Chapter I: Front Matter

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CON-FRONT-US PIECE.

THE COMPANY OF DISTINGUISHED COMEDIANS EXPRESSLY ENGAGED FOR THIS
PERFORMANCE.
]

------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE
COMIC HISTORY
OF
THE UNITED STATES,

FROM A PERIOD PRIOR TO THE DISCOVERY OF AMERICA
TO TIMES LONG SUBSEQUENT TO THE PRESENT.

BY JOHN D. SHERWOOD.

“Quamquam ridentem dicere verum
Quid vetat?”
HORACE, Satire I.

“A man may say a Wise thing though he say it with a Laugh.”
_Old Song._

WITH ORIGINAL ILLUSTRATIONS BY HARRY SCRATCHLY.

BOSTON:
FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO.
1870.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by

FIELDS, OSGOOD, & CO.,

in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the District of
Massachusetts.

WELCH,
BIGELOW,
& CO.

UNIVERSITY
PRESS.
]

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DEDICATION.
——●——
TO MY WIFE.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.

——●——

SUBJECTS.

THE COMPANY OF DISTINGUISHED COMEDIANS EXPRESSLY Con-front-us Piece.
ENGAGED FOR THIS PERFORMANCE

COLUMBUS DISCOVERS AMERICA Page 39

THE READER SCRAPES ACQUAINTANCE WITH THE AUTHOR 41

EXTERNAL VIEW OF THE AUTHOR’S HEAD 48

INTERNAL VIEW OF THE SAME 49

AMERICA BEFORE ITS DISCOVERY 55

TIME STOCKING AMERICA 59

THE PICTURED ROCKS AT TAUNTON ATTRIBUTED TO THE NORTHMEN, OR 66
SKALDS, OF THE ELEVENTH CENTURY

LANDING OF COLUMBUS 68

DISCOVERY OF NEWFOUNDLAND 71

SIR WALTER RALEIGH INTRODUCES SMOKING TO THE ENGLISH COURT 74

AN INDIAN RESERVATION 81

THE FIRST YEAR’S CROP IN THE NEW SETTLEMENTS 87

DRAKE WITH HIS FLEET SAILS ROUND THE WORLD 94

MAP OF MARYLAND 105

ORIGINAL FULL-LENGTH PORTRAIT OF JOHN SMITH 110

LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS AND MOTHERS 118

THE SPIRITS OF THE AGE LAYING THE FOUNDATIONS OF NEW YORK 128

DUTCH GENTLEMAN TRADING WITH THE INDIANS 134

NEW JERSEY SETTLED 142

FULL-LENGTH PORTRAIT OF PENN 144

THE CITY OF BROTHERLY LOVE IN 1681 AND 1869 147

TEMPTATION; OR, THE FIRST AMERICAN “RING” 153

WOMAN’S RIGHTS IN 1637 158

THE PENALTIES OF WITCHCRAFT IN 1692 AND 1869 171

COTTON MATHER EXORCISING A WITCH 176

EXPRESSING A COLONIAL GOVERNOR FROM LONDON 189

THE SCHOOLMASTER ABROAD 201

JOLIET AND MARQUETTE DOWN THE MISSISSIPPI 216

THE “PETTICOAT INSURRECTION” IN MOBILE IN 1706 221

THE CHAMPIONSHIP FOR THE AMERICAN BELT 227

BRITANNIA FORCES TEA ON HER TROUBLESOME CHILD 236

THE SURPRISE PARTY TO FORT TICONDEROGA 247

WASHINGTON REVIEWS THE TROOPS AT CAMBRIDGE 251

A PURITAN BREAKFAST 259

ENGLISH POOR RELATIONS EATING COLONISTS OUT OF HOUSE AND 276
HOME

PUTNAM’S HOME-STRETCH DOWN HORSE-NECK 293

NEW YORK EVACUATED, NOVEMBER 25, 1783 304

THE STATE TAKES LEAVE OF THE COLONY 314

THE IRREPRESSIBLE NEGRO 323

THE WHISKEY REBELLION IN 1794 338

COURTSHIP IN THE OLDEN TIME 353

SCHOOL-DAYS IN 1769 AND 1869 366

THE AMERICAN JOSS 372

LOOKING FOR A SCOUT 390

THE ROMANCE OF INDIAN WARFARE 407

ETERNAL VIGILANCE IS THE PRICE OF LIBERTY 421

THE PROGRESS OF FASHION 432

A MORMON FAMILY OUT FOR A WALK 451

THE SKEDADDLE OF JOHN B. FLOYD 461

AN INTELLIGENT JURY 468

COTTON SUPREME 483

THE CORONER’S INQUEST 500

COTTON DOWN 512

MEMBERS OF CONGRESS IN A. D. 1900 520

THE IRISH REPUBLIC IN AMERICA 529

GETTING MUDD OUT OF THE DRY TORTUGAS 533

SCHOOL-TEACHING FROM 1869 ONWARDS 542

THE AMERICAN LAOCOÖN 547

THE END 549

CONTENTS.

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PREFATORY.

PAGE

TREATING THE READER TO AN ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR, AND OF
THE PLAN, OBJECT, AND PRINCIPLES OF THIS HISTORY 41

The Author, proposing to be intimate with the Reader,
deems an Introduction desirable.—Born Early and
Poor.—How the Two Facts were managed and
overcome.—School Days and Nights.—College Lines, crooked
and straight.—Father’s Face against his.—A New American
Decalogue.—Into the Married and other States and
Territories.—Settling down.—Advantages of a Sub-urban
Residence.—Outside and Inside Views of the Author’s
Head.—Plans and Purposes of the Work.—Laughing
Facts.—Roman Precedents.—Impartiality holding the Shears
and Tape.—Sources of our Information.—Acknowledgments to
Smith and Brown.—Our Illustrations.

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BOOK FIRST.

DISCOVERIES.

B. C. TO 1607 A. D.

CHAP.

I. OF AMERICA BEFORE ITS DISCOVERY IN THE FIFTEENTH CENTURY.
B. C. TO 1000 A. D. 55

America older than Europe, Asia, or Africa.—Chronic Errors
on the Subject.—Europe presented to America.—Truth
vindicated.—Proofs of our Superior Antiquity.—Luxurious
Civilization of the Races which stocked this Continent
before the Indians.—Amount of Coal left by them
unburned.—Large Supplies of Fish packed away safely in
our Mountains.—Fish Culture measure of Human
Culture.—Fossil Cran-iology.—Laughable Blunders of
Former Historians and Ethnologists.—Ancient Nations,
Babylonian, Persian, Greek, the Ten Lost Tribes, etc.,
trickling through, have reappeared on our Side of the
Earth.—Instances cited.—Mythologies of Greece and Rome
originated here.—Proofs and Reproofs.—American Nests
well feathered Ages ago.

II. OF THE DISCOVERIES IN AMERICA DURING THE ELEVENTH,
FIFTEENTH, SIXTEENTH, AND SEVENTEENTH CENTURIES. 1000 TO
1607. 64

America not discovered by Jason.—Lithographic Specimens
attributed to the Northmen in the Eleventh Century
curious, but executed by Skalds more Modern.—Bishop
Berkeley’s Western Star not the First American
Constellation.—Columbus offers a Continent at Private
Sale; Isabella, a Spanish Lady, takes him up, and the
Profits also.—A Fish Story confirmed.—Of Ferdinand’s
Necklace.—Price of Eggs advanced in Spain.—England
finally sees something.—Discoveries which Columbus did
not make.—Ponce de Leon.—Mexico unfortunately
discovered.—The Straits of Magellan and other
Straits.—De Soto at the Bottom of the
Mississippi.—Champlain, a wise man, founds Quebec upon a
Rock.—Sir Walter Raleigh and him smoking.—The Mayflower
anchored.—Hudson up stream.

