Chapter 9

=The Cadet Chapel=, immediately north of the Administration Building, was erected in 1834. The chapel contains many valuable trophies of the Revolutionary and Mexican wars, including three Hessian and two British flags that were once the property of Washington. The walls have many memorial tablets and a famous "blank" of Arnold. Here also are several cannon surrendered at Saratoga, October 17, 1777.

=The Administration Building= was completed in 1871.

=The Library= adjoins the Cadet Chapel on the east, built of native granite in 1841, costing about $15,000. In 1900 the building was entirely reconstructed of fire-proof material by appropriation of $80,000. The exterior walls of the original building entered into the remodeled structure. The Library, founded in 1812, has about 50,000 volumes.

=The Gymnasium= adjoins the Barracks on the west, erected of native granite, costing $90,000.

=Memorial Hall=, plainly seen from the Hudson, completed in 1899, is of Ionic architecture. The building cost $268,000, a legacy bequeathed by Gen. George W. Cullum, built of Milford granite for army trophies of busts, paintings and memorials. The bronze statute of Gen. John Sedgwick in the northwest angle of the plain was dedicated in 1868. The fine cenotaph of Italian marble was erected in 1885. It stands immediately in front of Memorial Hall.

=Kosciusko's Monument= was erected in 1828. It stands in the northeast angle of Fort Clinton.

=The Chain-Battery= walk runs from Kosciusko's Garden northward to Light House Point, near which was the battery that defended the chain across the river in the Revolution. The scene is of great beauty and has been known for many years by the name of "Flirtation Walk."

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Where Kosciusko dreamed and proud scenes bring To mind the stormy days when Liberty Was cradled at West Point--the Highlands' key.

_Kenneth Bruce._

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=The Battle Monument=, on Trophy Point, is the most beautiful on the reservation--a column of victory in memory of 2,230 officers and soldiers of the regular army of the United States who were killed or died of wounds received in the war of the Rebellion. It is a monolith of polished granite surmounted by a figure of Fame. The shaft is 46 feet in length, 5 feet in diameter, and said to be the largest piece of polished stone in the world. The cost of the work was $66,000. The site was dedicated June 15, 1864. The monument was dedicated in 1897. The address was by Justice Brewer.

=Trophy Point=, on the north side of the plain, overlooking the river and commanding a majestic view of the Hudson and the city of Newburgh, has been likened by European travelers to a view on Lake Geneva. Here are the "swivel clevies" and 16 links of the old chain that was stretched across the river at this point. The whole chain, 1,700 feet long, weighing 186 tons, was forged at the Sterling Iron Works, transported to New Windsor and there attached to log booms and floated down the river to this point.

=Old Fort Putnam= was erected in 1778 by the 5th Massachusetts Regiment under the direction of Col. Rufus Putnam. It was originally constructed of logs and trees with stone walls on two sides to defend Fort Clinton on the plain below. It was garrisoned by 450 men, and had 14 guns mounted. In 1787 it was dismantled, and the guns sold as old iron. Its brick arch casements overgrown with moss, vines, and shrubbery are crumbling away, but are well worth a visit. It is 495 feet above the Hudson. A winding picturesque carriage road leads up from the plain, and the pedestrian can reach the summit in 20 minutes. On clear days the Catskill Mountains are visible.

=Fort Clinton=, in the northeast angle of the plain, was built in 1778 under the direction of the Polish soldier, Kosciusko. Sea Coast Battery is located on the north waterfront, Siege Battery on the slope of the hill below the Battle Monument. Targets for the guns on both batteries are on the hillside about a mile distant. Battery Knox, which overlooks the river, was rebuilt in 1874 on the site of an old revolutionary redoubt.

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Bright are the moments link'd with thee, Boast of a glory-hallowed land! Hope of the valiant and the free, Home of our youthful soldier band!

_Anonymous._

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While Fort Putnam was being built Washington was advised that Dubois's regiment was unfit to be ordered on duty, there being "not one blanket in the regiment. Very few have either a shoe or a shirt, and most of them have neither stockings, breeches, or overalls. Several companies of inlisted artificers are in the same situation, and unable to work in the field."

