The first thing which I saw as I opened my eyes Monday morning was the
tip of Passaconaway’s pyramid, rosy with the sun’s earliest rays, and
hanging like a great pink moon between the soft gray of a hazy sky and
the cold gray of the misty forests. It was a soft morning with a
southerly wind and a cloudy sky, yet with a chill in the air which
hinted of snow. As the damp wind swept across the snow-covered peak of
Chocorua, its moisture was condensed, and from the rock, trailing away
northeastward like a huge white banner, a cloud streamer waved for an
hour in the hurrying wind. Then the peak was overcome by the cloud and
hidden for the rest of the day in a slowly thickening and descending
pall.
In all the years which I had spent in wandering over these fair hills, I
never had explored Whitton Pond. Looking down upon it from the
snow-covered mountain yesterday, it had seemed so pleasant to the eye
that I determined to view it from all sides, and to see the mighty form
of Chocorua reflected in its clear waters. Towards Whitton Pond, then, I
directed my steps this gray morning.
Taking the Conway road from the Chocorua House, I walked northward upon
it rather more than three miles to what is known far and near in this
country as the Bell Schoolhouse in Albany. Perhaps the bell uses its
tongue in dark nights when the wild storm-wind sweeps down from
Chocorua, and the forest groans under its stripes. Certainly its tones
are not heard in the sunlit hours, as the bats in its belfry and the
spiders in its schoolroom can bear witness.
As I passed up the eastern side of Chocorua Lake, under the great pines
which guard its shore, a flock of ducks rose from the water and flew
towards the south, then wheeling, returned and vanished far in the
north. There were seven of them, six flying neck and neck in an even
row, and one lagging behind. The six were apparently snowy white with
dark markings on heads and wings; the laggard was dark colored.
One often hears in February and March that signs of early spring are
growing numerous, that red buds are swelling on the maples, catkins have
come upon the alders, and that many another shrub or tree is pushing out
its new life. Noticing the alder catkins swinging in the wind, I
measured several and found them already from an inch to an inch and a
half long. Some of the maples were noticeably ruddy in tone, so thick
and red were their buds. Lucky it is for the grouse that buds do not
wait for winter to go, before they pack away the sweet food of life
under their snug jackets. The grouse could give an eloquent lecture on
the pledges of the spring renaissance which are made every autumn by the
budding trees.
At the Bell Schoolhouse I took the right-hand road, crossed the Chocorua
River, a slender run at this point, and almost immediately after turned
again to the right, taking an old road leading eastward over the hills
to Madison village. The road was a new one to me, but I knew that it led
through one of the saddest regions in the Bearcamp valley. A generation
ago the “North Division” was comparatively thickly settled. More than a
dozen comfortable sets of buildings were tenanted on those sunny slopes.
Children flocked to the little school-house, corn rustled in the fields,
and farmer’s “gee” echoed back to farmer’s “wah-hīsh” from the plowings
or wood-lot. Now the porcupine and the skunk, the chimney swift and the
adder are the undisputed owners of the deserted farms. The people have
gone as though the plague had smitten the land, and houses, barns,
fences, bridges, and well-sweeps are mouldering away together. Why is
it? Ask the West and the great cities, which between them have drawn the
young blood from New England’s rural families, leaving the old and
feeble to struggle alone with life on the hills. A kindlier region than
this could be depopulated by such a process.
The most remote and the highest farm in the North Division shone, as we
approached it, like a brass button. Carpenters, painters, and
home-makers had been at work upon it until the hills and trees knew it
for its old self no longer. Nevertheless it was as empty and silent as
the decaying farmsteads below. Gazing from its terrace upon the far view
of Ossipee Lake, the broad Bearcamp valley, and the semicircle of hills
and mountains from Wakefield to Chocorua, I understood why its present
owner came from the shores of Lake Michigan to spend his summer in its
beautiful quiet.
Behind this redeemed fragment of the North Division rises a granite
ledge, from which matchless views of many mountains, lakes, and sleepy
hollows can be obtained. I found the ledge covered with snow, and the
spruce woods on its steep northern slope as full of snow as the thickets
on Chocorua’s ridges. At this season a slight elevation and shade make
all the difference between summer and winter.
