After leaving Clinton, where the road from Yale comes in, the road began to ascend, and on the right we passed an extraordinary chasm. Commencing by a gradual depression at the northern end, it became a deep fissure in the rocks about a quarter of a mile in length, ending abruptly in the valley to the south. The depth of the gulf is some 400 or 500 feet, and its width about the same. The sides of the chasm were perpendicular and smooth, as if the rocks had been split asunder. The road still went up, and after a few miles we reached table-land, with a barren sandy soil, thickly covered with small spruce, and intersected by numerous lakes. The accommodation along the road was everywhere miserable enough, but after leaving Clinton it became abominable. The only bed was the floor of the “wayside houses,” which occur every ten miles or so, and are named the “Fiftieth” or “Hundredth Mile House,” according to the number of the nearest mile-post. Our solitary blankets formed poor padding against the inequalities of the rough-hewn boards, and equally ineffectual to keep out the cold draughts which whistled under the ill-fitting door of the hut. A wayside house on the road to the mines is merely a rough log hut of a single room; at one end a large open chimney, and at the side a bar counter, behind which are shelves with rows of bottles containing the vilest of alcoholic drinks. The miners on their journey up or down, according to the season--men of every nationality--Englishmen, Irishmen, and Scotchmen, Frenchmen, Italians, and Germans, Yankees and niggers, Mexicans and South Sea Islanders--come dropping in towards evening in twos and threes, divest themselves of the roll of blankets slung upon their backs, and depositing them upon the floor, use them as a seat, for the hut possesses few or none. The next thing is to have a “drink,” which is proposed by some one of the party less “hard up” than his friends, and the rest of the company present are generally invited to join in. After supper and pipes, and more “drinks,” each unrolls his blankets, and chooses his bed for the night. Some elect to sleep on the counter, and some on the flour sacks piled at one end of the room, whilst the rest stretch themselves on the floor, with their feet to the fire. Occasionally a few commence gambling, which, with an accompaniment of drinking and blasphemy, goes on for the greater part of the night.