The most fatiguing, and perhaps the most interesting of my days on the Ridge was the one day in which I did not travel on foot. Passing through the village, on my return from one of my earlier visits to Falling Water, I stopped a nice-looking man (if he will pardon the expression, copied from my notes), driving a horse with a pair of clothes-line reins. He had an air of being at home, and naturally I took him for a native. Would he tell me something about the country, especially about the roads, so that I might improve my scanty time to the best advantage? Very gladly, he answered. He had walked and driven over the mountain a good deal, surveying, and if I would call at his house, a short distance down the road,—the house with the big barn,—he would make me a rough map, such as would answer my purpose. At the same time he mentioned two or three shorter excursions which I ought not to miss; and when I had thanked him for his kindness, he gathered up the reins and drove on. Intending no disrespect to the inhabitants of the Ridge, I may perhaps be allowed to say that I was considerably impressed by a certain unexpected propriety, and even elegance, of diction, on the part of my new acquaintance. I remember in particular his description of a pleasant cold spring as being situated not far from the "confluence" of two streams. Con-fluens, I thought, flowing together. Having always something else to do, I omitted to call at his house, and one day, when we met again in the road, I apologized for my neglect, and asked another favor. He was familiar with the country, and kept a horse. Could he not spare a day to take me about? If he thought this proposal a bit presumptuous, courtesy restrained him from letting the fact be seen, and, after a few minutes of deliberation,—his hands being pretty full just then, he explained,—he promised to call for me two mornings later, at seven o'clock. We would take a luncheon along, and make a day of it.
He appeared at the gate in due season, and in a few minutes we were driving over a road new to me, but through the same spacious oak woods to which I had grown accustomed. We went first to Burnt Cabin Spring, one of the famous chalybeate springs of the mountain,—a place formerly frequented by picnic parties, but now, to all appearance, fallen into neglect. We stretched our legs, drank of the water, admired the flowers and ferns, talking all the while (it was here that my companion told a story of a young theologian from Grant University, who, in a solemn discourse, spoke repeatedly of Jacob as having "euchred his brother out of his birthright"), and then, while a "pheasant" drummed near by, took our places again in the buggy.
Another stage, still through the oak woods, and we were at Signal Point, famous—in local tradition, at least—as the station from which General Sherman signaled encouragement to the Union army beleaguered in Chattanooga, in danger of starvation or surrender. I had looked at the bold, jutting crags from Lookout Mountain and elsewhere, and rejoiced at last to stand upon them.
It would have been delightful to spend a long day there, lying upon the cliffs and enjoying the prospect, which, without being so far-reaching as from Point Lookout, or even from the eastern brim of Walden, is yet extensive and surpassingly beautiful. The visitor is squarely above the river, which here, in the straitened valley between the Ridge and Raccoon Mountain, grows narrower and narrower till it rushes through the "Suck." Even at that elevation we could hear the roar of the rapids. A short distance above the Suck, and almost at our feet, lay Williams Island. A farmer's Eden it looked, with its broad, newly planted fields, and its house surrounded by out-buildings and orchard-trees. The view included Chattanooga, Missionary Ridge, and much else; but its special charm was its foreground, the part peculiar to itself,—the valley, the river, and Raccoon Mountain. Along the river-banks were small clearings, each with its one cabin, and generally a figure or two ploughing or planting. A man in a strangely long boat—a dugout, probably—was making his difficult way upstream with a paddle. The Tennessee, in the neighborhood of Chattanooga, at all events, is too swift for pleasure-boating. Seen from above, as I commonly saw it, it looked tranquil enough; but when I came down to its edge, now and then, the speed and energetic sweep of the smooth current laid fast hold upon me. From the mountains to the sea is a long, long journey, and no wonder the river felt in haste.
I had gone to Signal Point not as an ornithologist, but as a patriot and a lover of beauty; but, being there, I added one to my list of Tennessee birds,—a red-tailed hawk, one of the very few hawks seen in all my trip. Sailing below us, it displayed its rusty, diagnostic tail, and put its identity at once beyond question.
Our next start—far too speedy, for the day was short—was for Williams Point; but on our way thither we descended into the valley of Shoal Creek, down which, with the creek to keep it company, runs the old mountain road, now disused and practically impassable. Here we hitched the horse, and strolled downwards for perhaps half a mile. I was never in a lovelier spot. The mountain brook, laughing over the stones, is overhung with laurel and rhododendron, which in turn are overhung by precipitous rocks broken into all wild and romantic shapes, with here and there a cavern—"rock-house"—to shelter a score of travelers. The place was rich in ferns and other plants, which, unhappily, I had no time to examine, and all the particulars of which have faded out of my memory. We walked far enough to look over the edge of the mountain, and up to the Signal Point cliffs. If I could have stayed there two or three hours, it would have been a memorable season. As it was, the stroll was enlivened by one little adventure, at which I have laughed too many times ever to forget it.
I had been growing rapturous over the beauty of things, when my companion said, "There are some people whom it is no pleasure to take into places like this. They can't keep their eyes off the ground, they are so bitten with the fear of snakes." He was a few paces ahead of me, as he spoke, and the sentence was barely finished before he shouted, "Look at that huge snake!" and sprang forward to snatch up a stone. "Get a stick!" he cried. "Get a stick!" From his manner I took it for granted that the creature was a rattlesnake, and a glance at it, lying motionless among the stones beside the road, did not undeceive me. I turned hurriedly, looking for a stick, but somehow could not find one, and in a moment more was recalled by shouts of "Come and help me! It will get away from us!" It was a question of life and death, I thought, and I ran forward and began throwing stones. "Look out! Look out! You'll bury it!" cried my companion; but just then one of my shots struck the snake squarely in the head. "That's a good one!" exclaimed the other man, and, picking up a dead stick, he thrust it under the disabled creature and tossed it into the road. Then he bent over it, and, with a stone, pounded its head to a jelly. Such a fury as possessed him! He might have been bruising the head of Satan himself, as no doubt he was—in his mind; for my surveyor was also a preacher, as had already transpired.
"It isn't a venomous snake, is it?" I ventured to ask, when the work was done.
"Oh, I think not," and he pried open its jaws to look for its fangs.