What privations were here endured to establish our priceless liberty! It makes better Americans of us all to turn and re-turn the pages of the real Hudson, the most picturesque volume of the world's history.

West Point during the Revolution was the Gibraltar of the Hudson and her forts were regarded almost impregnable. Fort Putnam will be rebuilt as an enduring monument to the bravery of American soldiers.

The best way to study West Point, however, is not in voluminous histories or in the condensed pages of a guide book, but to visit it and see its real life, to wander amid its old associations, and ask, when necessary, intelligent questions, which are everywhere courteously answered. The view north seen in a summer evening, is one long to be remembered. In such an hour the writer's idea of the Hudson as an open book with granite pages and crystal book-mark is most completely realized as indicated in the Highland section of his poem, "The Hudson":

On either side these mountain glens Lie open like a massive book, Whose words were graved with iron pens, And lead into the eternal rock:

Which evermore shall here retain The annals time cannot erase, And while these granite leaves remain This crystal ribbon marks the place.

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Under Spring's delicate marshalling every hill of the Highlands took its own place, and the soft swells of ground stood back the one from the other in more and more tender coloring.

_Susan Warner._

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=West Point to Newburgh.=

The steamer passes too near the west bank to give a view of the magnificent plateau with parade ground and Government buildings, but on rounding the point a picture of marvelous beauty breaks at once upon the vision. On the left the massive indented ridge of Old Cro' Nest and Storm King, and on the right Mount Taurus, or Bull Hill, and Break Neck, while still further beyond toward the east sweeps the Fishkill range, sentineled by South Beacon, 1,625 feet in height, from whose summit midnight gleams aroused the countryside for leagues and scores of miles during those seven long years when men toiled and prayed for freedom. Close at hand on the right will be seen Constitution Island, formerly the home of Miss Susan Warner, who died in 1885, author of "Queechy" and the "Wide, Wide World." Here the ruins of the old fort are seen. The place was once called Martalaer's Rock Island. A chain was stretched across the river at this point to intercept the passage of boats up the Hudson, but proved ineffectual, like the one at Anthony's Nose, as the impetus of the boats snapped them both like cords.

Some years ago, when the first delegation of Apache Indians was brought to Washington to sign a treaty of peace, the Indians were taken for an "outing" up the Hudson, by General O. O. Howard and Dr. Herman Bendell, Superintendent of Indian Affairs for Arizona. It is said that they noted with cold indifference the palaces along the river front: "the artistic terraces, the well-kept, sloping lawns, the clipped hedges and the ivy-grown walls made no impression on them, but when the magnificent picture of the Hudson above West Point revealed itself, painted by the rays of the sinking sun, these wild men stood erect, raised their hands high above their heads and uttered a monosyllabic expression of delight, which was more expressive than volumes of words."

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The queenly Hudson circling at thy feet Lingers to sing a song of joy and love, Pouring her heart in rippling wavelets sweet, Which sun-kissed glance up to thy throne above.

_Kenneth Bruce._

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Sir Robert Temple also rises into rapture over the northern gate of the Highlands. "One of the fairest spectacles to be seen on the earth's surface; not on any other river or strait--not on Ganges or Indus, on the Dardanelles or the Bosphorus, on the Danube or the Rhine, on the Neva or the Nile--have I ever observed so fairy-like a scene as this on the Hudson. The only water-view to rival it is that of the Sea of Marmora, opposite Constantinople."

Most people who visit our river, naturally desire a brilliant sunlit day for their journey, and with reason, but there are effects, in fog and rain and driving mist, only surpassed amid the Kyles of Bute, in Scotland. The traveler is fortunate, who sees the Hudson in many phases, and under various atmospheric conditions. A midnight view is peculiarly impressive when the mountain spirits of Rodman Drake answer to the call of his "Culprit Fay."

"'Tis the middle watch of a summer night, The earth is dark but the heavens are bright, The moon looks down on Old Cro' Nest-- She mellows the shade on his shaggy breast, And seems his huge gray form to throw In a silver cone on the wave below."

