The Secret of the Storm Country

pitous slopes of East Hill,tapestried in green, etched here and there by stretches of winding whiteroad, and crowned by the buildings on the campus of Cornell University.Stretched from the foot of State Street on either side of the LehighValley track lay the Silent City, its northern end spreading severalmiles up the west shore of the Lake. Its inhabitants were canalers,fishermen and hunters, uneducated, rough and superstitious. They builttheir little huts in the simplest manner out of packing boxes and roughlumber and roofed them with pieces of tin and sheet iron. Squatters theywere appropriately named, because they paid no attention to land titles,but stuck their shacks wherever fancy indicated or convenience dictated.The people of the Silent City slept by day and went very quietly abouttheir work under the cover of darkness, for the game laws compelled thefishermen to pull their nets at night, and the farmers' chickens weremore easily caught, his fruit more easily picked when the sun waswarming China.