University of North Carolina Chapel Hill - Yackety Yack Yearbook (Chapel Hill, NC)

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of information and a love of nature which would be a pleasure and a benefit to him as long as he l ived. Even a casual observer can see at once that the countrj ' which lies at the foot of the hills, to the east of the University, and extends on to Durham and to Morrisville, possesses characteristics quite different from those immediately about Chapel Hill. The rocks of this region to the east, which may be seen to begin at the foot of both the Stroud hill on the Durham road and the Cemetery hill on the Raleigh road, are com- paratively soft, red, brown and graj ' sandstones and shales, which nowhere on the surface are to be seen in rugged angular blocks like those on the hills about the town. They decay more rapidly into reddish and grayish sandy soils, which in turn are more easily washed away bj the action of running water than are the stiffer clay loam soils of the hills. And conse- quently during the past centuries and cycles of time the entire surface of country to the east of us has been worn away more rapidly and more extensively through the action of running water ; and now that surface is at a level of from loo to 200 feet lower than the country to the west. As a result of this difference in elevation, the streams which rise to the west of Chapel Hill, like Morgan ' s creek and Borlan ' s creek, at this greater elevation, and flow down into the lower sandstone region to the east of us, have each of them a rapid cur- rent, which has in each case carved out a valley or ravine in which it runs ; and thus it is that both to the north and to the .south of Chapel Hill we have the.se deep and narrow valleys, and between the two (on which the town and University are located) is a narrow ridge, covered for the most part by soil, though over a considerable portion of this surface are scattered boul- ders of rock, and in some cases larger masses of rock are exposed on the surface. Of the water which falls as rain upon the back of this ridge, the larger part of it runs off into the valleys with rapidity, and as it does so it washes away the .soil and carves out smaller irregular ravines down the slopes of the ridge. A portion of this water, however, sinks into the surface soil and reappears at the springs about the margins of the ridge, some but little below the top, like those within the University campus, and others nearer the base of the ridge. Still another por- tion of this water which sinks into the surface .soil gradually finds its way into the wells in the University campus and scattered through all portions of the town. Instead, then, of our drinking water which, in some mysterious way, flows in underground currents from the mountains, we drink that which falls as rain and soaks down through the soil immediately about us. The soil thus acts as a great storehouse of water ; and in long dry seasons, if the supply is not replenished from above by rains, the springs and wells sometimes go dry. It will be readily understood that this carving action of the water would .soon remove all of the surface soil of the ridge but for the fact that the surface is protected by the forest growth which covers it, and the rocks are decaying and thus furnishing new supplies of .soil from below. It will be readily understood, further, that if this decay of the rocks and washing action of the water is continued into the indefinite future, the entire ridge will be removed. But whether at that time the fraternity or anti-fraternity faction of the Uni- versity is in ascendancy — the greatest question on earth ; whether or not then the President has secured

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TItc (HWtl Hill mtsian. Manj ' years before the location here of the Univer- sity the place had become fairly well known as a camp- ing ground for the wagoners between Newbern and Salisbury ; between Petersburg and Pittsboro and other places to the south. The famous spring from which they drank is still to be found near the southwest cor- ner of the campus ; a small chapel stood on the lot now occupied by Mrs. Graves ' residence. The two most noted hills on the roads from Petersburg and from Newbern were those leading up to this camping ground. The old Strowd hill (recently abandoned), on what is now called the Durham road, and the hill on the Raleigh road (now also abolished), lying to the north of Piney Prospect. In view of these conditions it is easy to understand how the place came to be called Chapel Hill; and doubtle.ss many a wagoner commented on the appro- priateness of the name when, after a hard struggle, late in the afternoon, he reached the camping ground at the summit and greeted a fellow wagoner who, even after a harder pull, had just brought his loaded wagon up the other hill. Here, after swapping stories (and perhaps horses), these wearj ' travelers would rest under the shade of the oaks, already then more than a cen- tury old, and which for another century since have given pleasure and comfort to thousands of the young men from this and other States. Doubtless then, as now, everyone who has stopped on this hill long enough to drink the pure and never-failing water, to feel the delightful breezes that move across these hills, to enjoj the shade of these splendid trees, and to see the pic- turesque nooks and brooks that abound, has departed with regret. But few students during their college course tramp over the region around Chapel Hill as they should, and among those who were here years ago I often hear expressed the regret that they had not done more of this. Indeed, the life of the average student illustrates how one-sided an affair the ordinary education is. The average man, though himself a part of nature, seems to go through life with the feeling that, outside of him- self and his fellow-men, there is but little in nature worthy of his consideration. If everj- student who so comes to the University would, during his college life, spend one afternoon per week tramping over the hills and through the ravines within a few miles of the place, not .so much with a view to getting exercise, but with an earnest eifort to learn something about the .soils and the rocks, the springs and the wells and the trees and the shrubs and the flowers and the animals which may come in his way, he would not only come to be a more observant man, but he would gain a fund

