60 Iftature Studies in Berkshire. 



way around, and the longest way around, too, in order 

 to get views. One of the chief uses of a good mount- 

 ain is to afford views. Mountains have a distinct 

 utility as objects to be looked at ; and it may be 

 fairly questioned which of the two better knows his 

 mountain, the one who has crawled and camped all 

 over it, or he who has travelled and loitered all around 

 it. Certainly the climbing brings only a half know- 

 ledge. A mountain needs to be seen in perspective. 



The wind was cool from the north-west as we 

 wheeled past the Maplewood and congratulated our- 

 selves on the mingled self-denial and frugality which 

 had induced us to be contented with a railroad lunch- 

 room instead of the homelike dining-room of the 

 fine old hostelry. But we saved an hour by lunching 

 instead of waiting for dinner, and were well up to 

 Pontoosuc, with its sentinel pines, by high noon. 

 There was a fine blue ripple on the lake, and minia- 

 ture whitecaps flashed in the sun ; and away to the 

 north the rounded shoulder of Greylock rose like one 

 of the bounds in the circus maximus in which we 

 were to do our chariot race. 



The fine air was like wine in our veins, and as 

 our machines worked free and the whirr of the chains 

 and the click of the bearing-balls rose to our ears, 

 we began to feel all the intoxication of spirit which 

 comes to the well-mounted wheelman when he 

 knows that all is well overhead and underwheel, 

 and a good road to the fore. 



It was an ideal track we took that afternoon, — one 



