'^"J^^^^ c°*-^;:>- Z-'^^'^. ''^/^^•^ o_ * V.^*" /.aiBl-, •^^..♦* - ' ^^K '--^m'' •/% '°^^/ J'"'\- v^^P/ *'^ ^^ ^ ''•^<% ./^:^^'\ .^°«-«;'^- /^jf^'-' ■.° v^^'-^. \>*" o. ;;^'% ^°/^;^>- /'i-B>'.\ .^ ''^'. %■• ay o * ♦o^o' ,v . ^^. .^ /^Va-^ ^<^. c^"^ .^^«5»^^ U <^ /^ V *1V' <^ '^..v :^mMh:'o ^^.c^" ,_.-.....^...^ ^ ^ ; Shawangunk Mountain Stories i i BY WILHELM BENIGNUS 1 "S h a w a n g u n k Mountain Stories" by Willi elm Benign us, 177 E. 78. Street, New York City. Preis des Buches 50 Cents. Das hiibsche, mit Naturaufnahmen geschmiickte Biich ist in enylischer Sprachegeschrieben. Es fiihrt uns in die Felsenwildnis der ,,Sha\vangunk Berge'< des Staates New York und enhiillt uns infesselnden Beschreibungen die herrliche, poetische Naturund die wildromantische Srhonheit dieser Bergesgegend, deren Seelenstiuinuingen Benignus mit ganz eigenem Zauber zu bannen und uns vorzufiihren verstanden hat. :A"* -'^ ^^ar ■ . ,, '^BBfc ] :■■ ■ y, ■■- ^ • . ^■'W- i»'..? VpTj-^;i. ' V-m^r ,^: v/ '., ■Br^ ' "^^m ,• X' ,•* P^:,->:^_:||| :^UU k■^^:-*f%-i^- "' '- ' f ■ »~^ " jf ■ "■:. ■Im^'itKl. ' ' ^ i.-'^ ■"-' <. : ,, ' ': •'' ■ ■' ■'^ ^•^'^^P'''/^^./ V"'^' •. .^^ '-'■ iK-.,'f^ ";i;^"f ^^. "^ .'■"^'W^?^^} ^i.^ke^ 1^:-. ■ ^5f^-. ' ■ :.>'■ J . ''-'*' •£»'*^^i^S i^^'^jm •■;-^' -^'jMrn ^^^ W^:\ WILHELM BENIGNUS. Shawangunk Mountains, N. Y., 1915. At the Foot of the "Jacob's Ladder", near the New Road to M^nnewaska. Shawangunk Mountain Stories By WILHELM BENIGNUS Copyright. Washington. D. C, 1916. by WILHELM BENIGNUS All Rights Reserved & WITH JOYOUS VOICE SINGS A NIGHTINGALE. A Morning Song of the Shawangunks. With joyous voice sings a iiightiiisale; full rich the sounds float away and awaken the echoes in glan and dale. and she hails the glorious day, she hails the day, the glorious day and the Queen of the Golden Rays. A fiddler young hears the joyous song; he lifts his fiddle to play, and a stream of rich melody floats along, and he hails the glorious day, he halls the day, the glorious day and the Queen of the Golden Rays. 4o TO THE MAN, POET AND LOVKK OF N ATI' UK, MR. HENRY W. SHOEMAKER, AUTHOli OF Argyle Verse, 1898. (Verse.) Editor of Immaterial Verses, 1898. (Verse) Random Thoughts, 1899. (Verse) Wild Life in Central Pennsylvania, 1903. Pennsylvania Mountain Stories, 1907 Pennsylvania Mountain Verses, 1907 Philosophy of Jake Haiden, 1911. Editor of More Pennsylvania Mountain Stories, 1912 The Indian Steps, 1912 Tales of the Bald Eagle Mountains, 1912 Elizabethan Days, 1912. (Verse) Su&quehanna Legends, 1913 Stories of Pennsylvania Animals, 1913 Stories of Great Pennsylvania Hunters, 1913 In the Seven Mountains, 1914 The Pennsylvania Lion, 1914 Wolf Days in Pennsylvania. 1914 Black Forest Souvenirs, 1914 Penn's Grandest Cavern, 1915 Pennsylvania Deer and Their Horns, 1915 A Pennsylvania Bison Hunt, 1915 Juniata Memories, 1915, who, as a Historian, Collector and Recorder of Legends and Folk-lore of Central Pennsylvania, in these his Writings, has rendered so lovingly, charmingly and understandingly The Sublime Soul and Spirit of the PENNSYLVANIA MOUNTAINS, these SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES are sincerely and respectfully dedicated by the Author. New York City, May, 1916. TABLE OF CONTENTS. With Joyous Voice Sings a Nightingale. Morn- ing Song 2 To the Man, Poet and Lover of Nature 3 The Chicadees' Good-Bye 7 to 9 Ellenville, N. Y., and King Shawangunk's Castle 11 to 15 The Mountain and the Cloud 17 to 20 The Spirit Lake 21 Great "Chief Tecumseh" and his War Horse "Fleet Wind" 23 to 25 The Path to Highpoint 27 to 29 The Cloudburst at Ellenville, August, 1915 31 to 36 ILLUSTRATIONS. Portrait of the Author Frontispiece Huckleberry Pickers' at Three Mile Camp 4 A Peaceful Summer Day 6 "Castle Rock" or "Gate Rock" and Highpoint 10 Nevele Falls, Ellenville, N. Y 16 "Rickety Spring" Water on the New Road 22 Highpoint 26 My Tent near Beaver Creek 30 The Old Zinc Mine 37 THE CHICKADEES* "GOOD-BYE". CAMPING three miles up tlie mountain, near Beaver Creek, in the forenoon of Alonday, the 10th of August, 1914, I was sitting at my home-made table, amongst the shady trees near my tent, ])usy writing. It was just as coz}- a green corner of the Shawangunk w^oods as you could wish to be snuggled up in on a hot summer day. The air was close, and its hot breaths full of wood-scents occasionally swept up the valley along the mountain road or welled in waves from the gullies and high-wooded swamps which slope down from the mountain ridge, called "High Point". The sky w^as threatening, and giant clouds reared their shining silver heads or stretched out fantastic arms to far distances. So I had decided not to go picking hucklel)erries on this day, and, besides, as the berries began to l)e scarce, I had made up my