It was impossible to get much information about our route into Tennessee, except that we should go by Paint Rock, and cross Paint Mountain.  Late one morning,—­a late start is inevitable here, —­accompanied by a cavalcade, we crossed the river by the rope ferry, and trotted down the pretty road, elevated above the stream and tree-shaded, offering always charming glimpses of swift water and overhanging foliage (the railway obligingly taking the other side of the river), to Paint Rock,—­six miles.  This Paint Rock is a naked precipice by the roadside, perhaps sixty feet high, which has a large local reputation.  It is said that its face shows painting done by the Indians, and hieroglyphics which nobody can read.  On this bold, crumbling cliff, innumerable visitors have written their names.  We stared at it a good while to discover the paint and hieroglyphics, but could see nothing except iron stains.  Round the corner is a farmhouse and place of call for visitors, a neat cottage, with a display of shells and minerals and flower-pots; and here we turned north crossed the little stream called Paint River, the only clear water we had seen in a month, passed into the State of Tennessee, and by a gentle ascent climbed Paint Mountain.  The open forest road, with the murmur of the stream below, was delightfully exhilarating, and as we rose the prospect opened,—­the lovely valley below, Bald Mountains behind us, and the Butt Mountains rising as we came over the ridge.

Nobody on the way, none of the frowzy women or unintelligent men, knew anything of the route, or could give us any information of the country beyond.  But as we descended in Tennessee the country and the farms decidedly improved,—­apple-trees and a grapevine now and then.

A ride of eight miles brought us to Waddle’s, hungry and disposed to receive hospitality.  We passed by an old farm building to a new two-storied, gayly painted house on a hill.  We were deceived by appearances.  The new house, with a new couple in it, had nothing to offer us except some buttermilk.  Why should anybody be obliged to feed roving strangers?  As to our horses, the young woman with a baby in her arms declared,

“We’ve got nothing for stock but roughness; perhaps you can get something at the other house.”

“Roughness,” we found out at the other house, meant hay in this region.  We procured for the horses a light meal of green oats, and for our own dinner we drank at the brook and the Professor produced a few sonnets.  On this sustaining repast we fared on nearly twelve miles farther, through a rolling, good farming country, offering little for comment, in search of a night’s lodging with one of the brothers Snap.  But one brother declined our company on the plea that his wife was sick, and the other because his wife lived in Greenville, and we found ourselves as dusk came on without shelter in a tavernless land.  Between the two refusals we enjoyed the most picturesque bit of scenery of