From the ledge I could see the whole of Whitton Pond, lying just below
me. It looked like a silver Maltese cross with its four arms reaching
out to the four points of the compass. A small island and one or two
single rocks rose from its surface. At least three bluff headlands,
pine-crowned and rock-faced, stood out boldly into its waters. Just
across its eastern side, and due north from the elevation upon which I
was standing, rose an impressive hill whose precipitous southern side
was formed of a series of polished ledges sloping directly towards the
deep waters of the lake. In the depths below those ledges large trout
are said to live in a state of haughty contempt for all except favored
anglers. I once asked a native, presumably not a favorite of the Whitton
Pond trout, whether he would advise me to go to the pond fishing.
Turning his gray eye upon me, he said solemnly, “Young man, ef I had the
ch’ice of fishing all day in Whitton Pond or in this sandy road, I’d
take the road every time.”
A logging road led from the back of the ledge down to the pond. In the
dark spruces near the water stood a tiny and dilapidated log hut and
stable. So small was the hut, it seemed as though only one lumberman
could have lived there. From the hut the road led straight to the
lakeside, and to as lovely a view of the eastern flank of Chocorua as
can be won anywhere. All that I had imagined yesterday as I stood on
those far ramparts was now made real. Here was the ruffled water, the
pine-capped headlands, the guardian ledges; there was the stern fortress
lifting its rock face and ragged outlines high against the sky. As the
mists hurried over the peak, they suggested smoke from cannon fired from
this Gibraltar of nature. Here and there spruces, standing in the clouds
upon the edge of the precipice, looked like the dim forms of men
guarding the heights.
As the water was very low, a narrow pebbly and rocky strip of beach
offered an easy way round the lake. I followed it through the eastern
coves to the northern shore, where the slippery ledges, one above
another, hung over me. Many boulders of large size and odd outlines lay
upon the shore, with the waves raised by the south wind splashing
against them. Here the beach failed me, and I had to force my way
westward through the woods and undergrowth to the outlet of the pond.
Considering that the lake was about a mile square, the stream which
escaped from it was singularly small. I crossed it with a single stride.
At high water it is probably much larger, for a dozen or more great logs
pushed far up on the rocks show that the rivulet of to-day gives no
suggestion of the force of water sometimes at work.
[Illustration: MOUNT CHOCORUA FROM WHITTON POND]
From the outlet to the highway was less than ten minutes’ walk, a
footpath bringing me to one of the many abandoned farms of unfortunate
Albany. Unfortunate no longer, I hope, for with debt paid, taxes
reduced, and lumbering on the decline, the township ought to revive,
partly through ordinary settlement, but mainly through the influx of
city people to one of the most beautiful spots in New Hampshire.
My walk back to the hotel took me round Chocorua Lake, while pictures of
Whitton Pond were still vivid in my memory. I confess to a sudden
feeling of jealousy for the newly explored pond when I looked at the
simpler outlines of my favorite water, and wondered how a wooded island
and bluff headlands would become it. Whitton Pond is certainly too
exquisite a bit of nature to remain long a wilderness; while to give up
its lofty ledges to quarrymen would be little less than a crime.
As I crossed the bridge between the lakes, the coloring was full of
sadness. The long-deferred rain was coming across the mountains. Their
tops were concealed, and only the dimmest, most tearful vision of their
flanks remained. Gray and cold, cold and gray, mountain, sky, forest,
and lake, all were the same. The cry of a pileated woodpecker and the
sputtering complaint of a Hudson Bay titmouse rang in my ears. Birds of
the north, strangers to these cherished spots, why were they here? Why
were their voices full of weird warning? The rain came softly, surely
onward, over the glassy water, and with a shiver I hurried towards the
fireside. After all, men, like birds and insects, flowers and leaves,
feel the chill of autumn and tremble at it. Full as the season may be of
eternal promise, it is charged also with a message of present death and
decay. Leaves wither and fall, flowers drop their petals and turn to
seeds, the locust dies in the grass, the bird takes wing and saves his
life by finding a gentler clime in the far south, and man, if he is to
linger under Chocorua’s lee, must gather his corn into barns, pile his
shed full of wood, and fortify his mind to endure long nights, intense
cold, deep snows, the wailing of wintry winds, and the gruesome voice of
the lake as the ice throttles it. If the heart is brave and serene,
there is peace in the long nights, pleasure in the cold, joy in snowshoe
races on the snow, and exhilaration in the wailing of the wind and the
moaning of the lake. As the viking exulted in sailing his ship through
the fierce gale of the north, so his offspring can find joy in the
wintry breath of Chocorua.