mind to take in hand my pilgrim staff one of the next days and strike out for New^ York City. The huckle- berries, the blue, the black, the grey, the silver, the flesh-colored and the pearl-colored one^, were begin- ning to get very scarce and only swamp-berries were, to a certain extent, ripe and ready now in certain local- ities to be gathered by the diligent searchers. As a forerunner of autumn days, a lonely and early katydid, the night before, had already tried near my tent to drum its well-known tune. Well, it was time 7 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. to go soon. Many pickers, single and in family groups, bad left already. So there I sat and mused and wrote a few lines occasionally. In spite of tl\e thunderclouds the sun shone strong and hot. A light breeze came along, swept through the woods and made the leaves of the trees and bushes and the finely feathered high ferns nod and whisper in soft unison. A big black and blue butterfly flapped with shimmering wings gracefully around a high-stemmed, tenderly red-colored flower a few feet from me, rested on the blossoms and sucked with long, flexible tongue sweet nectar from the ever hospitably- open chalices. Peace w^as here ; my .•ioul looked and listened. Silence dreamed its song of meditation, when all at once it seemed to stir and wake to active life with a flutter of wings all around me, and sweet, sing- ing voices of little wilderness-spirits busily gave me friendly greetings. .\ realh' agreeable interruption indeed. As I looked up I saw^ a flock of some dozens of chickadees flying around me, full of curiosity, won- dering, perhaps, how I came there, and pondering over my doings. They perched on the branches in my neigh- borhood w^ith kind and sweet calls of "Chica-dee-ee-ee- ee-ee, chica-dee-ee-ee-ee," and a couple of yellow- breasts watched me curiously amongst the green leaves above, their necks stretched, their little heads bent side- ways, listening, and chimed in with a "Ste-ee-ee-ee-ee," like the ringing and twinkling of flne, clear, pure, little silver bells. Such tunes you hear sometimes, when you listen to the voices of mountain brooks running SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. valley-wards over glistening- pebbles. I sat there quietly without moving. Replying with responding whistling to the birds' notes in their own calls, I re- ceived immediate responses with ever kindly "Chica- dee-ee-ee-ees" and silvery "See-ee-ee-ees/' and the dear fellows flew around me with a soft rush of wings oiily a hand broad away, and some of them perched near me at an arm's stretch and sat on the slender branches watching me and listening to my whistling interestedly, ever replying with their own original calls and songs. Without a motion, their wise little heads cocked sideways, their little kindly black eyes shining, watching, listening, observing, some of the chickadees sat there, and all around their quick-silvery compan- ions kept up a lively flying, hopping, twittering and singing. They were really a crowd of kind and consol- ing wood-folks, of cheering fairy-spirits moved by real interest, by real friendship. About fifteen minutes this kept up. Then I rose, and they flitted away southward, up towards the swamps in the direction of Highpoint, going about their business and their own peculiar er- rands. But a long while yet could I hear their "Good- bye," sounding fainter and fainter, the kindly and cheery and friendly and sweet "Chica-dee-ee-ee-ee-ee !" and the "See-ee-ee-ee-ee !" pure like the voice of a mountain brook and clear and fine like little, tinkling silver bells. 2q 2! >; u. ° If c 2. - Q. )l c OS o -^ DC UJ ELLENVILLE, N. Y., AND KING SHAWANGUNK^S CASTLE. TWENTY miles west of Kingston-on-the-TIudson, and reached from there in an hour's time hy the ''New York, Ontario and Western Raih'oad", the mountain town or village of EHenville awaits the visi- tors who long, in the good old summer time, for peace, rest and the enjoyment of fine and romantic mountain scenery. EUenville, in Ulster County, N. Y., is charmingly situated in the valley of the Sandburgh lirook, or Creek, which brook, a few miles towards the east, at Napanoch, flows into the Rondout, which in turn flows into the Hudson River. EUenville snuggles itself to the foot of a high mountain of the range of the "Shaw- angunk Mountains," which rise quite abruptly to a height of two thousand feet above the narrow plain upon which the village is built. The "Shawangunk Mountains" do not belong to the "Catskills," but are the northernmost promontory of the great range of the "AUeghenies". Opposite the "Shawangunk Range", on the western side of the Sandburg Creek, rises and stretches in undulating, softly contoured lines the range of the "Catskill