A visitor’s impressions of Pottsville, when first beholding its spires of churches and evidences of industry and thrift, from the heights above, cannot well be other than pleasing. The scenery encompassing the town is bold and rugged, and the descent by car to the Schuylkill, and Norwegian Creek, on whose high banks it is lodged, rapid and inspiring; and once having arrived in its handsomely-built streets, to one unaccustomed to see cities perched upon steep mountainsides, the sight is well calculated to evolve surprise. Having some twelve thousand inhabitants, there is in it much enlightenment and great wealth. Abundantly provided with handsome and elegant churches and school-houses, imposing business structures and beautiful residences, Pottsville enjoys an enviable reputation as a healthful and pleasant place for summer residence. One especial point of interest is the costly and artistic monument to Henry Clay. It is of pure white marble, in the shape of a fluted column, rising from a massive square pedestal, and surmounted by a full-length statue of the great Defender. The hotels—among which stand pre-eminent Pennsylvania Hall and the Exchange—are unsurpassed in the State. There is a large and commodious court-house, and a county jail rivaling in size and completeness of officers and appointments some of the larger State penitentiaries. It also has an Academy of Music, in which operatic and theatrical entertainments are given by traveling troupes. Pottsville is the concentrating point for an extended radius of rich mining country, and the depot of supplies for an equally wide circle. The surroundings in this part of Schuylkill County are, some of them, deserving of national celebrity. Among these is Mount Carbon, towering in height, broad, black, gloomy and stupendous; and, at its base, stand the Mansion House—a very agreeable place of resort—and a number of fashionable residences. Further away is a bit of natural landscape, pronounced one of the most striking in the country. It is “Tumbling Run Dam,” which has been painted by several master hands, and, in picturesqueness and sublimity, is worthy the drawing many times more. Here the waters of the stream, cut across by a heavy obstruction of sturdy rock, are turned abruptly aside, and rush, in a foaming, misty torrent, down, down, a steep side descent, torn and divided into innumerable smaller cascades, again uniting with the still, broad expanse below. Tall pines, stunted cedars, and noble oaks border the river on either shore, and, under the shadow of the overhanging barrier, are piled, in artistic confusion, great heaps of sharp and jagged rocks, seemingly rent from adjacent peaks by giant hands. To change the subject from the sublime to the real and practical: