14 HUDSON RIVER SCENERY. 



was somewhat disappointed with the far-famed scenery of this 

 river, the banks of which (as indeed is the case with land every- 

 where in America, at this season) are strikingly deficient in 

 verdure. The aspect of the rocky cliffs and the broad river is 

 very pleasing, enlivened as the latter was by numerous white- 

 sailed little sloops passing up and down, and now and then by 

 a white steamer trailing half a dozen loaded canal boats. Af- 

 ter passing West Point the wooded hills in the foreground are 

 backed by the Catskill Mountains, and the reaches of the river 

 are here extremely picturesque. But the wood, though there 

 is plenty of it, is little better than copse or brushwood. There 

 are no fine trees, and the soil appears to be beyond measure 

 barren. There are houses here and there, peeping out from 

 the woods, with green outside blinds, and towers with tall 

 steeples, all very white. But in the 150 miles between New 

 York and Albany I saw no good land and no grass which any 

 British ox would touch. From Albany to Troy the railroad 

 cars were crammed with people, all hurrying about, and yet it 

 was difficult to see what occupied them, as there are few signs 

 of manufacture, and the soil is evidently unfruitful and neg- 

 lected. There seemed nothing here to attract or create much 

 capital. No cheapness of price would compensate for the nat- 

 ural inferiority of such land to good land in our own country. 

 The lowland along the river is marshy and aguish-looking, and 

 the upland seemed either bare rock or stiff clay. Between Al- 

 bany and Troy there were some patches of Indian corn, but the 

 country is very uninviting, no verdure, and no pleasant home- 

 steads. 



I liked New York from its variety and picturesque novelty. 

 But the country so far disappoints me, and the same barren as- 

 pect, changed from clay to blowing sand, continues to Lake 

 Cham plain. The railways are very uneven and uneasy. When 

 I awoke after my first day's ride I thought myself at sea again, 



