>From the base of the mountain a road is very well engineered, in easy grades for carriages, to the top; but it was in poor repair and stony.We mounted slowly through splendid forests, specially of fine chestnuts and hemlocks.This big timber continues till within a mile and a half of the summit by the winding road, really within a short distance of the top.Then there is a narrow belt of scrubby hardwood, moss-grown, and then large balsams, which crown the mountain.As soon as we came out upon the southern slope we found great open spaces, covered with succulent grass, and giving excellent pasturage to cattle.These rich mountain meadows are found on all the heights of this region.The surface of Roan is uneven, and has no one culminating peak that commands the country, like the peak of Mount Washington, but several eminences within its range of probably a mile and a half, where various views can be had.Near the highest point, sheltered from the north by balsams, stands a house of entertainment, with a detached cottage, looking across the great valley to the Black Mountain range.The surface of the mountain is pebbly, but few rocks crop out; no ledges of any size are seen except at a distance from the hotel, on the north side, and the mountain consequently lacks that savage, unsubduable aspect which the White Hills of New Hampshire have.It would, in fact, have been difficult to realize that we were over six thousand feet above the sea, except for that pallor in the sunlight, that atmospheric thinness and want of color which is an unpleasant characteristic of high altitudes.To be sure, there is a certain brilliancy in the high air,--it is apt to be foggy on Roan,--and objects appear in sharp outline, but I have often experienced on such places that feeling of melancholy, which would, of course, deepen upon us all if we were sensible that the sun was gradually withdrawing its power of warmth and light.The black balsam is neither a cheerful nor a picturesque tree; the frequent rains and mists on Roan keep the grass and mosses green, but the ground damp.Doubtless a high mountain covered with vegetation has its compensation, but for me the naked granite rocks in sun and shower are more cheerful.
The advantage of Roan is that one can live there and be occupied for a long time in mineral and botanical study.Its mild climate, moisture, and great elevation make it unique in this country for the botanist.The variety of plants assembled there is very large, and there are many, we were told, never or rarely found elsewhere in the United States.At any rate, the botanists rave about Roan Mountain, and spend weeks at a time on it.We found there ladies who could draw for us Grey's lily (then passed), and had kept specimens of the rhododendron (not growing elsewhere in this region) which has a deep red, almost purple color.
The hotel (since replaced by a good house) was a rude mountain structure, with a couple of comfortable rooms for office and sitting-room, in which big wood fires were blazing; for though the thermometer might record 60 deg., as it did when we arrived, fire was welcome.Sleeping-places partitioned off in the loft above gave the occupants a feeling of camping out, all the conveniences being primitive; and when the wind rose in the night and darkness, and the loose boards rattled and the timbers creaked, the sensation was not unlike that of being at sea.The hotel was satisfactorily kept, and Southern guests, from as far south as New Orleans, were spending the season there, and not finding time hang heavy on their hands.This statement is perhaps worth more than pages of description as to the character of Roan, and its contrast to Mount Washington.
The summer weather is exceedingly uncertain on all these North Carolina mountains; they are apt at any moment to be enveloped in mist; and it would rather rain on them than not.On the afternoon of our arrival there was fine air and fair weather, but not a clear sky.
The distance was hazy, but the outlines were preserved.We could see White Top, in Virginia; Grandfather Mountain, a long serrated range;the twin towers of Linville; and the entire range of the Black Mountains, rising from the valley, and apparently lower than we were.
They get the name of Black from the balsams which cover the summits.
The rain on Roan was of less annoyance by reason of the delightful company assembled at the hotel, which was in a manner at home there, and, thrown upon its own resources, came out uncommonly strong in agreeableness.There was a fiddle in the house, which had some of the virtues of that celebrated in the history of old Mark Langston;the Professor was enabled to produce anything desired out of the literature of the eighteenth century; and what with the repartee of bright women, big wood fires, reading, and chat, there was no dull day or evening on Roan.I can fancy, however, that it might tire in time, if one were not a botanist, without the resource of women's society.The ladies staying here were probably all accomplished botanists, and the writer is indebted to one of them for a list of plants found on Roan, among which is an interesting weed, catalogued as Humana, perplexia negligens.The species is, however, common elsewhere.
