168 A PEEP AT 



the engine, the passage visibly contracts. The 

 Alpine character of the river strikes you. The huge 

 stones in its wide channel, which have been torn up 

 and rolled down by the sweeping torrents of spring 

 and autumn, lie bared and whitening in the summer's 

 sun. You cross and recross it, as in its deviations it 

 leaves space on one side or the other, for a practicable 

 road. 



" At * Chester Factories ' you begin your ascent of 

 eighty feet in a mile, for thirteen miles ! The stream 

 between you and the precipitous hill side, cramped 

 into its rocky bed, is the Pontoosne, one of the tribu- 

 taries of the Westfield river. As you trace this 

 stream to its mountain-home, it dashes along beside 

 you with the recklessness of childhood. It leaps 

 down precipices, runs forth laughing in the dimpling 

 sunshine, and then, shy as a mountain nymph, it 

 dodges behind a knotty copse of evergreens. In 

 approaching the * summit level ' you travel bridges 

 built a hundred feet above other mountain streams, 

 tearing along their deep-worn beds ; and at the 

 * deep-cut ' your passage is hewn through solid rocks, 

 whose mighty walls frown over you. 



" Mountain scenery changes with every changing 

 season — we might almost say with every change 



