Western Reserve chronicle. [volume] (Warren, Ohio) 1855-1921, 1869-06-09

/ the country around. Many refugee
/ has been pursued into it and there
murdered byrebel fiends, and his body
I left the prey of raving wolves. Pass
/ ing through it, We began the ascent.
/ II was just ten miles from that point
I to Mitchell's Peak. The path wound
continuously backward and forward
| up the mountain in long snake-like
I curves. Hour after hour we Iabored
along; we passed slowly through the
different stratas of the vegetation of
/ the mountain. The honey suckles
and roses were soon left behind, the
laurel followed, beech, tulip and ma
I pie trees and the flora of ATTITUDES far
north OF where we were successively
| appeared and disappeared. The vege-
/ tatlon grew thinner as we ascended.
| The sun poured down upon us and
I we sweltered beneath the heat. At
| intervals the streams from the melt
| ing snow above dashed madly past,
often ntumbling before them huge bowl
/ ders i'll their descent. We were making
for depression or gap between Big
/ Craggy and Mitchell's Peak. 1t was
the only practicable route. 1t was a
! simple trail which had been made by
the bears and wolves in their descent
upon the flOcks below and which had
been afterwards cleared out by the
mOuntaineers in carrying Mitchell's
body to the summit. Higher and
higher we ascended beech and maple,
gave way to pines and oaks, and they
in turn to birch and cedar, and still
we advanced. At each interval of
rest our guide gave US brief recitals of
various events connected with the
mountain history. Here a hunters
son had been carried off by panther,
there mountaineer had been slain by
a bear. At one place was shown US
the mark of a bullet that killed an
escaped Federal soldier, at another the
memorial tombstone of the first white
woman that ever assembled this noun
tain. After four hours ineessant
climbing, we reached the gap spoken
of above. 1t was simply high table
land laying between two peaks of the
mountain that heaved themselves far
above it into the clouds. 1t contained
about two acres of level ground and
upon it stood an old house that was
! built may years ago for certain con-
I sumptives that went there for their
\ health. The change in the atmos-
] IL
was terrible. All the morning we had
been climbing up a depression on the
southeast side of the mountain into
which the rays of the sun direct and
reflected poured with great force
making the heat oppressive in the eX-
/ treme. Now, however, we were sud-
/ denly exposed to the western blast
I that swept over this table land, and in
| the space of two hundred feet the eli
mate changed from tropical summer
| to arctic winter. This sudden transit
ton was terrible to bear. Over coats
which we had pronounced useless en-
cumbranees a few hundred feet below
were gladly put on, and while we
stood shivering in lea of the house,
tho guide endeavored TO dissuade US
from proceeding further. He repre-
sented the mountain to be covered
with snow underneath which run
yawning chasms in the rocks, into
which we were liable to fall and perish
as Mitchell had done before US. 1t
was, however, in vain. We had set
our minds on going to the top and we
were determined to do it. He re-
luctantly led US forward. Leaving
the mountain house, as it is called,
we began what might properly be
termed the second ascent. Figurative-
ly speaking we had reached the roof
of the building but the steeple had yet
to be climbed. After a few hundred
feet we struck the balsams. These
grow so thick that dog can hardly
crawl through them. We followed
the sinuosities of the little trail as it
led upwards and upwards for many
hundred weary feet. We strucksnOw
soon after entering the balsams, and
here the real labor of the ascent began.
The previous climbing was nothing
compared to it. 1t grew deeper as we
advanced. At first il was melting
slowly beneath the southern sun that
shOne directly upon it, and the trees
dropped large wet flakes upon US, and
that underfOOt gave way beneath our
trail like the wet slush of early spring.
We were thoroughly drenched and
our ascent became slower and more
tedious as we advanced. The snow
grew deeper, the path more precipitous
the cold increased in intensity, and we
soon encountered large masses of ice
the transit of which was a work of
great difficulty and danger. We were
passing gradually around towards the
northwestern side of the mountain
where the sun seldom shines, and
here winter burst upon US in all its
fury. Our path for a time lay beneath
some shelving rocks from the top of
which hung long icicles like the pill
lars of some mighty edifice. Below
US yawne6 horrid chasms of rocks and
ice hundreds of feet in depth into
which we were liable at any moment
to be plunged. A single misstep, the
giving away of the snow beneath our
feet and away we would have been |
carried in an instant. The storm beat |
in our faces with binding fury, the
cold still increased, the snow grew /
deeper, the atmosphere more rare, and /
we could proceed but a short distance /
without stopping to rest. Strange |
roarings We're heard in our ears, and J
one of our party became partially |
blind. Upward, still upward, we /
climbed hour after hour, and at last, |
at three o'clock in the afternoon, we /
stood on the bold and blaekened sum- /
NIT of Mount Mitchell, the highest /
point of land in the United States east /
of the Rocky Mountains. A thOus- !
and feet below US the wind had died 1
away and not breath of air was stir j
ring. An awful stiffness prevaded 4
this mighty summit. Not a single 1
sound arose TO break the oppressive /
silence of the scene. All was hushed,
breathless, mute as the grave. Here
solitude reigned supreme in the tenn
pies of immensity. Above us rose the
blue dome of heaven, beneath us were
the clouds. Around us on every side
lay sea of majestic peaks, hOaTy,
motionless, sublime. Before us like
two giants rose the dark and jagged
SUBMITS of the BIack Brothers, their
beetling crags standing out in mighty
relief against the northern sky. To
their right Grand Fathers mountain
heaved his grim and griZzled head
above the surrounding heights, the
patriarch of these mighty wilds, his
face vailed with frost work of ice and
snow, his waist encircltd with rich
robes of pine and hemlOck, and his
feet nestled away among fields of
wheat and corn in the distant valleys
below. Around his crown brooded
winter, desolatiOn and death, in his
lap smiled summer, plenty, and peace.
To the east was seen the Blue Ridge
and Table Rock, to the south Mt. Pts
gah, Mt. Gibbs and Big Craggy, to the
west rose the Great Smoky and the /
range, while far beyond
them, $50 miles away in the blue haze I
Of fba Distance Wbpra Garth and SEv