me in the wilderness," It was past the
middle of August, and the festival of the season neared its close. We
were belated guests, but perhaps all the more eager on that account,
especially as the country was suffering from a terrible drought, and
the only promise of anything fresh or tonic or cool was in primitive
woods and mountain passes.

"Now, my friend," said I, "we can go to Canada, or to the Maine woods,
or to the Adirondacks, and thus have a whole loaf and a big loaf of
this bread which you know as well as I will have heavy streaks in it,
and will not be uniformly sweet; or we can seek nearer woods, and
content ourselves with one week instead of four, with the prospect of a
keen relish to the last. Four sylvan weeks sound well, but the poetry
is mainly confined to the first one. We can take another slice or two
of the Catskills, can we not, without being sated with kills and
dividing ridges?"

"Anywhere," replied Aaron, "so that we have a good tramp and plenty of
primitive woods. No doubt we should find good browsing on Peakamoose,
and trout enough in the streams at its base."

So without further ado we made ready, and in due time found ourselves,
with our packs on our backs, entering upon a pass in the mountains that
led to the valley of the Rondout.

The scenery was wild and desolate in the extreme, the mountains on
either hand looking as if they had been swept by a tornado of stone.
Stone avalanches hung suspended on their sides, or had shot down into
the chasm below. It was a kind of Alpine scenery, where crushed and
broken boulders covered the earth instead of snow.

In the depressions in the mountains the rocky fragments seemed to have
accumulated, and to have formed what might be called stone glaciers
that were creeping slowly down.

Two hours' march brought us into heavy timber where the stone cataclysm
had not reached, and before long the soft voice of the Rondout was
heard in the gulf below us. We paused at a spring run, and I followed
it a few yards down its mountain stairway, carpeted with black moss,
and had my first glimpse of the unknown stream. I stood upon rocks and
looked many feet down into a still, sunlit pool and saw the trout
disporting themselves in the transparent water, and I was ready to
encamp at once; but my companion, who had not been tempted by the view,
insisted upon holding to our original purpose, which was to go farther
up the stream. We passed a clearing with three or fo