, and +in colonial times a distinguished British naval officer. When he was a +Captain he took Governor General Lord Dorchester to Canada in his +frigate, and designing to enter the St. Lawrence, a furious storm +arose. With skill he saved his vessel by managing to get under the lee +of these islands, which broke the force of the gale, and Lord +Dorchester in gratitude procured the grant of the group for Coffin. +There are also the Bird Isles, two bare rocks of sandstone, the +principal one called the Gannet Rock. These are haunted by immense +numbers of sea-birds, whose eggs the islanders gather. The surf dashes +violently against the gaunt rocks on all sides, and they have been +visited by the greatest naturalists of the world, who found them a +most interesting study. A lighthouse is erected on one of them. +Charlevoix, in 1720, recorded his visit here, and his wonder how "in +such a multitude of nests every bird immediately finds her own." It is +also recorded of this remote region that it, too, is a colonizer, the +people of the Magdalen Islands having established three small but +prosperous colonies over on the Labrador shore. Outlying the group to +the westward, eight miles from Amherst, is the desolate rock, +resembling a corpse prepared for burial, known as Deadman's Isle. Tom +Moore sailed past this gruesome place in 1804, and wrote the poem +making it famous: + + "There lieth a wreck on the dismal shore + Of cold and pitiless Labrador, + Where, under the moon, upon mounts of frost, + Full many a mariner's bones are tossed. + + "Yon shadowy bark hath been to that wreck, + And the dim blue fire that lights her deck + Doth play on as pale and livid a crew + As ever yet drank the churchyard dew. + + "To Deadman's Isle in the eye of the blast, + To Deadman's Isle she speeds her fast; + By skeleton shapes her sails are furled, + And the hand that steers is not of this world." + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of America, Volume 5 (of 6), by Joel Cook + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42842 *** |