’LECTION DAY, ’92.
Tuesday, the 8th of November, 1892, belongs to history now, but when it
began it was only an ordinary ’lection day. Floods of night rain had
washed the high peaks clear of snow, and at dawn the golden clouds swept
eastward, and the fairest of November days began its course. All the
horses and all the men turned their noses towards the wooden town-house
in Tamworth village; and by nine o’clock long lines of wagons streamed
under the two campaign flags, across the bridge over rushing Paugus
River, and up to the stores where the smoke of pipes and the sound of
laughter proclaimed the swarming of man. It was an occasion of more than
usual interest, for not only was the great ex-president to test his
tariff-reform lance against the silver shield of his once successful
rival, but New Hampshire in general, and Tamworth in particular, were to
try the Australian ballot system.
“Now, Jim,” said the committee-man, “remember to make a cross against
the name of every Democrat. Take your time, and look for the letter D.
Wherever you see D, put down your cross.” Then a sample ballot was
displayed to Jim, and that worthy child of Quebec proved the truth of
his assertion that he could “read D in English evvy time, sir.”
Just before ten, the three stores gave up their crowds in favor of the
growing swarm in front of the town-house. It was a strange commingling
of men. The bone and sinew of rural New England were there, and so were
the gristle, the fat, and the lean. Men well past ninety tottered feebly
to the benches which flanked the broad open floor of the hall. Young
fellows, just of age, stepped briskly in and went to the platform to see
that their names had been duly added to the printed check-list of
voters. Gaunt, loose-jointed, thin-faced men, in worn shoddy, the modern
successor of honest homespun, dragged themselves through the crowd,
answering salutations with grim indifference. Big, burly men with broad,
gray felt hats and scarlet flannel leggings strode in more confidently,
fresh from the spruce woods. Well-dressed, clean-shaven men with city
hats and big watch-chains shook hands with everybody, and with a hand on
John’s shoulder or Edson’s elbow whispered a word in the young voter’s
ear. The New England farmer or lumberman does not ride horseback. He
probably knows how well enough, but his roads have no clay mud, his
wagon runs easily, so he drives instead of riding. Not one man in fifty
owns a saddle. Who is it, then, that comes up the long street at a
breakneck pace, with flapping hat, trailing whip, and rattling spurs? He
rides well, and has a dashing air about him strangely in contrast to the
slouch of the man who always drives, with shoulders hunched and back
curved. He proves to be a city man who has had enough of a ranch and is
now extracting occupation from a farm and summer boarders.
Now a silk hat and a satin necktie loom up in the throng. They grace a
sleek son of the town who has a store “down country,” but who comes home
to vote. The silk hat looks strangely out of place among the well-worn
felts and woolen caps which cover most of the heads in the crowd.
The bell in the meeting-house tower moves, and then its clang strikes
harshly on the ear. Half a mile away it would be sweet-toned; here it is
merely discordant. The men straggle into the town-house in large groups,
and soon the room is crowded. Good air goes out by the chimney when the
smokers come in by the door. The supervisors are in their seats, and an
excited discussion is taking place in which they and many in the crowd
join. An oldish man and a foreigner who served in the late civil war has
just produced his naturalization papers and demanded to have his name
placed upon the check-list. The officers object, and point to the book
of statutes open before them, where a section states that no name shall
be added to the list at this late hour except by way of restoring a name
wrongfully dropped from an earlier list. The claimant declares that his
name was or ought to have been on an earlier list; a candidate for
office springs upon a chair and shouts to the supervisors that he will
“make it hot” for them if they refuse the veteran his suffrage; the
crowd cheers, and the officers yield. Then the warrant for the meeting
is read, and immediately after an elder offers prayer, the hats and caps
being doffed in obedience to a loud call of “hats off.” The prayer is
simple and earnest, asking for help in a freeman’s highest duty. A
moderator is chosen, and he delivers a brief and clear lecture upon the
machinery of the new ballot law. Then a resolution is passed with a
shout, allowing the old men to vote first, and the graybeards are pushed
gently forward to the inclosed space in which the five little voting
booths are built.
