The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1870-01-13

AONAAAON~
grim, before us. Soon we began to ascend
a slope, and the work Of our trip had
fairly began. At first, the ascent is COM
paratively easy the slopes are covered
with scattered brush and trees, with
Lodges of rock cropping out on all sides,
and boulders lying about as though a
race of Titans had been stoning each
other. / had always supposed that the
story of the land of New England, that
some of the fields were so stony that you
would be obliged to fire the corn into
the ground with shotgun, and slice the
potatoes, and plant EN- edgewlse, was I'M
true; but after seeing some of the land
around Mt. Anthony, I begau to think
there might be some truth in it. How
ever, they have one advantage in thatcoun-
try, as a Vermonter told me: the ground
being set up edgewise, they can cultivate
both sides of it.
AS we begin to ascend, the trees grow
more numerous, though it seems wonder
that they can strike their roots among
the rocks The mountain side is sleeper,
and we often find branch very convent
ent to assist us. On we scramble, until we
reach a ledge of rock, in which is small
opening. This is the entrance to quite a
cave, which has never been fully explored.
Lighting matches, we crawled in a few
feet, but not having suitable lights, we
did not venture far, and only saw pas
sage about three feet by two, leading
into the bowels of the mountain We
were now nearly halfway up the noun
tain, and sat down to rest and refresh
ourselves with smoke. 1t was delight
full to sit there, with the country spread
out before us, and to view it through
clouds from "the weed" We must not
stay here long however; the hardest of
the walk is still before us. Up we go
again, up the steep mountain side, crash
ing through brushes, sliding over bould-
ers, and beginning to think there is
some work in ascending Mt. Anthony.
1t is not all such hard work, however
now and then we come to small spaces of
comparatively level ground and on one
of these, we came upon certain signs,
which caused us to look o.our pistols
for be it known that an occasional bea
may be found on these mountains, and
here the tall weeds were bent and borne
down as though some heavy animal had
passed through. We saw nothing of it
however, and it may have been only a
stray sheep. No doubt it would add
much to the interest of this narrative,
could I now describe desperate, hand,
to hand, or rather hand to paao, conflict,
with a huge shaggy monster, and tell how
valiantly we met him, and laid him low
and l should certainly narrate such an
adventure; only we did not see any bear
so shall have to dispense with it, and
the reader may imagine how bravely we
should have fought, if there had been
anything to fight. or3 s Sad.
But now comes the tug of war directly
in front of us more than a hundred feet
high, rises an almost perpendicular cliff
Hooking each way we can see no lesser
angle; shall we yield, defeated, and
going around the mountain, take the
carriage road? No! Never! clenching
our teeth, and grasping at bushes, up we
go! It's desperate hard work; now and
then branch gives way, and we slide
back, vainly digging our fingers and toes
into the earth; then on again the sun, all
the time coming down through The thin
leaves like a furnace, and not breath of
air stirring; but at last the summit of this
precipice is gained, and we lie, painting,
on the narrow ledge, gasping for breath,
and our breasts heaving like a black
smiths bellows. But there is heavy work
vet before us; another precipice quite
as high and steep, looms up ahead of us
and after resting few minutes at it we
col 1 need not attempt to describe our
ascent further; it is made up of the
same Juggling and scrambliDg as before.
At last through the trees and bushes we
begin to catch glimpses, of buildings;
now one more effort and the summit is
gained We find ourselves on a small
irregular plateau partly cleaned of trees,
with the observatory, huge round
wooden tower, and the other buildings