Standing on the summit
of Whitcomb, one of the finest views of pure wild mountain
scenery in the East is disclosed. Immediately in front of you
loom vast numbers of wooded slopes with their varied tints of
green in grand variety, stretching shoulder to shoulder like
works of art. A great many peaks, rivers and dark blue lakes,
all saturated in the warm, purple light, lie dreamily silent in
the far distance. Rounded summits rise up from the vast
undulating mass like a never-ending sea, whose surface is broken
as far as the eye can reach with their immense billows of blue
and green.
The nearer forests comprise the green-tinted waves, which recede
and blend imperceptibly into infinite gradations of color from
palest sapphire to darkest purple tones. Standing here, gazing
at the glorious landscape circling round with its far-flashing
streams, placid lakes, and the infinite blue dome of the sky
above, and an air of mystery brooding over all, we exclaimed
with the poet: "And to me mountains high are a feeling, but the
hum of human cities torture."
What a wealth of natural beauty greets you here! It is the
highest point along the Mohawk trail, twenty-two hundred and two
feet above sea level. From the sixty-foot observatory the eye
sweeps sections of four states: Vermont, New Hampshire,
Massachusetts, and New York. Among the prominent peaks that
distinguish themselves are Monadnock, in New Hampshire, Mount
Berlin in New York, Wachuset, Mount Tom, and Graylock in
Massachusetts, the latter being monarch of them all, rising to a
height of thirty-five hundred and five feet. A remarkable
feature of the place is a spring issuing from the rocks near
Mount Whitcomb's summit.
There is more sublimity in the towering snow-clad Alps, more
real wildness in the Adirondacks, more gracefulness in the
flowing contour of the Catskills, yet few are so beautiful or
"bring more lasting and inspiring memories." Lying dreamily
silent in thick purple hues, old Graylock is a vision of
splendor that looms as a charming surprise to all observers. The
sunbeams that filter through innumerable leaves give the place a
cathedral-like solemnity. How all sordid thoughts disappear,
vanishing on the far shores of forgetfulness like the pale tints
that grow dim and melt along the sky-line! How the so-called
splendors and pomp of your cities pale into insignificance out
here among God's eternal hills! The eye roves over this vast
domain in unwonted freedom.
How quickly one imbibes disdain for all unrighteous restraint.
No wonder the inhabitants dwelling among the Swiss Alps could
not bear the crushing yoke of tyranny thrust upon them. The very
atmosphere they breathed had in it an elixir, and the lofty,
snow-clad hills, as they gazed upon their seeming
unchangeableness, were only loftier principles that led their
souls in trial flights heavenward.
As you look out again at this vast wilderness of mountains
towering together you are aware how many and superb are the
views you never could have enjoyed by remaining in the valleys
below. Only by continued effort can one leave the lowlands of
self, and it requires a courageous soul indeed not to look back
as did Lot's wife at the smoking ruins of her village. How much
of indomitable courage and firmness is taught by those hills!
How much of humility by the little blue campanula peeping from
rocky ledges, with heaven's own blue "gladdening the rough
mountain-side like a happy life that toils and faints not."
We do not know why the Florida range in the Hoosacs was so named
unless it was on account of the wonderfully luxuriant ferns that
present an almost tropical appearance along its sides. Here are
vast meadows of Osmundas, waving their plume-like fronds of rich
green in tropical beauty. These are the most luxurious plants
our low wet woods or mountain meadows know. They are all superb
plants whose tall, sterile fronds curve gracefully outward,
forming vase-like clusters with their resplendent shields.
The regal fern belonging to this family is all that its name
implies. It has smooth pale green sterile fronds, with a crown
that encircles the fertile, flower-like fronds, forming a vase-
like cluster of singular beauty. This fern was one time used by
herbalists to prepare a salve for wounds and bruises. We thought
that it would be harder to destroy such beauty than to bear the
wounds and bruises. It has in it the very essence and spirit of
the woods, and "as you approach and raise these fronds you feel
their mysterious presence."
Here, too, you meet with the interrupted fern, whose graceful,
sterile fronds fall away in every direction, holding you captive
with its charm. It is fair enough to interrupt Satan himself.
An old English legend relates that near Loch Tyne dwelt an
Englishman, Osmund, who saved his wife and child from imminent
danger by hiding them upon an island among masses of flowered
fern, and the child in later years named the plant for her
father.
Wordsworth was familiar with these ferns, for he writes:
Often, trifling with a privilege
Alike indulged to all, we paused, one now,
And now the other, to point out, perchance
To pluck some flower or water weed, too fair,
Either to be divided from the place
On which it grew, or to be left alone
To its own beauty. Many such there are,
Fair ferns and flowers and chiefly that tall fern,
So stately, of the Queen Osmunda named:
Plant lovelier, in its own retired abode
On Grasmere's beach, than Naiad by the side
Of Grecian brook or Lady of the Mere,
Sole sitting by the shores of old romance.
