CHAPTER VI.

_Journey from Albany to Boston—New Lebanon—Pittsfield—Road Repairing—The Features of the Country—Rhododendrons—Northampton—Mr Stuart’s Description of Northampton—Stage Passengers—Mode of Courtship—Villages—Agricultural Notices._

My companions and I having left Scotland without fixing on a route by which we were to proceed, I consented to visit the New England States, in order that I might claim their company through the Western States, to which they expressed an aversion. Accordingly we left Albany at two o’clock in the morning, by a stage which carried the mail-bag, crossing the Hudson in a horse ferry-boat, and reaching Nassau, by five, where we breakfasted on indifferent fare. Shortly afterwards we passed New Lebanon, finely situated in a lovely valley, surrounded by picturesque hills, a great part of which belongs to the religious sect denominated Shakers, whose principal establishment is here, and whose garden seeds are justly esteemed throughout North America. New Lebanon is celebrated for mineral waters, chiefly used for bathing; and the hotels afford ample accommodation for visitors. Nine miles beyond New Lebanon is the village of Pittsfield, a clean and beautiful village, reposing in a charming valley. The houses form a spacious square, in the centre of which is a tall aged elm, seemingly a remnant of unsubdued nature. There are several churches and hotels. Here the members of the Berkshire Agricultural Society, the oldest in America, hold their meetings, the first show of which took place in 1807, and consisted of two Merino sheep. We dined at Peru, a miserable country hotel, where bad fare was washed down by worse tea, the first time such a beverage had been presented to us during dinner, and is presented only in inferior hotels. We reached Northampton about six in the evening, having travelled seventy-seven miles in sixteen hours.

This day’s travelling afforded opportunities of seeing the American system of road-mending, or more correctly speaking, road-destroying. A plough, drawn by four, and occasionally six oxen, with two drivers, one man holding by the stilts, and another standing on the beam, is passed along the margins of the road, turning every fifty yards. The loosened earth is then moved to the centre of the road, by men with shovels, or by a levelling-box drawn by oxen, the stones, great and small, being first carefully removed from amongst the earth, and in many instances more were thrown aside than sufficient to Macadamize the road.

The country from Albany, has not an agricultural feature worthy of notice, the soil being chiefly poor sand, interspersed with rocks and innumerable stones. The crops were truly miserable, and the pastures thinly clothed with sheep and cattle, which were invariably lean. Some beautiful cows were seen at Northampton, apparently descended from the North Devon breed of England.

The road in several places was so hilly that the stage passengers walked on foot, which afforded an opportunity of examining much that was interesting. This was one of the happiest days of my life, almost every moving and stationary thing on the earth’s surface being new to me, and the weather fitted for displaying them to the best advantage. Strawberries of different kinds were gathered, tasted, and their seeds preserved. Shrubs and flowers were culled and compared. Insects and birds seemed to vie with each other in displaying brilliant colours; squirrels and woodpeckers of every hue were sporting around the trunks of aged trees, and the snakes were basking in the glorious sunbeams. Nature seemed in jubilee.

The forests through which the road led were strewed with decayed and decaying trees of former ages, and at the same time exhibited living specimens of each variety in every stage of growth, from the seedling budding into existence, to the aged pine, bearing the white and flowing tresses of Spanish moss, so emblematical of hoary and declining man. The flowers of rhododendrons and kalmias were unexpanded on the highest ridges, and opening into beauty in the valleys below, illustrative of the effect of elevation on climate. These plants were growing in all situations, on rocks, deep rich soil, beneath trees, and on exposed banks of rivers. The kalmias with bright red flowers, and white and pink blossomed varieties of rhododendron, were mingled in pleasing groups.

Near Northampton some snow-white rhododendrons, twelve feet in height, rich in blossoms and foliage, were shading cows browsing on the banks of the river, where decaying trunks of pine-trees stood in picturesque combination, like ruins of an ancient castle. After partaking of tea at an excellent hotel, we walked forth to survey the village, which is reckoned the most beautiful in New England. Northampton is extremely irregular, branching into roads leading in all directions. The houses are composed of wood painted white, with green Venetian blinds. The congregational church is a handsome structure, of the same hue and materials as the houses, and cannot fail to attract the notice of strangers, being one of the best specimens of wood and paint that the United States afford. The ranges of houses are enveloped in trees, amongst which are many magnificent elms, members perhaps of the original forest, reducing modern vegetation to insignificance, and affording umbrageous shelter to the inhabitants. The village stands in the rich valley of the Connecticut, and is surrounded by hills rising nearly 1000 feet in height, wooded to the summit, the chief of which is Mount Holyoke.