It is said that the "Culprit Fay" was written by Drake in three days, and grew out of a discussion which took place during a stroll through this part of the Highlands between Irving, Halleck, Cooper and himself, as to the filling of a new country with old-time legends. Drake died in 1820. Halleck's lines to his memory are among the sweetest in our language. It is said that Halleck, on hearing Drake read his poem, "The American Flag," sprang to his feet, and in a semi-poetic transport, concluded the lines with burning words, which Drake afterwards appended:

"Forever float that standard sheet, Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us."

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It floweth deep and strong and wide This river of romance Along whose banks on moonlight nights The Highland fairies dance.

_E. A. Lente._

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Just opposite Old Cro' Nest is the village of Cold Spring, on the east bank, which receives its name naturally from a cold spring in the vicinity; and it is interesting to remember that the famous Parrott guns were made at this place, and many implements of warfare during our civil strife. The foundry was started by Gouverneur Kemble in 1828, and brought into wide renown by the inventive genius of Major Parrott. Cold Spring has a further distinction in having the first ground broken, about three miles from the river, for the greatest engineering enterprise of the age--"The Water Supply of the Catskills," when Mayor McClellan, in June, 1907, began the work with his silver shovel. A short distance north of the village is

=Undercliff= (built by John C. Hamilton, son of Alexander Hamilton, but more particularly associated with the memory of the poet, Col. George P. Morris), lies, in fact, _under the cliff_ and shadow of Mount Taurus, and has a fine outlook upon the river and surrounding mountains. Standing on the piazza, we see directly in front of us Old Cro' Nest, and it was here that the poet wrote:

"Where Hudson's wave o'er silvery sands Winds through the hills afar, _Old Cro' Nest like a monarch stands Crowned with a single star_."

Few writers were better known in their own day than the poet of Undercliff, who wrote "My Mother's Bible," and "Woodman, Spare that Tree." On one occasion, when Mr. Russell was singing it at Boulogne, an old gentleman in the audience, moved by the simple and touching beauty of the lines,

"Forgive the foolish tear, But let the old oak stand."

rose and said: "I beg your pardon, but was the tree really spared?" "It was," answered Mr. Russell, and the old gentleman resumed his seat, amid the plaudits of the whole assembly. Truly

"Its glory and renown Are spread o'er land and sea."

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When freedom from her mountain height Unfurled her standard to the air, She tore the azure robe of night And set the stars of glory there.

_Joseph Rodman Drake._

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The first European name given to Storm King was Klinkersberg (so called by Hendrick Hudson, from its glistening and broken rock). It was styled by the Dutch "Butter Hill," from its shape, and, with Sugar Loaf on the eastern side below the point, helped to set out the tea-table for the Dunderberg goblins. It was christened by Willis, "Storm King," and may well be regarded the El Capitan of the Highlands. Breakneck is opposite, on the east side, where St. Anthony's Face was blasted away. In this mountain solitude there was a shade of reason in giving that solemn countenance of stone the name of St. Anthony, as a good representative of monastic life; and, by a quiet sarcasm, the full-length nose below was probably suggested.

The mountain opposite Cro' Nest is "Bull Hill," or more classically, "Mt. Taurus." It is said that there was formerly a wild bull in these mountains, which had failed to win the respect and confidence of the inhabitants, so the mountaineers organized a hunt and drove him over the hill, whose name stands a monument to his exit. The point at the foot of "Mount Taurus" is known as "Little Stony Point."

The Highlands now trend off to the northeast, and we see North Beacon, or Grand Sachem Mountain, and Old Beacon about half a mile to the north. The mountains were relit with beacon-fires in 1883, in honor of the centennials of Fishkill and Newburgh, and were plainly seen sixty miles distant.

This section was known by the Indians as "Wequehache," or, "the Hill Country," and the entire range was called by the Indians "the endless hills," a name not inappropriate to this mountain bulwark reaching from New England to the Carolinas. As pictured in our "Long Drama," given at the Newburgh centennial of the disbanding of the American Army,

That ridge along our eastern coast, From Carolina to the Sound, Opposed its front to Britain's host, And heroes at each pass were found:

A vast primeval palisade, With bastions bold and wooded crest, A bulwark strong by nature made To guard the valley of the west.

