a flDa^Bap on flDonument. 83 



ern peak of Monument, culling delicate blossoms all 

 the way. 



It was high noon when we sat down on the rocks 

 which overlook the steep precipices of the eastern 

 side of the mountain, and spread our frugal lunch. 

 Almost everybody who. knows Berkshire with any 

 thoroughness has studied the landscape that drew 

 our eyes away from our rocky table to the hazy 

 horizons. And nearly everyone has seen it through 

 the eyes of the Berkshire poet, who tells of it in words 

 that make other description superfluous : 



"It is a fearful thing 



To stand upon the beetling verge and see 

 Where storm and lightning, from that huge grey wall, 

 Have tumbled down vast blocks, and at the base 

 Dashed them in fragments, and to lay thine ear 

 Over the dizzy depth, and hear the sound 

 Of winds, that struggle from the woods below, 

 Come up like ocean murmurs. But the scene 

 Is lovely found ; a beautiful river there 

 Wanders amid the fresh and fertile meads, 

 The paradise he made unto himself, 

 Mining the soil for ages. On each side 

 The fields swell upward to the hills ; beyond, 

 Above the hills, in the blue distance rise 

 The mountain-columns with which earth props heaven." 



All this we saw in the' very prime of the spring, in 

 the haze of a May-day which was premature July, 

 with the brown acres of fresh-turned soil telling of the 

 seed-time just passing by. It was our last chance to 

 see the procession of budding things march past. In a 

 few hours we were whirling homeward. But we 

 bore with us much trillium and arbutus, trophies of 



