| | 41 | Author: | Bennett
Emerson
1822-1905 | Requires cookie* | | | Title: | Walde-Warren:  | | | | Published: | 2003 | | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 | | | | Description: | Far up towards the headwaters
of one of the tributaries
of the Cumberland river,
and not many leagues distant
from that portion of the Cumberland
mountains which divides
the state of Tennessee,
there is a wild, beautiful, romantic
valley. This valley
is about three miles in extent,
oval in shape, with the breadth
of a mile and a half in the
centre, closing up at either
end by the peculiar curve of
the hills which environ it, and
leaving just sufficient space
for the passage of the stream
alluded to, and a traveled
road which winds along its
banks and slightly cuts the
southern base of the projecting
eminences. About central
way of this valley, is a quiet,
picturesque village, of neat
white houses, overlooked by
the mountains, and as rural
and sequestered as one could
wish to find. This village occupies
both sides of the
stream, which is spanned by
an arched wooden bridge, beneath
which the waters
sparkle, foam and roar, as
they dash over a rocky bed,
and dart away with the frolic-someness
of youth. In fact
the stream itself may not inappropriately
be likened to a
youth just freed from the
trammels and helplessness
of infancy, when budding
strength begins to give buoyancy,
independence, ambition,
and love of wild adventure;
for, nurtured among the
mountains, and fed to a good
estate, it has burst from the
control of parental nature, and
now comes hopping, skipping
and dancing along, with childish
playfulness—occasionally
sobered for a moment as it
glides past some steep overhanging
cliff, like a youth full
of timid curiosity on entering
a place of deep shadow—but
in the main, wild, merry and
sportive—laughing in the sunshine—rollicking,
gamboling,
purling and roaring—now
playing hide and seek among
the bushes, and now rushing
away, with might and main,
to explore the world that lays
before it, unconscious that
aught of difficulty may lie in
its path. | | | Similar Items: | Find |
| 42 | Author: | Bennett
Emerson
1822-1905 | Requires cookie* | | | Title: | Wild Scenes on the Frontiers, Or, Heroes of the West | | | | Published: | 2003 | | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 | | | | Description: | We talk of the ferocity, the vindictiveness, the treachery,
and the cruelty of the native savage; and, painting him
in the darkest colors, tell how, when his hunting grounds
covered the sites of our now proudest cities, he was wont
to steal down upon a few harmless whites, our forefathers,
and butcher them in cold blood, sparing neither sex nor
age, except for a painful captivity, to end perhaps in
the most demoniac tortures; and we dwell upon the
theme, till our little innocent children shudder and creep
close to our sides, and look fearfully around them, and
perhaps wonder how the good God, of whom they have
also heard us speak, could ever have permitted such human
monsters to encumber His fair and beautiful earth. But
do we reverse the medal and show the picture which
impartial Truth has stamped upon the other side—and
which, in a great measure, stands as a cause to the opposite
effect—stands as a cause for savage ferocity, vindictiveness,
treachery and cruelty? Do we tell our young
and eager listeners that the poor Indian, living up to the
light he had, and not unfrequently beyond it, knew no
better than to turn, like the worm when trampled upon,
and bite the foot that crushed him? That we had taken
the land of his father's graves and driven him from his
birthright hunting grounds? That we had stolen his cattle,
robbed him of his food, destroyed his growing fields,
burned his wigwams, and murdered his brothers, fathers,
wives and little ones, besides instigating tribe to war
against tribe—and that, knowing nothing of the Christian
code, to return good for evil, he fulfilled the law of his
nature and education in taking his “great revenge” upon
any of the pale-faced race he should chance to meet? No!
we seldom show this side of the medal—for the natural
inquiry of the innocent listener might contain an unpleasant
rebuke: | | | Similar Items: | Find |
| 44 | Author: | Ward
Artemus
1834-1867 | Requires cookie* | | | Title: | Artemus Ward's panorama | | | | Published: | 2003 | | | | Subjects: | University of Virginia Library, Text collection | UVA-LIB-Text | University of Virginia Library, Early American Fiction, 1789-1875 | UVA-LIB-EarlyAmFict1789-1875 | | | | Description: | YOU are entirely welcome ladies and gentlemen
to my little picture-shop.1
1 “My little picture-shop.”—I have already stated that the
room used was the lesser of the two on the first-floor of the
Egyptian Hall. The panorama was to the left on entering,
and Artemus Ward stood at the south-east corner facing the
door. He had beside him a music-stand, on which for the
first few days he availed himself of the assistance afforded by
a sheet of foolscap on which all his “cues” were written out
in a large hand. The proscenium was covered with dark
cloth, and the picture bounded by a great gilt frame. On the
rostrum behind the lecturer was a little door giving admission
to the space behind the picture where the piano was placed.
Through this door Artemus would disappear occasionally in
the course of the evening, either to instruct his pianist to play
a few more bars of music, to tell his assistants to roll the
picture more quickly or more slowly, or to give some instructions
to the man who worked “the moon.” The little
lecture-room was thronged nightly during the very few
weeks of its being open.
My dear Sir,—My wife was dangerously unwell for over sixteen
years. She was so weak that she could not lift a teaspoon to her mouth.
But in a fortunate moment she commenced reading one of your lectures.
She got better at once. She gained strength so rapidly that she lifted the
cottage piano quite a distance from the floor, and then tipped it over on
to her mother-in-law, with whom she had had some little trouble. We
like your lectures very much. Please send me a barrel of them. If you
should require any more recommendations, you can get any number of
them in this place, at two shillings each, the price I charge for this one,
and I trust you may be ever happy. | | | Similar Items: | Find |
| 46 | Author: | Melville
Herman
1819-1891 | Requires cookie* | | | Title: | Typee | | | | 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 | Wiley & Putnam's library of American books | wiley & putnams library of american books | | | | Description: | Six months at sea! Yes, reader, as I live, six months out of
sight of land; cruising after the sperm-whale beneath the scorching
sun of the Line, and tossed on the billows of the wide-rolling
Pacific—the sky above, the sea around, and nothing else!
Weeks and weeks ago our fresh provisions were all exhausted.
There is not a sweet potato left; not a single yam. Those glorious
bunches of bananas which once decorated our stern and
quarter-deck, have, alas, disappeared! and the delicious oranges
which hung suspended from our tops and stays—they, too, are
gone! Yes, they are all departed, and there is nothing left us
but salt-horse and sea-biscuit. Oh! ye state-room sailors, who
make so much ado about a fourteen days' passage across the
Atlantic; who so pathetically relate the privations and hardships
of the sea, where, after a day of breakfasting, lunching, dining
off five courses, chatting, playing whist, and drinking champaignpunch,
it was your hard lot to be shut up in little cabinets of mahogany
and maple, and sleep for ten hours, with nothing to disturb
you but “those good-for-nothing tars, shouting and tramping over
head,”—what would ye say to our six months out of sight of land? Returning health and peace of mind gave a new interest to everything
around me. I sought to diversify my time by as many
enjoyments as lay within my reach. Bathing in company with
troops of girls formed one of my chief amusements. We sometimes
enjoyed the recreation in the waters of a miniature lake,
into which the central stream of the valley expanded. This
lovely sheet of water was almost circular in figure, and about
three hundred yards across. Its beauty was indescribable. All
around its banks waved luxuriant masses of tropical foliage,
soaring high above which were seen, here and there, the symmetrical
shaft of the cocoa-nut tree, surmounted by its tuft of
graceful branches, drooping in the air like so many waving ostrich
plumes. | | | Similar Items: | Find |
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