The voters are kept waiting half an hour, because at first no one can
open the patent ballot box, but at last it gives way to some persuasive
touch and the day’s work is fairly begun. By noon about fifty men have
passed the guard, taken their folded ballots, entered the little booths,
and spent from two to ten minutes each in marking or trying to mark for
their favorite candidates.
“This is a great thing for the fools,” said an old farmer; “they can
look just as wise as the wisest of us, but they nor nobody else will
ever know just who they voted for.”
One man, after entering the booth, came out and said he wanted some one
to mark for him. “Step this way,” shouted the moderator, “and take your
solemn oath that you cannot read your ballot and must have help in
marking it.” “I won’t swear to anything of the kind,” said the man
indignantly, and he went back to his booth. The crowd became impatient
at the delay, and began to push hard for the narrow entrance. Strong men
cried out in pain or anger; the stove tottered and part of the pipe
fell, scattering soot on the nearest heads; the moderator thundered
rebukes, and several men went home disgusted with the new-fangled
system, only to be dragged back later by the committees of their
respective parties.
Back of the town-house, Paugus River, well filled by the night’s rain
and the melted snow from the mountains, rushed noisily through its
rock-choked bed. I escaped from the hustling crowd, in the hot hall, and
watched the eager current till my eyes and ears were cleared of smoke
and empty laughter, and a taste of something sweeter than politics was
left on my tongue. The river, with its bright water, was following its
course towards the Bearcamp and the sea, because for time out of mind it
had flowed that way and knew no other. Most of the men inside the hall
were acting their parts with much the same intelligence, and marking
wherever they saw the letter R, or the letter D, not because they knew
what those two great letters were struggling for this day in all the
length and breadth of the Union, but because for years they had
worshiped the one and hated the other with the fetich-maker’s fervor.
A bright-faced, blue-eyed committee-man, just old enough to cast his
first vote for his party’s hero, came to call me to the dinner set for
those who had come from a distance to vote. After dinner I took my share
of the bone-crushing process inside the hall, marked my long ballot, and
started at once for the city. First my friend’s wagon rolled along the
pleasant Bearcamp valley to the pine plains. Turning a little aside, we
drove past White Pond, a shallow, mirror-like lake in the heart of the
plain, framed in snowy sand and gaunt pines. The view of the Sandwich
range across this lake is exquisite at all times, but to-day, with the
dark blue water dancing towards us in thousands of foam-capped waves,
and the mountains standing out sharply against the pale blue sky, it was
more than usually charming. Half a dozen wood-ducks were floating in the
midst of the restless waves, not far from the shore. They paid no heed
to our wagon as it crept through the sand on the beach.
When we reached the West Ossipee stage road I bade my friend good-by,
and strolled towards the station alone. The south-bound train was not
due till five, and it was now only half past two. The railway track was
not more than half a mile distant across the pine plains, so, leaving
the muddy road, I passed into the pines, following an obscure wood-path.
Presently the path became plainer, and as I glanced along its vista, my
eye caught a flash of bright yellow gleaming from something at a
distance. The object was shaped like a chimney, but it seemed to spring
from the ground among the scrub-oaks. The path began to descend, at
first gradually, then more abruptly, and I discovered that there was
winding through the barrens ahead of me a small river, which a moment’s
consideration told me must be the Chocorua River, on its way to the
Bearcamp. Beyond the river was a small clearing and in it stood a red
and white house with brilliant yellow chimneys. Then the land rose again
abruptly, inclosing the little meadow and its cottage between high walls
of sand, scrub, and pines.
