1SS7.] Langdon o« Birds of tke Chilhowee Mountains, Tenn. 127 



occasionally along streams, witch-hazel ; in many places the 

 'mountain laurel' forms impenetrable thickets for miles. 



'Pine Mountain,' adjoining Nebo on the east, and separated 

 trom it only by a shallow ravine, is clothed on its upper two- 

 thirds with a mantle almost exclusively of pine, while its basal 

 third corresponds closely with Nebo. 



The foot-hills surrounding Nebo are mostly cleared of timber 

 and under cultivation, corn, wheat and sorghum being the prin- 

 cipal crops, with some cotton and tobacco. This is the case also 

 in the 'coves' traversed on the way to the 'Smokies.' As the 

 'coves' are left behind, however, and the Great Smoky Range is 

 approached the scenery becomes bolder in character, the route 

 lying over mountainous ridges and the horizon shut in on all 

 sides by range after range of mountains from three to six 

 thousand feet in height. Along Little River the scenery in many 

 places might fairly be called grand. 



Night overtakes us on Scott Mountain at the home of Mr. 

 A. J. Dorse} r and his estimable family, whose hospitalities much 

 enhance the enjoyment of the trip. Here we leave our team, 

 and another day finds our party, ten in number, on foot for the 

 'Smokies,' seven miles distant, loaded down with guns, orni- 

 thological material, fishing tackle, photographic apparatus, cook- 

 ing utensils, and provisions. Our headquarters on Defeat 

 Mountain, a spur of the Smoky Range, was at a cattle-herder's 

 camp, a small log cabin, situated at an altitude of perhaps 4000 

 feet, in the heart of a giant spruce and poplar forest ; many trees 

 of both species measuring six feet in diameter and fifty feet or 

 more to a limb. Here, on a gentle slope covered with a velvety 

 carpet of moss, partridge-berry vine, and spruce needles, we were 

 lulled to rest by the babbling of the waters over the rocky bed 

 of a neighboring trout brook (middle fork of Little River) ; 

 this, with the hoot-to-toot of the Great Horned Owl and the 

 notes of a full orchestra of katydids, furnished a symphony emi- 

 nently appropriate to its surroundings. The 'patter of the rain 

 on the roof,' however, which ensued later, was a musical event 

 not so highly appreciated, since it necessitated the crowding of 

 ten men into a cabin ten feet square. 



As the sunbeams tip the crest of the 'Smokies' and struggle 

 in splinters through the dark evergreen canop}' about the camp, 

 our ornithological eyes are greeted with the sight of such species 



