1 82 Musings by Camp- Fire and Wayside 



At the mouth of the canon lie the Sycamore 

 Shoals, rendered famous by the assemblage and 

 mobilization there of Sevier's six hundred for the 

 King's Mountain campaign. Each had a good 

 horse, a powder-horn, a buck-skin sack of bullets, 

 greased patches, and a block of parched corn, 

 cemented with maple sugar. Thus equipped, they 

 crossed the mountain and won the most glorious 

 victory of the Revolutionary war. Sevier's tactics 

 were simple. "When the redcoats charge bayo- 

 nets, run your best, but don't run away. " That won 

 the battle. After running away, the buck-skins 

 would reload and rush back in a fury of wrath. 

 Their losses almost all came from refusal to run. 

 A clubbed rifle was no match for a bayonet. 



The handling of baggage on the Southern roads 

 is about where it was in the North twenty years 

 ago. A merchant told me it was the same with 

 freight. His boxes were roughly used, and his 

 goods not infrequently damaged. The fixtures in 

 my camera were wrenched, the mahogany split, and 

 it looked hopeless. I have never had any harm 

 done to my chest of tools or its contents before. 

 As for glass plates, none were broken. I pack 

 them in a manner that makes them secure, unless 

 the chest itself be broken in pieces. It would be 

 well if the railroad authorities would hold their 

 employes in this regard to a strict responsibility. 



I have not found any more beautiful scenery 

 than this. It has not the massiveness and grandeur 



