Notices of Mount Washington and the vicinity. 77 



Ladies sometimes go on this adventure, but it were better, in my 

 judgment, that they should not attempt it. It is scarcely pos- 

 sible to afford them any material assistance ; they must struggle 

 almost unaided, first through the arduous forest-ride, where none 

 but the practiced and wary-footed animals, that are trained to 

 the service, can carry them in safety ; and safety depends, very 

 much, upon permittmg the horses to wend their own way, un- 

 molested by guiding, through the deep mud holes, the tangled 

 roots, and the projecting stones and timber, which, notwithstand- 

 ing all that has been done, (and much labor has evidently been 

 expended here, ) still obstruct no small portion of the journey 

 through the woods. There are, however, only two or three miles 

 that are thus anxious and fatiguing ; the rest is a plain and open 

 road, the whole distance from the hotel to the foot of the moun- 

 tain being six miles. When the horses are abandoned, then com- 

 mences the severe labor. 



When we began our ascent, and during most of its pro- 

 gress, I insisted that the party should halt and sit down every 

 twelve or fifteen minutes ; three or four minutes of rest was, in 

 general, sufficient to restore a natural respiration and to equalize 

 the circulation of the blood, both being much disturbed by an 

 unceasing ascent, and the muscles are thus overstrained and ex- 

 hausted ; the respiration becomes laborious and the circulation is 

 hurried on, especially through the lungs, with oppressive and 

 even dangerous celerity. These precautions are of the utmost 

 consequence in ascending mountains, and by the neglect of them 

 and especially by yielding to a false pride of vigor and hardi- 

 hood, and to an equally false shame of being thought effeminate, 

 health is hazarded, and sometimes both health and life are de- 

 stroyed.* If ladies insist upon making this ascent, their dress 

 should be adapted to the service, and none should attempt it but 

 those of firm health and sound lungs, and although this remark 

 applies to them in a peculiar manner, it is decidedly applicable 

 also to those of the other sex. 



* An eminent writer and orator, one of the brightest ornaments of this coun- 

 try, assured me, that he never recovered from the effects of a rapid ascent in his 

 youth, up Mount Ascutney, near Windsor, in Vermont, which is not half so high 

 as Mount Washington. 



A very lovely and accomplished young lady, of fine talents, but of a spirit which 

 only rose with the difficulties to be encountered, is said to have laid, in this very as- 

 cent up Mount Washington, only a few years since, the foundation of an illness 

 which cut her off prematurely in a foreign land. I knew her well. I may add also, 



