The New York herald., 1921-02-20

MOUNTAIN REGION OF NEW
ENGLAND AND EASTERN NEW
YORK BY William Copeman
Kitchin. Boston: The Page Company.
The Orient-far Cathay and that
territory once explored by Marco Polo
or even Prester John-has had many
historians of its wonderland: but this
stout and well made volume is
purely American product got by the
automobile out of an intelligent trav-
ellers quick wits. II is the story of
the wonderland of the East in the
United States; volume of pictures of
travel through and along that country
back from the seacoast, which begins
at Sandy Hook and runs to Cape Ann
stretching back to the Berkshires
and the Adirondacks
There have been trainloads of books
about California and all the slories of
the Rocky Mountains, the Far West,
The Southwest, the Northwest and the
fertility of the soil. both physical and
literary, of the middle West, with par
ticular stress laid upon the fecundity
of the States of Indiana and Illinois.
But until now, in recent years, we
have had no such elaborately detailed
book of vacation tours along the At
lantic littoral-possibly because the
automobile has come since the days of
such writer's as Prescott. Parkman,
Irving and Cooper, and even later than
William c. Prime (of Eagle Cliff,
Samuel Adams Drake or any of
the others, who wrote of the beauty
and stimulation of this glorious play
al in n
time when many Americans forgot
how to play save at pitching pennies
upon the hot pavements of New York.
But with all the debts of man
slaughter and home disintegration
charged against it, the automobile has
opened up magical country, just over
the hill or around the turn in the road
away from every mans door. The short
trips longer excursions anu extended
tours made possible by the new god
gasolene have made this whole
wonderland first accessible and then
familiar to many thousands of dwell
ers in this fair country who had
scarcely known, until they went motor
ing. in what an earthly paradise their
home lott had been cast.
The author describes his work as a
book of travelogues Of sundry motor
car journeys, during four successive
seasons, through the woods and the
, valleys, alongside the rivers and the
lakes and among the hills and noun
tains of eastern New York, Vermont,
New Hampshire. Maine, Massachusetts,
and Connecticut. with a side tour
through the Finger Lake district of
central New York. He has included
much about the scenery and more or
less about the history of this fas-
cinatinS region.
Or. Kitchin remarks that while va
rious readable and useful books have
heen written about different spots in
this district, until now nobody has
considered the whole region as
unit. marked off by its physical differ
ence from other districts, notably the
seashore. of New England. And he
reminds the reader that che who
would know this land of delight as II
deserves to be known must see it for
himself" And he particularly urges
the traveller by. motor to make haste
slowly. Take time to see things,
says he
Worth while sightseeing is some
thing different from mere success
sion of sdelong glances from flying
car 1t calls for attentive gazing with
keen, observing eyes. 1t requires
leisurely progress and frequent stops
along the way. Take time, therefore,
10 pause and ponder upon the past
in the historic places. where great
men wrought great deeds and where
and DatrlOtS.
paid in blood the price of what we
possess and enjoy. Take time to loiter
on the high places, where landscapes
fling themselves abroad to charmed
horizons, and over the wide 5prospect
of woods and waters is the Vagrant
play of sun and shade.
The bulk of the volume is well
broken UP into variety of historical
and geological memoranda, memo
randa of beautiful scenery, which
many good photographs emphasize,
and running descriptions of motor
progress. starting along the Mohawk
Valley, through the districts in which
The romances of Cooper and Irving
were laid. through the Catskills and
he Hudson River country and so on
20 the Adirondacks. "a great wilder
ness surrounded by civilization" The
author remarks:
"The people Of the East do not real
ize the vast size Of this wilderness. IL
comprises greater or lesser parts or
eleven counties of this State. and is
ouite the size of the whole State of
Vermont. or the State of New Jersey
nr of New Hampshire. and is consid-
erably larger than either Delaware or
Rhode Island To compare 1t with
European countries. II is three-fourths
the size of the Kingdom of Holland or
Belgium or the Republic of Switzer-
land. whose Alpine character it clearly
resembles.
The great wilderness of northern
New York is an upland region, with
mean height of about two thousand
feet above the level of the sea. 1t Is
traversed by four distinct ranges OF
mountains, with we'll defined inter-