IN THE CATSKILLS 



tain-side was the painted trillium, the petals white, 

 veined with pink. 



The low, stunted growth of spruce and fir which 

 clothes the top of Slide has been cut away over a 

 small space on the highest point, laying open the 

 view on nearly all sides. Here we sat down and 

 enjoyed our triumph. We saw the world as the 

 hawk or the balloonist sees it when he is three thou- 

 sand feet in the air. How soft and flowing all the 

 outlines of the hills and mountains beneath us 

 looked! The forests dropped down and undulated 

 away over them, covering them like a carpet. To 

 the east we looked over the near-by Wittenberg 

 range to the Hudson and beyond ; to the south, 

 Peak-o'-Moose, with its sharp crest, and Table 

 Mountain, with its long level top, were the two 

 conspicuous objects; in the west, Mt. Graham and 

 Double Top, about three thousand eight hundred 

 feet each, arrested the eye; while in our front to the 

 north we looked over the top of Panther Mountain 

 to the multitudinous peaks of the northern Catskills. 

 All was mountain and forest on every hand. Civili- 

 zation seemed to have done little more than to have 

 scratched this rough, shaggy surface of the earth 

 here and there. In any such view, the wild, the 

 aboriginal, the geographical greatly predominate. 

 The works of man dwindle, and the original fea- 

 tures of the huge globe come out. Every single 

 object or point is dwarfed; the valley of the Rud- 

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