Surprised to find an inhabited house in the heart of the plains, where I
had supposed nothing but mayflowers and chewinks lived to break the
monotony of scrub and pine, I pushed on to learn more of the place. When
the path came to the river it crossed by a rustic bridge formed of a
large bow-shaped tree with pieces of board nailed to it, and a strong
hand-rail braced among its broken branches. The bridge was really
artistic, as well as ingenious in construction. From its farther end I
could see the whole of the tiny valley of which the mysterious house was
the gay capital. Five or six acres of grass-land and pasture were
surrounded by woods and sand hills. Three cows fed along the river bank.
Near the house was a neatly fenced garden, and as I came to the fence I
found it crossed by a real stile with three steps up and two steps down,
and a rail to lean upon.
My approach had, ere this, attracted the attention of the inhabitants of
the hidden valley, and five heads were visible at windows, house angle,
and fence corners. I crossed the stile and gained the little piazza. The
garrison massed around its commander and mother, who was ironing a white
apron on the kitchen table. Strong, plump, and smiling, she was proud of
her little army,—a boy of fourteen, with soft black eyes, black hair,
and the rich color of the Acadian peasant glowing on his cheeks; three
tow-headed girls, with their mother’s blue eyes, and a fifth, a girl of
two summers, with beauty and dignity enough for a duke’s darling. No
overtures of mine were sufficient to conquer this haughty little being’s
reserve. She would have nothing of me, and finally intimated a desire
that I should move on, and leave her undisturbed in her apple-eating.
This I did, taking a farewell look at the cozy house from the crest of
the sand-hills which rose between it and the railway. From the ridge I
could see many a mile of forest, and many a mountain peak, none fairer
than Chocorua. A grouse rose from the scrub at my feet, and flew nearly
an eighth of a mile before alighting.
The little child’s beauty haunted me as I strolled down the railway
track, and I wondered what her future would be if she grew up in that
snug nook in the woods and sand; what her character would be with its
mingling of Celtic, Gallic, and Saxon elements; frozen in the northern
winter and burned under the hot summer suns of the Ossipee plains.
At last the train came and bore me away towards the city. The sun sank
in orange splendor behind the Ossipees, and then the night overwhelmed
color and form in its shadows, and left the mind freer in its musings.
What had the day brought forth at the polls? Had the party of past
glories and present decay won another of its wonderful series of
victories, or had the people risen in their might and spoken for reform?
I hoped for some gleam of news before the journey was over, but
Portsmouth, Newburyport, Salem, and Lynn were all passed without tidings
of what the day had done. Even in Boston, with its narrow streets filled
with restless rivers of men and women, there seemed to be no word of
victory or defeat.
At half past ten I reached a small room high in one of the great
newspaper offices on Washington Street. Its windows looked out upon a
strange sight. Far below me was a vast expanse of human heads upon which
shone the bluish white glare of the hooded electric lamps. As white
bubbles, densely spread upon the pale green of the ocean’s water in some
rock-rimmed grotto, surge now out, now in; to left, to right; advancing,
retreating; crowding or separating; so those countless human heads
swayed first one way, then another, moved by fickle eddies and forces
hard to understand. Wild cries came from the crowd, cheers, jeers, and
yells of pain or brutal merriment.
Inside the room the wearisome clicking of a telegraph operator’s machine
charmed a circle of eager men and women. As sheet after sheet was
written by the operator, they passed from hand to hand. Some of those
present read them nervously, others, really intensely concerned, seemed
almost indifferent. Now and then hearty applause greeted a dispatch, or
deep regret was expressed at some friend’s defeat; but as a rule the
fragmentary news was received silently. Midnight passed, and then, as
the morning hours wore on, we knew that the people had achieved one of
the most remarkable transfers of political power ever accomplished in
the Union. Still, the result in Massachusetts was in doubt, and even
those who watched until dawn finally sought sleep without knowing how
the smaller cities had settled the great governorship contest.
Before sleep came to me, a panorama of the day swept in feverish review
across my closed eyelids. I saw the surging mob in Washington Street,
the group around the telegraph machine, the motley crowd in the Tamworth
town-hall, the baby beauty of the Ossipee plains, and then, like a
benediction, came a vision of Chocorua, snow-capped and immutable in a
pale blue sky, with the rosy light of the clear November morning
flooding its wondrous peak.