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the hearty co-operation of the students — which he ought to have all the while ; or whether the University will at that time have opened its doors to women — as it ought to have done long ago ; or whether it will then be known who steals pants from the faculty, are questions which the future alone can tell. Rain-water and water from these springs which runs down slopes of this ridge, on both the north and south and along its eastern end, has thus carved it into all sorts of irregular forms, the variety of which furnish interesting points of studj-. One of the most interest- ing of these is the ravine which, starting from the New East building extends down through the Battle Park and opens out to the eastward into the valley of Bor- land creek. It is often a good plan to have some method about one ' s pleasure tramps as well as about one ' s work, and it would be a good plan if every student who feels any inclination to tramp over the countrj ' around Chapel Hill would select each time some one of these little ravines ; start at its beginning near the top of the ridge, follow it along its course, observing the location of the springs, character of the .soil and of the trees and other objects lying on its route, and follow it until it opens out in some one of the larger valleys : later follow the ridges and then cross from valley to ridge and from ridge to valley. First of all, one should .see Bailie ' s Park, .should fol- low it from end to end and from side to side. He should see it in the spring, when its flowers are arrayed in all their loveliness; he should see it in the autumn, when the colors of the leaves of the trees and shrubs are so beautifully developed, and he should see it in winter, when the mosses and lichens and a few other hardy plants can be found to the best advantage. Near by one should see Piney Prospecl, from which he overlooks the sandstone valley to the east, and the view from which needs only a large, white farm-house and a small lake to make it all that one could desire. At another time one should wander down the brook which leads .southeast from the University beyond the cemetery (except do not look at the cemeterj ' as you pass by). There one will find, where two little brooks come together, The Meeting of the Waters where the large rock boulders are covered with mosses and ferns and the steep slopes of the hills are covered with flowers and shrubs and trees. No one who can stand the longer tramp should fail to visit Laurel Hill, on Morgan ' s creek, some two miles distant from the University. Here, on the steep north- ern slope of the hill grows luxuriantly the rhododen- dron or laurel, which in some mj-sterious way found a lodgment here and on the north slopes of the Occonee- chee hills near Hillsboro. This is quite diff erent from the ordinary rhododendron of the mountain region, and grows only near the tops of the higher mountains ; consequently its occurrence near Chapel Hill and Hillsboro is difficult to explain. A mile up Morgan ' s creek from Laurel Hill, and also about two miles from the University, is another interesting, picturesque place, Otey ' s Pe real ; a place where rugged, rocky bluffs, covered with ferns, jasmine and other wild flowers, jut against the borders of the creek ; and where Bishop Otey, during his connection with the University, is said to have gone whenever he desired to retire from the noise and bustle of Chapel Hill to a place of ab.solute quiet. Just across the creek from this the kalniia, or ivy, that beautiful shrub which abounds all along the streams in our Piedmont and mountain counties, occurs in considerable abundance, and may be seen in full 19