On the southern side of the range, west of Overlook, are two wild and beautiful clefts, the one known as the Stony Clove, and the other as West Kill or Bushnell Clove. The first begins as a narrow gorge with lofty hemlock and moss-clad mountain sides, and gradually opens out, at Phœnicia, upon the hills of Ulster and Esopus Creek. It is watered by a trout stream, and its few but cosey farm cottages offer shelter sufficient for amateur fishermen and artists, bewitched by its fairy recesses and fine forest growth. In the narrow portion of this clove are ice caves, where ice may be found at all seasons of the year, and whence issue cooling winds appreciable in the warmest summer days.
The West Kill, or Bushnell Clove, is said to be still finer and more alpine than the Stony Clove. The last-mentioned gap and that of the Plattekill join the main or Kauterskill Clove between Tannersville and Hunter, while the Bushnell Clove does not intersect the valley of the Schoharie until the West Kill flows into that stream near the charming village of Lexington, six miles south, a little west of Prattsville.
These geographical details may seem uninteresting, but if the writer had possessed them eight years ago, when first making the near acquaintance of the Catskills, many a mystification might have been avoided, and many a pleasant excursion, now only known to the fancy, have been found practicable. One great attraction of the Catskills is, that the greater number of the spots chiefly interesting are within walking or driving distance from the chief points of sojourn. Visitors in general confine themselves to the Mountain House and its immediate vicinity, and hence see but little of the beauties hidden among the cliffs and ravines of the inner peaks. The view from the Mountain House plateau is extensive, but tame and monotonous in character; the horizon is not interesting, and the cloud scenery is far more impressive than that of the land beneath. The views from the very easily ascended North or South Mountains, where, in addition to the river valley, the eye embraces the lakes, the opening of the Clove, and the distant mountains toward Lexington, are far superior. Clum's Hill, a terraced eminence, visible from many points among the Catskills, and the Parker Mountain, east of Tannersville, both offer peculiar and interesting prospects; but the king of views is that obtained from the cliffs of the South Mountain overhanging the Clove. This vista has furnished sketches for two remarkable pictures painted by that rare artist and genuine son of Helios, S. R. Gifford. Looking toward the west is the rolling plateau of the Clove, with the far-away mountains beyond Hunter, the Parker and North Mountains, the openings to the Stony and Plattekill Cloves, Clum's Hill, and the silver thread of Haines's Fall. At the foot of the cliffs, more than a thousand feet below, lie Brockett's (classic ground for artists), the Clove road, Moore's Bridge, the Dog Fall, and the brawling Kauterskill. Directly opposite stands the wooded crest of Round Top. The entire mountain side is visible, and the cleft is so narrow that the trees can almost be counted as they rise one above another to a height of 2,500 feet above the roaring stream, which here receives two slender cascades that have threaded their way through the tangled forest. Toward the east, the river is visible, and the sloping mountain declivities frame a lovely picture of lowland country and far-away Connecticut or Massachusetts hills. The effects of light and shadow are such as we have never seen surpassed. This earth there seems made of gold or crimson lights, of gray seas of mist, or of every imaginable combination of beautiful hues.
These cliffs are reached by a charming walk through a beech wood, and are distant about a mile from the Laurel House. A longer and still somewhat rough path was opened thither last summer from the Mountain House. But we should never end were we to characterize all the beautiful spots, the entrancing walks and drives to be found amid these cool and healthful slopes and plateaus. A difference of at least ten degrees is felt between the mountain resorts and the villages on the river bank, and the air is inexpressibly fresh and invigorating.
These mountains have also a very interesting flora. The oak, beech, birch, chestnut, hickory, maple, ash, hemlockpines, black, white, and yellowspruces, fir, and balsam, are among the most widely spread trees; and of fruits, the blackberry, gooseberry, raspberry, whortleberry or blueberry, and strawberry, grow in profusion and of fine flavor. Violets, anemones, liverworts, the fairy bells of the Linnea Borealis, the fragrant stars of the Mitchella or partridge berry, the trailing arbutus, Houstonia, the laurel, honeysuckle, sarsaparilla, wintergreen, bottle gentian, white and blue, purple orchids, willow herb, golden rod, immortelles, asters in every variety, St. John's wort, wild turnip, Solomon's seals, wild lilies of the vale, fire lilies, Indian pipe, with other flowers, ground pines, and varieties of moss and ferns innumerable, border the winding woodpaths and secluded roads. There are many regions in America more grand than that of the Catskills, but none, we think, more easily and gratefully compensatory to a careful survey.
Within Gethsemane's Garden kneeling,
Bends the Lord His sacred head,
His soul, each human sorrow feeling,
Quivers with keen shafts, sin-sped,
Every human misery knows,
Bears the burden of our woes.
Perchance not men alone His sinking,
Bleeding heart to weep is fain,
But poor dumb creatures sees He drinking
Deep the bitter cup of pain,
Hears the wailing, anguished cry,
Hears but curse and blow reply!
THE ISSUES OF THE WAR
The life of the soldier is one of constant anxiety and suspense. He never knows with any certainty to-day what he shall have to do to-morrow. Upon seemingly the greatest calm may suddenly burst the most terrific storm. There is little incentive to thought, except of that practical kind which directs the activities of the soldier's perilous life. Here we are, thousands of us, an acting mass rather than an assemblage of thinking individuals. Indeed, it is not strictly military to think; implicit and unquestioning obedience is the law. When the order was finally given on Monday night (September 21st) for the whole army to fell back on Chattanooga, the writer remarked:
'Well, if we shall not have to go any fartherif we can hold Chattanooga, we are not defeated;it is even a victory, and we have won Chattanooga at the battle of Chickamauga.'
'We want none of your speculations,' retorted our Prussian commander; 'it is a soldier's business to obey, and not to think.'
But, it is hardly natural for an American soldier to execute a movement without inquiring the wherefore. And if we are marched over mountains, and down the Lookout at Alpine Pass, within a few miles of Rome; and then marched back again, up the perilous steep, and northward to Stevens's Gap, and down again;why, even common soldiers, without the evidence of brains which there is, or ought to be, in shoulder straps, inquire of each other for the strategic value there may be in all this marching and countermarching, and find it hard to believe that it was all provided for in the original programme.
But in a still higher sense is the American soldier given to thinking. He is quite likely to have an opinion as to the origin and cause of the waras to the issues involved therein, and the results which it is likely to bring about. There is, moreover, a multiplicity of views, and not the unanimity of dulness.
The causes, the issues, the results of the warmomentous themes! and likely to be thoroughly canvassed by those whom they so vitally concernthe American citizen and our citizen soldiery.