Explore "The Panther of Jolton's Ridge" by Mary Noailles Murfree on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
A certain wild chasm, cut deep into the very heart of a spur of the Great Smoky Mountains, is spanned by a network, which seen from above is the heavy interlacing timbers of a railroad bridge thrown across the narrow space from one great cliff to the other, but seen from the depths of the gorge below it seems merely a fantastic gossamer web fretting the blue sky.
It often trembles with other sounds than the reverberating mountain thunder and beneath other weight than the heavy fall of the mountain rain. Trains flash across it at all hours of the night and day; in the darkness the broad glare of the headlight and the flying column of pursuing sparks have all the scenic effect of some strange uncanny meteor, with the added emphasis of a thunderous roar and a sulphurous smell; in the sunshine there skims over it at intervals a cloud of white vapor and a swift black shadow.