This tunnel,
contracted for by the city of New York, will cost twelve
millions of dollars. It will connect the Schoharie river and the
Gilboa reservoir with the Esopus and Ashokan reservoir."
We next entered a very picturesque country. True, the mountains
did not rise so high, as mountains go, and did not affect one as
do the sublimity and grandeur of the snow-clad Alps, yet the
warm light falling here and there in streaks and bars on
beautiful fern gardens that nodded and swayed in the cool forest
depths, where springs gushed forth in crystal clearness,
"brought that tone that all mountains have." We passed through
Arkville, a village of six hundred people.
Our curiosity was aroused concerning the name. On making inquiry
we learned that one fall there had been a freshet which carried
vast numbers of pumpkins down the east branch of the Delaware.
The house of Colonel Noah Dimmick was untouched by the water,
and his home was given the name of Noah's Ark, "from which the
name of Arkville was suggested. The summer residence of George
C. Gould, Jay Gould and Anthony J. Drexel, Jr., are located near
here.