Mountains," mostly shim- mering dreamily in a blue haze, sometimes, in very clear air, showing the peaks like a marvelous chain of cut and poUshed gems and often, at sunset, bathed in a 12 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. glory which holds the soul of man in awe and admira- tion. The valley of the Rondont Creek and the Sandburg Creek was settled in pre-Revolutionary times, and the community of Ellenville is old enough to have accu- mulated a store of traditions running back to the pio- neer period, before the Indian occupants had been entirely displaced. Wonderful legends of these times are floating about. Among these traditions are many relating to the flinding of metals, precious and other- wise, in the neighboring mountains. Ellenville has many points of interest. So the famous Sun-Ray Springs, belonging to the "Sun-Ray Company", and the factory buildings of the "Ulster County Knife Company". Many of the inhabitants of the peaceful mountain town are not specially blessed with an overflow of earthly riches. So they accept gladly and thankfully the liberal hospitality of the ancient Spirit of the Mountain, "King Shawangunk", and they swarm like busy bees over the tops of the mountains in the months of July and August, and gather the fine huckleberries, thus making some welcome extra dollars to tide them over the hard times. The new mountain road, built 1914 by ]\Ir. Smiley — who himself commenced as an Ellenville boy, and now, by his thrift and work, owns the finest and largest hotels on the mountain — begins at the old lead or zinc mine (now out of use) at the foot of the mountain and leads up to its side in winding curves, past boulder- SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. 13 Strewn, brush-covered, thickly-wooded wilderness, with occasional views towards the Catskills. Three miles up it runs level again. There P^eaver Creek crosses the road and flows down the mountain side to the valley. There the romantic wilderness of the "Ja- cob's Ladder" begins, with its gullies and swamps and rock-bastions and its patches of huckleberries. One mile farther on is "Four-mile Camp", where generally about twenty or thirty pickers camp and where John Wood, an old and experienced mountaineer, has a little hut and buys huckleberries from the pickers. A mile further on is "Five-mile Camp", where usually about one hundred and fifty huckleberry pickers are camping, single persons and large families. From there the road leads to Awosting, Minnewaska and New Paltz, to the big mountain lakes: Maratansa, Binnewater, x\wosting, or Long Pond, Minnewaska and Lake Mo- honk. Celebrated mountain hotels for summer and winter guests are the 'AVildemere Hotel" and the "Cliff Hotel" on Minnewaska Lake, and the "Lake Mohonk ^^lountain Hotel" on Lake IMohonk. Along the way, up on the mountain from Three-mile Camp to Five- mile Camp, you can look across the Rondout Valley and have the Catskills spread before you in beautiful vistas of glorious peaks, of wooded mountains, brooks and lakes. Four miles across the mountain top is Sam's Point, 2,340 feet above sea level. Around there are the largest picker-camps of many hundred people. In the summer of the year 1!)14 I camped at "Three- mile Camp", near Beaver Creek. If you look up just 14 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. before reaching the creek, you see, to the right, the rocks looming up Hke towering fortresses. 1 noticed high up on the rocks a portal-Hke upright giant slab, which, when the sun shone upon it. looked like the closed entrance to a mountain castle. 1 call it the "Gate Rock" or "Castle Rock". This gate 1 entered. How, I cannot tell. l)ut the reader may fancy how. Steps of snow-white quartz led up the now^ wide- open portal. Old "King Shawangunk", his beautiful daughter "Minnewah" at his side, and with him his countless retinue of Indian warriors proud and noble, led by the great chief "Tecumseh". welcomed me cor- dially and entertained me royally. Good things we had, and good talks. Too long would it take to write of it all. I shall only record here two sayings of the chief spirits of the mountain. Thus "King Shawangunk" spoke : "The world wants to know of the man wdio can do things. It does not want to know of him who can explain why he cannot do them. * * '•' If they hope and believe, the deaf shall hear, the blind shall see, the mute shall speak. * * * Keep your soul pure as the moun- tain brook. Be true and fearless. * * * Truth and Light are one ; open your ears and you liear them ; open your eyes and you see them ; guard your steps ; speak with the voice of your conscience, and the Great Spirit is with you." Chief "Tecumseh's" words ran thus: "An Indian and a white man sat on a log. The Indian pushed against the white man and continued pushing till the SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. 