III. OF THE INDIAN CHARACTER 76

Survey of Indian Character and Lands.—Our Pacific
Intentions towards the Indians.—The Whites better read
than the Red Men, and the Effects of Learning.—The Pale
Complexion of their Affairs.—Wet Blankets thrown over
their other Habits.—Different Traits discovered by
School-Girls and through Official Spectacles.—Meaning of
Indian Reservations.—Indian Style of Dress and its
Conveniences.—Indian Names.—Examples of their Happy
Application.

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BOOK SECOND.

SETTLEMENTS AND COLONIES.

1607–1775.

I. OF AMERICAN SETTLEMENTS GENERALLY 87

Some American Grounds, like Coffee, unsettled.—Some
Settlements pulled up by the Roots; others chilled by
Fever and Ague.—Moist Soils objected to except by
Doctors.—Unexpected Crops of Tomahawks from Wheat
sown.—Settlements in America because of impracticability
of making any at Home with Creditors.—Wild Oats sown
between 34th and 38th Parallels.—Frequent Settlements
make long Friends.—Settlements of Old Tavern Scores in
Chalky Districts.—Religious Squalls prostrate some
Plantations.—Indian Tempests uproot others.—Growth of
Virginia, although Queen Elizabeth a _femme
sole_.—Clergymen’s Settlements.—Brides unsettled.—Drake
around the World.

II. THE SETTLEMENTS OF VIRGINIA, DELAWARE, MARYLAND, THE
CAROLINAS, AND GEORGIA 95

Colored Views whitened.—Blue Ridges and Black Welts in
Virginia.—Virginia, smothered up in Infancy by Charters,
survives Royal Nursing.—Her Vigilance against her
Suitors.—Cotton introduced.—How the World managed
previously.—Charles I. and his numerous
Autographs.—Georgia and Oglethorpe.—Charleston set up.—A
Point on Old Point Comfort.—Tobacco first piped
about.—Unmarried Girls as Articles of Import.—Estimated
in, if not by, Pounds.—The Fancy Constitution of John
Locke for North Carolina.—Its own Length but Short
Life.—South Carolina Rivers do not run up.—Popular
Errors corrected.—John Wesley.—Singular Effect of his
Preaching on the Indians.—Maryland as a Duck of a Colony
canvassed.

III. JOHN SMITH 106

John Smith historically considered.—The Number in Leading
Cities stated.—How classified.—Why he is not put in a
separate Volume or in an Appendix.—Origin of the
Smiths.—American Genealogical Trees.—Smiths up a Stump,
in the Sap, and dangling from the Branches.—The
Antiquity and Ubiquity of the Smiths.—Variety and Extent
of their Occupations and Operations.—Will probably in
time own all the World.—Comic Situations of John Smiths
in Cities, at Family Dinner-Parties, at Prayer-Meetings,
at Balls, in Titles to Real Estate, etc.—Whether he can
be sued.—Other Legal Questions in reference to him
considered.—John Smith of Pocahontas Fame a Myth.

IV. OF THE SETTLEMENT OF THE NEW ENGLAND STATES 115

Views of the New England States and Character determined
by one’s Church.—Partial Notions about Clocks, Nutmegs,
Pumpkin Pies, etc.—Getting an Historical Coach to one’s
self.—Why the Puritans did not hang up their Stockings
on their first Christmas Eve.—Their nearest
Neighbors.—Indian Points and other Points.—Governor
Carver and Want of Meats.—Massasoit, and how he kept his
Faith in-violate.—New Hampshire on the Rampage.—Why
Boston was begun, and why it is not finished.—Roger
Williams and his Providential Ways and
Dealings.—Connecticut founded, although its Charter not
found.—The Wind against Cromwell.—Harvard
College.—Vermont and her Ways and Means.

V. THE SETTLEMENT OF NEW YORK 126

The Spirits of the Age present at its Foundation.—Who they
were and how they were affected.—The Wonders of
Manhattan in September, 1609.—How the Animal, Vegetable,
Ornithological, Maritime, and Human Productions then
compared with those now.—What New York Lots were worth
two hundred and fifty years ago.—Their Owners.—Hudson’s
Trip up the River.—What he saw and didn’t see.—The four
Dutch Governors; their Doings and Misdoings.—Sketch of
Holland and the Characteristics which she impressed upon
New Amsterdam.—Bravery evinced in settling Brooklyn.—How
the Van Rensellaers and other Vans were enticed
hither.—The Troubles and Sorrows of Wouter Van Twiller
and William Kieft.—Of the Surrender of the Dutch, and
the Instalment of English Rule in New York.—Petrus
Stuyvesant retires from Business.—His Farm and what he
raised on it.

VI. THE SETTLEMENT OF NEW JERSEY 142

A spirited Sketch of the Way in which it was done, and the
Results.

VII. THE SETTLEMENT OF PENNSYLVANIA 143

Governments in their Action like Pianos.—The Reason; and
illustrating Examples.—Varieties in the Make-ups of the
different Settlers of the Colonies.—Character of Penn,
and why it improves by Age.—His Accomplishments.—His
first Visit to America in 1681.—Tall Talk and
Peace.—Philadelphia, its Early and Late
Characteristics.—Delaware sets up for herself.—Penn in
Prison.—Again in Pennsylvania.—Returns to England by the
Philadelphia Line.—Pennsylvania leaps into the
Eighteenth Century, and what she does there.

VIII. THE COLONIES IN THE UPPER HALF OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 150

The Young Colonies watched by the “Old Folks at
Home.”—Required to furnish Inventories of their
Property.—Old People particular as to Shops where the
Youngsters traded.—Several Articles of Political
Housekeeping, as Printing-Presses, Jury-Boxes, etc., not
allowed.—Some Favorites among the Children.—The first
American Ring.—Cromwell as a Step-Father.—The Atlantic
Swimming-Bath.—Political Rights jarred off the Parent
Tree; others Fell when Ripe.—Some Proprietors sell out
to raise Money for Costs.—General Thaw in High
Places.—Legislative Mills with two runs of
Stone.—Woman’s Rights in Capsules.—How hard Puritan Wood
got softer.—Episcopal Race-Courses enlarged.—A Black
Frost curls up the Green Leaves of the Charters.—What
Sir Edmund Andros swallowed and the Fit of Indigestion
which followed.—Effect of European Housekeeping in
setting Colonial Brooms in Motion.—New York swept into
the English Pan.—Result of James II.’s over-stay in
Paris.—Slaps in the Face of Canada and their Return.—How
Public Events tell on Family Matters tolled long and
loud.—People occasionally subject to Scarlet Fever and
Fourth of July, but can’t live on either.—Kidd at Sea;
takes off a few People.—How the Deficiency was
supplied.—Number of Colonists at close of Seventeenth
Century.—Would have been more had Chicago
started.—Colonial Colts at the Bars of the eighteenth
Century.

