I went three times up the Hudson; and if I lived at New York, should be tempted to ascend it three times a-week during the summer. Yet the greater number of ladies on board the steam-boat remained in the close cabin, among the crying babies, even while we were passing the finest scenery of the river. They do not share the taste of a gentleman who, when I was there, actually made the steam-boat his place of abode during the entire summer season, sleeping on board at Albany and New York on alternate nights, and gazing at the shores all the day long, with apparently undiminishing delight.

The first time we went up, the early part of the morning was foggy, and the mist hung about the ridge of the Palisades,—the rocky western barrier of the river. There were cottages perched here and there, and trees were sprinkled in the crevices; and a little yellow strand, just wide enough for the fisherman and his boat, now and then intervened between the waters and the perpendicular rock. In the shadowy recesses of the shore were sloops moored. Seagulls dipped their wings in the gleams of the river, and the solitary fish-hawk sailed slowly over the woods.