Along its heights the beacons gleamed, It formed the nation's battle-line, Firm as the rocks and cliffs where dreamed The soldier-seers of Palestine.

It was also believed by the Indians that, in ancient days, "before the Hudson poured its waters from the lakes, the Highlands formed one vast prison, within whose rocky bosom the omnipotent Manitou confined the rebellious spirits who repined at his control. Here, bound in adamantine chains, or jammed in rifted pines, or crushed by ponderous rocks, they groaned for many an age. At length the conquering Hudson, in its career toward the ocean, burst open their prison-house, rolling its tide triumphantly through the stupendous ruins."

* * *

The Highlands are here moulded in all manner of heights and hollows; sometimes reaching up abruptly to twelve or fifteen hundred feet, and again stretching away in long gorges and gentle declivities.

_Susan Warner._

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=Pollopel's Island=, east of the steamer's route, was once regarded as a haunted spot, but its only witches are said to be snakes too lively to be enchanted. In old times, the "new hands" on the sloops were unceremoniously dipped at this place, so as to be proof-christened against the goblins of the Highlands. Here also another useless "impediment" was put across the Hudson in 1779, a chevaux-de-frise with iron-pointed spikes thirty feet long, hidden under water, strongly secured by cribs of stone. This, however, was not broken and would probably have done effective work if some traitor to the cause had not guided the British captains through an unprotected passage. The State at one time contemplated the purchase of this island on which to erect a statue to Hendrick Hudson. For some reason Governor Flower vetoed the bill. It is now owned by Mr. Francis Bannerman, an energetic business man, who perhaps some day may see his way to promote a monument to Hudson on the splendid pedestal which nature has already completed.

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What sights and sounds at which the world has wondered Within these wild ravines have had their birth! Young Freedom's cannon from these glens have thundered And sent their startling echoes o'er the earth.

_Charles Fenno Hoffman._

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=Cornwall-on-the-Hudson.=--This locality N. P. Willis selected as the most picturesque point on the Hudson. The village lies in a lovely valley, which Mr. Beach has styled in his able description, as "an offshoot of the Ramapo, up which the storm-winds of the ocean drive, laden with the purest and freshest air."

=Idlewild.=--Where Willis spent the last years of his life is a charming spot and rich with poetic memories. E. P. Roe also chose Cornwall for his home. Lovers of the Hudson are indebted to Edward Bok for his realistic sketch of an afternoon visit. The "Idlewild" of to-day is still green to the memory of the poet. Since Willis' death the place has passed in turn into various hands, until now it belongs to a wealthy New York lawyer, who has spent thousands of dollars on the house and grounds. The old house still stands, and here and there in the grounds remains a suggestion of the time of Willis. The famous pine-drive leading to the mansion, along which the greatest literary lights of the Knickerbocker period passed during its palmy days, still remains intact, the dense growth of the trees only making the road the more picturesque. The brook, at which Willis often sat, still runs on through the grounds as of yore. In the house, everything is remodeled and remodernized. The room from whose windows Willis was wont to look over the Hudson, and where he did most of his charming writing, is now a bedchamber, modern in its every appointment, and suggesting its age only by the high ceiling and curious mantel. Only a few city blocks from "Idlewild" is the house where lived E. P. Roe, the author of so many popular novels, as numerous, almost, in number as the several hundreds of thousands of circulation which they secured. There are twenty-three acres to it in all, and, save what was occupied by the house, every inch of ground was utilized by the novelist in his hobby for fine fruits and rare flowers. Now nothing remains of the beauty once so characteristic of the place. For four years the grounds have missed the care of their creator. Where once were the novelist's celebrated strawberry beds, are now only grass and weeds. Everything is grown over, only a few trees remaining as evidence that the grounds were ever known for their cultivated products. A large board sign announces the fact that the entire place is for sale.

