308 Exploring Visits to the Sources of the Hudson. | 
from our camp at Lake Colden to McIntyre, by this rout, probably 
does not exceed six miles. Continuing our course, we reached the 
settlement without serious accident, but with an increased relish for 
the comforts of civilization. 
This part of the state was surveyed into large tracts, or townships, 
by the colonial government, as early as 1772, and lines and corners 
of that date, as marked upon the trees of the forest, are now dis- 
tinctly legible. But the topography of the mountains and streams 
in the upper country, appears not to have been properly noted, if at 
all examined, and in our best maps, has either been omitted or rep- 
resented erroneously. ‘Traces have been discovered near McIntyre 
of a rout, which the natives sometimes pursued through this moun- 
tain region, by way of Lakes Sanford and Henderson, and thence to 
the Preston Ponds and the head waters of the Racket. But these 
savages had no inducement to make the laborious ascent of sterile 
mountain peaks, which they held in superstitious dread, or to explore 
the hidden sources of the rivers which they send forth. Even the 
more hardy huntsman of later times, who, when trapping for north- 
ern furs, has marked his path into the recesses of these elevated for- 
ests, has left no traces of his axe higher than the borders of Lake 
Colden, where some few marks of this description may be perceived. 
All here seems abandoned to solitude; and even the streams and 
lakes of this upper region are destitute of the trout, which are found 
so abundant below the cataracts of the mountains. 
Whiteface Mountain.— The Notch. 
At a later period of the year, Professor Emmons, in the execu- 
tion of his geological survey, and accompanied by Mr. Hall, his as- 
sistant, ascended the Whiteface Mountain, a solitary peak of differ- 
ent formation, which rises in the north part of the county. From 
this point, Prof. E. distinctly recognized as the highest of the group, 
the peak on which the writer’s attention had been fastened at the 
termination of our ascent of the Hudson, and which he describes as 
situated about sixteen miles south of Whiteface. Prof. E. then pro- 
ceeded southward through the remarkable Notch, or pass, which is 
described in his Report, and which is situated about five miles north 
from McIntyre. The Wallface mountain, which forms the west 
side of the pass, was ascended by him on this occasion, and the 
height of its perpendicular part was ascertained to be about twelve 
hundred feet, as may be seen by reference to the geological Report 
