Beyond the archipelago, eastward from the Penobscot estuary, is the noted island, presenting the only land along the Atlantic coast where high mountains are in close proximity to the sea. It appears to-day just at it did to Champlain when he first saw it in September, 1604, and, being impressed with its craggy, desolate summits, named it the _Isle des Monts déserts_, the "Island of Desert Mountains." He then wrote of it, "The land is very high, intersected by passes, appearing from the sea like seven or eight mountains ranged near each other; the summits of the greater part of these are bare of trees, because they are nothing but rocks." In approaching from the southwestward by sea, the distant gray recumbent elephant that has been lying at the horizon gradually resolves its two rounded summits into different peaks; but the finer approach is rather from the northward by the railway route, which is the one most travelled. The quick advance of the train unfolds the separate mountain peaks, and the whole range is well displayed, there being apparently eight eminences, but upon coming nearer, others seem to detach themselves. Green Mountain is the highest, rising over fifteen hundred feet, near the eastern side, while Western Mountain terminates the range on the other side, and at the eastern verge is Newport Mountain, having the fashionable settlement of Bar Harbor at its northern base. There are several beautiful lakes high up among these peaks, the chief being Eagle Lake. Beech and Dog Mountains have peculiarities of outline, and a wider opening between two ponderous peaks shows where the sea has driven-in the strange and deeply carved inlet of Somes' Sound, six miles from the southern side, to almost bisect the island. Hung closely upon the coast of Maine, in Frenchman Bay, this noted island, the ancient Indian Pemetic, is about fifteen miles long, of varying width, and covers a hundred square miles. It has many picturesque features, its mountains, which run in roughly parallel ridges north and south, separated by narrow trough-like valleys, displaying thirteen distinct eminences, the eastern summits being the highest, and terminating generally at or near the water's edge on that side in precipitous cliffs, with the waves dashing against their bases. Upon the southeastern coast, fronting the ocean, as a fitting termination to the grand scenery of these mountain-ranges, the border of the Atlantic is a galaxy of stupendous cliffs, the two most remarkable being of national fame--Schooner Head and Great Head--the full force of old ocean driving against their massive rocky buttresses. Schooner Head has a surface of white rock on its face, which when seen from the sea is fancied to resemble the sails of a small vessel, apparently moving in front of the giant cliff. Great Head, two miles southward, is an abrupt projecting mass of rock, the grim and bold escarpment having deep gashes across the base, evidently worn by the waves. It is the