The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1896-06-20
MANY PROMINENT VISITORS
Interesting Papers Read and
Able Speeches Made.
THE PYTHIANs VISIT BILTMoRE
The Mountain Scenery of Western
North Carolina is UnequaIled
in Grandeur in all
America

work in earnest Wednesday.
1t is true that there was an alterna-
ton Of mist and rain, but the attend
ance was good and interest lively.
The day was taken up with the read
ing of papers, of much practical value.
In spite of the rain, the Pythians
went out during the afternoon to
Biltmore. and received the courtesies
of the place. Among the things Of
credit to be put down TO the A. and NJ.
College at Raleigh is the fact that it
has one graduate, Mr. Meacham, OF
Wake county, who is doing good work
at Biltmore. Although Mr. Meacham
is not engaged in the dairy depart
ment proper, the manager OF the dairy
said this afternoon that he was much
depended on and gave him many use
full suggestions. This is one of the
results of teaching young men to do
something in North Carolina, of max
ing them practical in the way that the
A. and NJ College is doing.
Probably the best point from which
to get an idea of this country is on the
portico of the Battery Park Hotel. The
panorama is a continually changing
study. The mountains seem never
baified in making beauty out OF all
conditions. They take clouds and
make draperies, and enwrap them
selves with grim mystery more inn
pressive than, ii not SO exhlliarating as
that kind of orchestral effort that
seems to issue from them under the
sun-splendors. There seems to be here
a sort of mountain-language in the
air. which slips into the thoughts of
people at every moment. The climb OF
! 1ne two great engines up eighteen
miles of mountain cannot well Oe Gtz
seribed in words, The horseshoe
bend on the Pennsylvania road, the
sudden precipitousness of the Chesa-
peake and Ohio, besides the succession
of curves along that climb are like
melodies by the side of the epical re-
suit of some Tannhauser. One might
carefully select a succession OF words
with which TO tell of the series of
pictures, but it would take some kind
OF music property to expel the utter
ance that beats against the bars of the
lips in the presence of it all. That
music might have flute notes for the
glens, and shy sweet valleys of fern,and
blazing brass-notes for the chestnut
crests that seem to have been dipped
into some sunset solution; symbals
for the sheer falls of water, tossed
an shattered and spangled, riotous
with unruly clash: some plant long
violin note for bit of curving quiet
water in some chance level; note as
of morning from the very heart of the
cornet for the syllables of gold that
seem almost audible in the straight
shafts of sun that bursts from between
the blue lips of shaggy cloud; melo-
dies for meadows tender with the yet
unfolded sprout of corn; mad notes for
crags caressed with vines and traceries
and kissed with color after color, just
like minor notes, playing about calam-
itousness; deep notes that lay almost
fathomless in the rich, almost breath
ing masses of green. The note of the
pilprim might be heard, and the note
of love, of languor, of reslessness, coy
ness: there is endless music in the
whole panorama: the heart can hear
it altogether issuing out of it all like
a swell from the sea. And speaking
of the sea. had these semi-mountains
about been so many waves stilled in
stantly in a storm, they would APP
pear just about as they are. The
Battery Park Hotel is on one of them.
| tossed high up, commanding level
view of the twin Semi-mountalns that
| Law at the foot of the Blue Ridge just
| beyond. The tops of these heights
are almost on level, with all kinds
of valleys between. Once there We're
no valleys. This is what State Geolo-
| gist Holmes told me to-day. Millions
of years ago, he said, it was level
plain and was what was known as
1 A N l.
| turtles. the streams have been busy
| chisilling the landscape into it's pres
ent shape, the rivulets add
| ing their touches to some gently
| modulating slope, and the French
board putting the bold strokes that
| gives prominent feature.
! In the midst OF some such surround
| ings the different conventions have
been meeting these days.
| Among the teachers and friends who
are here, are Miss Lottie M. Linton, of
| Charlotte; w. S. Snipes, of Carthage;
| L. M. Snipes, of Charlotte; J. II. Wea-
| therspoon of Sanford; w. p. McCurrie,
| West End; j. l.. c. Bird, Marion; John
| T. Moffitt and wife, Mrs. Herndon,
| Miss NJ. Driver, Driver, Va; ID. A. Pat
| terson, G. B. Sellers, MaXton; l.. l..
4 I1ODDS, Ou1llOIl 1Oilt7SE, ~ ~. HUG liz
| Greensboro; q. f. Peaty, Archdale; W.
| j. Terrell, Wake Forest; j. b. Carlyle,
Wake Forest; A. MCLAUGHLIN, wife and
| daughter. Wadesboro; j. III. James, son,
wife and two daughters, Pelzer, S. c.;
w. X. Jacobson, Mrs. G. Jarvis, Wash
| ington, n. c.; S. p. Parker, Wilson; j.
| w. Fleetwood, Severn; Mabel Stevenson,
| Margarettsville, Johnny Wick, Marga-
rettsville; A. +. Cooper Brepard; Mr..
| and Mrs. James p. Cook, Concord; 5.
| "A. Finger and wife, Newton; r. G. Cra-
ven, Mt. Airy; Charles d. NIcIyer,
| Greensboro; Miss Lula Whitfield, La
| Grange; Miss Sallie Davis, Greensboro;
| Lula Edmondson, Apple Tree; Misses
| Carrie Wooten, Eliza Wooten, Bessie
| Rouse, Eulah Rouse, La Grange; Ma
| tilda Fort, Goldsboro; g. II. CrowelI,
| Asheboro; j. A. Baldwin, Morven; G..
L. Roper, Greensboro; Rhodes Tayloe,
| Misses Lizzie Mitchell, Rachel Tayloe,
Windsor; Kate Alley, Miss Hobgood,
Winston; j. B. Edamp, Windsor; Miss
Homes Winston. II . bedford Thomas