Page:A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers.djvu/325

Rh I am well drenched upon my bed of oats;

But see that globe come rolling down its stem,

Now like a lonely planet there it floats,

And now it sinks into my garment's hem. Drip drip the trees for all the country round,

And richness rare distils from every bough,

The wind alone it is makes every sound,

Shaking down crystals on the leaves below. For shame the sun will never show himself,

Who could not with his beams e'er melt me so,

My dripping locks—they would become an elf,

Who in a beaded coat does gaily go.

The Pinnacle is a small wooded hill which rises very abruptly to the height of about two hundred feet, near the shore at Hooksett Falls. As Uncannunuc Mountain is perhaps the best point from which to view the valley of the Merrimack, so this hill affords the best view of the river itself. I have sat upon its summit, a precipitous rock only a few rods long, in fairer weather, when the sun was setting and filling the river valley with a flood of light. You can see up and down the Merrimack several miles each way. The broad and straight river, full of light and life, with its sparkling and foaming falls, the islet which divides the stream, the village of Hooksett on the shore almost directly under your feet, so near that you can converse with its inhabitants or throw a stone into its yards, the woodland lake at its western base, and the mountains in the north and north-east, make a scene of rare beauty and completeness, which the traveller should take pains to behold.

We were hospitably entertained in Concord in New Hampshire, which we persisted in calling New Concord, as