ets, with a good glass, a view of six or seven states, I was told.
Possibly there were that many in sight, though at that season of the
year states look so much alike that it takes an expert to pick them out
readily. When states are moulting, it is all I can do to tell Vermont
from Massachusetts. On this mountain one gets a nice view and highly
exhilarating birch beer.

Albany can be distinctly seen with a glass--a field glass, I mean, not a
glass of birch beer. Some claim that the nub of a political boom may be
seen protruding from the Capitol with the nude vision. Others say they
can see the Green mountains, and as far south as the eye can reach. We
took two hours and a half for the ascent of the mountain, and came down
in about twenty minutes. We descended ungracefully--the way the Irishman
claimed that the toad walked, viz.: "git up and sit down."

Mount Utsa-yantha--I use the accepted orthography as found in the
Blackhawk dictionary--has a legend also. Many centuries ago this
beautiful valley was infested by the red brother and his bronze progeny.
Where now the red and blue blazer goes shimmering through the swaying
maples, and the girl with her other dress on and her straw colored
canvas cinch knocketh the croquet ball galley west, once there dwelt an
old chief whom we will call Polka Dot, the pride of his people. He
looked somewhat like William Maxwell Evarts, but was a heavier set man.
Places where old Polka Dot sat down and accumulated rest for himself are
still shown to city people whose faith was not overworked while young.

Old Polka Dot was a firm man, with double teeth all around, and his
prowess got into the personal columns of the papers every little while.
He had a daughter named Utsa-yantha, which means "a messenger sent
hastily for treasure," so I am told, or possibly old Polka Dot meant to
imply "one sent off for cash."

Anyhow Utsa-yantha grew to be quite comely, as Indian women go. I never
yet saw one that couldn't stop an ordinary planet by looking at it
steadily for two minutes. She dressed simply, wearing the same clothes
while tooling cross-country before breakfast that she wore at the scalp
dance the evening before. In summer time she shellacked herself and
visited the poor. Taking a little box of water colors in a shawl strap,
so that she could change her clothes whenever she felt like it, she
would go away and be gone for a fortnight at a time, visiting the ultra
fashionable people of her