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University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875[X]
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1Author:  Mathews Cornelius 1817-1889Requires cookie*
 Title:  Big Abel, and the little Manhattan  
 Published:  1997 
 Subjects:  University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 
 Description: Whoever has sailed up or down the East River in a fog, or driven to Hallet's Cove, Long Island, on a dusty day, or walked the Third Avenue in the moonlight, has been beset by the vision of a great white tower, rising, ghost-like, in the air, and holding all the neighborhood in subjection to its repose and supernatural port. The Shot-Tower is a strange old fellow, to be sure! 'Spite of that incessant buzzing in his head, he holds himself as high and grandly, as though he hadn't the trouble of making shot for the six-and-twenty United States. He never dozes or nods, even in the summer noon; nor does he fall asleep in the most crickety nights, but winks, with that iron top of his, at all the stars, as they come up, one by one; and outwatches them all. There he is, gaunt and clean, as a ghost in a new shroud, every day in the year. Build as you may, old Gotham! Hammer and ding and trowel on all sides of him, if you choose,—you cannot stir him an inch, nor sully the whiteness in which he sees himself clothed, in that pure glass of his of Kipp's Bay! If you have seen him once, you know him always. A sturdy Shot-Tower to be sure!—and go where you will, you carry him with you. He is the Ghost of New York, gone into the suburbs to meditate on the wickedness of mankind, and haunt the Big City, in many a dream of war, and gun-shot wounds, and pattering carnage, when he falls asleep.
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