Prev | Current Page 293 | Next

Bruce, Wallace, 1844-1914

"The Hudson Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention"


* * *
There is a fall in the hills, where the water of two
little ponds runs over the rocks into the valley. The
first pitch is nigh two hundred feet and the water looks
like flakes of driven snow before it touches the bottom.
_James Fenimore Cooper._
* * *
It may seem antiquated and old-fashioned in the midst of elevated
railroads to speak of mountain driveways, but that to Palenville, as
we last saw it, was a beautiful piece of engineering--as smooth as a
floor and securely built. It looks as if it were intended to last for
a century, the stone work is so thoroughly finished. The views from
this road are superior to anything we have seen in the Catskills, and
the great sweep of the mountain clove recalls a Sierra Nevada trip on
the way to the Yosemite.
The writer will never forget another Catskill drive fully twenty
years ago. Starting one morning with a pair of mustang ponies from
Phoenicia, we called at the Kaaterskill, the Catskill Mountain
House, and the Laurel House, took supper at Catskill Village, and
reached New York that evening at eleven o'clock.


Pages:
281 282 283 284 285 286 287 288 289 290 291 292 293 294 295 296 297 298 299 300 301 302 303 304 305