308 Editorial Miscellany. 



I send you, is after the plan desig-ned by the Mount "Washing-ton 

 Road Compan}', and affords a very accurate view of the peak of 

 the Mountain. (See Frontispiece). The road will be completed in 

 about two years. Among the curious features of this locality, is 

 an immense /«ce (I enclose a drawing) called the old man of the 

 mountains ; a well defined profile of a human being, twelve hun- 

 dred feet above the level of the pass ; sculptured by nature in the 

 solid granite, and of dimensions in proportion to her other grand 

 works in the vicinity. The profile is on the south side of Cannon 

 Mountain, facing Mount Lafayette. Said an eccentric speaker, at 

 a celebration a few years since in Fryburg : — " Men put out signs 

 representing their different trades ; jewelers hang out a monster- 

 watch ; shoemakers, a huge boot ; and, up in Franconia, God 

 Almighty has hung out a sign that in New England he maifes 

 men." The top of the mountain is about two thousand feet above 

 the level of the road, and four thousand feet above the level of the 

 sea. Near the summit, an oblong rock, resembling a cannon, has 

 given a name to the mountain. The sides are covered with a thick 

 growth of maple, beech, birch and spruce. The Profile Rock itself 

 is more than twelve hundred feet above the level of the road : it 

 being situated far below the summit of the mountain. The profile 

 is composed of three separate masses of rock, one of which forms 

 the forehead, the second the nose and upper lip, and the third the 

 chin. Only at one particular place are they brought into their 

 proper position, which is on the road leading to the Notch, about 

 a quarter of a mile south of the Lafayette House. The expression 

 of the face, as it stands out in bold relief against the sky, is quite 

 stern. The mouth alone betrays any signs of age and feebleness. 

 But the " Old man of the Mountains " has never been known to 

 flinch. " He neither blinks at the near flashes of the lightning 

 beneath his nose, nor flinches from the driving snow and sleet of 

 the Franconia winter, which makes the mercury of the thermome- 

 ter shrink into the bulb and congeal." Passing down the road 

 from the particular spot where it can be seen to perfection, the 

 Old Man's countenance changes first into a " toothless old woman 

 in a mob cap," and soon the profile is entirely lost. In passing up 

 the road, the nose and face flatten until the forehead alone is seen. 

 The length of the profile, from the top of the forehead to the low- 

 est point of the chin, is eighty feet. The face looks towards the 



