The daily morning journal and courier., 1895-08-21
THE ASCENT OF WEST ROCK.

THE ASCENT OF VEST ROCK.
 Yes, I might as we'll go now. West Rock had stood there as an unanswered challenge long enough, raising his proud head in defiance and scorn of the weak ness of man. I never passed the foot of the rock, but he seemed to throw me his gauntlet and dare me to the ascent. And why not now? To be sure l had intended to read over some hundreds of pages of Latin and Greek and Ger man against the time, when some one should need my assistance. But re viewing with no very definite knowledge of what you ought to review is not especially inspiring, when the ther- mometer stands at 90 degrees in the shade. Not an extra good temperature for scaling the cliffs either, but I thought l could furnish the energy for this if I could not for the other.
 set out for the rock at p. m, Aug ust IS, 1895, having first arrayed my self in ball suit with tennis shoes On nearing the rock I passed up the quarry road along the face. Just be- yond where the old chimney stands on the Westville side and almost in the center of the cliff, two laborers were breaking a large stone into pieces small enough to be handled and go through the crusher. They looked at me with curiosity as though they thought was strayed. I asked where would be a good place to go up? They pointed around the road. But, I said, 1 am going up the face. They could not speak English well, but they shook their heads and ejaeulated out of which l only made that they thought I could not get up, This was in about the steepest part of the rock and almost beneath the second iron fence on the eastern end Out of the 90 degrees of a right angle the cliff seemed to have at least S5 degrees in its favor. On the whole there seemed a very good foundation for the workmen's belief. But I had already been up the face of East Rock several times and was beginning to feel like an expert climber. As started up the workmen exclaimed No! No You get killed" and pointed down the path. But I pressed on and after a hard scramble over loose stones and debris I reached the side of the rock For thirty or forty feet up the ascent was fairly easy. Here l sat down to rest for moment. Two more laborers had come up and stood watch ing me They asked where was going? said: lover the top" Like h-l you are. There never was only one man tried that place and he broke his neck" 'Well you watch and see" The ma jority of the cliff was not hard climb ing for one who is used to it. I have never yet seen a cliff where good share of the way a level head and sure foot might not pass in safety But all of the cliff was not so. About one third of the way up I found a band almost perpendicular and seemingly quite smooth. It was about twelve feet high and seemed a barrier to all fur ther progress. There were few little ledges, however, from half an inch to an inch deep where slabs of stone had broken off and to these I managed to cling until I got my hands on the ledge above, when I felt perfectly safe.
 The rock above me was very interest ing. The basaltic columns were quite plainly marked in places, and of a gi- gantic size. The surface of the rock was split with vertical Assures, leaving at the corners many loose slabs of stone which a hand could easily detach. These are the chief dangers of scaling a cliff like this. The trouble is not so much to find a foot hold as it is to be sure the foothold will stay where you find it. It is seldom safe to step on a block without you have hold of one or two other places, so you can hold if the block goes down. It is generally best to push off most of the loose pieces before trying a hitch, but I was afraid to do this on account of the men be- low I worked my way gradually up- ward, with now and then hard climb, and occasionally a cedar to which l could cling. I was afraid to trust these at first, as I feared they might pull out of their rocky crevises. They grew for the most part in vertical Assures in the side of the perpendicular rock. The roots ran down through the cracks where there didn't seem to be the least bit of soil or moisture. Still they held there and proved much more reliable than the rocks themselves. Outcasts of the vegetable world, stunted by fam inc and drouth, they still cling to the mountain sides, and fiaunt their defiant