Barn doors and byways . mps that presently reddened the sky ahead,the scream of a distant train, commerce, haste,worry, the rush of modern life were the realthings again. We paid the chauffeur (a coloredman, who also owned the car) a ridiculously smallfee, considering the distance and the state of theroads, and hastened on our journey by the ordi-nary carriers of commerce. That is not the ideal way to take leave of theDismal Swamp, but it is not without its vividsuggestion of contrast. Life in the swamp isslow, simple, primitive; it still keeps its flavorof a vanished century, like the languid
Barn doors and byways . mps that presently reddened the sky ahead,the scream of a distant train, commerce, haste,worry, the rush of modern life were the realthings again. We paid the chauffeur (a coloredman, who also owned the car) a ridiculously smallfee, considering the distance and the state of theroads, and hastened on our journey by the ordi-nary carriers of commerce. That is not the ideal way to take leave of theDismal Swamp, but it is not without its vividsuggestion of contrast. Life in the swamp isslow, simple, primitive; it still keeps its flavorof a vanished century, like the languid peace ofits canal. The swamp itself is still, to all in-tents, a virgin wilderness. Yet we tore out ofit in a motor-car. There are few rude spots leftin America so easily accessible; and there is no THE DISMAL SWAMP 209 spot more beautiful, more haunted with old asso-ciations, more musical with birds and strangewith ancient cypresses and lovely with the spellof the trackless wilderness than the Lake of theDismal THE ABANDONED FARM AM sitting as I write in a sunny corner ofthe pasture behind our house. Though itis but the first week in September, we had a frostlast night, and the sun is grateful. The potatoplants are already brown, the fodder corn is with-ering, the leaves of the pumpkin vines are droop-ing round their stems. This early frost is a greatblow to the farmers of our valley, one of theirbesetting discouragements. The valley stretchessouthward from where I sit ten miles to the greatblue bulk of Moosilauke, which is beautifullyframed through our barn door. The valley iswalled on the east by three mountains, averag- THE ABANDONED FARM 211 ing four thousand feet in height and springingdirectly up from the farms. Indeed, the pastureseat their green way up the slopes into the three great hills have been lumbered intimes past, but by the grace of Heaven — it wasno fault of the lumbermen — the fire did notfollow, nor the destructive landslide. They
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublisherbosto, bookyear1913
