Out-doors at Idlewild; or, the shaping of a home on the banks of the Hudson

Front matter

NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER OUT-DOORS AT IDLEWI L D ; OB, THE Imping nf a Mvm m tjiE Iknks nf tljr Ittusnn. DT N7 P. WILLIS. " At King Kemserai's caravanserai I dismounted from roy camel ; and here travellers were entertained, on condition of telling their adventures." Eastern Storv-Book. NEW YORK: CHARLES SCRIBXER, 145 NASSAU STREET. 1855. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1S54, by CHARLES SCRIBNER, In the Clerk's Office for the District Court of the Southern District ol New York. W. II. TIXSON, TAWS. RUSSELL !.- CO.. STEREOTYPER, BOOK AND .TOE TIIIXTI I'S BY i •> 23 Beeliman St., N. Y. 26 Beekman ana IS Sj ru. ■_■ -> :« Beekman ana IS Spiu. est HON. JOSEPH GRINNELL THESK OUT-DOOR SKETCHES OK THE HOME TO WHOSE IX-DOOR HAPPINESS HIS KIND AFFECTION IS ONE OF THE CONSTANT BLESSINGS, 3rc CratcfuIIj arttr ©ortjtalrn fitsjiwtctj, BY HIS SON-rX-LiW, N. P. WILLIS.

Idlewild, October, 1854. $ttlatt. The following volume is a simple weaving into language of the every-day circumstances of an invalid retirement in the Highlands of the Hudson. It was written in Letters to the Home Journal, and it was expected by the author, that they would owe their interest to being plainly truthful, and to picturing exactly the life that formed itself around the new-comer to one particular portion of our country — its climate, its conveniences, its accessi bilities, and its moral and social atmosphere. As it is a neighborhood to which the sick are often sent by the physicians of New York, for the nearest mountain air, which is completely separated from the sea-board, the author has thought it might add a utility to his book to give his invalid experience with the rest. In this feature of it he has aimed to serve his fellow sufferers rather than to please the general reader.

In contributing these sketches to a periodical, and contenting himself with no other formation of thoughts and events into a work, than the mere putting ->f the loose sketches together, the author has committed another of the offences for which he has been called to account by every genial and kind critic, as well as VI

Preface

. abused by every malicious and carping one. As this may be his last work, and it is time, perhaps, to say, what he has always felt, but neglected to say, deprccatoiily, upon this point, he will venture to quote the most recent of these fault-finding passages of criticism, with a word of reply to it. Thus says the New York Quarterly Review (of July, 1854), in a most liberal and friendly criticism, written, the author understands, by a clergyman who is a stranger to him : — " Mr. Willis is perhaps most distinguished as a writer of light, brilliant and dashing sketches, contributed to the magazines. His collected papers of this kind amount to three thick volumes. Notwithstanding their apparent absence of hard work, they have no doubt been carefully eliminated. In style they are original, artistic, and follow no previous model. * * He has that one merit — that his style is his own.

There are elements in all his sketches, which, if combined in one well-compacted design, might make a sparkling novel, and Mr. Willis would better have con sulted his own fame had he seized upon the retirement of five years afforded him at Glenmary, to have wrought out some works of more enduring character, where that which seems light and flippant, when we have too much of it, and liable, like loose leaves, to be blown away, might have been securely bound up in some design much safer than board covers. The mere collection and collocution of papers which have served the purposes of ephemeral magazines, into books and volumes, may enhance their chance for time — but not for eternity. There is an opportunity for Mr. Willis to do at Idlewild what he has neglected to accomplish at Glen mary. He has seen enough of the world to afford him ample material ; let him combine the qualities which sparkle along his works so that they may flash in one setting. This is good advice ;

PREFACE.

. VII but if is to be observed that those who bind themselves down to the craving demands of the periodical press, soon jog along like patient horses in the traces, and forego the ambition and aspira tion of authors. * * It would be better to run some of the Home Journal metal into bullet-moulds, clip over an aspiring gray eagle as it is trespassing upon his air-territory over the bounds of Idlewild, pluck a feather, nib it to a sharp point, and go to work at that novel in two volumes," &c., <fcc. Kind as this is, the author feels that it implies, as do other criticisms, a misconception of both the aim aud the impulse with which he has labored in his profession. It is a refusal to him of what he has never sought nor claimed in his prose writings — what, if he knows himself, he has never sufficiently wished, to give turn or color to a sentence.

