Dodgeville chronicle. [volume] (Dodgeville, Wis.) 1862-current, 1863-08-20
Mount WASHINGTON.

VI 'Ae summit OF Mount Washing
ton!
Above the mountains themselves, above
the world Nothing above us but the
infinite sky! The very clouds at oul
feet, rolling away their gray, white mas
ses, tlnged with evanescent crimson and
gold, through the glens and rayines
flashing out lightnings, and belching
forth thunders-proclaiming, even as
of old around Mount Sinai, that God
liveth .h
The gorges are filled with cloudy va
pors. They cling to the bald brows of
fthe mountains, and climb up fearful
precipices where no human foot may
tread, and rest on dizzy heights where
even the wild eagles eye might blench
to fix his talons.
A very Hades in shadows-its bottom
obscured with gloom; Tuckerman's ra-
vine stretches above its three thousand
feet of black horror! cherishing in it's
bosom the crystal waters of little brook,
that flows on as fearlessly and innocent
ly as meadows streams-down there in
that solitude where never ray of sun
shine shall penetrate
To the north west, across the almost
illimitable gorge known as the Gulf,
rises the Alps-ike range, comprising
Mounts Clay, Adams, Jefferson and Mad
ison. Standing on the brink of the di-
viding chasm, we can see these granite
ribbed "guards Of liberty" from their
base unto their summit, clothed darkly
in evergreens, torn and desecrated byland
slides, ploughed and furrowed by wild
spring floods, bare, gaunt, and stern as
fate, lifting up their bleached old fore.
heads to the northern sky!
Glancing past them, we look into the
valley Of the Connecticut, We see the
great, silvery river winding its beautiful
length through green meadows, and past
thriving towns and busy cities, on it's
way to the far off haven Of the sea. Far
away, the eye can trace, family outlined
against the sky, the blue line that marks
the Green Mountains in Vermont; mere
pigimies they seem, in the mirage of the
purple distance.
To the west, rise the Francois those
sturdy relatives Of the White Noun
tains-behind whose lofty peaks the sun
goes down, on fair nights, in flood of
liquid fire.
To the south, fifty miles away, CLEANS
through the intervening mountains the
calm bosom of Lake Winnepissiogee-
the smile Of the Great Spirit; and ly-
ing between us and that sweet lake is
the abrupt castle-like cone oe Chocor-
na-thc bleak, rugged, desolation, where
stood the old Indian chieftain, and with
his dying curse, before he took the fatal
leap into eternity, blighted the fair lands
that lay in its shadow
The ocean, old as time itself, meets
the sky far to the east; and the almost
imperceptible needle-like point, We. can
see, is the gray shaft of freedom on Bun
ker's Hill.
We see the pine forests of Maine
the glitter of Sebago Lake; and close
at hand the unrutded mirror of Love
wells Pond -storied in history and
song-lts lore written in lines of blood !
framed in the rough mountains, like
some rare gem set in unwrought gold
Why linger we over details I? Let US
take in the grand, the awfully solemn
and magnificent whole The works of
His fingers The monuments of His
greatness
Mount Washington Stern, and sol
itary, and desolote Alone thy gran
deur no face is lifted up to heaven as
thine-no lofty mountain brow is so near
to God as thine! Bleached by the
storms of thousands of years, washed by
mighty torrents, frozen by polar cold,
and smiled on by a penurious sun thou
art supreme, matchless, unapproachably
magnificent, Goliath among the giants