I Scrambled Up
The Hill To The Only Shelter That Could Be Found, A
Small Country Store Owned By A Captain Conk
Who Kept Entertainment For The Traveller.
Rough
fellows and old crones came in to talk about the
spooks that had been seen in the neighboring
hills.
It was veritable "Sleepy Hollow" talk.
The physician of the place, they said, had been
"skert clean off a bridge the other night."
Embarking the following morning from this
weird and hilly country, that prominent natural
feature, Anthony's Nose, which was located on
the opposite shore, strongly appealed to my
imagination and somewhat excited my mirth. One
needs a powerful imagination, I thought, to live
in these regions where the native element, the
hill-folk, dwell so fondly and earnestly upon the
ghostly and mysterious. Three miles down the
river, Dunderberg, "the thundering mountain,"
on the west bank, with the town of Peekskill on
the opposite shore, was passed, and I entered
Haverstraw Bay, the widest part of the river.
"Here," says the historian, "the fresh and salt
water usually contend, most equally, for the
mastery; and here the porpoise is often seen in
large numbers sporting in the summer sun. Here
in the spring vast numbers of shad are caught
while on their way to spawning-beds in
freshwater coves." Haverstraw Bay was crossed, and
Tarrytown passed, when I came to the
picturesque little cottage of a great man now gone
from among us. Many pleasant memories of
his tales rose in my mind as I looked upon
Sunnyside, the home of Washington Irving,
nestled in the grove of living green, its white
stuccoed walls glistening in the bright sunlight,
and its background of grand villas looming up on
every side.
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