Our curiosity was aroused concerning the name. On making inquiry we learned that one fall there had been a freshet which carried vast numbers of pumpkins down the east branch of the Delaware.
The house of Colonel Noah Dimmick was untouched by the water, and his home was given the name of Noah's Ark, "from which the name of Arkville was suggested. The summer residence of George C. Gould, Jay Gould and Anthony J. Drexel, Jr., are located near here. Francis J. Murphy, the noted landscape painter, owns an ideal estate in the woods adjoining the village. The studio of Alexander H. Wyant, who was considered one of America's best landscape artists, is still to be seen amid its picturesque surroundings." No wonder the place was chosen by the artists, for they never would lack for sketches of the most picturesque and sublime character. The work of Indians may be seen on the inner walls of high caves, known as the Indian Rocks, rudely carved with strange hieroglyphics.
This forenoon we feel as if we were treading hallowed ground, for all through this beautiful region are trails that were used by America's most beloved naturalist, John Burroughs. What a wealth of woodland lore, fresh as these dew gemmed meadows, pure as these crystal flowing streams, serene and high as these beautiful hills, he has left us. How much of our enjoyment in birds and flowers we owe to this gentle lover of the true and beautiful in Nature. How many lives he has helped, by showing them wherein lies the real gold of these hills. On reading his pages, redolent with the spirit of the out-of-doors, one is conscious of a feeling of grandeur and solemnity as when listening to a sonata by Beethoven.
The beautiful village of Roxbury is the birthplace of this gentle Nature lover and enthusiast. Here too, Jay Gould, the great railroad magnate, was born. Both grew up in the same town, amid the same sublime mountain scenery. These boys both lived on the farm, and attended the same school, but how different the product! Both found the work for which they were fitted. Here the mountains are comparatively graceful and gentle in contour. Their loveliness is unsurpassed. No wonder Mr. Burroughs was contented to dwell here, no matter how far he traveled. Even on his last day he was found with his face turned toward his native hills, which afforded him such a wealth of beauty and natural scenery and such a free and glorious life. "Mr. and Mrs. Finley J. Shepard (Helen Gould) spend two or three months each year at 'Kirkside,' their modest summer home on the west side of Main street, near Gould Memorial church just north of village center."
About three miles from Roxbury is a small village called Grand Gorge. One and one-half miles from the village Irish and Bald mountains tower three thousand feet, and crowd river, railroad and highway into a narrow pass. The Gilboa reservoir is located three miles northeast of the village, and the Shandaken tunnel three miles east. The purpose of both the reservoir and tunnel is to augment the great Ashokan supply. The view of the Catskills through Grand Gorge is most beautiful. Here you lookout over a vast mountainous landscape; the foliage of the maples sheers regularly down, covering the mountain sides with their leafy terraces. Far away stretches the landscape, checked red with patches of grain or velvety meadows, marked faintly with stone fences, giving it the appearance of a vast domain all dreamy beneath its luminous veil.
One of the finest touring centers in the Catskills region is Stamford, a town with a population of one thousand, situated at the foot of Mount Utsayantha. On this mountain which is three thousand three hundred feet above the sea, is an observation tower, from which an unobstructed view of all the Catskills opens up before you. Truly, Nature has been lavish in her bestowal of rare gifts of scenic beauty at this place.
Standing there and looking out over the magnificent panorama before us, we thought how often the eyes of that gentle lover of Nature gazed in admiration out over the rolling hills or rested lovingly upon some rare flower or strange bird until he gained their secrets.
You will see many wonderful orchards in New York state and much of the land is given over to the raising of fruit, for which it seems admirably adapted. You will also notice other less inviting regions, where the old homesteads have gone into decay. In several places we saw many vacant homes around which crowded whole armies of weeds, while scraggly, mossgrown apple trees still managed to send forth a few green branches. It must have been a scene like this which Shakespeare saw, when he wrote:
"The whole land is full of weeds; her fairest flowers
choked up,
Her fruit trees all unpruned, her hedges ruined."
The crumbling moss-grown stones of the fences over which poison vines were clambering and the myriads of wild carrot, chicory, and ox-eye daisies added to the desolateness of the scene.