IX. WITCHCRAFT 169

The Witch-Caldron at Salem.—How its Bubbling raised
Tea-Pot-Lids and has kept open other Lids ever
since.—The Young Female Witches at Salem condemned to
the Ties of Matrimony; the Old Ones to harder Knots.—The
Sin of being Old considered.—The Scarlet
Letter.—Examples of Witchcraft cited.—The Delusion of
Adam and Eve at the first Pomological Convention in
Eden.—Woman as Man’s familiar Spirit; and her
Conjuries.—Cases of David, Samson, and Herod.—Antony
dissolved in that Egyptian Drink Pearl Water.—The Maid
of Orleans and what an Arc she subtended.—The Philtres
of Love, Ambition, Heroism, etc., administered to Men
and Nations.—Their Effects.—Delusions, like Measles,
catching.—The Frenzies of Fashion fully described.—The
Stock Exchange.—Private Witchcrafts at Quiltings,
Apple-Parings, etc.—Red Corn and other Red Ears.—Sweet
Witches.—A Jury of gushing Girls.—Punishment of Men
incapable of being bewitched.

X. OF THE MANNERS, MORALS, HABITS, AND LAWS OF THE COLONISTS
IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY 177

First-class Telescope to see the MANNERS of a Past
Age.—Difficulties of Near-sighted and Long-sighted
People.—Near Objects more embarrassing to the Observer
than Distant.—Why?—The Ghosts of the Past.—The Manners
and Dress of Stuyvesant, Eliot, Calvert, Rolfe, etc.
described.—Manners of the Mass detailed; in their Work,
Play, Diet, Courtship, Fashions, Treatment of Young
Ladies and Gentlemen, Children, Servants, etc.—Superior
Advantages of Paterfamilias then in making Acquaintance
with his Wife and Children.—Fast Girls and Calicoes.—The
Isothermal Lines of ETHICS.—Certain Vices, like Eggs,
laid secretly and hatched afterwards.—The Fashions of
Crime at various Epochs compared.—Jails and
Jail-Birds.—The ingenious Crimes of Trade, Corporations,
Schools, and Seminaries noted.—How Sects are frozen or
thawed by Temperature.—Northern and Southern
Sectarianism.—Why Episcopacy flourished in Warm
Latitudes.—The early Commercial Morality of New
York.—Baptists, Congregationalists, and
Independents.—The HABITS of the Century; their Material,
Color, Durability, and Wear.—The LAWS mainly
imported.—What a Business the Colonists carried on,
notwithstanding, in the Domestic Article.—Kindness of
the Proprietors in furnishing Ready-made Office-holders
not appreciated.—American Itch for Law-making.—Laws
against Criminals.—Their Crimson Color.—How the Rains of
Mercy fell on hard Enactments, and the Thaw which
followed.—Coroners’ Inquests sat upon.—Verdicts under
various Lights.—Justices of the Peace, and the Law they
peddled.—Administrations of Law then and now
contrasted.—How Colors, although imponderable, turned
the Judicial Scales.

XI. THE COLONIES IN THE LOWER HALF OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 194

The Colonial Colts in the large open Field of the
Eighteenth Century.—The Effects of a Sniff of French
Gunpowder.—Queen Anne’s War, 1702–1713; its Cost and
Results in Europe and America.—Acadia changes its Name
to Nova Scotia.—How the Colonies started a Newspaper in
1704.—Philadelphia in a Sheet in 1719; and how
comfortable it was.—The Franklin Bros. furnish Food too
condensed even for Boston.—Benjamin quits the Hub; foots
it without tiring to New York.—How he got through New
Jersey without paying Toll.—Enters Philadelphia with Two
Loaves, and sets up an Intellectual Bakery.—Banks built
on the Sands of Credit.—Moving Accidents.—John Law’s
Scheme to use the Mississippi Valley; how it grew; what
it promised, and how it performed.—A French
Pasquinade.—The Results of a Bank Panic in the
Eighteenth Century.—The Effects on the Manufacture of
Children.—Number of Colonists in 1713 and 1743.—The
Condition of Delaware, New Hampshire, and Vermont.—The
Training of Young America.—Yale College and its
Mustard-like Growth.—The American Learned Oak.—The
Connection between Slate-Pencil and Gum Chewing and
Female Education.—What took Place between 1713 and
1743.—A Negro Plot in New York.—Negroes thrown
overboard, and the Bubbles that rose.—How large Historic
Doors swing on small Hinges.—Examples from A to W.—What
happened because Maria Theresa was a Female.—The English
Georges; what Bulls they were, and made.—The
Transatlantic Bullocks, and how they rushed into King
George’s War in 1744, and what Mischief they did for
Four Years.

XII. THE CHAMPIONSHIP FOR THE AMERICAN BELT. 1754 TO 1763 208

No Hopes for the Millennium in American Colonies up to
1754.—More Swords than Ploughshares.—Mars in
America.—Sixteen Indian Wars in 147 Years.—How they were
fed by French Oil and blown by French Bellows.—The Five
Great Continental Wars, and how they reached over and
handled the Colonies.—The Treaty Patches, and how they
failed to cover the War Breaches.—The Volcanic Character
of American Soil.—How the Animosities of France and
England grew through Four Centuries, and in what a
Hateful Harvest they waved, in 1754, each Side the
Sea.—Celebrated Fights between the Rivals in Europe.—How
Commercial Competition rubbed in Salt Water, and
Religious Differences Brimstone, into the
Wounds.—Memorable Cases of Battle Surgery.—The Relative
Merits of English and French Claims to America fully
stated.—Deeds of Land and of Arms clash.—French Jesuits
with Crosses and Traders with Skins encompass the
English Plantations from Maine to Minnesota, and thence
to Alabama and Texas.—Marquette, Joliet, La Salle,
Lallemand, and others.—The Former escaped the Fast Life
of Chicago, and La Salle the Hazards of Natchez.—France
seeks to fasten a Remarkable Rosary around the Neck of
Young America; England to cut it.—Suitors to the same
Maiden, they suited not her nor each other.—Their soft
Ways to her.—Their Hardness to each other.—Their Long
Quarrels over her Person and Purse result at last in a
Decisive Fight.—The Championship for the American
Belt.—The Champions, the Belt, and the Ring
described.—How John Bull and Jean Crapeau stepped into
the Latter.—The Nine Rounds from 1754 to 1763.—How Mr.
Bull won; what he said, and how Monsieur Crapeau
behaved.—A Suitor pleased, and a Suitor non-suited.

XIII. CAUSES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION 229

The People as Yeast.—The Fermentation.—Washington, Samuel
Adams, Patrick Henry, Rutledge, Franklin, Otis, and
others, and their Value in the Colonial Fermenting
Pots.—State Courtships in 1754–1765 and 1774, tend to a
more Perfect Union.—How Home Confidences operate.—What
Effect the English Navigation Acts had on American
Swimmers.—Lord North and Charles Townshend.—Colonial
Assemblies and Country Dances.—Dislike of
Impositions.—That small Boston Tea-Party.—The large
Amount of Atlantic Water between the Tea Seller and Tea
Purchaser.—When Tea can’t be sweetened.—Be-cause as a
Cause.

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BOOK THIRD.

THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION.

