MOUNT MITCHELL 307 
blankets and provisions for the night taken up on 
horseback. The best way is to let the guide go ahead, 
and then loiter on as you please, the hoof-marks 
affording a sure protection against getting lost. 
With a long staff you can cross the rushing trout 
stream dry shod on the projecting rocks, after which 
you begin a most joyous ascent into the clouds. 
The lower part of the mountain is covered with 
hardwood trees, the path leading past a tulip tree 
that twenty years ago measured over thirty-three 
feet in circumference — no one seems to have had 
the "ambition" to measure it since. This majestic 
column had a narrow escape from destruction a few 
years ago when a mountaineer was with difficulty 
dissuaded from chopping into it to get an imaginary 
bee's nest. The fine natural forest is composed of 
many kinds of trees, among which the path winds, 
now in the woods, now across a stream, now through 
an open glade. The air, heavy with the honey-like 
odor of linden trees in full bloom above your head, 
murmurs with the myriads of bees that hover about 
the flowers. The uneven floor of the forest is covered 
with moss and large violet leaves. The white flower 
clusters of treelike rhododendrons gleam on the 
slopes. Laurel presents dense tangles on all sides. 
Hemlocks darken the way, ferns and moss every- 
where carpeting the earth beneath them. 
About three miles up, you pass through what is 
known as the. beech nursery, a level bench grown 
with small beeches where grass and flowers cover the 
floor, a friendly vestibule to the dark forest that lies 