He could not but value " fame," if it should be thu3 won, inasmuch as it might give pleasure to his children ; but, TO Live, as variedly, as amply, and as worthily, as is possible to his human faculties, while upon this planet, has been his aim ; and not to be remembered after he shall have left it. Literature — periodical literature — offered him the readiest means for this — the least confining mode of subsistence, the freest access to contemporary mind and society, the most influence and power, the best habits of mental exercise and enlargement. He chose, it, therefore, as a profession. In it, as an editor, he found a power — over and above all power of serving himself — and upon this alone, aside from the objects just named, he has endeavored to keep a fixed purpose, suitable to the trust with which, in that power, he was charged.

The reviewer above quoted, has, in one chance remark, borne testimony to his discharge of this trust — therein oiling him, he must freely own, a certaiu '; fame " which he hopes will belong to his writings while they live. He says : —

PREFACE.

. " Mr. Willis has usually minded his own business, and gone straight ahead in his literary career, without any apparent regard either of praise or blame, of appreciation, or neglect, or dislike ; * * and he has already, by words in season, built up the reputation of a score of people as securely, at least, as Jus own." That the author has had no eye to " immortality," but has labored honestly and industriouslyfor the wants of himself and those dear to him, and has served others whenever it was in his power, with what means and opportunities chance threw into his hands — if this, which he finds thus incidentally testified to by a stranger, be true, he has certainly achieved all his purpose in literature, and would be abundantly content with that, for all his fame. Idlewild, October, 1854. Æottttts.

Letter V

Reasons for Neighbors moving Off — Morals of Steamboat Landings — Class that is gradually taking Possession of the Hudson — Thought-property in a Residence — Horizon-clock of Idlewild — Society for the Eye, in a View. . . 45

Letter XI

Plank Foot-bridge over the Ravine — Its Hidden Location — Value of Old-man Friendships — Friend S. — His Visit to the Bridge — His Remembrance of Washington — Tobacco Juice on Trees to Prevent Horse-biting, &c, &c. . . 73

Letter XIX

Neglect of Personal Appearance in Country Seclusion— Unexploring Habits of City People— Dignity of Un-damage-able Dress— Thoughts on Cooper's Mansion being turned into a Boarding-house — Suggestion to Authors, as to turning their Influence to better Account— Letter from Cooperstown, &c, &c. 123

Letter XXIV

Dilemma as to Placing Settees — Double Service of out-of-door Seats — Difference Between Appreciation of Landscape by Men and by Women — Right of all Strangers to enter Beautiful Grounds — Favor of being Figures on the Landscape — &c, &c 153

Letter XXXIII

Sudden Fall of Leaves — November Haze — Fame of Newspaper-wrappers — Naming of a Village — Legend of Moodna, the Indian Chief— Importance of Immortalizing Men and Events by the Naming of Towns, Ac, Ac. . . . 214

Letter XXXIX

Visit to Seven Lakes and Natural Bridge— Torrey the Blacksmith — Sunday in Nature — My Companion's Hobby — Hollett the Quaker — Morning Sensations — Jonny Kronk's and its Cemetery — Mammoth Snapping-Turtle — Iron Mine, &c, &c 24S

Letter XL

Many-Lake Alps and their Woodsmen — Highland Life — Contrast between it and New York, only three Hours' Distance — The Difficulty — Natural Bridge — Driven on the Rocks — Hoflett's House, and our Ascent to the Peak — Seven Lakes — Quaker and Panther Meeting in the Woods, &c, &c. . . . 256

Letter XLV

Snow and its Uses — Winter View of Grounds, as to Improvements — Old Women's Weather-Prophecy — Finding of an Lndian God in the Glen— Idlewild a Sanctuary of Deities of the Weather — Name of Moodna, &c, &c. . . 294

Letter XLVI

Hudson Frozen Solid — Boats on Runners — Water-lilies — Indian Legend, and Poem on it by a Friend — Philosophy of naming Streams hereabouts — Angola and its Epidemic — Story of Smart Boy, &c, &c 302

LETTER XL VII.

