The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1871-09-02
A Night Above the Clouds.

Everybody goes to Monnt Washington
which is prima facie evidence against it; if
as the backwoods preacher said, majoritiel
are always wrong. But in this case thu
majority is right, and the self conceited
traveller who shuns the main-traveled
road" is obliged to confess that one fash
ion is exceedingly sensible. His nissan
thropy can only take refuge in the com.
forting thought that Madam Shoddy and
her seven daughters, whose names are
! registered just above his own, at the Tip.
top House, have no eyes to see what he
sees. With all their money they can not
do what the Pennsylvania man, who had
''struck OIL" proposed to do for his daugh.
ter; they cannot buy ga capacity" And
yet the sublimity of White Mountain
scenery is on SO vast scale, that one could
fancy that savage might feel it. You
can hardly believe that mountaineer can
have lost his interest in it. So convinced
were we that nobody could help appreciat-
ing it, that we asked our driver, who had
twenty years experience on the mountain,
eff people that were used to these things
were able to feel them as we did p" There
was cold rain prevailing at the moment,
and the veteran driver only shrugged his
shoulders, and replied: Well, yes, we do
SILVER little sometimes
Agur prayed that he might be neither
poor nor rich. If you are about going up
Mount Washington, pray that it may be
neither cloudy nor clear. We would not
have missed, for anything, the showers
that swept over us. It is not often that
one has chance to view a shower at every
angle. And there was something intellect
ually delightful as well as physically mis-
cradle in shower that enveloped us near
the summit shower that had no perpen-
dicular, that came from cloud all around
us. There is fascination in this getting
glimpse of a storm factory in actual
operation.
The stunted trees are pitiful to see.-
Little frs ten feet high, then six, and at
last only six inches high. And they look
hundred years old, with their scraggy
boughs and dwarfed, scrawny appearance.
They are half human to our eyes. We
have seen so many people stunted in the
same way, as by some great weight of cir
cumstances laid upon them. Like these
miniature trees, they only needed little
more sunshine, and little kindlier soil, to
have developed into something larger and
better. But soon the trees are gone, and
now there are only the arctic grass and
flowers struggling up between the great
boulders and the wonderful lichens, cover
ing the nakedness of the rocks.
Of course the great object of those who
stay over night is to see sunset or sun
rise, and of course great many are disap-
pointed. But it well repays one for the
Astounding discomforts of night on top
to watch the changing effect of light and
shade on the mountains, even if they see
no sunset. Mountains are always seen
best in slantwise light. But in that chill
air, wet as we were with rain, we enjoyed
the fire more than the scenery, and having
given up all hope of a sunset, we sat dry
ing our garments by the stove and finding
such consolation in philosophy as one could
get in an atmosphere so rare, when one of
the boys Of our party rushed in, breath
less, and gasping: "It's clearing away %
In twinkling the house was emptied, and
every man, woman, and child was perched
on some one Of the boulders or cairns look
ing at one of the finest sunsets imaginable.
The sun was setting belop us, and it made
us feel strange to find that our shadows
were thrown off into space-shadows mil
lions of miles long! The golden sunlight
on the crests contrasted strangely with the
deep darkness of the abysses that, in the
twilight, seemed to be bottomless. The
effects would not stay. A mountain was
transformed every minute by the changing
lights. We had rainbow such as we had
never seen before. 1t was about seven
eighths of a circle, only the shadow of the
mountain summit cutting out a segment at
the bottom. Painting with our exertion in
climbing over the rocks in an air so rare,
we shouted huskily to one another from
different points of rock; and as the shad-
ows crept up the mountain sides and night
settled in the valleys below, while the faces
of our conf anions still shone in the golden
rays of the sun and the clouds famed with
color, the scene was weird and unearthly.
Just before the sun dipped cloud covered
it, and the marvellous view was ended
There was only left for us panorama of a
hundred miles of country, lying in the twi-
light deepening into darkness.
For a long time thirty or forty people sat
in the rude sitting-room around the box
stoves. Tie memory of that fifteen min
utes of supreme sunset made us hilarious.
The story-,cllers of the party brought forth
things new and old. Yankee stories and
wild Western yarns were alike greeted
with laughter. A grim Bohemian, who
took no part in the conversation, telegraphed
to New England paper as follows: GA
great entertainment is taking place here;
- and - are telling stories to the
assembled company" And thus we were
bulletined to the outside world.
Did you ask about the sleeping? Well,
we did not sleep much. The low roof is
chained down; the rooms are small; and
the little skylight windows are Theoretically
sealed, lest some young hurricane should
creep in and uncover the house. The air
is rare to begin with, and as two must
sleep in room it does not take long to
consume the small allowance of oxygen
We thought of breaking one of the lights
of glass, but did not know what might be
the exact price of pane of glass, for
prices on top Of Mount Washington are,
like everything else, high. We reasoned,
that as every meal, lodging, etc., was
charged at precisely one dollar and half,
the glass must be the same. If we could
only have been certain on this point, dol
lar and halfs worth of fresh air would
have been cheap.-HearM and Home.
"A good story is told of a rather YER
dant agricultural laborer who, having by