My impressions of this village, which must be attractive at all times, were perhaps heightened by the circumstances under which it was viewed. A delightful day’s travelling had terminated at a comfortable hotel. The air was luxuriously balmy, and a cloudless sun, on the eve of setting, imparted a rich mellow tint to the face of nature, with which every person of observation, leading a country life, must be familiar, and have experienced how decorative it is to vegetation, and soothingly gratifying to human feelings. The houses, decked in white and green colours, which harmonize in rural scenery, and are associated with purity and shade, so desirable during an American summer, were in keeping with the landscape. In seeking for a comparison to Northampton, memory suggested the village of Dirleton, near to my native place in Scotland. But Dirleton, although associated with some of my best cherished recollections, and containing a picturesque ruin shrouded in ivy, and adorned with shrubbery of unrivalled sweetness, yielded to Northampton in situation, buildings, and vegetable beauty.

Having carried Mr Stuart’s work, “Three Years’ Residence in America,” with us, as a kind of guide-book, for which it is recommended in the author’s preface, we experienced considerable disappointment at being unable to corroborate his description of Northampton. Instead of finding that “much of the pavement and steps are of white marble,” we could only observe a small portion which consisted of red brick. I shall not, however, take upon me to say there is no white marble pavement or steps in the village, but three of us walked about for an hour and a half without discovering a single stone of white marble; we did not, of course, approach villas remotely situated from the public roads, with a view of gratifying our curiosity, but every street, lane, and walk which promised gratification, were explored. His allusions to the vegetable beauties are also unhappy, when he says, “if a traveller in Britain were to stumble on such a place as this, he would not fail to enquire whose great estate was in the neighbourhood, and attribute the decorations of shrubs, flowers, &c., which adorn even the smallest habitations here, to the taste of a wealthy neighbour, or his being obliged to make them to promote electioneering views.” In the streets of Northampton, we numbered three or four bushes of lilac and white pipe, and a few roses, as the amount of shrubs adorning the foreground of houses, and flowers of small size were equally rare. The spaces were generally unmown grass, and in several instances luxuriant thistles and docks excluded light from the apartments. At the back part of the hotel in which we lodged, there was a garden, surrounded with a low ugly wooden fence, and crowded with the gaudiest of flowers, but our general impression was, that the gardens are ill kept, void of beauty, and unworthy of the place. I would require no better illustration of the small progress the inhabitants of the United States have made in gardening than Northampton, where man hath long resided, and done so little to improve the exquisite beauties of nature.

We left Northampton at three o’clock next morning, and passed the bridge and valley of Connecticut before daybreak, breakfasting at Balchertown, and passing through Ware and Brookfield to Worcester, where we dined, and reached Boston Tremont hotel in the evening.

The stage passengers, in course of the day, were intelligent, communicative, and agreeable companions, polite during meals, and frequently asking others to partake of the dishes they distributed. A gentleman asked me if the old mode of courting in Scotland was still practised—when, after the consent of the lady’s parents had been obtained, she was mounted on horseback, and her suitor placed in a similar situation, and if he could not overtake the fair one, it was considered a refusal. I laughed heartily, and assured him it was the first time I had heard of such a custom existing in my country, which, in all probability, never existed there, and could not now, as most of the youth of both sexes were denied the luxury of riding, by a heavy tax on saddle-horses. He rejoined, with an air of astonishment—“What! horses taxed! Does any thing escape government? Would a man having a nose longer than his companion’s be taxed for it?” I answered, “if he filled it with snuff—a practice very common amongst my countrymen—he would be taxed.”

The villages through which we passed presented the same characters—white wooden houses with green Venetian blinds, and every thing wearing the appearance of cleanliness, order, and comfort.

The use of wood for fuel, the machinery of the manufacturing villages—and all of them may be termed such—being propelled by water, and the absence of coal smoke, contribute, in no small degree, to the external cleanliness of the houses and garments of the inhabitants. Manufacturing establishments were conspicuous in every direction, and innumerable bundles of rye straw were bleaching around the cottages—the manufacturing of straw hats to an immense extent being carried on in this district.

We passed the workmen employed at the Boston and Worcester railway, at present in progress, and which, it is said, will ultimately be extended to Albany. Agriculture furnishes little of interest, the soil is poor, and the crops partaking of its character—rye being the prevailing crop. Small patches of Indian corn were observed, nearly destroyed by frost; and the pastures were inferior. In the neighbourhood of Worcester, many of the fences consist of stone walls. Within a few miles of Boston five or six men were engaged in throwing peats out of a bog, seemingly for the purpose of fuel.

The horses observed on the roads were lean and inferior. Draught oxen seemed in good condition, and of large size. Many of the cows were finely formed, of a deep red colour, with dark faces. Barberry, elder, and alder were growing plentifully in a state of nature. The rhododendron seemed to occupy the place of furze in Scotland—the kalmia that of heath.