I. THE FIRST TURN OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WHEEL. GRIEVANCES; THE
PREPARATION; THE START 235

The Hard Lot of the Colonists, and what they got from
it.—Colonial Governors, like Old Topers at a Free
Opening of a Tavern.—The Miseries of a Visit from
Relatives poor and proud.—How, like poor Fowls, the
Navigation Acts laid many bad Eggs.—Examples
cited.—Parliamentary Laws ingeniously floored and
roofed.—English Strabismus, or Squint-eyedness, sought
to be made fashionable in the Colonies.—Success in
Canada.—English Tubs to catch Revenue off American
Slopes.—Manufacture of Hats prohibited; how and where
the Fur flew.—What a Cute Yankee saw from the Top of the
American Roof.—How Four Yards are worth more than
Five.—Bull-yism defined, and its Laws stated.—The First
Bill to raise Revenue; the large Bird behind it
described.—Sent over to America, it was foul-ly
treated.—Molasses denied to Colonists.—Effects on Yankee
Appetites and on the Increase of Straws in Custom-House
Casks.—Stamps and Stampedes.—The Act repealed; the Sting
left in.—Another Bill and larger Bird behind it in
1767.—The First Blood.—The Wheel starts; its Hub,
Spokes, and Periphery.—English Bees swarm over and
settle in Boston and other tender Parts.—The
Dis-cord-ant Sounds at Concord.—George Washington; his
Appearance and Costume, and what befell him, June,
1775.—Gage falls from a Tree.—Why and Howe?—Washington
seizes Boston Neck.—The Spasms.—Bunker Hill gets a Scar
and afterwards an Ugly Monumental Patch.—The Boone
Colonists in Kentucky.—How they blazed a-way thither
from Virginia.—Washington at Cambridge.—Unseasoned
Troops seasoned.—General Montgomery earns Laurels at
Quebec mixed with Cypress.—The Revolutionary Wheel
throws off Dusty Colonial Governors.—How Washington
broke up the Hessian Swarm at Boston, and Howe they flew
to Halifax.—Washington attends a Lecture in
Boston.—General Lee’s Neck-and-Neck Race with Sir Henry
Clinton for New York; Lee ahead 120 Minutes. Sir Henry
and a Party of Jolly Dogs alight near Charleston, and
how the Waspish Lee lit upon and stung them.—Where the
Jolly Dogs then went.—The Wheel well started.

II. JULY FOURTH 1776 AND SO FORTH 257

Review of our Historical Journey from the Start up to the
Summit of the 4th of July.—_Resumé_ of our Tramp through
Pre-Columbian and Post-Columbian Times.—Our March from
St. Augustine, via Jamestown and the Manhattan Cabins,
to the Temperance Tavern at Plymouth.—Descriptions of
Indian Interruptions.—Polite Interference of Gallic
Gentlemen at Narrow Parts of the Road in 1689, 1710,
1745, etc.—Banditti on the Highways of History, English,
French, and Dutch.—Blazing Description of the Summit,
the Flagstaff, Flag, and Eagle.—The Grand Political
Pic-Nic there of Fifty-one Wise Men.—The Thunder Storms
around them; and their Behavior.—General Account of this
Group; and how remarkable and marked.—Special
Portraitures of Thirteen of them.—Some Peculiar Heads
there, and how much George III. wanted them.—Prayer of
John Adams.—A Great Freshet of a Speech and what it
carried off.—A Remarkable Declaration made by
Jefferson.—An Electrical Battery charged and
discharged.—The Peppering George III. got.—How he worked
Seven Years against the Declaration.—The Gun-powdery
Effect of the first Fourth, and the Fire-Crackers since
touched off by it.—Independence originally handled
without Gloves; now by Aldermen and very Common
Councilmen with a half-dozen pair apiece.—The Fourths up
to 1850.—Tar Barrel Eloquence.—Military and Civic Renown
snatched on that day.—What Eggs, containing Addling
Heroes, pip on that Day.—How Swords embarrass Crooked
Legs.—Militia Lines, and what Snarls they get
into.—Dissolving Bursts of Golden Glories.—Effects of
Sulphur administered to a Rural Population.—Cakes of
Gingerbread, and how they stuck in the Teeth, Stomach,
and Memory.—Lamentations over the Decay of the Old-time
Fourths.

III. SECOND TURN OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WHEEL; ITS ECCENTRIC BUT
ONWARD MOVEMENTS. 1776–1780 277

English Hawks gather around New York.—Washington watches
them.—About an Esquire.—The Way the Germans took
Brooklyn the first Time.—How they returned, not to their
Mutton, but to Kalbfleisch.—Difficulty of reaching New
York from Brooklyn in 1776.—Washington takes a Trip to
Harlem.—The British also.—Red Eyes and Disfigured Faces
the Consequence.—Lord Howe attempts to get around the
American Squire.—The slight Unpleasantness at White
Plains.—The different Uses of the Croton Water in 1776
and now.—The Amount of Whiskey it took in 1869 to
qualify the Water in New York.—Washington ventures into
New Jersey.—Set-to at Fort Lee.—Washington across
Rivers.—Philadelphia covered.—Homesickness of
Agricultural Lads.—What befell Lee at a
Tavern.—Washington crosses the Delaware and drops
Christmas Presents into German Stockings.—The Effects of
Yankee Doodle on Lafayette, De Kalb, Kosciusko, Pulaski,
and others.—Friends of America in England, Fox, Hume,
etc.—Friends of England in America.—The Statue and
Statutes of George III. repealed.—Battle of
Princeton.—The Germans obtain Cider and Sausages at
Danbury.—Colonel Meigs tickles the Feet of Long Island,
and makes Congress laugh.—Colonel Prescott is obliged to
rise very early one Morning at Newport.—Silas Deane and
B. Franklin in France.—What followed.—Burgoyne tries to
find a back-stair Passage to New York.—Strong Gates in
his Way near Saratoga.—Still-Water runs
deep.—Brandy-Wine an unpalatable Drink.—French Treaty
with America in 1778.—The Wheel moves in Water and turns
out French Names.—Crossing New Jersey, Lord Howe
collides with Washington at Monmouth.—Count d’Estaing is
prevented by an Injunction off the New York Bar from
entering New York.—Coquetting, but no Engagement, near
Newport.—Buzzard’s Bay and its Roosts.—Little Egg Harbor
and its Nests, and what was laid there.—The Benefits of
the Wyoming Massacre.—Guerilla War at the
South.—Savannah trounced.—Horse Neck and Putnam’s
Home-Stretch down it.—Count d’Estaing’s Yachting.—Spain
hankers for Gibraltar.—England as a Pawn-Broker.—Paul
Jones and his Whip.

IV. THE LAST TURN OF THE REVOLUTIONARY WHEEL; ACCELERATIONS;
SLOWINGS; THE GRIST. 1780–1783 296

The different Opening of 1780 for those who pushed and
those who obstructed the Revolutionary Wheel.—The Strain
on both Sides.—Hard Spring in Charleston in consequence
of Leaden Hail-Storms.—How these Storms spread; and how
the Crops were saved from Ruin by Marion, Sumter, and
Pickens.—The Carolina Game Cock, and his sharp Spurs in
the Sides of Cornwallis and Tarleton.—Gates broken down,
and the Presidency lost at Camden.—Greene set up in his
Place, proving a good standing Color.—The Village of St.
Louis assailed.—André humiliates himself, and is
Exalted.—Arnold gets $50,000, a Brigadier’s Commission,
and is elected by General Contempt into the Order of
Judas Iscariot.—New-Year’s Day among the Pennsylvania
Troops at Morristown.—The United States Treasury, made
less Celestial, becomes Defiled by filthy Lucre.—The
Goring and Tossing of Tarleton by Morgan at the
Cow-Pens.—An Irish-like Fight at Eutaw Springs.—Southern
Hunters around the British Flock at Charleston and
Savannah.—The troublesome Seizure of Virginia
Assemblymen.—How the Captors missed burning their
Fingers with Jefferson’s red Hair.—Cornwallis enmeshed
at Yorktown.—What Lord North said.—What the English
George threatened and what the American George did.—“Let
there be Peace”; and Peace was.—What England lost and
America gained.—The kind of Grist obtained.