15 white man fell off the log. In surprise and anger the white man asked : 'Why did you do this?' The ln;lian replied : 'That is the way you pale-faces pushed us oft* our possessions and stole and kept our lands. First we, in great kindness, gave you a piece of land to live on, then you wanted more, and we gave you more for the sake of peace ; l3Ut you were not satished and wanted still more, and at last you took all we had. Thus the pale-face ro1)1)ed the red man and made him homeless'." NEVELE FALLS, ELLENVILLE, N. Y. THE MOUNTAIN AND THE CLOUD. A Shawangunk Mountain Story, Dedicated to the Memory of an Ellenville Poet. By Wilhelm Benignus. LIFE is one grand song, one grand i)oem: — a sacred hymn, a sublime and majestic ode, an impas- sioned rhapsody. Nature writes the stanzas and sings them to the harp of the winds and waters. In nature God is embodied, the Great Spirit. With His voice nature speaks and gives most wonderful revelations. In solitude you gain knowledge. Rocks, trees, plants, animals, yourself, God — all are of one family. Each day rises resplendent as a new wonder and freely presents to you new riches, and you gather for your inner life imperishable treasures. Your spirit mounts on the wings of light and your soul chimes jubilantly in the rhapsody of creation. To this song of nature I often listened in camp near Beaver Creek, where my tent was pitched in a green wilderness of trees, l)ushes, bracken brake ferns, sweet ferns and mountain laurels, which just left a big patch of sky visible over- head. There Beaver Creek hurried downhill toward the Sandburg A^alley in foaming and pearly cascades, and the bed the busy waters have burrowed as their runway forms a deep, thickly wooded gully, which is called ''Witches' Hole." This is the wildest part of tlie mountains. A silver mine is hidden there, which 17 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. is yet to be found. A giant hemlock tree stands there, over one hundred feet high; also giant pitch ])ines. In the hiding places of "Witches' Hole" the wild animals of the woods make their homes : porcupines, raccoons, woodchucks, squirrels, rabbits, foxes and many others, which have often ])een my nightly visitors around tlic tent. In the hollow trunks of trees swarms of wild bees have their hives. Rattlesnakes and co])perhea(ls are lively around lliere. too. We killed several of tlicm near our tents, not far .down the road at Rickety v^pring and on the " Jacol/s Ladder." When the shadows of night fall the calls of the whip-poor-will, that haunts "Witches' Hole" and has its nest there, rings through the w^oods: "Whip-])oor-will ! Wdiip-poor-will ! Whip- poor-will !" When around and over my tent the storm roared and the voices of the woods and waters, down from the "Jacob's Ladder" and Highpoint, and up from the deep and wild ravine of "Witches' Hole," joined in a mighty chorus, I am sure the s])irits of the old Indian hunters and warriors who once roamed over these mountain wildernesses were awake and alive and a-wandering. And there came into my mind the im- mortal lines from "Lvangeline", a tale of Arcadie, of the bard Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: "This is the forest primeval. The murmuring pines- and the hemlocks bearded with moss, and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight, stand like Druids ot old, with voices sad and prophetic, stand like harpers hoar, with beards thU re&'t on their bosoms. SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. li^ Loud from its rocky caverns, the deep voiced neighboring ocean speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the wail of the forest. This is the forest primeval; but where are me Hearts that beneath it leaped like the roe, when he hears' in the woodland the voice of the huntsman?" And I tliought of a ])oet friend wlio lived in I^llen- ville in the lirst decade of this twentieth century, and there wrote his hook of perfect poems, "'i'he Strife of Life"; of the late pastor of the EUenville Evangelical Lutheran Church on Centre Street — Dr. (lOtthol 1 August NeelT. He died in Utica, N. Y., and there rests with his wife Sophie, who foUow^ed him soon. If you stand in EUenville on a fine summer day. when the wind is high and the white cloufls are sailing in the sky, and watch the cloud-shadows fleeing up the green-billowed mountain sides, you \\i\\ understand what Neeff meant with his poem : TO THE CLOUD. "O shadow of the cloud, do let me flee high up the mountain and its meadows green; high up, high up, beyond the dark ravine; O let me flee, and let me fly with thee! "O silvery cloud, do let me flee with thee and with thine