Bushkill village is in a picturesque location, opening pleasantly
towards the Delaware. It is also just over the Monroe border, in Pike
County, long ago described by Horace Greeley as "famous for
rattlesnakes and Democrats," but now more noted for its fine
waterfalls and attractive scenery, its many streams draining numerous
beautiful lakes, and dancing down frequent roaring rapids in the
journey to the Delaware. The falls of the Little Bushkill near the
village is the finest cataract in Pennsylvania. From Bushkill,
bordering the eastern bank of the Delaware, for thirty miles up to
Port Jervis, is one of the best roads in the world. The Marcellus
shales of the Buried Valley, which form the towering cliffs bordering
the river along the base of which the road is laid, make a road-bed as
smooth and hard as a floor, the chief highway of this district, for
the railway has not yet penetrated it. Over on the other side of the
river the great Kittatinny ridge presents an almost unbroken wall for
more than forty miles from the Water Gap up to Port Jervis. Frequent
creeks come in, all angling streams, the chief of them being
Dingman's, which for several miles displays a series of cataracts, and
at its mouth has the noted Pike County village of "Dingman's Choice,"
at which is located the time-honored Dingman's Ferry, across the
Delaware. The source of Dingman's Creek is in the Silver Lake, about
seven miles west of the Delaware, and in its flow it descends about
nine hundred feet, breaking its way over the various strata of
Catskill, Chemung and Hamilton sandstones. The upper cataracts, called
the Fulmer and Factory Falls and the Deer Leap, are located in a
beautiful ravine known as the Childs Park, while, below, the creek
pours over the High Falls, one hundred and thirty feet high, a short
distance from the river. Near this is the curious Soap Trough, an
inclined plane descending one hundred feet, always filled with foam,
down which comes the Silver Thread, a small tributary stream. The
gorge by which Dingman's Creek comes out is deep and massive, the
entrance being a narrow canyon cut down into the Marcellus shales
which make the towering cliffs along the river. There are also fine
cataracts on the Raymondskill and the Sawkill, flowing into the
Delaware above. The cliffs here rise into Utter's Peak, elevated eight
hundred feet, giving a magnificent view along the valley.
The little town of Milford, the county-seat of Pike, is one of the
gems of this district, spread over a broad terrace on the bluff high
above the Delaware, with a grand outlook at the ponderous Kittatinny
in front, rising to its greatest elevation at High Point, six miles
away, where a hotel is perched on the summit. Surrounded by mountains,
the late N. P. Willis, when he visited Milford, was so impressed by
its peculiar situation that he described it as "looking like a town
that all the mountains around have disowned and kicked into the
middle." Thomas Quick, Sr., a Hollander, who came over from the Hudson
in 1733, was the first settler in Milford. His noted son, Thomas
Quick, the "Indian Killer," was born in 1734. "Tom Quick," as he was
called, was brought up among the Indians, and had the closest
friendship for them; but when the terrible Colonial war began, the
savages, in a foray, killed and scalped his father almost by his side,
Tom being shot in the foot, but escaping. Tom vowed vengeance, and
ever afterwards was a perfect demon in his hatred of the Indians,
sparing neither age nor sex. After the French and Indian war had
closed and peace was proclaimed, he carried on his own warfare
independently. The most harrowing tales are told of his Indian
murders, some being horribly brutal. He never married, but hunted
Indians and wild beasts all his life, and was outlawed by the
Government, it being announced that no Indian who killed him would be
punished; but he finally died in bed in 1796. He was entirely
unrepentant during his last illness, regretting he had not killed more
Indians; and after saying he had killed ninety-nine during his life,
he begged them to bring in an old Indian who lived in the settlement,
so that he might appropriately close his career by killing the
hundredth redskin. The most noted Milford building is "Pinchot's
Castle," on the hillside above the Sawkill, a Norman-Breton baronial
hall, the summer house of the Pinchot family of New York, whose
ancestor, a French refugee after Waterloo, was an early settler here.
Seven miles above Milford the Delaware River makes the great
right-angled bend in its course, from the southeast to the southwest,
which is known as the "Tri-States Corner," and here, on the broad
flats at the mouth of the Neversink River, is the town of Port Jervis.
From the village of Deposit, ninety miles above, the Delaware descends
in level five hundred and seventy feet; and from Port Jervis down to
the Water Gap, forty-three miles, the descent is one hundred and
twenty-seven feet. In the first it falls six feet per mile and in the
latter only three feet, the difference being caused by the entirely
changed conditions above and below the great bend. Above, the Delaware
flows through the ridges by a winding ravine cut transversely across
the hard rocks almost all the way, while below, it meanders parallel
to the ridges along the outcrop of the softer rocks of the Marcellus
shales and Clinton formations in the long, trough-like buried valleys.
The Neversink comes from the northeast through one of these valleys
which is prolonged over to the Hudson, the source of the Neversink
being on a divide of such gentle slope that the large spring making
the head sends part of its waters the other way, through Rondout
Creek into the Hudson. A long, narrow peninsula, just at the
completion of the great bend, juts out between the Neversink and the
Delaware, ending in a sharp, low, wedge-like rocky point, the
extremity being the "Tri-States Corner," where the boundary line
between New Jersey and New York reaches the Delaware, and ends in
mid-river at the boundary of Pennsylvania. This spot was located after
a long boundary war, and the fact is duly recorded on the "Tri-States
Rock," down at the end of the point. The Delaware and Hudson Canal,
constructed in 1828, and coming over from Rondout Creek through the
Neversink Valley, made Port Jervis, which was named after one of its
engineers. The canal goes up the Delaware to the Lackawaxen, and then
follows that stream to Honesdale. The Erie Railway also comes through
a gap in the Kittatinny (here called the Shawangunk Mountain, meaning
the "white rocks"), descends to Port Jervis, and then follows up the
Delaware. These two great public works have made the prosperity of the
town, which has a population of over ten thousand. The long and
towering ridge of Point Peter, forming the northwestern boundary of
the Neversink Valley, and thrust out to the Delaware, bounding the
gorge through which the river comes, overlooks the town. On the other
side is the highest elevation of the Kittatinny and the most elevated
land in New Jersey, High Point, rising nineteen hundred and sixty
feet.