THE OREGON NATURALIST. 13 



of lull and tree and vi-ions too, of goblin and the life of reptiles, insects and birds of the 

 ghost and good old dn3'S as told to us in Mes"zoic Time. 



merry legends and songs. Of these last named branches of the animal 



Washington Irving is sleeping his lust long kingdom, do we find innumerable signs in the 

 sleep, but still yet in the Highlands 'tis said, rocks forming the Pali.sade Highlands. Foot- 

 may be heard ihe sound of the " balls" and prints of various animals, the claw of the bird 

 the "])ins"' when thunder storms come-and the wing of the insect have been seen again 

 not long ago -but the dreamer must don her and again in ths sand-stone rock, 

 science cap and leave visions and ghosts to flit If some time the reader should find himself 

 away as do mists of the Indian summer from in the region of Amherst, Massachusetts and 

 Palisade's crest, when the cold frosts come. if he will make a vi.sit to the College collection 



The Palisades of the Hudson as recalled by he may see for himself thousands of these very 

 the tourist, consist of a peij endicular ledge of prints and fossils, brought from different 

 brown gray rock on the western banks of the sections of the Highlands by Prof. Hitchcock 

 Hudson River, rising to the height of from 200 who has made this study a specialty. All this 

 to 500 feet in almost an unbroken line, for a to prove the time in the history of our continent 

 distance of something like 20 miles northwaul at which these hills were formed and of which 

 from New York City. This natural bulwark is the Hudson Palisades eonstitute the most marked 

 but a part of what is known as the Highlands feature. 



of the Hudson, and which in turn is but a po:- It would be of interest to picture to the reader 

 tion ol a range of hills extending from Rock- the Palisades themselves as they are seen from 

 land on the Hudson River, southwest through the river, on the New York Central Road 

 New Jersey, Pennsylvanin and Virginia east of which winds along following closely the river's 

 the Blue Ridge, a distance of no miles and bank on the opposite side. But how shall I de- 

 with an average width of 20 mdes . scribe their beauty to you, what language use? 



Geolrgy tells us that during the third great For the Palisades, on a winters day when the 

 age or period in the history or the North sky is clear, and the sun well up and the river 

 American Continent, known as Mesozoic, these "'"^ miles wide at one place forming a great 

 Highlands were formed. The lock of which vvhite sheet of glistening ice, are not the 

 they are composed, is generally a reddish sand- Palisades of an early March day, when athous- 

 stone.vvith occasionally a region of shale or con- ^^^^ desolate cakes of gray ice jostle about in a 

 glomerate and again in two or three vicinities mw'ky sea, and the clouds are low down, and 

 chiefly south of New Yoik, are found vahiab'e '^e Palisade's sides seem dreary and dead, 

 beds of bituminous coal. It might be well for a l^"t when Maytime comes, the rocks put on 

 moment to cast a th.ought back to the first and ^ garb of fresh green verdure, and each open- 

 second periods of our Continents history, in '"S tree nods laughingly down to the bright 

 order to connect this condition of affairs in this sparkling river, which glistens and flashes back 

 Mesozoic Period with those which preceded i^s own happiness to the soft white clouds and 

 after the Azoic Time, in which the rocks found smiling Palisades. Riding along the banks of 

 were chiefly Metamorphic, (granite gneiss syen- ^^^ Hudson on a midsummer day just at the 

 ite,) and the life chiefly of the vegetable king- time when the sun will set, gives one perhaps 

 dom and that of the lowest order, came the ^'^'^ "^°^^ transcendent view which can ever be 

 Paleozoic Age. This Paleozoic Period, produce- seen of River and Height, 

 ing the annnals of all the lower orders, piling up The sun is gradually sinking, a ball of crim- 

 rocks of a stratified nature upon the granite son light, down into some break in the mount- 

 foundations and storing away coal for the use ^'" ledge. The sky is aglow with crimson and 

 of man, laid the way for what was to come- g'^'f^ sent off from the sun; a long broad path- 



