We journeyed from Mount Œta to North Adams, leaving State Street about ten o’clock, and ascended the path to Witt’s Ledge. Soon we rounded the Ragged Mountains, entering the woods near Crystal Spring, where we descended the Cascade ravine. Its rocky chasm is beautifully draped with the Common Polypody Ferns, and delicate tufts of Maiden-Hair Spleenwort, which clings in the fissured ledges. The bed-rock appears to be a flinty slate, similar to that of the Tunnel Mountain. It is not so favorable to the growth of the rarer ferns—such as the Rue-in-the-Wall—as the lime-rock formation of Gregor Rocks in Pownal. Large boulders lie in the heart of the brook bed, and the hillsides are clothed with primeval hemlocks. Just above the brow of the Cascade, I found a few Walking Ferns. The ravine is accessible to this point, but here I was forced back and climbed the southern bank to the path leading around to the waterfalls. High boots supplied with hob-nails are indispensable to safety in such climbing in the channels of streams. [Illustration: =The Cascade of Notch Brook, at the Base of Mount Greylock’s Brotherhood, North Adams, Massachusetts.= “_The highest lands of Berkshire’s noble hills_ _Shall sweetly ring with song and louder trills;_ _And many a spring within the Bellows dumb_ _Shall swell and flow with swift, yet soothing hum._” G. G. N.] From this point we retraced our steps to the Pent Road, leading up through Snuff Hollow to the City’s reservoir, at the junction of the South Adams Road. Here we trudged up the hill and entered the Notch highway at Walden’s farmhouse. Greylock Park Road turns off here through the pastures, around Mount Williams. We, however, continued straight ahead toward the source of The Notch Brook,—Hawthorne’s and Thoreau’s routes, long before roads to Greylock were available. It was steady climbing, until at last we reached the pasture-land where the streams from Greylock’s Brotherhood divide; there is a stream beyond the ridge, flowing southward to South Adams, while those on the north side flow down Notch Valley to the Hoosac River. Hawthorne often sought the seclusion of this valley, and in his _American Notes_, under date of September 9, 1838, describes these rugged slopes. He not only followed up the North Notch, but descended the South Notch in the rocky course of the stream homeward through South Adams. He speaks of inquiring at a cottage his way to South Village, which was “across lots,” into the road near the Quaker Meeting-house, surrounded by grave-stones. He also drank of the region’s spring water,—the “most delicious” he ever tasted,—“pure, fresh, almost sparkling, exhilarating,—such water as Adam and Eve drank.”[51]