The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1891-11-04
A Day in Montpelier.

1t was a perfect day, one in a thousand,
clear, cool and cloudless all nature was
dressed in living green, and an air of quiet
repose prevailed.
A pleasant place is Montpelier, the home
OF my youth, up among the green hills of
Vermont. In appearance it has greatly
changed since my day there, years ago, and
all for the better. The numerous shade
trees saplings then-have grown to be
large, widespreading and noble, the walks
have been raised and paved, and the irregu-
lar and unsightly fences removed from in
front of the dwellings, and the grounds
graded and become one long fine lawn up
and down both sides of the principal streets
very noticeable improvement, and adding
greatly to the general appearance of the
place. Them too, the place has grown in
size streets of new houses in fields and pas
lures of the past; even the steep hillsides
are dotted here and there with pretty cot
tages. The business center has become
quite citiied with its long brick blocks.
Among them, notice in its pristine glory,
the substantial brick corner building, where
served an apprenticeship as a clerk when
1t was country store, and everything was
kept for sale from a needle to a grndstone
and we traded in all kinds of country pro-
duce
The principal public buildings must not
omit to mention. The state house with its
noble facade and columns, as white and
bright its granite as when first built, and its
/
new post-office building of marble, than
which there is not a finer structure in the
| country nor one surprising in beauty of de-
sign and finish. Now for a public library
building as fine, and it will complete the
| place as TO necessary public buildings.
AS walked the streets that pleasant day,
impressed and oppressed with the feelings
| that | was a stranger in strange place,
knowing, and known to, but few of the
many met, my mind reverted to the past,
to the times when | knew all that walked
| these walks How changed and the fathers
and mothers of their now scattered children,
where are they? The places that knew
them, now know them nc more. Their names
only are known to the many now here as
they see them recorded in marble in the
beautiful city of the dead at the bend of the
river" Green Mount"
The farest spot of hill and glade
nd sgep srea she Ssgb aPS ne tree
But turn from the view of the past So
great has been the changes, it seemed to me,
that the old had passed away and all was
now new.
must not omit to include in my brief
sketch of the place my ride up the river
road, over the hill and up through Gospel
street 3" in Berlin, to the heights beyond,
where is spread out to view the grandest
and finest scenery in central Vermont. In
the distance. the peaks in Orange, the high
mountains in Worcester and Middesex,
WIN MOUNT MdnSHelu ana CameI'S
Hump towering above all, while at our
feet along " Gospel street " lay fine farms
with fields of corn and grain, and pastures
green, hocks here and there feeding. The
whole scene so graphically and beautifully
pictured in verse by the poet Whittier in
his Song of the Vermonters came forci-
bly, to mind:
We've sheep the hillside and corn on the plain
And gay-tasseled corn-feds. and rank growing
grain.
q
And ours are the mountains which grandy rise
Till they rest their green heads on the blue of tn
skies"
1t was with reluctance that l left the
place and rode on down to, and along, the
shores OF Mirror Lake." where in my boy
hood days, when it was plain Berlin
Pond" had taken many fish, and from
whence now comes the bountifu supply of
water for the village. Passing on down the
familiar road over which / had so often
walked, | stopped for a moment or two at
the " reservoir" at the head of those ro-
mantle falls which 1 did not fail to view
and admire. and then in the gray of the
evening crossed the venerable arch bridge
entering the village and my pleasant day
was ended G.B.R.
Bos on, October 81, 1891.