THE LAND OF THE CHEROKEES 



543 



porch. At the little town of Cleveland, the exploring 

 tourists were ushered into the drug store and billiard 

 hall where a spread of soda pop, peanuts, cigars and 

 bananas awaited them. 



Such was the nature of the hospitality accorded the 

 party as it moved up through the foothills toward the 

 undulating skyline of the Blue Ridge, bathed in a soft 

 haze of restful colors. By evening of the first day, the 

 forest travelers drew up in the shadow of Yonah Moun- 

 tain, the trysting place of the beautiful Indian maid, 

 Nacoochee, and 

 young Laceola, 

 son of a hostile 

 chieftain. The good 

 roads of the lower 

 foothills and the 

 stretches of rolling 

 and terraced fields 

 had been left be- 

 hind. Instead, the 

 route more and 

 more wound in 

 and out, up and 

 down, across 

 bridgeless creeks 

 and over ungraded 

 and often washed 

 out roads, into the 

 steep and wooded 

 hills of the Chero- 

 kees. But the sky 

 was clear and the 

 increasing jolts and 

 discomforts of the 

 road were absorbed 

 by the beauty and 

 restfulness of a 

 perfect evening 

 amid mountains 

 which seemed the 

 untarnished heri- 

 tage of gentle 

 spirits of ages long 

 ago before there 

 were noisy, crowd- 

 ed cities filled with 

 greed, hypocracy, 

 heart - aches and 

 jaded souls. 



After spending the night in Nachoochee Valley, just 

 outside the purchase area of the Cherokee National For- 

 est, the expedition swung eastward, crossing the beau- 

 tiful Chattahoochee River just above Tullulah Falls. It 

 then turned northward and began the ascent of the 

 Tallulah mountains. The weather was still clear and al- 

 though the road was very rough with many hairpin 

 curves and hazardous pitches, progress was seriously 

 impeded at but one point where several machines balked 

 on swimming a swift running mountain stream. All 



THIS POINT ON YONAH MOUNTAIN MIGHT WELL HAVE BEEN THE TRYSTING 

 PLACE OF THE INDIAN MAID, NACOOCHE, AND HER LOVER, LACEOLA 



along the way, young forests crowded the road, seemingly 

 cutting it ofif here and turning it in there, much like a 

 crowd of boys driving a skittish calf. Blooming laurel 

 and rhododendron brightened the dense shade of the 

 hardwoods while in the valleys and ravines where the- 

 mountaineers have built their log cabins and cleared 

 small patches of ground, thin columns of blue smoke 

 drifting lazily upward, stood out against the green 

 mountain sides. 

 As darkness fell on the evening of this second day, 



the caravan of au- 

 tomobiles, their 

 radiators siteaming 

 hot, crested the di- 

 vide and stopped 

 for the night at 

 the hamlet and 

 summer resort of 

 Highlands, North 

 Carolina, almost 4,- 

 ooo feet above the 

 sea. Coming up the 

 mountain, every 

 turn of the road 

 around a project- 

 ing shoulder threw 

 into relief a moun- 

 tain view of im- 

 pressive beauty and 

 the spell of the 

 Blue Ridge was 

 therefore aglow in 

 the breasts of the 

 travelers as they 

 retired for the night 

 after a supper of 

 fried chicken and 

 hot biscuits at the 

 village inn. 



But on the fol- 

 lowing morning the 

 skies were dark 

 with low hanging 

 clouds ~and a Steady 

 rain was falling. 

 The day's plan was 

 to go to Franklin 

 the headquarters of 

 the Natahala Na- 

 tional Forest. The first lap was one of eighteen miles 

 down the mountain to Dillard. Those eighteen miles 

 proved almost the undoing of the expedition. The road 

 at best is a bad one, but soaked with rain, it was almost 

 impassable. First one car and then another settled in 

 the yellow mud until its body rested upon the ground, 

 defying the efforts of the car in front to pull it out or 

 of the one behind to push it through. A mountaineer 

 with a team of diminutive mules, who chanced to over- 

 take the caravan saved the day. Seven hours were re- 



