16 LETTERS FROM THE BACKWOODS. 



LETTER III. 



ASCENT OF MOUNT TAIIAWUS — DIFFICULTIES OF TUB 

 WAY — GLORIOUS PROSPECT FROM TUB TOP. 



I HAD finally resolved to ascend this mountain, tlie 

 highest in the Empire State, and the highest in the 

 Union with the exception of Mount Washington. 

 The hunter Cheney told me that not a human foot 

 had pressed its lordly summit for six years, and that 

 it would require three days to ascend it and return. 

 It was fifteen miles to the top, through a pathless 

 wilderness, across rivers and amid tangled thickets, 

 and over swamps that would task the powers of the 

 strongest man. As he looked at my pale visage and 

 slender frame, he intimated that I could not accom- 

 plish the ascent. I told him I could, and what was 

 more, I could do it all in a day and a half, passing 

 only one night in the woods instead of two. He said 

 it was impossible ; that it had never been done but 

 once in that time, and then it was performed by him- 

 self and another man from necessity, and that he did 

 not get over it for a week after. 



Notwithstanding these discouragements, our little 

 party concluded to start ; and so, on Friday morning, 

 before the leaves had shaken the dew from their fin- 



