Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 2.djvu/360

336 KEARSARGE MOUNTAIN. time, had the idea entered that a rival mountain was entitled to these honors. In due time Admiral Winslow died, and a boulder was taken from the original Kearsarge to serve as a monument at his grave. And now the controversy as to the origin of the ship's name began; but the family of the Admiral stood by our Kearsarge, and the boulder is found in Forest Hill Cemetery, Boston Highlands, supporting a bronze tablet with the following inscription :

A correspondent of the Boston Journal, writing from Petersburg, Virginia, July 16, 1864, says, — "The sinking of the Alabama by the Kearsarge gives great joy to the soldiers. They are as much gratified as if they had won a victory. The men of the Kearsarge were mainly from New Hampshire. Their ship was built there, and it bears the name of the grand old mountain, beneath the shadow of which Daniel Webster passed his childhood. The name was selected for the ship by one of the publishers of the New Hampshire Statesman. The tourist, passing through the Granite State, will look with increased pleasure upon the mountain whose name, bestowed upon a national vessel, will be prominent in the history of the republic."

Warner, Wilmot, Andover, Sutton, and Salisbury all claim ownership in this mountain. Warner and Wilmot meet, on the very summit; Andover comes near the top ; Salisbury and Sutton not quite as near.

The summit of Kearsarge is a bald rock. It was once mostly covered with wood; but about seventy-five years ago the fire ran over the top of the mountain, increasing in intensity for several days, and consuming not only the dead and living trees, but burning up the greater portion of the soil itself.

Standing on the majestic height, one feels that he is, indeed, on the king mountain of all this region. It stands there without a rival. It has no neighbor on the east — nothing to intercept a view of the ocean. At the south, fifty miles away, rises the grand Monadnock, its equal, and its solitary neighbor in that direction. At the west lies old Ascutney, triple-pointed, and grand beyond description in the evening twilight, but this mountain is "over the border," for, by the decree of King George the Third, in 1764, the west bank of the Connecticut river is our boundary. Then, to the northward and in fair view, though from thirty to sixty miles away, the nearest equal neighbors are Cardigan, White Face, and Chocorua, the summit of the two latter being seldom trodden by human feet. Each of these mountains is sublime in its way, but Kearsarge stands alone in solitary grandeur — the Mont Blanc of central New Hampshire.