F 129 co^: i' LAKE PLACID AND AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE I.EPRINTED FROM THE ADIRONDACKS COPYRIGHT 1917 BY THE CENTURY CO. BY T. MORRIS LONGSTRETH Price, $2.50 net NEW YORK THE CENTURY CO. Fn^ ^1^1 Our library has a shelf full of books on the Adirondacks but by common consent Long- streth's is the best and most enjoyable of them all. Since its publication we have told all in- quirers for something about the Great North Woods to get Longstreth, and many of our members have chosen it as the best possible gift for any friend who wishes to know more of this marvelous region. Melvil Dewey, President, Lake Placid Club. CHAPTER X LAKE PLACID AND AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE OCTOBER had had but a short start of us, and the sun not any before we were pointed toward Placid. October's start was a bold one. The clear night had left a film of ice on the smaller ponds ; tiny streams breathed mistily in the woods, and along the road the frost lay audaciously in wait for the sunbeams. Clear coffee and fine air put adventure in our blood, and our pace smart- ened as we went. Only Luggins seemed reluctant. Has nobody tried cotfee with horses in the effort to eradicate a certain inertness? "We were ready for adventure, but adventure never retired more coquettishly from road-curve to road-curve. We ceased to gaze wistfully ahead. No fox crossed in front of us ; the birds had gone to Dixie. The whole landscape was waiting for something that did not transpire. Apertures in the woodway gave views of forget- me-not and forest green. The scents of sheltered sun patches drifted by us. But never a sound ex- cept of Luggins striking an occasional stone in 231 THE ADIRONDACKS the sandy road! So Lynn and I fell into an ap- propriate silence. It was no time, we instinc- tively felt, for incompetent comment on tlie uni- verse. Our map plainly pointed to tlie route througli Gabriels, Harriettstown, Saranac Lake, and Eay Brook as the most plausible, even though it stood Luggins a good twenty-five miles. But to round Whiteface by Franklin Falls and up through the Wilmington Notch had the advantage of scenery and an extra day in flannel shirts. That decided us. To make a bare breast of it, a haze of distrust fell on us when we thought of surrendering to the club. To be sure, the Lake Placid Club had long been a name to us. Hearsay and inquiry had de- veloped its reputation till we had decided upon the ordeal of staying there a week. The neces- sary cards were in my treasure bag. But for all that, in our separate souls we hated to diminish our summer freedom by three nights in a bed. It was not that we had been too proud to wash ; we had despised to advertise in starch. All summer we had collaborated with comfort and wood-sense. We supposed that in a club, comfort must disap- pear before convention. Even for the purpose of investigation, which was a purpose become dear to both of us, we loathed the idea of being hustled into appearances for a club's sake. To forsake AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 233 pine-needles for polished floors, an open fire for a radiator, camp costume for evening-dress — these anticipations threw us into such a ditch of despondency that we seized upon the detour with vehemence. Our lightened hearts took us far down the Saranac. Of all the memories of that day, the green ranges ahead, the high ridges on the right, dip- ping to let Whiteface look over, the falls, the vast landscapes of brilliant foliage, the spell of the winding road, of all these entrancements there is one that struck deeper than all — the slim, elusive stream of the river, curving in amber shadows, lying at the feet of pointed firs, rippling in a break of light. Noon in such a place is more beau- tiful than moonlight in many another. "We kept on till mountain shadows and airs, which shivered through disrobing birches, warned us of the piles of fire-wood needful for a long night. In the morning my thermometer registered twelve. Such tricks will clear air play at the alti- tude of two thousand feet. But we were not cold. If the breeze bit, his wound healed quickly. Lug- gins courted the ashes, but we each chopped a log in two and preached him a sermon upon the text. He listened in repose. More exhilarating than winning bets was it to wash one's face in the brooklet. The glow of the 234 THE ADIRONDACKS new sun slanted through forests of gold-leaf, for we had tented in a grove of beech. A breath was life, full and undisguised. And later, when smells of breakfast filled the wood, I doubt whether Adam's personal recollections of the new world could have been happier or more vivid. Up from the Saranac down to the Ausable, then the flank of Marble Mountain, a turn to the right, and we were confronted by the Notch. The "Wil- mington Notch is the result of the west branch of the Ausable River having its own way, cheese- knife fashion. It has also had its own time, for these are very hard mountains to cut through. It is still going at the job with energy. Above the notch it chatters, becomes more argumentative, and soon downright passionate, till in a great out- burst it thunders down and over at High Falls. And all the while it is gnawing at the Notch. Only a long way below