he _Harlem Railroad_ from New York to Dover Plains with three miles
of carriage drive from that point. The outlook from the ridge is
magnificent; a sweep of eighty miles from the Highlands to the
Helderbergs, with the entire range of the Shawangunk and the
Catskills. Mr. Lossing once said that his family of nine persons had
required during sixteen years' residence on Chestnut Ridge, only ten
dollars' worth of medical attendance. Previous to 1868 he had resided
in Poughkeepsie, and throughout his life his form was a familiar one
in her streets.

* * *

Thy waves are old companions, I shall see
A well-remembered form in each old tree
And hear a voice long-loved in thy wild minstrelsy.

_Joseph Rodman Drake._

* * *

=The Dover Stone Church=, just west of Dover Plains Village, is also
well worth a visit. Here a small stream has worn out a remarkable
cavern in the rocks forming a gothic arch for entrance. It lies in a
wooded gorge within easy walk from the village. Many years ago the
writer of this handbook paid it an afternoon visit, and the picture
has remained impressed with wonderful vividness. The archway opens
into a solid rock, and a stream of water issues from the threshold. On
entering the visitor is confronted by a great boulder, resembling an
old-fashioned New England pulpit, reaching half way to the ceiling.
The walls are almost perfectly arched, and garnished here and there
with green moss and white lichen. A rift in the rocks extends the
whole length of the chapel, over which trees hang their green foliage,
which, ever rustling and trembling, form a trellis-work with the blue
sky, while the spray rising from behind the rock-worn altar seems like
the sprinkling of holy incense. After all these years I still hear the
voice of those dashing waters and dream again, as I did that day, of
the brook of Cherith where ravens fed the prophet of old. It is said
by Lossing, in his booklet on the Dover Stone Church, that Sacassas,
the mighty sachem of the Pequoids and emperor over many tribes between
the Thames and the Hudson River, was compelled after a disastrous
battle which annihilated his warriors, to fly for safety, and, driven
from point to point, he at last found refuge in this cave, where
undiscovered he subsisted for a few days on berries, until at last he
made his way through the territory of his enemies, the Mahicans, to
the land of the Mohawks.

* * *

Tell me, where'e