December, 1906 



AMERICAN HOMES AND GARDENS 



357 



Notable American Homes 



By Barr Ferree 



" Woodlea," the Estate of Mrs. Elliott F. Shepard, Scarborough, New York 



HE hundreds of thousands of persons who 

 annually pass up and down the Hudson 

 River by the railroad that borders its eastern 

 shore, are for the most part completely un- 

 aware of the beautiful country that rises 

 sharply above them. The hillsides come 

 down so steeply to the water's edge that for many miles there 

 scarce seems room for the railroad bed. And the gleaming 

 waters of the Hudson and the towering fronts of the Pali- 



eler thinks the outlook from his car window the chiefest of 

 the river sights. 



The foot of the hills being cut away for the railn 

 there is little to be seen on the land side. One knows, in- 

 deed, that there arc "Places" far up above, for all the world 

 has heard of the splendors of the Hudson River palaces. But 

 they are so far above the train that one can not so much as 

 catch a glimpse of them, and unless a deliberate journey is 

 made among the beautiful roads ol Westchester County they 



The " Echo " Portico Overlooking the River 



sades beyond in furthest Jersey are so boundlessly attractive 

 that many, no doubt, think these sights are the chief points 

 of interest in the country through which they are traveling. 



In a sense this is true, for the overlook here is world- 

 famous and one of the most beautiful in America. It is a 

 scene of wonderful majesty and penetrating beauty, of sharp 

 contrasts, too, for where else is the laughing water so broadly 

 brilliant beneath such a frowning background as the Jersey 

 Palisades? In itself well worth the journey, even though 

 nothing else be seen, it is little to be wondered at if the trav- 



are apt to be little more than a name. We know they are 

 there because they must be there; but of visual evidence from 

 below there is none at all. 



Yet the train-traveler, as he pursues his journey on the 

 river's edge, has a glimpse of the nature-beauty that the for- 

 tunate residents on the river front have always. Surely if it 

 is fine to see this marvelous spectacle of nature at her best 

 in one of her finest settings — to see this but once or twice, it 

 must be incomparably finer to be able to see it always, to look 

 at it daily from one's windows, to nightly watch the sun sink 



