Year: 1871

A letter from one of the scientific party
on Mount Washington has interesting me-
moranda: The greatest velocity of the
wind probably exceeds hundred miles
an hour, though the greatest measured
has been ninety-two. Gains are very
rare and of short duration. They occur
only when the wind is on the point of
changing. AT times the changes are very
sudden; the wind may be southeast, and
in an hour there will be a stiff breze from
the northwest, which soon increases to a
gale. This change of the wind from
point to that directly opposite is not un-
common. The prevailing wind has been
northwest, and the most violent winds
have thus far come from that direction, or
a few points further north. As the side of
the house presents a surface of more than
SIX hundred square feet the pressure of
the wind, when it reaches its greatest We
loclty, IS tremendous, especially when it
comes In heavy gusts, it puts the house to
the severest test. After a time Of light
wind. when the building is full of frost
and the joints are frozen, heavy wind
loosens lthe joints with a report that is
startling; so sharp that, until we become
accustomed to it, we can hardly believe
but that the house is coming down over
our heads. These reports, with the al
most constant roar of the wind, are trying
to weak nerves, and even if person has
considerable courage it is sometimes Diff
cult to be perfectly cool, particularly
when the thermometer gets below 40, as
the chances OF escape are very small should
the house be crushed. But in general it
only furnishes excitement enough to keep
off the ennui incident to an isolated life.
Nothing has surprised me more than the
fierce winds we have when it is perfectly
clear. We expect them when there are
clouds on the mountain, but have had the
wind more than eighty miles per hour
when there is not single cloud above the
summit. The wind at such times 10 rare
ly steady pressure as it is during peri
cd of storm. No war of the elements is
so remarkable as at this high summit on
clear, cold moonlight night in midwinter.
AT such times the sky is intensely blue,
the moon looks coldly down and the stars
shine as nowhere else, except at high alti-
tudes and in northern attitudes Besides
the roar of the wind and the creaking of
the house, the wind seems to be trying its
utmost to draw the coal upward through
the stovepipe, for it tugs and pulls and
jerks, and now, as if gathering ali its force,
it gives one long, steady pull. but the Goals
are too heavy for it. With light wood it
would certainly succeed, if not in taking
the wood away, at least in taking every
spark of tire-for this was done several
times during my stay in Moosilauke.


Now the sound is hoarse, deafening
roar, that dies away into plaintive moan;
now it screeches and howls as though all
the witches of Macbeth were therein con-
fined but in an instant the sound ceases,
only, however, to be renewed by others
so weird and strange that one almost be-
lieves that the ghosts of the aborigines.
who were guilty of having assembled
where only the lichens grow, still hover
about the summit: for they have tradi-
ton that such would never reach the
hunting ground beyond the sunset, but
must wander forever around the mountain
they had dared profane.