the flume does it flow out into carved meadows, forgetful of precipices, black rocks, and the tangle of white waters. But more interesting than the falls and the gorge was the cold flow of air from the floor of the higher valley before us, and the sight of icicles that would so soon flower into the great winter stalactites. Winter had already established his depot. We were glad to come up into the smiling sun. As the mountain flanks parted, we came upon AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 237 new and fairer views than any we had seen, splen- did prospects of valley floor, curving river, and distant ranges. Our hearts softened toward the club that could revel in such possessions. In barest terms the Placid valley is a low-undu- lating river-bottom, checkered with farms and woodland, and walled in on three sides by moun- tains, on the fourth by a brace of lakes. But the barest terms or the most minute descriptions would fail to convey the circle of landscape from the eye to the ear. So I can best report on an inspiration that fell upon us that autumn afternoon. We had come on our road to the man-proof fence that surrounds the Club precincts. A little runt of a mountain, which we afterwards found was called Cobble, rose invitingly at our backs. The sun slept on its bare top, which did not look more than ten minutes above us. We determined to spy out the land, tied Luggins to the gate, and in eight minutes by the watch were sitting on the top. It was the most astounding eight minutes' worth of climb that I have ever done. And many times since have I been up Cobble, once with thun- der stalking down the valley, often with the spruces showing black against deep snow, and al- ways there has been some measure of surprise at such a view from such a tiny hill. That first 238 THE ADIRONDACKS largess of unexpected beauty laid hold of our hearts. We lay there gulping down the distrac- tions of its variety. Below us, calf-size, stood Luggins, patient with his pack, on the road that wound from the Notch which partly showed to the northeast. The Notch was steeped in shadow ; but the sheer range of the Sentinel Mountains, still lighted by the level sun, streamed southward from it, making a barrier all along the east of the valley, an abrupt limit to its beautiful floor. On the south the greater moun- tains, Elephant, Saddleback, Basin, Haystack, Tahawus, Algonquin, and colder Iroquois stood remote, but clearly high. On the west nearer mountains continued the valley 's wall to the break wherein the Saranacs lie. With the proper sun their glimmer can be caught. Again to the north- west McKenzie, Moose, and St. Armand rose pro- tectingly. In the north Whiteface, always noble, dominated. At his foot lay Lake Placid, balsam- girt, islanded. This then is the skeleton of the view from Cob- ble. But the form and flesh of the encircling mountains, the flow and color of the valley plain, these no drivel of words can in the least reveal. Eeluctantly, we rose from the rocks. And shadowly we came down through the evergreen to Luggins, and raggedly did we file through the Club grounds, a maze of pine and balsam, and between AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 239 snug cottages to Forest Hall. We presented our cards of introduction from a friend. At once were we received as guests within a family. It was evident that we had reached the unusual in clubs. Indeed, for a place where your precon- ception varies more widely from the reality, I know not where to look. Lynn confided to me that his first satisfaction was the broad hearth. We, in our flannel shirts and lumbermen's socks, were not stared at ; that was mine. A gentleman- clerk inquired after our trip, a gentleman-bell-boy took our knapsacks. With the courtesy of an ac- ceptance he refused a tip. From this marvel be- gan my study of the Club. I am still studying it. By bedtime that night Lynn and I had reached an acute stage of curiosity as to the genesis of an institution that performed so many unusual serv- ices for its members with such an engaging effi- ciency. The destiny of any enterprise depends on its objective, its dream, and that upon its dreamer. We longed to meet the person or group of persons who had dreamed this bold and embracing enter- prise into being. Many a time since that autumn evening has the Club been my home. Each time I have seen its significance enlarged, another of its possibilities brought to light. And now despite the dangers of cold type, — false emphasis, chiefly, — the charm and value of the Club are riding me into print. 