"From its outlet inward to the southwest is about a mile, where there is a small lake of clear water which has no visible outlet. So far as I can learn, I was the first human visitor to this fabled residence of the Indians' Pamolah. It is not strange that a superstitious people should have many traditions of his wonderful pranks, and be kept away from close engagement with such a foe. When we reach the lake on our way to Ktaadn, it is easy to see the origin of those fears which the Indians are said to have respecting the mountain as the residence of Pamolah or Big Devil. Clouds form in the basin, and are seen whirling out in all directions. Tradition tells a 'long yarn' about a 'handsome squaw' among the Penobscots, who once did a great business in _slaying_ her thousands among the young chiefs of her nation, but was finally taken by Pamolah to Ktaadn, where he now protects himself and his prize from approaching Indians with all his artillery of thunder and hail. "The Indian says that it is 'sartin true, 'cause handsome squaw always ketch em deble;' whether this be true or not, the basin is the birth-place of storms, and I have myself heard the roar of its winds for several miles. But on the 15th of October, when I entered it and went to the upper lake, all was still as the house of nymphs, except when we ourselves spoke, and then the thousand echoes were like the response of fairies bidding us welcome. In this way the music of our voices would find itself in the midst of a numerous choir singing a '_round_.' "The upper lake, which I visited and went around, has an inlet, a white pearly brook, coming out nearly under the chimney, and running a short distance through alders and meadow grass. It has no visible outlet; but on the north side it seems to ooze out among the rocks. We can trace this water-course curving to the east of north till it reaches the lower and largest lake, from which flows a brook sufficiently large for trout to run up. This brook curves to the south, running into West Branch, and is called Roaring Brook. The mountain around this basin is in the form of a horse-shoe, opening to the northeast. From the peak on the northern wing there is another deep gorge, partly encircled with a curving ridge, which some would call another basin. On the north side of this gorge there is a peak nearly equal in height to the one on the south of it, but considerably further east, making this northern basin or gorge open to the southeast. These two basins, from some points of view, seem to be one. From the last-mentioned peak the mountain slopes off from one peak or shoulder to another, perhaps three miles, before it reaches the timber growth. Some of the branches of the Wassataquoik come from this northern part, but some of them from the basin or southern part of Ktaadn.