The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1890-11-16

CORRESPONDENCE of THE SUNDAY HERALD.i
Hot SPRINGS, n. c., Nov. 14.-The boom
which has recently struck the South is by no
means confined to Virginia and Tennessee.
The Old North State feels it, especially in this
western section, and evidences of her CONNER
cal and industrial reawakening are abundant.
II Is not many years since many people, If
asked to name the most backward State in the
South, would have readily answered, North
Carolina To-day this is far from the truth.
North Carolina is awake, with her brain alert,
her eyes open, and her coat off. She has begun
to measure her own power and possibilities, and
she finds them great. All along the line of the
Richmond and Danville Railroad, which pene-
trated Western North Carolina but few years
ago, new spirit has been infused into the peo-
Pile. The towns have been stirred into new and
vigorous activity.
AT Asheville, the metropolis of Western
North Carolina, the rapid development of the
last few years can be studied at it's best. This
beautifully situated mountain city is enjoying
vigorous boom. The moss which almost over
grew the town in the depressing years which
followed the war has been torn off and cleared
away by the strong and impatient hands of
progress The modern spirit is in the bracing
mountain air, and the haze which hangs forever
over the surrounding. hills is no longer com
posed wholly of such stuff as poets dreams are
made Of There is quite a mixture of the
smoke of prosaic factory chimneys in it.
The location of Asheville is uncommonly at
tractive. On every side rise wooded mountains,
scanned by deep ravines Through the town
flows the Swannanoa River, soon to join the
beautiful French Broad. Asheville is loosely
and irregularly built along both sides of the
stream, on the easy gradients of the hillsides,
and even up the embochures of the ravines that
seam the mountains. The town is now in
an unlovey transition pericd-between the
sleepy picturesqueness of the old and the
smartness of the new. New streets and ave.
nues are being cut into the hills, the old streets
are being torn up and repaved, new buildings
arearising on every hand, and the clear, sweet
air resounds with the rap of the hammer and
the creak of the builders crane. Real estate is
rapidly advancing in value, and the population
is increasing at lively rate. Another factor
which is doing much for the town is its we'll
deserved reputation as a health resort. Ashe-
vile is situated in mountain valley, at an alti-
tude of nearly 5000 feet above sea level. The
rainfall is slight the year around and the mum.
Der of sunny days is almost as great as in Colo
RADIO or Southern California.
An institution of which Asheville is Justly
proud is the Battery Park Hotel The location
of this picturesque edifce is on hill lust out
side the town, of which complete view can be
obtained from the hotels broad porches, while
the panorama of wooded mountains extending
into the haZy distance on every side, is some
thing indescrbably beautiful.
But to obtain the full charm of these noun
tans of Western North Carolina one must pene-
trate beyond Asheville to this old but now re-
iuvenated resort, the Hot Springs. The Rich
mond and Danville Road brings you here,
along the famous valley of the French Broad
River, amid scenery not exceeded in impressive
grandeur and quiet beauty by any have ever
beheld. The road creeps close to the river all
the way, winding in and out about the feet of
he mt WI tprtrr ity
vealing every few minutes fresh vista of grand
orbeautiful landscape as it whirls about a sharp
curve or plunges out OF deep gorge into
more open stretch. As one gaZes out of the car
window at the rugged course the river has made
for itself the imagination calls up vivid pictures
of the fierce war that has been waged for I'M
numbered centuries between the contending
forces of the water and rocks. A thousand
times the mountains seem to have flung them
selves in the way of the on-rushing torrent de-
termined to check it and turn it back as an in
vader who threatened to disturb their sublime
repose. But each time the indomitable river
turned the wings of the rocky army. or flung
itself with irresistible fury against the granite
breastworks, heaving them down in ruin and
scattering them to right and left as it sped ON
its way in roaring triumph. Mile after mile the
conflict was kept up, the river always victor,
the mountains still undismayed. AT last the
latter seem to have grown weary OF the fight
at such close quarters with the strange, elusive,
shifting invader, who laughs at all the arts of
mountainous warfare and continues in turbu-
lent triumph his career through the hostile coun-
try of the granite giants. The mountains ap-
pear to have made up their minds to quietly
draw off bit and reconnoitre the enemy from
a distance as he rushes along. The result of
this retreat of the mountains is one of the pretti-
est parks that can well be imagined. To left
and right the bold hills open out, leaving beau
tiful, almost level, meadow, perhaps mile long
and three-quarters of a mile wide. Along its
northerly side the river winds over broad bed,
less turbulently than in the narrow gorges,
where every foot of its narrow passage was dis
puted by the embattled rocks. Still every part
of the valley is filled with the subdued roar of
the waters, which at night sound like the rumble
of a railroad train softened by the distance In
this lovely little valley, sheltered ON all sides by
the mountains, there reigns an almost perennial
spring. Even yet though the oaks and
naples and beeches on the hillsides have mostly
passed through the glories of yellow and crimson
to the dry, sombre brown of vegetable death the
grass in the valley is green. Here, close by the
banks of the river, bubble up the springs which
give the place its name, and which have been
famous for the healing powers of their waters
for century Ninety years ago the first inn
was built in this favored valley and since that
time three four Others have been erected on the
same site. The present hotel, large wooden
structure in its main part of Queen Anne de-
sign, is five or six years old and was erected by
the Southern Improvement Company which
owns great amount of property in this region.
Until few years ago these springs were al