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The river narrows at their proud behest And creeps more darkly as it deeper flows, And fitful winds swirl through the long defile Where the great Highlands keep their stern repose.

_E.A. Lente._

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Cornwall has been for many years a favorite resort of the Hudson Valley and her roofs shelter in the summer season many thousand people. The road completed in 1876, from Cornwall to West Point, gives one a pleasant acquaintance with the wooded Highlands. It passes over the plateau of Cro' Nest and winds down the Cornwall slope of Storm King. The tourist who sees Cro' Nest and Storm King only from the river, has but little idea of their extent. Cro' Nest plateau is about one thousand feet above the parade ground of West Point, and overlooks it as a rocky balcony. These mountains, with their wonderful lake system, are, in fact, the "Central Park" of the Hudson. Within a radius of ten miles are clustered over forty lakes, and we very much doubt if one person in a thousand ever heard of them. A convenient map giving the physical geography of this section would be of great service to the mountain visitor. The Cornwall pier, built by the _New York, Ontario and Western Railroad_ in 1892 for coal and freight purposes, will be seen on our left near the Cornwall dock. This railroad leaves the _West Shore_ at this point and forms a pleasant tourist route to the beautiful inland villages and resorts of the State.

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A solitary gleam struck on the base of the Highland peak, and moved gracefully up its side, until reaching the summit, it stood for a minute forming a crown of glory to the sombre pile.

_James Fenimore Cooper._

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=Newburgh to Poughkeepsie.=

=Newburgh=, 60 miles from New York. Approaching the city of Newburgh, we see a building of rough stone, one story high, with steep roof--known as Washington's Headquarters. For several years prior to, and during the Revolution, this was the home of Jonathan Hasbrouck, known far and wide for business integrity and loyalty to liberty. This house was built by him, apparently, in decades; the oldest part, the northeast corner, in 1750; the southeast corner, in 1760, and the remaining half in 1770. It fronted west on the king's highway, now known as Liberty Street, with a garden and family burial plot to the east, lying between the house and the river. It was restored as nearly as possible to its original character on its purchase by the State in 1849, and it is now the treasure-house of many memories, and of valuable historic relics. A descriptive catalogue, prepared for the trustees, under act of May 11, 1874, by a patient and careful historian, =Dr. E. M. Ruttenber=, will be of service to the visitor and can be obtained on the grounds. The following facts, condensed from his admirable historical sketch, are of practical interest:

"=Washington's Headquarters=, or the Hasbrouck house, is situated in the southeast part of the city, constructed of rough stone, one story high, fifty-six feet front by forty-six feet in depth, and located on what was originally Lot No. 2, of the German Patent, with title vested in Heman (Herman?) Schoneman, a native of the Palatinate of Germany, who sold, in 1721, to James Alexander, who subsequently sold to Alexander Colden and Burger Meynders, by whom it was conveyed to Jonathan Hasbrouck, the grandson of Abraham Hasbrouck, one of the Huguenot founders of New Paltz. He was a man of marked character; of fine physique, being six feet and four inches in height; was colonel of the militia of the district, and in frequent service in guarding the passes of the Highlands. His occupation was that of a farmer, a miller, and a merchant. He died in 1780. The first town meeting for the Precinct of Newburgh was held here on the first Tuesday in April, 1763, when its owner was elected supervisor. Public meetings continued to be held here for several years. During the early part of the Revolution, the committee of safety, of the precinct, assembled here; here military companies were organized, and here the regiment which Colonel Hasbrouck commanded assembled, to move hence to the defence of the Highland forts."

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Sacred in this mansion hoary, 'Neath its roof-tree long ago Dwelt the father of our glory, He whose name appalled the foe.

_Mary E. Monell._

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From this brief outline, it will be seen that the building is singularly associated with the history of the Old as well as of the New World: with the former through the original grantee of the land, recalling the wars which devastated the Palatinate and sent its inhabitants, fugitive and penniless, to other parts of Europe and to America; through his successor with the Huguenots of France, and, through the public meetings which assembled here, and especially through its occupation by Washington, with the struggle for American independence.