shadows' changing tourmaline, O let me flee with thee, where thou hast been, and spread my wings high o'er the mountain-tree. "O let me spread my soul, where thou dost flee, and dreaming, lose myself in opal air. O hast'ning cloud, do let me flee with thee. "O let me flee as swift as thou dost flee, that to the cloud my soul be married there, O let this restless, dreaming shadow flee!" 20 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. Neeff called this poem a ''sound poem". His soul is married to the white cloud now. In realms of peace he dwells, but even from there his spirit fights the battles for Truth, .Right and Light. His spirit was and is a batteler-spirit. Well, let the shadows flee and be gone. O glorious sun, thou golden goddess of tlie sky, gladden our liearts witli thine rays! Let us liave sunsliinc! Tliis life is good to live! Really. Let us make it wcnili while to live ! This life, I think, is all right, friend, and not so bad indeed. There is a thorn to ev'ry rose, but aint the roses sweet? Say, ain't the roses sweet? THE SPIRIT LAKE. ON ''Shawangiink Mountain" is a lake where every twenty-five years on a certain summer night a ghostly procession of spirits can be seen by privileged eyes. The full moon sheds its silvery light, strange and fantastic shadows weave and waver, the winds are hushed and silent, the mirror of the lake is smot/i'i and motionless while the spirits walk around the shim- mering waters three times and whisper and sigh and sing softly. If you listen closely you can hear them sing this SONG OF LOST LOVE. "True love flows deep as a river flows, but love means many a thing! It can be compared to a floating rose which the waves to the deep sea swing. "Love leads you sometimes to sunlit skies where in glory redeemed souls dwell; it brings you to regions where pain-wrung cries of lost souls ring through hell. "The dewdrop trembles, a sparkling gem,- in the purple flower's chalice, and a sunbeam, which from heaven came, drinks it hotly — that's love! — with a kiss. "But the love that alone will a long time last I compare to a crystal lake, wherein purest pearls of a happy past their rest at the bottom take. "And a shimmer deep down from its golden sands meets fondly the s'oft moonbeams, while with lilies white in their spirit hands on the shore walk our wishes and dreams. "And their eyes are turned with a sudden start to the treas- ures there hidden long, and they sing, with sighs that could break your heart, of lost love, a sad, sad song." 21 TECUMSEH AND FLEET WIND. Story of the Great Indian Chief and His War Horse. A LITTLE over half-way up the path to llighpoint — -which starts on the new road a few^ hundred feet below Rickety Spring — and when you can see Highpoint well ahead of you — strike out to the right, towards the west, and you will find a pair of white giant-rocks standing neighborly together. One of them shows the strong, grim, determined features of an Indian warrior — this is "Great Chief Tecumseh". The other rock, southward, has the form of a horse — this is the chief's war horse, "Fleet Wind". Between the two rocks lay some big slabs wdiich look like a shield and a tomahawk. On many a sun-hot summer day I picked various kinds of huckleberries near these rocks, and always found plent)'. Their different col- ors are astonishing and wonderful ; some are^ coal- l)lack, some are dark-blue, some are sky-blue, others pearl-gray or fiesh-colored, and each kind has a differ- ent and enticingly delicious taste. Sometimes a crowd of pickers approached noisily and disturbed the soli- tude, 1)ut mostly I was alone in the ])eace and poetr)' of this Shawangunk wilderness. Annoying were only the myriads of Ijloodthirsty little flies which appeared in these latter years and whicli seem to take a special pleasure in l)othering you constantly. They seem to 24 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. think your eyes and ears are fine places to fiy into. Often I noticed a wild hawk sailing in keen curves in the azure sky like the bold spirit of the old warrior himself. And the old rattlesnake that lives under the rocks gave me a sign of its existence by the unfor- gettable pungent odor it emitted in anger and fear wdien it fled from the presence of the intruder of its domain. It was as honest in its warning as tlie old chief himself ('"Tecumseh" means "rattlesnake") who hated the palefaces, but always fought them honestlv and fairly. There he stands. "GREAT CHIEF TECUMSEH", WITH HIS WAR HORSE "FLEET WIND". Turned into the stone the warrior bold, the Great Chief Tecumseh, waits for the promised "Age of Gold", when wrong no more shall be. His mighty shield lays close by him, his heavy tomahawk; high in the blue, where white clouds swim, his s'pirit sails, a hawk. Fleet Wind, the war horse, by his side, fast like the wind did seem ^ Brave deeds and many a fierce fight flit through the warrior's dream. Stern like the rock the hero stands and dreams, the Great Chief Tecumseh. Nobly he lived and bravely he fought and died to free his wronged people from the yoke of the palefaced robbers and oppressors. He sleeps and dreams. But one night of the year he wakes to life. This night, a late summer night, is preceded by a brooding hot day on which heavy gra\ - black clouds with threatening thunder-heads loom up on the horizon. SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. 