Boy-Teamster — Our Republic's worst-treated Citizen — Boy Condition in the Country — Our Neighborhood suited to Boy-Education in Farming — Vicinity CONTENTS. of New York Market— Boy-Labor and Boy-Slavery— City Parents and then' Disposal of Boys — Gardening Profits, Ac, Ac 309 309

Cedar-Trees and their Secrets — Bird-Presence about Home — Our Night-Owl — A Bird's Claim on Hospitality — Difference between City and Country Influences — Death in a Neighbor's House, Ac, Ac 356

Letter LIV

A Newfoundland Dog and his Nature — The Beauty of a Brook as a PlayfeUow for Children — Country Life's Opportunity to cultivate Intimacy with Children — Local Protection against East Winds — Mechanical Alleviation for Night- Coughs, Ac, Ac 363

Letter LV

Snow-Storm in April— Newburgh to become a Seaport— Railroad from Hoboken, opposite Chamber Street, to West Point and Newburgh — Dutch Aristocracy — American difference from England as to Living near the Old Families, Ac. 370

Letter LVI

Birds suffering from Snow— Answer to a Fault-finder— Preparing for Old Age by learning to live with Nature— Another Estimate of the Value of Farming —Common and strangely unvaried Idea of " a Villa"— Hints as to choosing and arranging a Home in the Country, Ac, Ac ■ CONTENTS. XV

Letter LVII

Remarkable Land-slide — Woman nearly Buried — Our Gateway Stopped — Ravages of Floods — Embellishment of a Neighbor's Grounds by a Land-slide, Sec, Sec 3SS

LETTER LVII

I. Immense Freshets — Islands in Solution — Curious Slides — Brickyards along the Hudson — Irish Laborers, and the Contrast between them aud Native-Born Country People — The Infusorial Cemetery, Sec, Sec 394

Letter LIX

Distinctions of Rank in Vegetables — Splendid Outburst of Spring — Chivalry among Fowls — A daily Steamboat Luxury for this Neighborhood — Philosophy of Visits to the City, Sec, Sec 401

Letter LX

Newness of Junes — Effects of the Eclipse — Cows embarrassed — Nature's Caprices — Visit to West Point — The Salute to the Visiting Committee — Cadets' Mess-Room — Professor Weir and the Gallery of Drawings — Parade — Stature of the Present Class of Cadets, Ac, &c 410

Letter LXI

Adventure with a Snapping-Turtle — Wild black Cat, and other quadruped Bandits — Visit to a Revolutionary Soldier — Venerable Companion — Privations of the Army — Washington's features, &c, Sec 424

LETTER L

X 1 1 . Celebration of the Fourth of July by Children — Procession through the Grounds of Idlewild — Song by the Children — Their Pic-nic in the Grove — Speeches, &c, &c 437

Letter LXIII

Government of the American Homestead — Republic in the Country, but not in the City — Aristocracy of upper Servants not tolerated — Each Individual's Self-Esteem to be cared for — Irish lad in his progress in Americanizing — Difficulty of other Servants allowing a Head Man, &c, Sec. . . . 444

Certainty of a Genius Loci— His Susceptibility of Pbiue — Curious Exercise of it— The Drip-Rock Parlor— Check to a falling Leaf— Farewell. . .

Letter I. The Highland Terrace

[ The following description, written for Mr. Putnam's very splendid work, the " Book of the Picturesque," was published immediately before the commencement of the Letters from Idlewild, and while the author was deciding upon the spot for his future residence. ] West Point is Nature's Northern Gate to New York city. As soon as our rail-trains shall equal those of England, and travel fifty or sixty miles an hour, the Hudson, as far as West Point, will be but a fifty-mile exten sion of Broadway. The river banks will have become a suburban avenue — a long street of villas, whose busiest resident will be content that the City Hall is within an hour of his door. Prom this metropolitan avenue into the agricultural and rural region, the outlet will be at the city's Northern Gate, of West Point — a gate whose threshold divides Sea-board from In-land, and whose mountain pillars were heaved up with the changeless masonry of creation.

