Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1868-07-16
For the HKaAIp.l
In XII. 'ington and After.
ny W. d. CUNNING.

VINE Wfote a uonk WI ''.'"''t'" "'"N'
he maintained that mountains are blotehei
ON this goodly earth; blotehes whioi
show where the curse Of God fell on hi
new-ereated world Ihope all good PEG
pie Of Vermont viii spurn this heresy
Looking down on the State from the tol
Of Killington. the words Of the preacher
seemed To me little else than blasphemy
What infinite beauty and grandeur
How little of desolation, even, on thes,
uppiled pillows and domes Of granite
| have written "billows," for II is as l
you were looking away over a vast, silen
sea, whose pillows rolled westward, huns
ON the curl and petrifed ! Your thoughts
reach back to time when the face OF tn,
earth was like sea vexed by a grea'
storm. These mountsins are the brand
Of great earth agony. And the valleys
which seem from this mount Of vision
like troughs Of the Sea, must have been
deepened by ages Of erosion since the
mountaing were born. In tho valley,
you will find slate, limestone, marble; OF
the mountains granite, or some member
of the granite family. Imagine a lin,
drawn from the base of Killington ovel
Rutland to the Laconic range in the west
Above the line you would find granitorial
rocks, and below the softer shale and
limestone. These rocks are more subject
To erosion than their neighbors above
But water is doing its work on the noun
tain, too. The rills which flow down
Mont Blame are supposed to carry with
them about eighty thousand tons of sedi.
ment every year This is eighty thousand
tons of mountain ground To dust every
year, and borne down TO the valleys and
thence TO the ocean. Ii some one could
estimate the weight Of sediment borne
down by the rills which flow from Xii.
lington. we might be amazed to see how
our mountains are wasting away. The
everlasting hills" are not everlasting
Every water-drop that triokles from Hill
side is doing something TO bring the hill
down To the ocean.
Almost every high mountain view gives
You sense Of desolation. Not so, the
view from Killington. You will see
hardly patch of utter desolation. Vas,
fields of spruce and birch clothe the
mountains to the topmost rocks. Look
down on the slope toward Pieo, A vast
field crumbled up into undulatives, and
sown with trces-the dead standing like
wiered specters among the green.
A. You climb the mountain you will
note the change of vegetation. You soon
leave below the wild mulberry, the "Rut.
land beauty" the elders, the milkweeds
The orchids and the rose-bug are very
common as high AS the spring On the
very top you will find scarcely weed.
There is the humble lichen cln .I- to
the base ronk These are the humblest
children Of nature and the most univer-
sally ditfu>ed They are found far up in
the regions Of the pole and high up on
the mountains Humboldt found .pe-
cies OF lichen on Chimborazo 1890 feet
high. Some Of these species on Killing
ton are common to the Alps. How have
the same species wandered from Vermont
to Switzerland
You will see on Killington what Office
the lichen fills in the scheme of nature.
The spore falls on rock and throws off a
cell. This throws out another, and this
another, and 80 on through hundreds of
years, the mystery of the plant being to
multiply cells and to continue. The cells
adhere closely together and form a crispy
thing which is neither root nor stem nor
leaf, but all these III onc--a "thallus"
This presses on the conservative rock and
prepares it for higher use, makes it crum-
bic away in little atoms of soil. The.
hchen there j. Il pioneer in nature. 1t de-
tacheS grains ot soil from the rock and pre-
pares the way for higher forms of life
Here and there on the mountain are little
clumps of moss growing where the lichens
had been, and near the highest ledge,
sphagnum, which is forming peat The
most abundant and beautiful lichen is the
little Fairies Torch" The soil on the
top of killington has been worn from
the hard rock by the lichens and the moss.
The mountain has been struck by gla-
cier and some Of the lodges were crushed
and pushed westward, but the ice hammer
left no soil there.
This is all | have time to say about Kill
lington.
And after , am afraid that for day
after you will be so tired you can say
nothing about it. Nature keeps her choic-
est gifts for those who will toll for them,
and if you see Killington you must pay
for it. The path is obscure-in many
places is utterly lost in under-brush, in
some places obliterated by the fallen tim
Der in all places, impossible to horse.
You cannot see Killington well in one
day, and if you stay through the night
you must make or take your own tent
When Rutland becomes large city she
will be so proud of her Killington that
she will make it accessible.
tB At Munich. they have govern
ment iron foundry, or industrial school,
where the best iron workers in Germany
nave received their education. This es-
adjustment has turned out numerous
statues, ornamental gates, figures, busts,
&c and nj the nrnsant tirna haa nndar