{"id":"01KG8AKFNHA0D2VWA86YCHT2DQ","cid":"bafkreicf37pmoa6o75xcb3fepieof52mtitdji3gchqivkb4jh72xshyju","type":"chunk","properties":{"end_line":190,"extracted_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:05.590Z","extracted_by":"structure-extraction-lambda","label":"Chunk 1","source_file":"01KG89J1DKC9HHJRKY25JZBEXW","start_line":125,"text":"CHAPTER I.\r\nTHE BIRTHPLACE OF ISRAEL.\r\n\r\n\r\nThe traveller who at the present day is content to travel in the good\r\nold Asiatic style, neither rushed along by a locomotive, nor dragged by\r\na stage-coach; who is willing to enjoy hospitalities at far-scattered\r\nfarmhouses, instead of paying his bill at an inn; who is not to be\r\nfrightened by any amount of loneliness, or to be deterred by the\r\nroughest roads or the highest hills; such a traveller in the eastern\r\npart of Berkshire, Massachusetts, will find ample food for poetic\r\nreflection in the singular scenery of a country, which, owing to the\r\nruggedness of the soil and its lying out of the track of all public\r\nconveyances, remains almost as unknown to the general tourist as the\r\ninterior of Bohemia.\r\n\r\nTravelling northward from the township of Otis, the road leads for\r\ntwenty or thirty miles towards Windsor, lengthwise upon that long\r\nbroken spur of heights which the Green Mountains of Vermont send into\r\nMassachusetts. For nearly the whole of the distance, you have the\r\ncontinual sensation of being upon some terrace in the moon. The feeling\r\nof the plain or the valley is never yours; scarcely the feeling of the\r\nearth. Unless by a sudden precipitation of the road you find yourself\r\nplunging into some gorge, you pass on, and on, and on, upon the crests\r\nor slopes of pastoral mountains, while far below, mapped out in its\r\nbeauty, the valley of the Housatonie lies endlessly along at your feet.\r\nOften, as your horse gaining some lofty level tract, flat as a table,\r\ntrots gayly over the almost deserted and sodded road, and your admiring\r\neye sweeps the broad landscape beneath, you seem to be Bootes driving\r\nin heaven. Save a potato field here and there, at long intervals, the\r\nwhole country is either in wood or pasture. Horses, cattle and sheep\r\nare the principal inhabitants of these mountains. But all through the\r\nyear lazy columns of smoke, rising from the depths of the forest,\r\nproclaim the presence of that half-outlaw, the charcoal-burner; while\r\nin early spring added curls of vapor show that the maple sugar-boiler\r\nis also at work. But as for farming as a regular vocation, there is not\r\nmuch of it here. At any rate, no man by that means accumulates a\r\nfortune from this thin and rocky soil, all whose arable parts have long\r\nsince been nearly exhausted.\r\n\r\nYet during the first settlement of the country, the region was not\r\nunproductive. Here it was that the original settlers came, acting upon\r\nthe principle well known to have regulated their choice of site,\r\nnamely, the high land in preference to the low, as less subject to the\r\nunwholesome miasmas generated by breaking into the rich valleys and\r\nalluvial bottoms of primeval regions. By degrees, however, they quitted\r\nthe safety of this sterile elevation, to brave the dangers of richer\r\nthough lower fields. So that, at the present day, some of those\r\nmountain townships present an aspect of singular abandonment. Though\r\nthey have never known aught but peace and health, they, in one lesser\r\naspect at least, look like countries depopulated by plague and war.\r\nEvery mile or two a house is passed untenanted. The strength of the\r\nframe-work of these ancient buildings enables them long to resist the\r\nencroachments of decay. Spotted gray and green with the weather-stain,\r\ntheir timbers seem to have lapsed back into their woodland original,\r\nforming part now of the general picturesqueness of the natural scene.\r\nThey are of extraordinary size, compared with modern farmhouses. One\r\npeculiar feature is the immense chimney, of light gray stone,\r\nperforating the middle of the roof like a tower.\r\n\r\nOn all sides are seen the tokens of ancient industry. As stone abounds\r\nthroughout these mountains, that material was, for fences, as ready to\r\nthe hand as wood, besides being much more durable. Consequently the\r\nlandscape is intersected in all directions with walls of uncommon\r\nneatness and strength.\r\n\r","title":"Chunk 1"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KG8AJHFMBAB9MB1FX78RYMZR","peer_type":"chapter","predicate":"in"},{"peer":"01KG89J1DKC9HHJRKY25JZBEXW","peer_type":"file","predicate":"extractedFrom"},{"peer":"01KG89HMDZKNY753EZE1CJ8HZW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KG8AKFNMVPN79MH0KNGE2B4T","peer_type":"chunk","predicate":"next"}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-01-30T20:48:05.809Z","ts":"2026-01-30T20:48:12.981Z","edited_by":{"method":"manual","user_id":"01KFF0H3YRP9ZSM033AM0QJ47H"}}