25 Suddenly the trees and bushes of the forest raise a chonis of sound as a strong wind arises and (h-ives the clouds before him like a shepherd his flock. W'ith a pecidiar restlessness these clouds, in solid ranks, roll up from the region of the Catskills and from the direc- tion of the Aileghenies and from the Hudson River country, and, grumbling like angry bears, they shift and move in ever-changing shapes around and around the Highpoint flats. Occasionally, like a warning, heavy raindrops fall. When the pitch-dark night sets in the cloud-armies clash together and their masses burst asunder amid mighty roars of thunder and blind- ing flashes of blue lightning. Here and there the fiery shafts strike big forest trees which sink to the ground with a crash, struck to the heart and splintered to matchwood. Hell seems loose. The elements wrestle tumultously, and the forests sigh and moan under the merciless whippings and lashings of howling tempest and hissing rain. The creeks swell over their l)or(lers, and, bellowing like fiends, they rush and rumble and thunder in raging torrents down the mountains. Then Great Chief Tecumseh stirs to life, grasps his shield and tomahawk, mounts his war horse Fleet Wind, and sends out a ringing yell, and his warriors assemble around him, strong and brave and fierce, and they war in the battle of the clouds and winds, and they hunt over the mountain territory, and their slirill cries wake the echoes in forest and glen : " Yoohoo-oo-oo-ee-ee-ee ! Yoohoo-oo-oo-ee ee-ee ! Youhee-ee-ee! Ee-ee-ee!" ^^, THE PATH TO HIGHPOINT. The Story of a Solitary Climb Up the Rocky Mountainside. THE new road to Minnewaska, built by Mr. Smiley, commences where the old zinc mine stands at the foot of the mountain. In winding curves the road leads up the rocky, thickly- wooded mountainside and offers, higher up, beautiful views of the Catskills across the valley. At three dift'erent places, each about a mile distant from the other, cool, clear water from the mountain springs refreshes the traveler. The last of these drinking places is Rickety Spring, three miles up the mountain. The water runs strongly through an iron pipe into a trough ; you have to look out there for rattlesnakes. About ten minutes farther up is Beaver Creek, flowing under a wooden bridge built over the road. The water of this creek is pure and good to drink. Up this new road about two and three-quarter miles from Ellenville, a sign at the right side reads: "I'o Highpoint". From there the path to Highpoint leads southward up the mountain. This is an old Indian path and is much used by the huckleberry pickers, for around Highpoint and the Ice Cave, to which another path branches off to the right, are the best berry grounds. The distance from the new road to Highpoint is a little over a mile. 27 23 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. Highpoint is a mountain promontory from whicli a wide view over the surrounding mountain country opens. So the government built a hut up there, fitted it out with a telephone, and put it in charge of a war- den, who looks out for forest fires, which happen sometimes and rage fiercely. Huckleberry plants want space to grow ; their growth is hindered by close-grow- ing ferns, trees and bushes, which at the beginning of this rocky Highpoint path are especially thick. Higher up there are free spaces ; the vista opens and you see Highpoint ahead. To the right and to the left of the path you find w^onderful berries, especially where fires have left the blackened trunks and stumps of pitch-pines. Such ground is called ''burned ground" and the huckleberries grow there astonishingly fine. These berries do not respond to culture ; they are wild and love ground which holds much acid. Not far from Highpoint, to the left of the path, you find in the hot weather a welcome good water to slake your thirst at the so-called Mud Spring. Beware of rattle- snakes there, too ; also farther up at the rocks. In this blessed solitude of the regions near the path I picked berries often, all by myself, and found regular fairy spots. There the "hair cap moss", like myriads of green stars, grows along the rock crevices, 'i'hc golden sunbeams play around you, God's sunshine warms your heart, and you see the beauty, the won- ders, of this mountain world as in transfiguration. 