240 THE ADIRONDACKS If I needed excuse it would be that no summary of the features of the Adirondack Park would be complete without mention of this, its most orig- inal association. And if I am charged with en- thusiasm I can but say that no honest mention could ever be perfunctory. The Lake Placid Club was sired by a sneeze. For, though at the age of forty-five Melvil Dewey had planted and seen sprout the seeds of more original and useful enterprises than most Ameri- cans achieve at ninety, he couldn't resist the spasms of hay-fever. He had started, in 1876, the American Library Association, the American Li- brary Bureau, the Library Journal, the American Metric Bureau, and the Spelling Eeform Associa- tion. I have forgotten what his business was. Also he had married a woman who had a penchant for starting things too. She started the Ameri- can Home Economics Association. But she had rose-cold and she couldn't stop that. Thus be- tween sneezes and snuffles this efficient couple lost about four months a year. A birth of a son who might have both diseases determined them. They decided to start something in the Adirondacks. The Adirondacks has always been a good place for dreams. Old Mountain Phelps had one. He sat on a log and indulged it. If Charles Dudley Warner had not nosed it out, the world would have been little the wiser. Paul Smith had one. AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 241 Even with his parents upon his back, he never lost sight of it. He died rich and respected. Dr. Trudeau had one, a tremendous one. He helped the ailing and the unaided to health, himself neither rich nor in health. And Melvil Dewey has one: perhaps it is the biggest of all. Now the way of the dreamer is hard. For it is extremely easy to enfog your whole system with the beauty of your dream, vaguely hoping that it may sometime crystallize about your person. That is the way of the amateur dreamer. But the professional's way is different. He begins with some nucleus of fact, some practical act at hand, and wraps his dream about that, irresistibly, no matter how small the progress, how tedious the process. By this time the Deweys were no longer amateurs at dreams. Their nuclear idea was to set up a sort of uni- versity club in the wilderness where men from the colleges might assemble in summer, sneezelessly, and yet undivorced from the agreeable. It was planned for men whose incomes were not too great a match for their intelligences. The meals cost a dollar a day. During the first summer thirty ate them. They ate them in the Adirondacks only after the entire continent that flies the Stars and Stripes had been searched for a better spot. Maine, Flor- ida, Alaska, California, Wisconsin, Vermont, M2 THE ADIRONDACKS Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina — all had been discarded for some place in the Adiron- dacks, and after three more years of inquiry that place had not been located. But Melvil Dewey, once snatched from earth by an idea, was past re- capture. He continued hunting. At last he consulted Paul (who was Apollos) Smith, the sage and father of the Adirondacks, sitting, aged and bent at the top of his stairway. At first the old guide would not admit that there existed finer sites than his St. Eegis lakes and lands. But being pressed, he said finally, "Well, Dewey, everybody knows there ain't a finer place in the hull woods than Placid, but after that you 've got to come here." Upon those words, as in novels, the sneezer and wife took guide and canoe, went through the seven carries, climbed into their buckboard, drove twenty-odd miles through arching wood, and when they stood on that little hill by Mirror Lake and looked over the rolling valley to its enclosing ranges, they knew that their New World had been discovered. At that time there were few houses at Lake Placid. But in them dwelt the crafty. They demanded a thousand dollars an acre for the best of their land. In those days, 1890, any amount of land could have been bought for $500, $200, $50, $10 an acre, and the Deweys spent more summers roaming AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 243 about in the hopes of making a lucky strike, but always they returned to Placid. The crafty ones had raised their views on the value of their soil to $2500 an acre. It speaks well for the texture of the dream that only the best was good enough. Mr. Dewey got a better price at wholesale, and took 250 quarter-acres. At last the dream was housed. For the next twenty years the solidifying of shadows, the expansion on new planes took place. It was not without compromises, defeats, labor, that complete disaster was staved off. There was much ebb and flow of check-book, much silent sac- rifice, much hope. During the second summer the wilderness uni- versity club was visited by eighty guests, while last August there were eleven hundred guests at once, not counting the seven hundred employees, and many others disappointed for lack of room. Numbers, of course, mean little. Eleven hundred guests at Coney Island, for example, would not excite comment other than profane. But eleven hundred at a club that is still very much in the woods, every one of them vouched for by a mem- ber or his friend, and no one of whom but is in sympathy with the lines of club development im- posed by an energetic and elevating dream — eleven hundred guests of this kind is a triumph- in-sort. 244 THE ADIRONDACKS I believe the clue to Mr. Dewey's dream can be found in something that underlay his previous endeavors. His names for his library associa- tion, his library bureau, his metric bureau, and all the rest were prefaced by the word American. It cannot have been by chance. He knew that the men and women who live under the flag can never be either satisfied with life or be true Americans unless they live somewhat in accord with the eter- nal verities, for of such was the beginning of our nation. It was belief in the eternal verities that gave