Its Name Is Said To Mean "The Two Breasts," There
Being Two Eminences Some Distance Apart.
The highest, which is
about fourteen hundred feet above the sea, probably affords a
more extensive view of the Merrimack valley and the adjacent
country than any other hill, though it is somewhat obstructed by
woods.
Only a few short reaches of the river are visible, but
you can trace its course far down stream by the sandy tracts on
its banks.
A little south of Uncannunuc, about sixty years ago, as the story
goes, an old woman who went out to gather pennyroyal, tript her
foot in the bail of a small brass kettle in the dead grass and
bushes. Some say that flints and charcoal and some traces of a
camp were also found. This kettle, holding about four quarts, is
still preserved and used to dye thread in. It is supposed to
have belonged to some old French or Indian hunter, who was killed
in one of his hunting or scouting excursions, and so never
returned to look after his kettle.
But we were most interested to hear of the pennyroyal, it is
soothing to be reminded that wild nature produces anything ready
for the use of man. Men know that _something_ is good. One says
that it is yellow-dock, another that it is bitter-sweet, another
that it is slippery-elm bark, burdock, catnip, calamint,
elicampane, thoroughwort, or pennyroyal. A man may esteem
himself happy when that which is his food is also his medicine.
There is no kind of herb, but somebody or other says that it is
good.
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