'J'he pure, fresh mountain air caresses you, and the healthy wood-smells please your nostrils, and the huckleberries SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. taste luscious. The strength of the towering rocks enters your being, and a new will to live and to do per- vades you and lifts your spirit. Enclosed by the brown wilderness these mossy berry spots look like fairy grounds transplanted from a far wonderland. In these solitudes your soul can dive into the deepest seas of meditation and gather and bring to light most precious pearls of thought and ])ure desire. Not even there you are quite so lonesome, for, like comrade spirits, the black, white and chestnut-red chewinks cheer you up with their call, ''Chewink" ! or start a short song for you that sounds in words like ''Chuck-berries-pick-I-will-I-will." a: "RICKETY SPRING" WATER, At the New Road, below Three Mile Camp. CLOUDBURST AT ELLENVILLE. OUR camping and Inickleberry picking on Shawan- gunk A fountain in the month of July and August, IDlo, was, to condense it in a short word. "wet". It rained once steachly (hiring a whole week. On tlie side of my tent toward tlie new road a l)rook l)egan to form; on the other side of the tent the water llowed strongly, and in the middle of my tent a spring welled up, for which 1 dug a trench so the water could pass out through the tent opening. A regular swamp formed itself in front, and I carried stones together and placed them about, so I could step around and do my cooking dry footed. Although T did not object to the "Well of the Seven Muses" in my dwelling — it was so altogether original and unexpected — }et the w'ater all around and all over was a little too much to suit my fancy ; so I broke camp and left the mountain the middle of August. If I had stayed till the cloudburst came, August the 22d, my tent would have been swept away by the flood rushing dowm to the valley. Of tliat time I give account as I heard it from a picker who stayed up there, and as I read it in the newspapers. Never before had Ellenville passed through such an ordeal as the cloudburst and the electric storm of that singular August day brought along. Torrential rain flooded towns in tw^o New York counties, and villages in Sullivan County suffered greatly. The cloudburst tore out ])art of the tracks of the New SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. York, Ontario and Western Railroad, destroyed sec- tions of the State road and of many mountain roads, ripped away bridges and ruined crops, and the electric storm started hres and added to the people's terror. This is the story of the cloudburst and flood tiial visited Ellenville, Ulster County, N. Y., on the mem- orable day, August the 22d, 1915 : Alountain streams, already dangerously swollen from a week of heavy rains, broke their bounds in the afternoon during a heavy cloudburst that deluged parts of Sullivan and Ulster Counties, sent mud slides thun- dering doW'U mountainsides, ripped out railroad tracks, broke dams and tore away houses. No loss of life was reported, though there were many thrilling rescues and a large amount of property damage, particularly in rural districts and in villages at the foot of the great hills. PART OF ELLENVILLE WIPED OUT. Ellenville, in Ulster County, snuggled in a basin that is rimmed about by peaks of the Shaw-angunk range, suffered most. A section of the village was wdped out by the mountain torrent when the dam at the head of the reservoir burst. The higher section of the village escaped the devastation of the torrent. Another dam collapsed at Napanoch, in Ulster County, shutting off the water supply from the Eastern Reformatory. At Parksville, in Sullivan County, the cloudburst did severe damage, ripping out a large section of the New- York, Ontario and Western Railroad tracks. SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. 33 The severest electrical storm seen in the Shawaii- gunk and Catskill Mtjuntains for years followed the cloudburst, terrorizing the townsfolk as it flashed and flared amid deafening thunder, and setting two hres at Ellenville while that village was still panic-stricken at the whirling flood tearing at the foundations of houses. DAMAGE TO CROPS IS HEAVY. No estimate to the damage could be obtained, bur farmers for many miles about the villages which were the storm centers were reporting severe crop losses up to the time, late last evening, when the telephone wires began to suffer from the storm and communication was interrupted in many directions. A curious feature of the deluge at Ellenville was that the rainfall seemed to be mostly upon the tops of the mountains about the village. For half an hour the rain in seemingly solid sheets volleyed down upon the mountains. Sandburg I'rook, which flows through the heart of the village, was already badly swollen. Anxious townspeople gathered along its banks as tor- rents came down the mountainsides, where ordinarily only rivulets trickle into the brook. Another fifteen minutes and it became apparent that the stout dam which holds back the brook from the reservoir which supplies Ellenville with drinking water was being badly strained. Helpless, the vil- lagers gathered at that point until wiser heads ordered them to higher ground. 