And once upon a car of flaming fire, The dreadful Indian shook with fear to see The King of Pennacook, his chief, his sire, Ride flaming up to Heaven, than any mountain higher." The first house on the mountain, built by Ethan Allen Crawford in 1821, was a small stone cabin having the floor covered with moss for bedding, the only furniture being a chest to contain blankets, and a stove; a roll of sheet-lead serving as the "register," on which the guests scratched their names and the date of visit. This cabin was swept away by a terrific storm in August, 1826. Some time later an eccentric individual took possession of the summit, naming it "Trinity Height," and called himself the modern "Israel of Jerusalem," proposing to inaugurate in this exalted place a new Order, styled "The Christian or Purple and Royal Democracy." With an eye to business, he put toll-gates on the bridlepaths and taxed each visitor a dollar. There were bitter quarrels about the ownership for years afterwards, and the first winter ascent was made by a sheriff, who went up to serve a writ in 1858, and found frost over a foot thick enveloping everything. The lawsuits, however, were ultimately fought out and settled, and the present owners have been undisturbed for years. The view from the summit is widespread. The most distant objects that have been recognized are Mount Beloeil, northwest in Canada, and Mount Ebeeme, northeast beyond the Moosehead Lake in Maine, each one hundred and thirty-five miles away. These distant mountain tops are said to be brought into view only by the aid of atmospheric refraction, in raising them, as they are actually below the horizon. Also northeast is Mount Abraham, sixty-eight miles away; and were it not for this, Maine's greatest mountain, Katahdin, in the wilderness of the upper Penobscot, might be seen, but Abraham obstructs the view. Katahdin, rising nearly fifty-four hundred feet, is one hundred and sixty-five miles northeast. Saddleback, at the head of the Rangeley Lakes, is seen sixty miles away, and Bald Mountain, to the right, one hundred miles off in Maine. To the eastward is seen Mount Megunticook, in the Camden range, on Penobscot Bay, one hundred and fifteen miles off. To the east and southeast for many miles is the ocean between Casco Bay and Cape Ann. The sea, however, is never well viewed from Mount Washington, because it is so nearly the color of the sky at the horizon as to be difficult of acute discernment. The moving vessels, however, can be readily seen by the aid of a glass. The bright waters of Sebago Lake are to the southeast, and beyond are the shores of Casco Bay and the city of Portland, sixty-seven miles off. The low round swell of Mount Agamenticus shows faintly above the horizon, seventy-nine miles south-southeast, and to the right there is also a faint trace of the Isles of Shoals, ninety-six miles off. To the southeast, twenty-two miles, is the sharpest and noblest peak of all