V. HOW A POOR CONSTITUTION BROKE DOWN 305

Every Community has its Axis of Growth.—That of the
Confederation described.—Causes of the Distrust of
Federated Power.—How the States preferred to sew up the
Treasury Pocket rather than allow their own Agents to
put their Hands in it for necessary Funds.—Facetious
Bills of Exchange.—The Shady and Sunny Side of
Power.—Similarities and Dissimilarities of the
States.—The Committee to draft Confederation Sixteen
Months over the Cold Nest.—The curious Knot-ty Grub that
issued.—The Spawn of Doubt put to the Nurse of
Jealousy.—How it was nursed, starved, and doctored; and
what a poor Constitution it got. The Confederate Scheme
like a Pine Board.—It could not raise Money, An Army,
Credit, Postage, Revenue: in fact, could not raise
itself.—The Comic Side of the Franking Privilege.—A
desirable Prohibition.—How the Grub became a
Caterpillar, and the Caterpillar a Butterfly.—A very
Larky Phœnix rises, crowing Yankee Doodle.

--------------

BOOK FOURTH.

THE UNITED STATES.

I. THE FEDERAL CONSTITUTION. 1777–1787. 313

The Constitution as a Resort for Shoppers in Civil
Rights.—Every kind of Article to be found either for
Ordinary or Exceptional Use.—The Fringe called Preamble;
its Thread, Texture, and Quality.—Counterfeit Patterns
and Simulations easily detected.—Piles of heavy Cloths
for the Country’s Winter Use in War, Financial Storms,
etc.—Executive and Legislative Ready-made
Clothing.—Judicial White Goods.—Hosiery for
Congressional Understandings, swift or slow.—A variety
of Miscellaneous Wares; Contrivances for catching People
with Colored Skins; Habeas-Corpus Non-Suspenders;
Muzzles for violent or hungry Congressmen; Handsome
Checks on the Treasury; Specimens of tender Gold and
Silver; Militia Uniforms; Padlocks for securing Houses
against Searches; Jury-Boxes, Trial Balances, and other
Goods.—The Sumner Patent.—The latest Novelty to prevent
Electoral Black-and-White Suits from being stripped
off.—State-Rights Dresses, and strong Federal
Out-Fits.—Messrs. Calhoun, J. Davis, Webster, Clay, etc.
The Manufacture of bright Buttons, called “Coins.”—The
Fifteenth Amendment.—Doubtful Packages.—Paper Money as a
Substitute for real Money.—Unauthorized Use of the
Constitutional Bazaar.—Seekers of Goods never
made.—Nicholas Biddle and his Gold Suit.—Everybody
suited at the Federal Store.—Of excessively sharp and
dense-headed Shoppers.—How Articles are
mistaken.—Water-proof Goods for River and Harbor
Dredging and for Lighting Coasts.—Of long Selvedges, or
Railroad Strips, and their wonderful Elasticity.—Rights
and Lefts.

II. CONSTRUCTION; OR, WASHINGTON’S ADMINISTRATION. 1789–1797. 324

How the Thirteen Colonial Children crept into their New
Bed.—The Upholstering described.—Why Rhode Island was
last in.—Who tucked her up.—Washington as
Superintendent, and John Adams as First Assistant.—The
Family low in Credit.—Amount of their Indebtedness
compared with ours.—Washington’s Inaugural.—His
Exemption from Office Beggars, Committees, Pugilistic M.
C.s, boring Place-Seekers, enterprising Donors,
etc.—Washington as a Spirit.—His Capacity to select a
Cabinet.—Who they were.—Of Henry Knox.—The Chief Justice
and Attorney-General.—Amendments to a perfect
Constitution.—The Supreme Court as a sound, seaworthy
Tribunal.—Why States cannot be sued by Individuals.—How
Governments get around paying Interest on
Principle.—Streaks of the Millennium.—Of the Public
Debt.—Discrimination among Creditors.—Misfortune of
being a Cisatlantic Holder of American Bonds.—Alexander
Hamilton’s Notions.—Washington’s Receptions and
Dinner-Parties.—The Political Color of the President’s
Silver Spoons and Window Curtains.—The Honeymoon of the
new Government disturbed.—Ganderous Long-bills splash
Washington.—The French Revolution and its
Conundrums.—How answered by Washington and the Federals;
how by Jefferson and the Anti-Federals.—The Census Act
procures Names without Owners.—The Naturalization Laws
and their Pat-riot products.—Polls and Polling-Places.—A
Sinking Fund that did not sink.—How Vermont made the
Thirteen States old.—An Indian War.—Cincinnati
begins.—Kentucky starts.—Mistakes about
Bourbon.—Washington’s second Term.—What Genet did, and
how he was done for.—Helpful Americans.—The Whiskey
Rebellion of 1794.—The Year of Treaties; how they
enlarged while they tied us.—Tennessee the Sixteenth
State.—Nashville gets warm.—Washington’s Farewell, and
its cheap Imitations.—The Shades of Office.—Who crept in
and who stepped into the Sunshine.

III. OLD FAMILY PORTRAITS 340

Modern Photographic Albums like Ancient Roman
_Simulacra_.—The Pleasure of looking at the Likenesses
of Friends.—The Portraits of our Fore-Fathers.—Our dear
old Great-Grandfather GEORGE WASHINGTON.—His one hundred
and twenty-eight original Portraits.—His unique
Character; of the same Size all the Way up.—His Manners
and Characteristics.—How the Eighteenth Century, so long
mated, refused to survive him.—Our Great-Grand and good
Mother MARTHA WASHINGTON.—The Resemblance between her
and a Bowl of ripe Strawberries and Cream.—Her
Pride.—What Qualities were corseted in her Bosom.—Our
favorite Uncle, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.—How the Sky got into
his Face and how it stays charged.—Looks like an
hereditary Director of all the Estates.—A born
Trustee.—What an Idea Burns might have got of him in
1774, and how expressed it.—Of our Aunt, Mrs. JAMES
MADISON; and what a fine Lady she was.—Her careful Dress
and Manners.—Impressive but patronizing.—How Time forgot
her, and the Years ran on un-notched.—The forty Years
she acted as Presidentess.—PATRICK HENRY described in
Dress, Person, shooting Game, and taking Audiences.—Our
dear Visitor, GENERAL LAFAYETTE; his Difficulties in
reaching us; his noble Bride; his Embarkation at a
Spanish Port; his Labors here; his two subsequent
Visits, and how he survived Hand-shaking and
Kissing.—About JOHN JAY and his Wife SALLIE
LIVINGSTON.—How they lived and what he became.—Glances
at ISRAEL PUTNAM and his expressive Face; at NATHANIEL
GREENE and his square, Quaker Character; at the
Telescopic Eyes of FRANCIS MARION, with a Dash at his
soldierly Qualities.—The Effigies of the WISE
MEN.—General Sketches of our Heroes and Heroines.—A
Heart Delineation of the Mothers, Wives, and Sisters of
the Men of the Revolution.

IV. THE STRUGGLE AND FALL OF FEDERALISM; OR, JOHN ADAMS’S
ADMINISTRATION. 1797–1801. 354

The Pre-Adamite Epoch: its Upheavals and Disruptions in
America, and the red-hot diplomatic Stones, Fauchet and
Adet, ejected from France upon us.—The new French
Acrostics; and the Attempts by our Commissioners and
Congress to solve them.—Gold-mounted Spectacles, offered
us by France; and our Inability to see our Interest or
Duty through them.—Why and when the Keel of the American
Navy was laid.—Of the Alien and Sedition Laws; why
passed and how passed by.—General Washington and the
Gallic Cock; a Crow never crowed out.—Napoleon’s Tour in
Egypt and Palestine described; and its Results on the
Treaty of Peace deduced.—Of the Office and Offices of
Consul.—A Review and new View of our Difficulties with
France from 1790 to 1800.—What a Pitt England fell
into.—The City of Washington as a Geographical
Study.—About Mississippi, Alabama, and the French Growth
of Mobile.—The Territorial Condition illustrated.—The
Introduction of Vaccine and other _Virus_.—Why some
Things first break out in Boston.—State of Parties in
1801.—Why the first Adams was banished from the
Presidential Eden; and the Flaming Swords which
prevented his Return.