34 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. WALL OF WATER SWEEPS INTO VILLAGE. Before all were safely away there was a ripping, crushing- noise and the crumpled dam was buried be- neath a wall of water that swept down into the village. In a moment the New York, Ontario and Western station and yards were islanded in a lake six feet deep. Small frame houses in the neighborhood were stoop high in the flood, and foundations were being loosened on all sides. The first driving rush of water tore out five hundred feet of railroad tracks along the Ellenville Branch, starting at the railroad station. All through the village the Sandburg Brook was climbing over its banks. For a few minutes it looked as though the whole town would go, and those on the higher ground thought only of their own danger. . Then, as they perceived that the main section of the town was safe unless the cloudburst lasted for hours, they bethought themselves of those in the houses in the lower section about the railroad station. CRY FROM HOUSES FOR HELP. Half a dozen men launched a boat far up Sandburg Creek and worked their way slowly against the terrific current back toward its source, and the broken dam. Here and there a man or woman, marooned in a house, was crying for help and holding out imploring arms to the slowly moving rescuers. One after another four frame houses slipped about on their foundations, then were ripped away and SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. 35 floated out on the raging stream. From all of them the occupants had escaped at the first shouted warn- ing before the dam burst. In the confusion caused by the tearing away of the houses, which made a dangerous impediment to the progress of the rescue boat, the men in it had to al)an- don their attempts to get at those still in danger. But the force of the torrent soon lessened and the remaining houses seemed safe on their foundations; With great peril to themselves the boatmen reached two women on the roof of a one-story house. They took them into the boat and worked their perilous way across the stream to the shore. TAKE TWO MEN FROM HOUSETOP. Back they came, guiding their craft slowly to two men who were on the roof of another shaking dwell- ing. Thus the flood raged, and for long years it will be remembered. HOW TO REACH ELLENVILLE AND ITS MOUNTAIN, "OLD SHAWANGUNK". If you start from New York City, the most enjoy- able trip can be made by steaming up the Hudson River to Kingston Point, also called Rondout Landing, with any one of the palatial steamers of the Hudson River Day Line Company. These steamers run in full daylight and offer the best views of the beautiful Hudson River scenery. They are in service from May 1 till the end of October, making return trips be- tween New York and Albany daily, except Sundays, 36 SHAWANGUNK MOUNTAIN STORIES. and stopping at Yonkers, West Point, Nevvhurgh. roughkeepsie, Kingston Point, Catskill, Pludson and A11)any. For information, time-tables, etc., etc., ad- dress the Hudson River Day Line Company, Des- brosses Street Pier, New York City. Prom Kingston Point, or Rondout Landing, the electric cars take the travelers through the streets of Kingston, uphill, and bring him in ten minutes to the Kingston terminal of the New York, Ontario and Western Railway, where trains leave regularly for Ellenville and bring you there in an hour's time. In Ellenville good hotels and boarding houses offer every possible comfort to the travelers. Ellenville is reached directly over the Ontario and Western Railroad, stations in New York City at foot of West Forty-second Street and Cortlandt Street. Four through trains run each way daily. Fare, $3.04. Connection is also made by the Port Jervis and Kings- ton Division of the Ontario and Western Railroad at Port Jervis, and with the New York Central, West Shore and Ulster and Delaware and with the Hudson River boats at Kingston. 3477-117 5« §5 \^^^^ >.^* * J" % , 9 t'^I^,** ^ 1'*'*' "'""' :k00),"„ -^^ .A ■i" . i LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ^B 014 222 535 9 ^M ] J ■ 1