We called one journey a cemetery journey because we visited so many cemeteries, and another a ministerial journey because we met so many ministers. Trees were a marked feature of this journey. We saw many beautiful trees beside the big willow in Norridgewock, the Lafayette Elm in Kennebunk, and now sketching the curious oak had possibly saved us harm from a beautiful maple, for we had not driven many miles before we struck the track of the gale, where large trees were torn apart, or uprooted. We had driven through the thunder shower, or rather it seemed to sweep quickly past us, the pelting rain lasting only a few moments, but as our direction turned we found a large maple across the road. We were obliged to go two miles farther round to reach the Lancaster House, and we had not driven far before the road was obstructed by another large tree. This time we could drive round through a field, and a third time, a large fallen branch had been cut and the way cleared. We rejoiced that the Great Elm stood unharmed, though mutilated trees were on each side of it.
Giant willows, historic elms, upright oaks from horizontal trunks, glorious maples and elms laid low, and scores of noble though not distinguished trees, that we admired and shall remember as we do pleasant people we meet, together with the fact that the greater part of our driving was in the grand old Pine Tree state, warrants us in calling this most delightful journey our Tree Journey.
CHAPTER XV.
ON HIGHWAYS AND BYWAYS. 1894 to 1904.
In response to many requests to share this journey with our friends as we used, the spirit has moved us to give you first an inkling of our annual trips for the ten years since our last report.
This is easily done, for we have a book in which is recorded the name given to each journey, the name of every town we pass through, with distance from place to place, and the sum total of time, distance and expense of each journey. This goes with us, and is a valuable book of reference. The revolver still goes with us, too, the one thing we take but never use. Our electric hand-lamp, on the contrary, is very useful. The Kennebec journey was followed by our first visit to Nantucket, leaving our horse at New Bedford, and once again prolonging the return trip to Leominster by driving to Boston. This journey had a memorable postscript: We drove to Boston for a day or two in the autumn and were detained eleven days by that terrific November snow storm, and even then the last thirty miles of the return trip it was good sleighing!
A September mountain trip, “The Figure 8” we named it, comes next in order, followed by a Jefferson and Jackson trip, and then a Massachusetts journey, which is always delightful.
The three ranges of the Green Mountains, with their “gulf” roads, was a journey unsurpassed, and from Cape Ann to Mt. Tom was another interesting journey in our own state, followed by a Cape Cod trip, which completed the coast for us from New Haven to Bar Harbor.
By this time we were ready for another journey to Lake George, Saratoga, and the Berkshires, and the next trip through the mountains was exceptionally fine, as we returned via Sebago Lake, Portland and the coast, being just in time for the September surf.
The following journey “capped the climax,” seemingly, when we crossed the Green Mountains, ferried Lake Champlain to Ticonderoga, and drove to Eagle, Paradox and Schroon Lakes in the Adirondack region, returning to Lake George, thence to the Berkshire towns and as far south as Hartford, Connecticut, a superb drive of five hundred miles.