V. THE CHIEF AMERICAN PRODUCTIONS OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY 360

The Cereals and Serials of the last Century.—Hares caught
before cooked.—Useless Indians put under Ground.—Human
Bones the Phosphates of History.—The Statecraft of
Washington, Jefferson, and Others.—The Automatic
Workings of Governments exposed.—What small Brains
rule.—Description of our Government Machine.—Its Merits
and Demerits.—The Disadvantages of frequent Changes of
official Workmen.—How the Machine-Oil is stolen.—The
Inventions of the Eighteenth Cycle of Time.—An American
Noah inebriated by the Cotton-Gin.—How Ham laughed and
how Japhet put a Blanket over the Patriarch.—The Growth
of Commerce.—The Notions which Importations put in and
on the Heads of the Young People.—Paris supplies the
Mistakes of Nature.—Of Dress.—Hoops, Head-Gear, Coats,
Vests, Tights, etc., descanted upon.—Improvements in
Roads and Means of Transit.—The Journey from New York to
Boston in 1732.—The Road-Maker and Vehicle-Propeller as
Leaders of Civilization.—The great Invention now
needed.—The Populations of New York and Boston in
1700.—Description of the Former in that Year by an
English Traveller.—Slave-Market in New York in
1711.—Manufactures and their Growth.—The Habits of the
Period described.—Improvements in Morals, and wherein.—A
general Review of American Literature and Book-Making
through the Century.—The first American printed Volume;
and how fast and long it ran.—Earliest Original Book of
Poems; by a Woman, with a touching Specimen
therefrom.—An Account of the leading Writers on
Theology, Political Science, Government, Natural
Science, Natural History, of Novels, etc.—The American
Joss; its Worshippers, and their Treatment.

VI. DEMOCRACY IN POWER; OR, JEFFERSON’S ADMINISTRATION.
1801–1809. 373

Few Removals by Mr. Jefferson from the Ungilt Official
Chairs.—Mr. Smith gets into the Navy.—Who started long
Messages to Congress; and the Difficulty of finding an
End to them.—War with Tripoli; and the Complexion with
which the Bey ended it.—Decatur and his Mediterranean
Travels.—Ohio in 1802.—The early Danger it ran of being
all cut up into City Lots.—How the Exodus of its
Population was the Genesis of its Growth.—Of Westering
Caravans.—Bonaparte sells Louisiana, and what a Sell it
was.—How we were saved an extra Volume of Supreme Court
Decisions.—The Murder of Alexander Hamilton.—A
Ghost-Story about Aaron Burr.—The public Estimate of his
Character unchanged by Biographical varnishing.—A South
Carolina Conceit.—The Play of Lear in Tripoli.—Peculiar
Mussulman Habits; the Author of Don Quixote.—Michigan
escapes the Cuppings of Eastern States.—Her lymphatic
Temperament.—Lake Michigan as a Breakwater against
Chicago.—Burr tried for Treason, “not proven” guilty,
and surrendered—to himself.—Of Bonaparte and other
Usurpers.—The Oldest dislike the Youngest.—History of
the Attempts of George III. and Bonaparte to blockade
without Ships.—Once a Bull always a Bull.—Search of
American Ships for Seamen.—The Unwisdom of
Half-apologies.—The American Embargo and its Popularity
with Unmarried Girls.

VII. THE UNITED STATES AT SEA; OR, MADISON’S CRUISE. 1809–1817. 382

The Captain and Officers of the “Seventeen Sisters” which
put to Sea in a Gale.—Diplomatic Talks.—Difference
between one’s own Cows gored, and one’s own Bull in a
Neighbor’s Field stoned, exemplified.—_Cave
canem._—Bonaparte improves the Code Napoleon.—Executions
before Trials.—Horace Greeley fights benevolently into
the World.—Louisiana and her Vivacious Debts taken in;
what sweetened them.—Witch-Hazel Rods of Clay, Cheves,
etc., dip to the National Mines of Feeling.—Our Second
Wrestling-Match with England.—The Hull-sale Surrender of
Michigan.—Colonel Cass breaks his Sword, and gets an
Anglo-phobia.—Better Hulls on the Water.—America marries
the Sea.—A Wasp on a Frolic.—Marine Flirtations and
Engagements.—The Constitution, an Old Sea-Flirt; her
rapid Winning and Wooing of the Java.—South Carolina
loses a Presidential Candidate.—Of the Three Armies
afield.—Harrison at Tippecanoe and the Thames.—Colonel
R. M. Johnson’s life-long Chase for Tecumseh’s
Scalp.—Toronto emptied and filled.—General Brown, a Real
Man, in Spite of his Name.—General Wade
Hampton.—Court-Martials, and how they touch off Military
Charges.—The United States at Sea on Land.—The Hornet on
a Peacock.—An Immortal Word wrung from a Mortal
Moment.—Commodore Perry.—General Scott improves the
Niagara Frontier for Hack-Drivers.—Macdonough charges
Lake Champlain with Heroic Ingredients.—English Marine
Parades.—Cotton Breastworks at New Orleans.—Their
Feminine Adoption.—The Treaty of Peace and its Wonderful
Omissions.—Costs and Gains of the War.—The Hartford
Convention and its Equestrian Exploits.—Mr. Calhoun and
Invisible Ink.

VIII. THE ERA OF GOOD-WILL; OR, MONROE’S NESTING. 1817–1825. 396

Why Byron did not write sometimes.—Application.—Rainbow
after the Shower.—The Happy Family.—An Inlaid
Cabinet.—Virginia’s Dower Rights in the Presidency.—Five
New States.—The Three M’s.—Proof from the Census of 1820
that Chicago had not started.—The Missouri Compromise.—A
Good Bridle until used.—Florida bought in 1819.—What we
got over the Bargain.—The Florida Keys.—The Dry Tortugas
thrown in.—The Dews fortunately left.—A Cracked Cup in
the Family Cupboard.—The Monroe Doctrine.

IX. TROUBLES BUBBLE; OR, THE SORROWS OF JOHN QUINCY ADAMS.
1825–1829. 399

Parallel between Sidney Smith’s Old Razor and J. Q.
Adams’s Term.—How several Gentlemen, touched by Age,
reached in Vain after Honors too high.—Who they were;
and what Acid Grapes the House of Representatives
snatched from them.—Pamphleteering and Privateering.—An
Italian Saying.—Description of a Good Statesman spoiled
in the Mould of a Politician.—An Illustrative
Anecdote.—Partisan Scales weighing Public Interests.—The
Weights.—The Depravity of Political Blunders.—History
_vs._ Party Judgments.