The passage through the Mountain-Gate of West Point is a three-mile Labyrinth, whose clue-thread is the channel of the river — a complex wilderness, of romantic picturesqueness and beauty, which will yet be the teem ing Switzerland of our country's Poetry pencil — and, at the upper and northern outlet of this labyrinthine portal of the city, there is a formation of hills which has an ex pression of most apt significance. It looks like a gesture of welcome from Nature, and an invitation to look around you ! Prom the shoulder-like bluff upon the river, an outspreading range of Highlands extends back, like the curve of a waving arm — the siDgle mountain of Shawan gunk (connected with the range by a valley like the bend of a graceful wrist), forming the hand at the extremity. It is of the area within the curve of this bended arm — a Highland Terrace of ten or twelve miles square, on the west bank of the river — that we propose to define the capabilities, and probable destiny.

The Highland Terrace we speak of — ten miles square, and lying within the curve of this outstretched arm of mountains — has an average level of about one hundred and twenty feet above the river. It was early settled ; and, the rawness of first clearings having long ago disap- THE HIGHLAND TERRACE. 19 peared, the well-distributed second woods are full grown, and stand, undisfigured by stumps, in park-like roundness and maturity. The entire area of the Terrace contains several villages, and is divided up into cultivated farms, the walls and fences in good condition, the roads lined with trees, the orchards full, the houses and bams sufficiently hidden with foliage to be picturesque — the whole neighborhood, in fact, within any driving distance, quite rid of the angularity and well-known ungracefulness of a newly-settled country.

Though the Terrace is a ten-mile plain, however, its roads are remarkably varied and beautiful, from the curious multiplicity of deep glens. These are formed by the many streams which descend from the half-bowl of mountains inclosing the plain, and — their descent being rapid and sudden, and the river into which they empty being one or two hundred feet below the level of the country around — they have gradually worn beds much deeper than ordinary streams, and are, from this and the charac ter of the soil, unusually picturesque. At every mile or so, in driving which way you will, you come to a sudden descent into a richly wooded vale — a bright, winding brook at bottom, and romantic recesses constantly tempting to loiter. In a long summer, and with perpetual driv ing over these ten-mile iuterlacings of wooded roads and glens, we daily found new scenery, and heard of beautiful spots, within reach and still unseen.

Prom every little rise of the road, it must be remembered, the broad bosom of the Hudson is visible, with foreground variously com bined and broken ; and the lofty mountains (encircling just aboat as much scenery as the eye can compass for enjoyment), form an ascending background and a near horizon which are hardly surpassed in the world for boldness and beauty. To what degree sunsets and sunrises, clouds, moonlight, and storms, are aggrandized and embellished by this peculiar formation of country, any student and lover of nature will at once understand. Life may be, outwardly, as much more beautiful, amid such scenery, as action amid the scenery of a stage is more dramatic than in an unfurnished room. The accessibilities from Highland Terrace are very de sirable. West Point is perhaps a couple of miles below, by the river batik ; and, though mountain-bluffs and precipices now cut off the following of this line by land, a road has been surveyed and commenced along the base of Cro' nest, which, when completed, will be one of the most picturesque drives in the world.

A part of it is to be blown out from the face of the rock ; and, as the lofty eminences will almost completely overhang it, nearly the whole road will be in shade in the afternoon. To pass along this ro mantic way for an excursion to the superb military grounds of West Point, and to have the parades and music within SUMMER RESORTS. 21 an easy drive, will be certainly an unusual luxury for a country neighborhood. The communication is already open for vehicles, by means of a steam ferry, which runs between Cornwall Landing (at the foot of the Terrace), and Cold Spring and the Military Wharf — bringing these three beautiful spots within a few minutes' reach of each other — Morris the song-writer's triple-view site of "Undcr cliff," by the way, overlooking the central of these High land-Ferry Landings.

It may be a greater or less attraction to the locality of the Terrace, but it is no disadvantage, at least, that three of the best frequented summer resorts are within an after noon drive of any part of it — the West Point Hotel, Cozzens's, which is a mile below, and Powelton House, which is five or six miles above the Point, at Newburgh. For accessibility to these fashionable haunts of strangers and travellers, and the gaieties and hospitalities for which they give ojjportunity — for enjoyment of military shows and music — for all manner of pleasure excursions by land and water, to glens and mountain-tops, fishing, hunting, and studying of the picturesque — Highland Terrace will probably be a centre of attraction quite unequalled. The river-side length of the Terrace is about five miles — Cornwall at one end and Newburgh at the other.