America her reason for being. She feared God ; she was brave ; she did not disdain to labor ; she was frugal; she admired cleanness, honesty, high-thinking. What began as the Placid Club was, therefore, more than a refuge for hay-fever victims, more than an eating-resort for indigent intellectuals. It gave men breathing time in surroundings of haunting loveliness. It gave them a chance to cleanse themselves, to see things squarely, to come into high thoughts. And almost the only essential for membership was character. No matter how prominent or able or wealthy a man or a woman might be, if she or he had not that passport to good society, which is easier to recognize than to define, that person was asked to seek elsewhere more congenial atmospheres. And every season some such persons, who cannot grow accustomed AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 247 to life without a bar, or who mistake the spirit of the Club in other ways, receive such a request. The result is that the atmosphere is kept so un- hotel-like that parents who would not leave a child alone in a hotel for a single night have often trav- eled abroad, leaving their young daughters at the Club for all summer in entire confidence that no unhomelike taint will touch them. No person can be entertained at the Club with- out an introduction or invitation from a member. In a private card catalogue under constant re- vision every guest is rated on his merits and marked by letters. If he belongs to class C, he is a common client, welcome, neither specially ad- vantageous to his fellow clubmen nor at all dis- advantageous. If he belongs to class B (better), he has some talent, some distinguishing traits that make him desirable. He is sought for member- ship. Class A includes those who are admirably suited to further the ideals of the club. They are given every inducement to join. Class D, on the other hand, contains the doubtful or deficient characters, who, if not positively discouraged from joining, are not invited till a further insight into their personalities has been obtained. Class E is made up of unsuitables who, if already in, must be eliminated; if still out, must be excluded for the protection of the rest. It is a pretty game. Thanks to the closeness of the unguessed scrutiny 248 THE ADIRONDACKS and to the superior level of influence demanded, the easy charm of the place has not had to wane with growing numbers. An exceptional membership naturally has de- manded exceptional service. And before any clerk or bell-boy is engaged, his past is searched for any possible reasons why he should not be at- tached to the force. Engaged, he knows that how- ever capable he may be, a cigarette, a glass of beer, a deviation into profanity or vulgarity of any sort will send him job-hunting. In this broad country there are men eager for the opportunity to live and work under the best imaginable influ- ences, and the intelligent gladly deprive them- selves of cigars and profanity to their profit. They also abjure tips, but as many guests leave or send back parting gifts they lose nothing but the humiliation. Besides being better paid than hotel servants in like capacities, they have better meals, better living-rooms, recreation centers, an occasional motor or launch, A $20,000 staff house is to be built for them. And members continually say that they feel more comfortable knowing that those who minister are well cared for. The Club 's first distinction is character ; its sec- ond is excellence of equipment. In many depart- ments this nears perfection. Again the essentials have been demanded. Since neither display nor the nonsense of pretension figures in the expense AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE M9 account, the club is able to focus its brains and resources on the items of practical advantage. It was supplied with the most invigorating air under heaven ; it secured a perfect water supply. Milk was a more difficult matter. Cornell experts found that local sources were all unsound. The club bought a cow and lodged her sanitarily. She has increased five hundredfold, and the amount of cream consumed a month is a matter for comment ; no guest is denied any lactic desire. Indeed, the cream and milk, the butter and eggs lay the foundation for a table that is deliberately the best possible within limits. These limits lie well within commonsense and yet well beyond reason- able desire. The range at any meal must take into account the oldish lady who has sat by the fire all afternoon and the men who have been mountaineering on snow-shoes. And from end to end each item must be of the best. I know that there is no hope of saying this without its sound- ing like an advertisement. Their pastry cooks must be exquisite fellows. Beds, the management claimed, were of the ut- most importance, and all the money should go into springs and mattresses and blankets and none whatever into carvings and guardian angels. The tired ski-er sleeps delightfully. Beds make an excellent hobby for club-makers. And in the in- firmary one can lie all day in the last luxuries of 250 THE ADIRONDACKS healing if tobogganing has disabled or the intoxi- cation of flexible flying been overdone. Another extravagance is "the system of fire pro- tection ; $50,000 has been spent to perfect a system that in times of greatest drought or in the wildest blizzard could deluge the first flames with 2500 gallons a minute from its system of hydrants. A night and day patrol is so arranged that a fire could never get a running start; the great fire- pump is kept under constant pressure; Mirror Lake is the supply. Fires do occur. In twenty- three years forty-two have broken out. But the system has kept the total loss under $500. Angry flames, indeed! And now of the greatest extravagance of all. One day Dr. Albert Shaw of the ''Review of Re- views ' ' asked if he might sink a couple of tomato cans in the garden turf to knock a white ball into. In such a manner the game of ten centuries' growth began at Lake Placid. The Club has sunk $200,000 in their turf. Four hundred players have done themselves tan on the courses in one day. And the difficulties begin with the choice of your course; there are four now, three nine-hole courses and one of eighteen holes, of 6300 yards, and two more eighteen holers of 6000 yards are al- ready well under way. The Club dooryard is ten miles long and there is always room. Nowhere in the world in such a setting of great woodlands, AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 251 shapely peaks, and passes can men follow the ball over courses more interestingly diversified, more scientifically planned. Even Lynn, whose title for the game is ''fugitive idiocy,'^ was soothed into something very like admiration for the technical as well as the natural beauties as explained to us by the creator, Mr. Dunn. And if this prospect does not hold you spell- bound, I, who talk as if the Club were the result of mine own vigil, — I will offer you others. There are forty courts for tennis and other outdoor games, and there is fishing away, and boating at home, and water-sporting, and riding and driving, and camping by still waters, and music and pageants, and four outdoor theaters, and climbs, and the four million acred Park in which to play in company with the most charming people of the land. And it is this last that brings me back from the outlay of dollars to the dream. How is it, one may reverently inquire, that granted a perfect setting, a perfected apparatus of enjoyment, an atmosphere of commonsense, warmed with culture and kept in motion by great wealth, — how is it that the Lake Placid Club can prevent itself from gradually being enwrapped in a cocoon of complacency, refinement, sport, and soullessness? This conundrum presented itself to us on the second day. A sample bill had been sent around to our room, as is the custom, so that 252 THE ADIRONDACKS if there are any moments of harsh surprise they may come at the beginning of one's sojourn and not at the end. I believe I had remarked that the place was extraordinary. ' ' Extraordinary ! ' ' said Lynn. * ' Well, and well it might be. For every day that you and Luggins and I pay our bill we might have a fortnight in the woods. It 's easy wallow for the rich, but some pace for the professor. You said that it w^as founded for the classics who 'd taken the count, didn't your' On the following day, I replied: * ' It is. " I had sought, met, and been conquered by the idealist in the room where he puts his ideals to hard labor. It is a room piled quite high with the paraphernalia of offices and doesn't look at all like a den of visions. It is a very practical idealery. And its master is big, well-set, bushy- browed, peering, quick; the garment of his being is that of a purposeful business man. Only when stripped for confidences do you sense the aggres- sive prophet. I am glad that I came upon the Club in its suc- cess, for the season of strenuous waiting is at an end. At the other end, a quarter of a century back, it would have been too easy to have said with the great majority, ''It is a pretty dream, but it will not work. ' ' AN EXPERIMENT IN INTELLIGENCE 253 The core of the dream was: "by cooperation to secure among congenial people and beautiful natu- ral surroundings all the advantages of an ideal vacation or permanent country home.'' The con- genial people were the worn college professors, *Hhe classics who had taken the count," according to the irreverent Lynn. But I had not seen any of these about. Eosy and exuberant millionaires golfed in droves and hiked long distances. But as a retreat for the professorial elite whose thoughts were longer than their pocket-books the Club was but raggedly utilized. So little was I acquainted with the ways of the practical vision- ary that I, too, began to think that it was **easy wallow" for the rich and rich alone. Early in the dreamiest stage the young Club began to lose money. At a critical time one of Mr. Dewey's originations brought him in twenty times what the original Club cost, and he and his wife put that and the rest of their fortune into the dream. Thus do Holy Grailers. As expansion came more capital was needed, and without abandoning their final object, they called in the millionaire, the intellectual rich man, to make the others' paradise a possibility. The final object was and is a permanent foundation in this most lovely of all regions where the promising youth of the country may lay hold of inspiration 264 THE ADIRONDACKS and carve