X. THE AGE OF HICKORY; OR, JACKSON’S EPOCH. 1829–1837. 402

Military Men, domesticated to Civil Life, like tamed
Animals.—General Jackson’s Camp Traits in the White Den
at Washington.—His Prehensile Habits claw out the Eyes
of several Measures.—How he foraged on his Political
Enemies, and turned his Troops of Friends into the
Public Pastures.—Lord Palmerston’s Remark upon
Gladstone; and its American Application.—An Insurrection
among the Household Cabinet Troops.—How the vigorous
Hickory Club, wielded chivalrously for a Woman, quelled
it.—The President moves on the Bank, and captures all
its Fortified Points.—Chicago starts in 1830.—Why it did
not overtake and annex the United States.—South Carolina
threatens Nullification, and is threatened.—Mr. Calhoun
violently promised an elevated Position between two
Posts. Mr. Clay’s Compromise.—Horace Greeley starts the
First Daily Paper.—Its untimely End bewailed in
Verse.—Black Hawk caged and shown around.—Georgia, the
Cherokees and Supreme Court.—Three Celebrities gained by
the Seminole War.—Of Arkansas and its Papal Little
Rock.—Prospects for the Pope when flung from the
Tarpeian.—An Arkansas Paul preaching in the American
Athens and Corinth.—Old Hickory and the Nuts left to be
cracked.

XL. THE DUTCH REIGN OF MARTIN VAN BUREN. 1837–1841. 409

A New-Yorker reaches the White House, and has Hard Fare
there.—The Disadvantages of Competition.—A Financial
Earthquake breaks large Amounts of Crockery.—How much
made a Pile in 1837.—The Sub-Treasury.—The Connection
between long Messages and Anarchy in
Finance.—Defalcations in Office.—Why an Old Man’s House
is easily robbed.—The Phantom of Slavery.—_Extraits de
l’Afrique._—Principles and Goods sold at a Profit.—A
Political Trader loses his Capital, and gives up
Business.

XII. THE HARRISON-TYLER TROUPE; HOW IT PLAYED. 1841–1845. 412

General Harrison’s Death and Life Insurance
Companies.—Whig Bank-Bills with no Tyler Bodies to suit
them.—A Good Flint which required a first-rate Gun,
Stock, Breech, and Barrel, to suit it.—Definition of
Crabs, etc.—The Ashburton Treaty.—The Bankrupt Act, and
whom it helped.—Misfortunes and Fortunes.—Mr. Calhoun’s
Texas Trick.—Diplomatic Magic-Lanterns
exposed.—Roman-like Garments with Carthaginian
Spots.—Florida our Stocking-Heel; how darned.—Yarns
about it.—Iron Railings as State Corsets.—How the
Florida Keys might be usefully employed.

XIII. POLK’S WHIRL; OR, THE AMERICAN POLKA. 1845–1849. 416

The Floor Committee for the coming Polka
described.—History of previous Balls, Country Dances,
Virginia Reels, Quincy Waltzes, Irish Jigs, South
Carolina Shake-ups, etc.—General Taylor, his Advances
and Movements at Palo Alto, Resaca de la Palma,
Monterey, and Buena Vista.—How his Partner, the Army,
was taken away.—General Scott among the Mustangs at Vera
Cruz, Natural Bridge, Chepultepec, Mexico, etc.—Of Wool,
Kearny, Fremont, and Commodore Sloat.—What New Mexico
and California added and subtracted.—The Mustang
Liniment, or Treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo.—How the Path
for the Traditional Sun of Civilization Westward was cut
and paved.—Revolvers judicially quoted and
applied.—Peculiar Fruit adorning the Pendulous Branches
of Trees in New Settlements.—What the Little Trick of
the Wizard of the South conjured up.—California in 1848
and now contrasted.—David Wilmot raises a Ghost which
disturbs several Party Feasts.—How the Polka Party broke
up; and how it pleased some and dissatisfied others.

XIV. OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY ON THE AMERICAN HALF-SHELL 424

The contrasted Beginning and End of the Half-Century.—What
America brought to the New-Year’s Day of 1850 in the
Raw, and what for the Grill of more refined
Tastes.—Historical Stews, and their Foreign and Domestic
Sauces.—What they were.—Attempts at, and Failures in,
Insurrections in America.—Mechanical Inventions of the
Half-Century; Steamboats, Telegraphs, Reapers,
Sewing-Machines, etc.—Their Advantages.—Vestments and
Investments.—Of Ether.—How Populations drifted to
Cities.—Chicago bibulous and dropsical.—Public Men and
their Versatile Principles.—Newspapers and their
unfulfilled Prophecies.—Plutocracy.—Fashions and their
Constancy to Change.—The Stormy Petrels of Commercial
Disasters.—How Owners turn Wreckers.—Profits out of
Losses.—Of Merchant Salvors.—The Effects of Gold
Discoveries in California on Labor, Ladies’ Heads and
Hearts.—Auriferous Marriages.—The Spite of Midas against
Children.—Ecclesiastical Gardens in America.—The new
Mormon Shrub of the _Genus Polygamous_.—Architectural
Improvements.—American Houses and their
Sites.—Farmsteads; their Better Complexion.—The Crops
from the National Farms, the Sea and Land, in 1850.—Of
American Literature, Science, Natural History, The
Philosophies and other Branches of Knowledge, and their
Cultivators, through the Half-Century.—Summary of the
Bill of Fare for the Repast on the Half-Shell.—Its
Character and Critics.

XV. THE BEGINNING OF STRIFE; OR, THE TAYLOR AND FILLMORE
WEBBING. 1849–1853. 439

The Young Polka Dancer becomes Floor Manager.—The large
Apples of Discord emptied on the Floor of Congress.—What
they were; and the Pacific Trees from which they
fell.—Of California, New Mexico, and Deseret.—General
Taylor’s Death, and Mr. Fillmore’s suave Manners and
smooth Appeals.—Wendell Phillips and J. Davis.—Political
Nurses and Anodynes.—Kossuth and his Short
Catechism.—How it did not take, and how he did.—A large
Piece of Japanned Ware.—Deaths of Clay and Webster.—The
Autumn Glory which they shed on a Stormy Season.

XVI. THE UNION PIERCED; OR, PIERCE’S TURN. 1853–1857. 443

Reference, by Believers in the Transmigration of Souls, to
Mr. Pierce for its Proof.—His real and apparent Age.—The
Slave Colossal Figure bestrides the Presidential
Harbor.—How the New President rode in between its Legs,
and cast out a curious Anchor.—An Antediluvian
Cabinet.—Still Times expected.—Sudden Freshet.—Douglas
breaks the Missouri Dike.—Bitter Waters over the
Land.—Alarm among the Elderly Gentlemen, and how quieted
by J. Davis.—Alarm North and South not quieted.—The
African Outlook towards the North Pole.—The Power of
Douglas illustrated from his Scotch Namesake and
Proverb.—What Warriors rushed to our Flanders.—The Blow
on the Head of Sumner and Slavery from Brooks’s
Cane.—The Dred Scott Essays.—American Africanization.—An
Exploring Party in the Interior.—Discovery of an Extinct
Race, and of Fremont.—Undiked Waters not strong enough
to float Douglas into a Nomination.—Buchanan in the
Dock.—The Know-Nothings make a neat little Present to a
Polite Gentleman.

