Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1919-07-31
BEING HAPPY IN VERMONT
A Summer Vacation In An Old
Fashioned House
City Dweller Revels in Quiet Beauty
Of waterbury Center--The Glory
Of the Mountains and of
Motoring
CBy Catherine Beach Ely

for us the allurement OF the |
unknown. We felt 1t would be quite the |
opposite of New York city and for two |
summer months we wished to plunge our
selves into a cool invgorating bath of |
air.
The trip from Burlington to Waterbury |
was a promising prelude, the scenery |
from the car window being wild enough |
to augur even more exciting natural |
beauties. We seemed to he penetrating
farther and farther into a sea of deep |
green out of which buged the rugged
TANKS of mountains and forth from
which gusned refreshing streams.
At Waterbury we boarded a single
track trolley for Waterbury Center.
This ancient looking car started off with
much fracas, grooming. squaking and
lurching its way through a country of
SURPRISING loneliness. To those ac-
customed to city surface cars and
suburban lines this trolley comes as
revelation. II is antique and yet original
in contour. 1t seems to have an almost
human sense of its own Importance.
With a cheerful abandon it creaks. bangs
and rattles at every turn, while 1t is
initiating the traveller into the august
beauties of the Green Mountains.
The conductor dumped us and our bag
before a big grey box Of a house. We
gazed somewhat dsappointedly at the
uncompromising outlines of its archi-
lecture. But once inside the charm of
the interior made itself felt. Each
spacious cool room opened it's several
windows upon mountain scenes. We
pitied those who put up with the uncom-
Portable quarters of more crowded re-
sorts.
The house stands on a verdant plateau
about which swings the circle of
majestic view. From its shady lawn one
looks across a deep valley to the fertile
Stops of the mountains which melt into
hazy outlines of more remote ranges In
certain atmospheric effects the distant
mountains show a deep azure against the
horizon-as If the most intense blue in the
world had been nassed on the artist s
! palette.
| At the bottom Of the valley winds a
brook which glstens like a silver thread
of embroidery against the darker tones
of the landsca pc We used to sit un~Sr
| the hospitable trees of the lawn with an
almost reverent feeling for the vastness
of the panorama spread out before us
Nature is on a big scale at Waterbury
Center. on the roomy emerald slopes Of
the mountains Craze contented cattle,
their "fetlocks deep in plant grass"
| This verdancy is notified with golden
splotches of ripe grain fields, beyond
which blue slopes are massed against the
sky: over head great pregnant clouds
ride over the summer sky-their shadows
move in endless procession across the
hillsides and the valley. 1t is as if the
supreme artist were swning his brush
from horizon to horizon. Inness' large
New England canvasses give something
of the effect of vastness to be found in
such scene. A mammoth painting by
Ruysdal shows SO wildly cloud shadows
marching over the summer meadows that
one fairly sees their flying pursuit.
The library in the paror of the grey
house contains old-time standard New
England literature. We used to dream
over some bound volumes of New Eng
land magazines in their early days.
Under our favorite tree we, saturated
with mountain light and air. immersed
ourselves in serials of bygone days-the
wit and wisdom Of oliver Wendell
Holmes and the early writings of Henry
James. In one and the same OF these Old
volumes unearthed two articles bear
ing on two then youthful writer's one
a treatise on the function of the chief
executive in a democracy by A college
professor. Thomas Woodrow Wilson. and
the other in which the editor reviewed a
recent book written by a young dweller
of the Western plains-Theodore Roose.
Welt. This odtime editorial review com.
mended such wide knowledge and vigor-
Gus grasp of the subject in a young and
inexperienced writer like Roosevelt.
AS next door neighgor to the house
stands the only public building OF
Waterbury Center. Formerly the AGA
tn re oil
lage activities-library, public school
village societies and dances. church anc
Red Cross entertainments on warn
evenings from its windows pour forth
the imprisoned tones of some village
orator or the rhythm of dancing fee
treading to music, while outside lovesicl
SWANS coo softly in the deep shadows o
the trees. On summer afternoons the
chirping of feminine voices is heard
while bent heads and busiy piled needles
are visible at its windows.
The old fashioned red brick church oil
the hillside adds an effective bit of colo
and line to the landscape. The long low
lying brick farm houses are also mos
. picturesque feature of Northern Yer
mont. introducing as they do a brillan
!, note amongst the greenery.
One realizes the nearness of tn
. Canadian boundary Tor some or the sign
, are in French, Four miles distant from
Waterbury Center is Waterbury
Canadian ladies sometimes make shop
ping excursions thither and Canadian
families pass the summer at Waterbur
Inn. This well equipped attractive In
is on the principal street of the town. bu
we preferred to the town of Waterbury
the seclusion of Waterbury Center wit
the big grey house perched safely ava
from dusty roads and accessible to tn
wine of mountain air.
, Mount Mansfield (4.365 feet high
loftest peak of the Green Mountain
dominates the scene. Its four summit
are supposed to form the forehead, nose
chin and Adams apple of a mans profl
and are named accordingly, 1t does NO
require a very great effort OF tn
Imagination to discover the profile of
supine giant outlined against the SIX,
Cancels Hump third highest peak c
the Green Mountains) rivals Mount Mans
field as an important feature Of tn
landscape. The Green Mountains ougf
l. to be better known to athletic touristl
They offer the finest opportunities fo
mountain climbing, for rouchng In tn
: open,
q On the house veranda we Assem- BILE
h after the evening meal like spectators q
n the theatre to view the sunsets. Tho
were sften of startling beauty. Brilliant
n lY husd clouds shed their unearthl
a glory, Abave Mount Mansfield giar
q cloud masses changed from amber I
ysrmliion, then Ia crimson Camel
;. HUMP was transAgupsd into a eeissti'