The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1885-06-06
About Davis City.
i. Of The Wheeling Intelligencer.

About Davis City.
cor. ofthe Wheeling Intelligencer.
ST. GEORGE, w. VA, May %
That region Of forests and wider
nesses extending from Fairfax Stone,
ne cornerstone of Maryland and
West Virginia. southwark and west
ward along the western face of the
Allegheny mountains for fifteen or
twenty miles, was until recently en-
tIrely unknown to the outside world,
and even now it is not thoroughly
explored. The w. V. c.. q p. rail-
road has pushed its surveys into
Mhglea and thickets where until the
last year or WO none but the adVen-
tunRsoEne hunter or the roaming
Wsd1sisnen had ever penetrated. The
TaAFnad has now reached Davis City,
=, taer town Swinging up-at the con-
~ sncesos BiacN Fork of Great river
tn,l y B'aver creek. Black Fork comes
ju from the south, and flows through
the splendid Canaan valley, the fame
of which is no new thing. Beaver
flows down from the summit Of the
Allegheny mountains, and its course
tends to the west, and from source to
mouth, distance of about twenty
miles, ii flows through one unbroken
forest of gigantic pines and one i'm
mense wilderness of laurel, tangled
and impenetrable. The new town of
Davis is regularly laid out under the
supervision of the railroad company,
and occupies beautiful situation on
a rising ground, overlooking the
bronze colored waters Of Black Fork.
A few days ago | had occasion to
visit the town of Davis. 1t is named
after Senator H, G. Davis, and he is
sparing no mean to make it q pOpu-
lar and fashionable summer resort.
Already the site is pointed out where
he and Stephen Elkins will shortly
erect their superb residences, and the
grounds are laid off for magnificent
flower gardens, and for fountains that
will flow with water from living
springs. But now there is no artifi"
cial beauty about the place. The men
are only preparing for works of art.
They are tearing down the temples
of Natures building-the groves, for
the site of the town was recently, and
part Of it still is, covered with huge
pines, thick together and standing
straight and symmetrical one hun
dred feet high. 1t cost 500 per acre
to remove the timber from the
{ Ht:nd. / watched this work going
on. When the trees had been cut
down and the trunks hauled off and
the tops and limbs burned, the sur
face of the ground was almost hidden
by stumps. One could nearly walk
from stump to stump. Next follow
ed a corps of WOrkmen with crow
bars and dynamite. A hole was made
under the stump and cartridge of
dynamite put in place, With the eX-
plosion of the dynamite the stump
was torn from the ground. Some
times trees were thus blown out, and
the explosion would tear the tree in
to splinters.
The country around Davis is not
infinitely explored. The laurel is so
dense that it can hardly be penetra-
ted. While | was there. Il. w. Eas-
than, the founder of Davis, came in.
He had just returned from an eXplor-
ing expedition on hill standing on
the opposite side of the river, a half
mile away, and had discovered very
large and cold spring of water, the
existence Of which was not before
known. The spring is higher than
the town, and the water can be car
ried in pipes into every dwelling.
But that which claimed my atten-
ton most and excited the deepest
curiosity was not the town springing
up where four months ago had stood
the wilderness, nor the effect which
the explosion of dynamite had on
trees and stumps; ; but it was the de-
caying of the forests, the dying of the
gigantic pines that had grown and
lived and stood for generations and
centuries and now, with no visible
cause, dying. That whole region,
facing westward from the Alleghan-
les and reaching to the Backbone
mountains on the west, an area OF
more than one hundred square miles,
is one grand grove Of pines and hem
locks, the stately beauty Of whose
trees | have hardly seen eXcelled in
the cypress swamps of Louisiana OF
the redwood groves of Nevada OF
California. No one who has an ap.
probation for nature as she is mani.
tested in the venerable woods, car
look over this forest and not feel i'm.