. The Catskill Mountains; . title. Summer is here, and the morning is gay,Let us be children together to-day,Sorrows a myth, and our troubles but past is an echo, the future a dream. Concerning the early history of this charmingmountain region or its people, the records areHISTORY. strangely silent and incomplete. Even the voiceof tradition ventures cautiously in the corridors of the remoteand prehistoric past. But this only serves to invest the localitywith new enchantment, and interest, and the embers of specu-lation are readilv fanned into life by such breezes from an un-known real
. The Catskill Mountains; . title. Summer is here, and the morning is gay,Let us be children together to-day,Sorrows a myth, and our troubles but past is an echo, the future a dream. Concerning the early history of this charmingmountain region or its people, the records areHISTORY. strangely silent and incomplete. Even the voiceof tradition ventures cautiously in the corridors of the remoteand prehistoric past. But this only serves to invest the localitywith new enchantment, and interest, and the embers of specu-lation are readilv fanned into life by such breezes from an un-known realm of romance. Whether it was Henrv Hudson. Verrazano, Gomez, orsome earlier navigator, who tirst sailed up the Hudson river,which was then called Cohohatatia. by the Indians, meaningriver of the mountains, is now open to question. But it is suf-ficient to note here that when Hudson first ventured up thenoble stream in ibog in his quaint Dutch ship, the attractionsof the Catskills were such that he was induced to cast anchor. THE CATSKILL MOUNTAINS. 29 iind make a short inspection. He was received with markedhospitahtv bv the hoquois Indians, then in possession of theregion, hito their rude bark hut. which was stored with cornand beans, they took the curious navigator and his small partvof sailors. Upon the ground tloor, mats were spread in theirhonor, and here they partook of food from a large wooden bowlor tray. The tlesh of a fattened dog, which had been killed forthe feast, was among the tempting viands prepared for thewhite visitors, who seem to have been in no hurrv to returnto their ship. The record then closes with this quaint, aborigi-nal scene and does not re-open until sixty-nine years later ;leaving us to assume that the region remained in the peacefulpossession of the red men during that long period. But thiswas the dawn of the Dutch occupation. On the eighth of julv,1(378. the purchase of a large portion of this mountain regionwas effected by a company of Dutch and
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Keywords: ., bookauthorulsteranddelawarerail, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900
