DYER’S HOLLOW. ak 
To see Dyer’s Hollow at its best, the visi- 
tor should enter it at the western end, and 
follow its windings till he stands upon the 
bluff looking out upon the Atlantic. If his 
sensations at all resemble mine, he will feel, 
long before the last curve is rounded, as if 
he were ascending a mountain; and an odd 
feeling it is, the road being level, or sub- 
stantially so, for the whole distance. At 
the outset he isin a green, well-watered val- 
ley on the banks of what was formerly Little 
Harbor. The building of the railway em- 
bankment has shut out the tide, and what 
used to be an arm of the bay is now a body 
of fresh water. Luxuriant cat-tail flags 
fringe its banks, and cattle are feeding near 
by. Up from the reeds a bittern will now 
and then start. I should like to be here 
once in May, to hear the blows of his stake- 
driver’s mallet echoing and reéchoing among 
the close hills. At that season, too, all the 
uplands would be green. So we were told, 
at any rate, though the pleasing story was 
almost impossible of belief. In August, as 
soon as we left the immediate vicinity of 
Little Harbor, the very bottom of the valley 
itself was parched and brown; and the look 
