mountaineers still call this system
collectively the Alleghanies, but the U. S. Geological Survey has given
it a more distinctive name, the Unakas. While the Blue Ridge has only
seven peaks that rise above 5,000 feet, the Unakas have 125 summits
exceeding 5,000, and ten that are over 6,000 feet.

Connecting the Unaka chain with the Blue Ridge are several transverse
ranges, the Stone, Beech, Roan, Yellow, Black, Newfound, Pisgah, Balsam,
Cowee, Nantahala, Tusquitee, and a few minor mountains, which as a whole
are much higher than the Blue Ridge, 156 summits rising over 5,000
feet, and thirty-six over 6,000 feet above sea-level.

In northern Georgia the Unakas and the Blue Ridge gradually fade away
into straggling ridges and foothills, which extend into small parts of
South Carolina and Alabama.

The Cumberland Plateau is not attached to either of these mountain
systems, but is rather a prolongation of the roughs of eastern Kentucky.
It is separated from the Unakas by the broad valley of the Tennessee
River. The Plateau rises very abruptly from the surrounding plains. It
consists mainly of tableland gashed by streams that have cut their way
down in deep narrow gulches with precipitous sides.

Most of the literature about our Southern mountaineers refers only to
the inhabitants of the comparatively meagre hills of eastern Kentucky,
or to the Cumberlands of Tennessee. Little has been written about the
real mountaineers of southwestern Virginia, western North Carolina, and
the extreme north of Georgia. The great mountain masses still await
their annalist, their artist, and, in some places, even their explorer.

CHAPTER II

"THE BACK OF BEYOND"

Of certain remote parts of Erin, Jane Barlow says: "In Bogland, if you
inquire the address of such or such person, you will hear not very
infrequently that he or she lives 'off away at the Back of Beyond.'... A
Traveler to the Back of Beyond may consider himself rather exceptionally
fortunate, should he find that he is able to arrive at his destination
by any mode of conveyance other than 'the two standin' feet of him.'
Often enough the last stage of his journey proceeds down some boggy
_boreen_, or up some craggy hill-track, inaccessible to any wheel or
hoof that ever was shod."

So in Appalachia, one steps shortly from the railway into the primitive.
Most of the river valleys are narrow. In their bottoms the soil is rich,
the farms well kept and generous, the owners