Lamoille Newsdealer

From the Brandon Monitor

Mansfield Mountain.

No Vermonter should fail to visit Mansfield Mountain. Defer your trip to Lake George, Saratoga, Newport, Niagara, or even to Europe, till you have spent a week among the beautiful and sublime scenery of this the proudest of our noble Green Mountain range. To reach its lofty summit was formerly a Herculean task, and none but men fit for military duty were considered equal to the undertaking: but so well have the roads been worked and such the facilities furnished for ascending this Mountain that the most delicate lady can leave Rutland or Brandon in the morning and dine on the summit of Mansfield Mountain, and accomplish the trip with as little fatigue as a journey to Saratoga. The Mountain is accessible both from the eastern and western sides, but if you wish for an experience of ascending mountains made easy, be sure and take the eastern route. You take the cars of the Vt. Central road at Burlington and reach Waterbury in an hour, from whence there is a regular route to the top of the mountain. A fine drive through a fertile country for ten miles brings you to Stowe, where you leave your superfluous baggage and proceed some six miles to the "half way house" one and a half mile from the summit. Thus far we have a fine carriage road. Now we betake ourselves to the saddle, and the well trained nags bear you up and down the trail that leads to the mountain top with complete safety.

Here many a nervous timid little lady takes her first lesson in equestrianism. My better half being wholly inexperienced in horsemanship was little skeery at first but she had been so accustomed to hold the reins ever since our bridle tour that as soon as seated in the saddle she took to it like one to the manor born, and really pronounced it the pleasantest part of the route.

The features of the mountain are familiar. It is fancied to resemble the face of a man lying on his back;—having a fairly developed forehead, a tremendous Roman nose, a long and decidedly stiff upper lip, a small mouth and a prominent chin, which is the highest peak and about five thousand feet high. The "features," except the more prominent parts, are covered with a moustache, of gnarled spruces, which grew shorter and shorter as you near the summit, till the highest points are only bare rocks. A well finished Hotel with good rooms and accommodations for about fifty guests, with fare as good as ordinarily found at first class Hotels down upon the earth, is situated upon the summit directly under the nose. (What would be its fate should the Old Man sneeze?) Here we were provided with every comfort and received every attention and kindness from the gentlemanly landlord, Mr. Spaulding and his estimable lady.

On the afternoon of our arrival the Old Man had donned his nightcap of clouds and did not see fit to unveil his beauty to our anxious eyes, but at dawn the next morning the summit was clear and clouds all beneath, filling the entire valley on the east for miles, reflecting the morning light presented a scene of indescribable beauty. We turned out to enjoy this and other views and to greet the rising sun; -but no, the Old Man had only lifted his nightcap to salute the rising day and quickly replaced it and we could see nothing. But as the day advanced the cloud curtain was occasionally drawn for an instant revealing, as if by magic, scenes of surpassing beauty and loveliness, then instantly closing to open anew on some widely different view.

To me these tableau views produce the most thrilling sensations of any I experienced while on the mountain, and had we enjoyed a cloudless sky during all our stay we should have lost the greatest charm of our visit.

The next day was beautifully clear with a perfectly transparent atmosphere, and we enjoyed the scene to which we had been so gradually initiated in all of its grandeur and glory. On the east we had a fine clear view of the White Mountains one hundred miles away. Far away to the north and south stretched the Green Mountains, piled one upon another in endless continuity far as the eye can reach. Jay peak towering above the rest on the north, and Camel's Hump on the south, and Ascutney far in the distance down the valley of the Connecticut. But the most varied and extensive view is to the west and north-west. A charming and fertile landscape, teeming with well cultivated farms; -a score of beautiful villages with rivers winding through them like silver threads, and Lake Champlain stretching in a broad luminous belt for one hundred miles, dotted with beautiful islands, while the Adirondack Mountains bound the view. Montreal, with its mountains in the back ground, can be seen with the naked eye in a clear day.

The point of the nose being most easy of access is first sought by visitors, but the great excursion is to the chin, about one and a half miles. As a small party set out on this expedition, we earnestly entreated our fair friends to leave their hoops behind, but without avail. Their gallant attendants found constant employment in unhitching them from the brambles and crags, till on our return, when passing the lips, a wild gust of wind swept up the mountain side, followed by a terrific scream from some of the ladies which suggested to me the idea that some of them must have been blown over the precipice near by. On glancing around I discovered truly a fearful state of affairs. The hoops had refused to obey the usual laws of gravity, and were towering upward like balloons; near by was a newly married pair, the blushing bridegroom tugging most lustily at the canvas to spare the mortification of the unfortunate bride.

Suffice it to say that the "favorite institution" received a more severe blowing up than it ever did from the most strong minded advocate of the bloomer costume. However, a general collapse was soon effected and our ladies returned to the summit house wiser if not better women.

On our return from the mountain we passed a pleasant evening at the Mansfield House, kept by Mr. Matthews, which is at present filled to overflowing with guests, mostly from the cities, who all seemed happy and cheerful.

In conclusion, I would say that the opening of this route to the mountain and providing it with its present admirable conveniences and comforts is due to the enterprise of W. H. H. Bingham, Esq., of Stowe, proprietor of the Mansfield House, the Halfway House, and also the Summit House, and I believe of the Mountain itself. We would also acknowledge the kind attentions of Mr. Matthews of the Mansfield House; of Mr. and Mrs. Spaulding of the Summit House; of Jehu, the Stage driver, and John, the conductor of the route up the mountain, and shall hold them all in the kindest remembrance, from Mr. Bingham down to Charlie, the famous nag that bore my wife up and down the mountain. They all seem in blissful ignorance of the exertions practiced upon travelers and guests at other popular resorts. You feel that you have received far more than the worth of your money, and that Mansfield Mountain accommodations are all and even more than they are cracked up to be.

C. L. C.