The Hudson: Three Centuries of History, Romance and InventionBruce, Wallace
History
The Hudson: Three Centuries of History, Romance and Invention
Bruce, Wallace
Hudson River (N.Y. and N.J.) -- Guidebooks
Strangely enough the altitude of the mountains at the southern portal
of the Highlands has been greatly overrated. The formerly accepted
height of Anthony's Nose has been reduced by the Geological Survey
from 1,228 feet to 900. It has, however, an illustrious christening,
and according to various historians several godfathers. One says
it was named after St. Anthony the Great, the first institutor of
monastic life, born A. D. 251, at Coma, in Heraclea, a town in Upper
Egypt. Irving's humorous account is, however, quite as probable that
it was _derived_ from the nose of Antony Van Corlear, the illustrious
trumpeter of Peter Stuyvesant. "Now thus it happened that bright and
early in the morning the good Antony, having washed his burly visage,
was leaning over the quarter-railing of the galley, contemplating it
in the glassy waves below. Just at this moment the illustrious
sun, breaking in all his splendor from behind a high bluff of the
Highlands, did dart one of his most potent beams full upon the
refulgent _nose_ of the sounder of brass, the reflection of which
shot straightway down hissing hot into the water, and killed a mighty
sturgeon that was sporting beside the vessel. When this astonishing
miracle was made known to the Governor, and he tasted of the unknown
fish, he marveled exceedingly; and, as a monument thereof, he gave the
name of Anthony's Nose to a stout promontory in the neighborhood,
and it has continued to be called Anthony's Nose ever since." It
was called by the Indians "Kittatenny," a Delaware term, signifying
"endless hills." The stream flowing into the river south of Anthony's
Nose is known as the Brocken Kill, broken into beautiful cascades from
mountain source to mouth.
* * *
The beautiful and in some places highly singular
banks of the Hudson rendered a voyage both amusing
and interesting, while the primitive manners of the inhabitants
diverted the gay and idle and pleased
the thoughtful and speculative.
_Mrs. Grant of Laggan._
* * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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