settlers are far between, and there are few to cross its stream;
enjoying in solitude its cascades still unknown to fame; by long
ranges of mountains of Sandwich and of Squam, slumbering like
tumuli of Titans, with the peaks of Moosehillock, the Haystack,
and Kearsarge reflected in its waters; where the maple and the
raspberry, those lovers of the hills, flourish amid temperate
dews;--flowing long and full of meaning, but untranslatable as
its name Pemigewasset, by many a pastured Pelion and Ossa, where
unnamed muses haunt, tended by Oreads, Dryads, Naiads, and
receiving the tribute of many an untasted Hippocrene. There are
earth, air, fire, and water,--very well, this is water, and down
it comes.

Such water do the gods distil,
And pour down every hill
For their New England men;
A draught of this wild nectar bring,
And I'll not taste the spring
Of Helicon again.

Falling all the way, and yet not discouraged by the lowest fall.
By the law of its birth never to become stagnant, for it has come
out of the clouds, and down the sides of precipices worn in the
flood, through beaver-dams broke loose, not splitting but
splicing and mending itself, until it found a breathing-place in
this low land. There is no danger now that the sun will steal it
back to heaven again before it reach the sea, for it has a
warrant even to recover its own dews into its bosom again with
interest at every eve.