At both these places there are landings for the steamers, and from both these are steam ferries to the opposite side of the river, bringing the fine neighborhood of Fishkill and Cold Spring within easy reach. Newburgh is the metro polis of the Terrace — with its city-like markets, hotels, stores, trades and mechanic arts — an epitome of New York convenience within the distance of an errand. Downing, one of our most eminent horticulturists, once resided here, and Powell, one of the most enterprising of our men of wealth, lives here still ; and, along one of the high acclivities of the Terrace, are the beautiful coun try seats of Durand, our first landscape painter, Miller, who has presented the neighborhood with a costly and beautiful church of stone, Verplanck, Sands, and many others, whose tastes in ground and improvements add beauty to the river drive.

To the class of seekers for sites of rural residences, for whom we are drawing this picture, the fact that the Ter race is beyond suburban distance from New York, will be one of its chief recommendations. What may be under stood as " Cockney annoyances " will not reach it. But it will still be sufficiently and variously accessible from the city. On its own side of the river there is a rail route from Newburgh to Jersey city, whose first station is in the centre of the Terrace, at " Vail's Gate," and by which New York will eventually be brought within two hours or less. By the two ferries to the opposite side of the river', the stations of the Hudson Railroad are also UNION OF GREAT THOROUGHFARES. 23 accessible, bringing the city within equal time on another route. The many boats upon the river, touching at the two landings at all hours of day and night, enable you to vary the journey to and fro, with sleeping, reading, or tranquil enjoyment of the scenery.

Friends may come to you with positive luxury of locomotion, and without fatigue ; and the monotony of access to a place of residence, by any one conveyance — an evil very commonly complained of — is delightfully removed. There is a very important advantage . of the Highland Terrace, which we have not yet named. It is the spot on the Hudson where the two greatest thoroughfares of the North are to cross each other. The intended route from Boston to Lake Erie here intersects the rail-and-river routes between New York and Albany. Coming by Plainfield and Hart ford to Fiskkill, it here takes ferry to Newburgh, and traverses the Terrace by the connecting link already com pleted to the Erie Railroad — thus bringing Boston within six or eight hours of this portion of the river. Western and Eastern travel will then be direct from this spot, like Southern and Northern ; and Albany and New York, Boston and Buffalo, will be four points all within reach of an easy excursion.

To many, the most essential charm of Highland Ter race, however (as a rural residence in connection with life in New York), will be the fact that it is the nearest accessible point of complete inland climate. Medical science tells us that nothing is more salutary than change from the seaboard to the interior, or from the interior to the seaboard ; and between these two climates the ridge of mountains at West Point is the first effectual separation. The raw east winds of the coast, so unfavorable to some constitutions, are stopped by this wall of cloud touching peaks, and, with the rapid facilities of communi cation between salt and fresh air, the balance can be adjusted without trouble or inconvenience, and as much taken of either as is found healthful or pleasant. The trial of climate which the writer has made, for a long summer, in the neighborhood of these mountainous hiding places of electricity, the improvement of health in his own family, and the testimony of many friends who have made the same experiment, warrant him in commending it as a peculiarly salutary and invigorating air.

We take pains to specify, once more, that it is to a certain class, in view of a certain new phase in the philo sophy of life, that these remarks are addressed. For those who must be in the city late and early, on any and every day, the distance will be inconvenient, unless with unforeseen advances in the rate of locomotion. For those who require the night and day dissipations of New York, and who have no resources of their own, a nearer resi dence might also be more desirable. For mere seekers HEALTH, WEALTH, AND ENJOYMENT. 25 of seclusion and economy it is too near the city, and the neighborhood would be too luxurious. But for those who have their time in some degree at their own disposal — who have competent means for luxurious independence — who have rural tastes and metropolitan refinements rationally blended — who have families which they wish to surround with the healthful and elegant belongings of a home, while, at the same time they wish to keep pace with the world, and enjoy what is properly and only enjoyable in the stir of cities — for this class — the class, as we said before, made up of Leisure, Refinement, and Luxury — modern and recent changes are preparing a new theory of what is enjoyable in life.