it to their uses. The Club is to be, and is, the home of inspiration in practice. Tried in- tellects will gather on their sabbaticals; assem- blies of research will meet ; congresses of moment will debate in this most suitable environment. In the cool of summer or in the white fire of winter the country's best will exchange ideas before the open hearth. It would sound too beautiful if the foundation had not been laid and hardened to sup- port the superstructure these many years. See what has been done : Seventy-five hundred acres owned in the heart of a great and perpetual State park; farms, buildings, camps, sport facili- ties developed; a large membership culled from two countries, on whom is the impress of the Club's essential ideals; a financial incorporation now beyond the power of individual whim to change; and the creator of all this yet young enough to drive on with the unfinished dream. Emerson doubtless fed on his own dictum many times without divining how nourishing it would be to others when he said, **If a man can make a better book, preach a better sermon, or make a better mouse-trap than his neighbor, the world will make a beaten track to his door." This is the motto of the Club. And with its glorious text a sermon is being preached, the pur- port of which is health, wisdom, and good-fellow- ship. AN EXPERIMi^NT IN INTELLIGENCE 257, October swam over into November while Lyma and I lingered in the lap of bankruptcy at this caravansary. And when we pulled Luggins from his bed of enervating luxury, we three swore that when our chores were done, back we would come in time for winter sports. How my hand itches to be at the naming of them, if only to carry me back to the season when there are no tragic in- sects, no weeks of mist, and when the winter woods are fair — so fair that I cannot resist the telling, the trying to tell, in its own proper place I LIBRftRY OF CONGRESS Press Comments on "The Adirond ^ ^^ ^ 205 393 7 ^ The Beooklyn Eagle: "Baedeker puts stars to mark the best hotels. Longstreth takes us to a different sort of starland — the great Adirondack Park, the glory of New York State. Only once in a dozen years does the jaded reviewer get a real breeze from a book. He gets it from The Adirondacks by T. Morris Longstreth. " The New York Times: "The book begins with a short history of the Adirondacks — geology, exploration, settlement, exploitation, and preservation for 'the people forever' by the law of the State of New York. After that the author proceeds in a leisurely course, commencing the narrative with his summer's beginning, wandering on through the forest, climbing mountains, fishing, meeting interesting lovers of the woods, coming upon a curious bit of history, a strange rock formation, telling the reader about it in the pleasantest, friendliest way. He interrupts his narrative for a delightful chapter on the animals of the Adirondacks. He tells the story of that famous guide Paul Smith, and then of the 'Beloved Physician' who found his first approach to health under Paul Smith's roof and built his own great sanitarium in the mountains out of his determination and his steadfast dreams. He has a passing reference to R. L. S. at Saranac, and he tells in detail of the fulfilment of another dream — that of Melvil Dewey in the Lake Placid Club. There are other stories of the North Woods, and of men who have left some token of remembrance in the Adirondack Forest. And there is much word picturing of the different beauties of the wilderness. " The New Republic: \ " Mr. Longstreth can reflect the glories of trout-fishing and swimming. He has the insinuating charm of the born walker. There is a real provocative quality to his de- scriptions of the splendor of the autumn woods, the real naturalist's affection for the animals — the wildcats, fox, woodchuck, squirrel, the birds. A generous number of photographs tempt the neophyte explorer, and for those who want to be explicit the Century Co. has furnished a thoroughly informative map. " The New York Tribune: "The next best thing to catching a trout is to talk trout gossip with a group of addicts. The next best thing to camping in the North Woods is to read Mr. Long- streth's book about the great Adirondack Park. To those who have fished or hunted there, have pitched their tents on the shores of some beautiful mountain lake, or even have spent a summer vacation in one of the numerous hotels or camps in the great forest park, it will bring back pleasant memories. To those who have never yet visited that magnificent region of forests, lakes, mountains and rivers, it should furnish the incentive to get out into the woods for a while and let the world go hang. " The Philadelphia Ledger: "Imagine a section of woodland wilderness larger than the State of Connecticut, girdled and laced with a thousand lakes, shouldered into the skies by hundreds of moim- tain ranges; then follow the wanderings of two congenial nature lovers on a fascinating journey through every nook and cranny of this extensive garden of nature, and you have T. Morris Longstreth's book, The Adirondacks, conveniently crowded into a nutshell. " 8vo. S70 Pages. 32 Illustrations. Price $2.SO At All Bookstores TUfC ^^17 WTI Tl? V Cf\ 363 Fourth Avenue Published by 1 ni-j V^C