delphia from Hudson. The Lebanon
Valley, in the northeastern part of the county, is considered one of
the most beautiful in the State, and said by Sir Henry Vincent, the
English orator, to resemble the far-famed valley of Llangollen, in
Wales. The Wy-a-mon-ack Creek flows through the valley, joining its
waters with the Kinderhook. Quechee Lake is near at hand, where Miss
Warner was born, author of "Queechee" and the "Wide Wide World."

* * *

Welcome ye pleasant dales and hills,
Where dream-like passed my early days!
Ye cliffs and glens and laughing rills
That sing unconscious hymns of praise!

_Wallace Bruce._

* * *

=Lindenwald=, a solid and substantial residence, home of President
Martin Van Buren, where he died in 1862, is two miles from the
pleasant village of Kinderhook. Columbia County just missed the proud
distinction of rearing two presidents, as Samuel J. Tilden was born in
the town of Lebanon. Elisha Williams, John Van Buren and many others
have given lustre to her legal annals.

* * *

Ever fonder, ever dearer
Seems our youth that hastened by,
And we love to live in memory
When our fond hopes fade and die.

_Wallace Bruce._

* * *

=Hudson to Albany.=

=Athens.=--Directly opposite Hudson, and connected with it by ferry,
is the classically named village of Athens. An old Mahican settlement
known as Potick was located a little back from the river. We are now
in the midst of the great

="Ice Industry,"= which reaches from below Staatsburgh to Castleton
and Albany, well described by John Burroughs in his article on the
Hudson: "No man sows, yet many men reap a harvest from the Hudson. Not
the least important is the ice harvest, which is eagerly looked for,
and counted upon by hundreds, yes, thousands of laboring men along its
course. Ice or no ice sometimes means bread or no bread to scores of
families, and it means added or diminished comforts to many more. It
is a crop that takes two or three weeks of rugged winter weather to
grow, and, if the water is very roily or brackish, even longer. It is
seldom worked till it presents seven or eight inches of clear water
ice. Men go out from time to time and examine it, as the farmer goes
out and examines his grain or grass, to see when it will do to cut. If
there comes a deep fall of snow the ice is 'pricked' so as to let the
water up through and form snow ice. A band of fifteen or twenty men,