It is a mixture of city and country, with the home in the country. And the spot with the most advantages for the first American trial of this new combination, is, we venture confidently to record, the Highland Terrace, encircled in the ex tended ARM OF THE MOUNTAINS ABOVE WEST POINT.

Letter II. Highland Terrace Continued

[This Letter also preceded the commencement of the regular series of Idlewild Papers.] Dat before yesterday, a cold and raw snow-storm kept us housed by the fire. To-day, the flies were troublesome to my horse, and the shade of the Sontags of the woods — (the maples, still full-leaved and only more beautiful with autumn) — was refreshing to both of us. It is, as I write, a summer's evening — crickets iterating, mosquitoes reconnoitering, wasps stretching their legs, and evidently reconsidering their premature givings-over, the ground fragrant with the twilight dew, and — my pen embarrassed. I had prepared to give you a picture of the Tropics, thinking you might like it as a contrast to stave off the first rudeness of winter. But in Broadway, to-day, it must have been as hot as Hayti — and of Hayti, therefore, you would rather read when it is cooler.

What shall I write about ? October and Webster have left us — one gone to the Past, the other to the Future— but the parting of both, AN OCTOBER SABBATH. 27 like a Sabbath of midsummer. What a day was Sunday, i the 31st 1 — tranquil, balmy, genial, beautiful. I spent its " service-time " with Nature — not irreligiously to my self, though I fear it seemed so to my neighbors. Let me describe it to you (even if there seem little to record), for the apparition of beauty, in face, or mountain, weather or flower, grows to be more and more of an event to me. Standing aside and letting the world crowd on, as I have done of late, the sense of what is fair and excellent has rallied, like the quality which the pressure had most overborne, and I am most moved by what the day brings to admire. Is this a change to be sad about ?

We should have a sweet word, like "sunset," for depart ed health — the clouds so brighten with it. As I was saying, October's dying day was a Sabbath of profound beauty. (You may have realized it in the city, as the prisoner hears the music of the band march ing under his window.) I drove along the Hudson, a mile or more — taking wife and children to church — and, with the last note of the bell, stood tying my horse to the fence. (You know the church. It is that pretty struc ture of stone which is the gem of this ten-mile Terrace of the Highlands. The bell, in its turret you remember, sends its echoes into the elfin haunt of Drake's poem — the wild home of the " Culprit Fay.") Just across the road lay a broad lawn, with a skirt of noble trees on its farther edge, and the river lay below. Ah, thought I, as I looked around, that little church is but a chapel within a vast cathedral — the Hudson a broad aisle, the High lands a thunder-choir and gallery, Black Rock a pulpit, aud a blue dome over all — and lo !

Nature, in her sur plice of summer, ready to preach the sermon ! Why not do my worshipping out of doors ? I have always found it easier to be devout when pacing slowly, than when sitting still. I should pray better, even in a church, if I could walk the aisle, instead of remaining motionless in a pew. " The groves were God's first temples," and it was, perhaps, because men could there walk and pray that the early saints were more pious. The more the body is pent up, the more thoughts wander, is a common human experience, I believe — -truer even of pews than of prisous. Nature, as you know, seldom repeats herself, even in an every-day morning, but seems to keep sky and weather in an eternal succession qf new experiments. I had never seen the Hudson look as on this last day of October. It was strange as well as beautiful.

The Terrace Bay (that broad sheet spread below the ten-mile lap of the High lands, on a knee of which sits Newburgh), was all one breathless surface, but half of it was in shadow as dark as polished steel. Water so silvery bright and so inky black I never had seen together. Of every mountain nature's sermon. 29 there was a mirrored reflex ; but one was copied in light, one in darkness — like truth in reputation. And the sails of a fleet of becalmed vessels dotted this far mirror like snow-flakes lightly fallen. Nothing moved. Nature seemed to have bid even the un-Sabbath-keeping keels to stop and let the scene look holy. Up and clown under the trees edging the high bank of the river, I paced out the service-time, hearing every note of the organ, hymning it on the other side of the lawn, and eloquently preached to, by Nature — the theme God's wondrous works, and our many blessings in open air.