XVII. COTTON-SEEDS SPROUT; OR, BUCHANAN’S ADMINISTRATION.
1857–1861. 449

The new Missionary Party and its Growth.—Character of Mr.
Buchanan and his Want of Same.—Description of curious
Drawers in his Cabinet.—The Uses of Isaac Toucey.—The
Lecompton Constitution and how it fell together.—African
Order of the Woolly Fleece.—The Mormon Magic-Lantern,
and its Shows.—What Minnesota brought into the Union;
and how a Long-fellow raised a Fall.—The War of the
Illinois Giants.—Abraham Lincoln described.—Self-made
Men; their Self-ishness and Unsymmetrical
Characters.—Mr. Lincoln’s Growth and Character
Illustrated.—Mr. Douglas delineated.—Presidential
Bonfires, Tar-Barrels, and Oratory.—A Spectre in
Virginia; his Body swinging, his Soul marching on.—A
live Coal on the Southern Heart.—What the Democratic
Convention was asked to solve, and what it re-solved.
Heads I win, Tails I don’t lose.—Breckenridge as a rare
Prize-Taker.—The Missionary Party makes a
Nomination.—New Lights and Shadows.—An original Recipe
for threatened Political Apoplexy.—A sudden Convention
in South Carolina.—Its mysterious Origin and Dark
Ways.—A Chaotic Message.—Of different Secession
Ordinances; and Want of Federal Ordnance.—Political
Strikers described.—General Cass and a Broken
Heart.—John B. Floyd skedaddles, chased by an
Indictment.—General Anderson.—Fort Sumter breaks the
Cabinet.—The Confederate Government and Flag made.—Their
Composition.—History and Character of J. Davis.—Where
Mr. Buchanan went March 4, 1861.

XVIII. OUR NEWER NATIONAL ALBUM 464

The Second Generation of our Great Men nearer in Time but
not in Affection.—Several sufficient Reasons
therefor.—Ingenious Biographers confusing our Verdicts
over old Offenders.—A Latin Quotation to prove an
Original Remark.—Why we should not stick to old
Opinions.—Sketches of Clay, Calhoun, and
Webster.—Parallels do not always run at equal
Distances.—Three Fates.—Original Anecdote of Webster.—Of
Lewis Cass and Thomas H. Benton.—Why double-chinned
Persons are satisfactory.—The Plutocrats Girard and
Astor; how they made Fortunes, and how much.—John
Marshall as a Judge, and John Trumbull as a
Painter.—Albert Gallatin skims American Cream.—Rembrandt
Peale and Washington Allston described.—Why Felix
Grundy, S. S. Prentiss, J. J. Crittenden, Samuel
Houston, D. D. Tompkins, and Others, were like Shoots
grafted upon hardy Native Stocks.—The Senate illuminated
by J. M. Berrian, S. L. Southard, W. C. Preston, etc.,
Legaré, and Butler.—A full-length Portrait of Winfield
Scott.—Irving delineated.—Drake, Halleck, and
Paulding.—Fenimore Cooper descanted upon.—Science
illustrated by Silliman, Hare, and Rush.—Descriptions of
Prescott, Mrs. Sedgwick, Greenough, and Hawthorne.—How
well the Second Set persuaded the Eighteenth Century
over into the Nineteenth.

XIX. THE WAR OF IDEAS AND MUSKETS; OR, LINCOLN’S
ADMINISTRATION. 1861–1865. 480

IN THREE DIVISIONS.

DIVISION FIRST.

COTTON VEILS HIDE THE UNION. MARCH 4, 1861, TO JANUARY 1, 1862.

Striking Historical Contrasts of professed Virtue and
cruel Enforcement.—The American Fetich; its strange,
passionate Worship and armed Adoration.—The Freshet of
Slavery traced from its small Beginnings.—Mr. Lincoln
over its Ridges lands in Washington.—A Striking
Announcement, and who it struck.—Of Seward, Cameron, and
Chase.—A Naval Joke.—A Wry Fort makes Wry Faces.—An
American Nightmare.—Watching with the Sleeper.—Sparing
the Rod and getting the Ramrod.—Call for Seventy-five
Thousand Ramrods.—Massachusetts Boys and Baltimore
Hards.—Busses and Blunderbusses.—Few Office-Seekers, but
many Gun-Holders in Washington in April, 1861.—The
English Telescope and the Wonders it discovered.—A Dual
View.—An Official Talk between two Lords.—A Proclamation
to restrain Englishmen.—A Parallel.—War Materials,
Forts, etc., generously given away by Loose-handed
Custodians.—Twiggs inclined as Tree is bent.—Cotton
Curtain before Washington; and a near View of it by
General Mansfield.—Colonel Ellsworth.—Butler and
Bethel.—Lyons in Missouri.—McClellan moves into
Virginia; what he found.—A Wise Man flees when a real
Man pursueth.—Bull’s Run and General Run.—A Discovery
and Noise over it.—Stonewall Jackson and Praying
Soldiers.—Piety and Powder.—A Drill-Ground near
Washington.—General Lee’s First Kicks against the
Pricks.—Du Pont at Port Royal.—Mason, Slidell, and
Vigilant Friends.—John C. Breckenridge a striking
Sign-Board.—War in the Mississippi Valley.—Kentucky and
her Coy Ways.—A Spartan Leonidas and Greek
Ulysses.—Christmas Eve, 1861.

DIVISION SECOND.

COTTON MIXED. JANUARY 1, 1862, TO JANUARY 1, 1864.

The Road to Peace.—Distance thither illustrated.—What
certain Knights might have learned.—The Difficulties
created by losing Battles in Kentucky, Tennessee,
Missouri, and Arkansas detailed.—What Grant, Thomas,
Curtis, and others did; and what Crittenden,
Zollicoffer, etc., had done unto them.—Whistling in the
Woods.—Wonderful Story-telling powers of J. Davis.—How
he repeated Tales with charming Variation.—A Sea Story
in which Iron enters.—Farragut and Porter up the
Mississippi.—Received at New Orleans with Illuminations
and Bonfires.—Butler deals with effervescing
Materials.—The Peninsular Campaign traced.—Spading and
Fighting.—The Glories and Disasters of the Army of the
Potomac.—The American Pope fallible.—Lee’s Trip into
Maryland.—Accidents at South Mountain and
Antietam.—Difficult Questions besiege Mr. Lincoln in
Washington.—His New-Year’s Gift to the Slaves.—Getting
rich on Paper.—Cotton mixed.—A Depraved Currency.—Hooker
gets at Lee’s Rear at Chancellorsville.—What
followed.—Lee at Gettysburg; gets the Advertising its
Springs want.—The Sorrows of Vicksburg, July 4,
1863.—The Mississippi open.—Mortar-boat Building.—Valor
of Colored Regiments at Charleston; and of discolored
Irish in New York.—Contrasts.—Grant Transfigured at
Missionary Ridge and Look-Out Mountain without Bragging
of it.

DIVISION THIRD.

COTTON WORSTED. JANUARY 1, 1864, TO APRIL 14, 1865.

What the Confederate Stool—not of Repentance, but of
Mars—stood on, and how braced and steadied.—The Daisies
and Corn-blooms beneath it.—The broken Industries,
harried Life, and disrupted Ties of Unionists in the
Border States.—Tragedies.—Grant Commander-in-Chief.—His
Plan to break up the Nightmare.—Work ahead.—Jubal E.
Early and his Raids.—The Year of Jubal E.—Sherman at
Atlanta.—The Southern Knob seized, and the main Door
burst open.—An unprotecting Hood; how it was pounded and
cleft.—Sherman’s Swath through Georgia.—A Christmas Gift
to Mr. Lincoln of a Sheaf.—The Scorpion Alabama: its
Hatching out; its slimy, wriggling Course, and
sulphureous End.—The Iron Jaws of Mobile pried open, and
its Teeth drawn.—Autumn Brands at the North.—Tokens of
the coming Fall.—Andrew Johnson and the Goose.—Grant
breaks Things at Petersburg and disturbs J. Davis in
Church at Richmond.—Flight of the Latter with
corruptible Treasures.—Negro Troops enter
Richmond.—Light Suggestions thereupon.—A Meeting at
Appomattox Court-House.—Leaving bloody Instructions, Lee
goes to College.—J. Davis in Court and his Sentence.—A
Thunder-Clap and its Victim.—Death of Abraham Lincoln.

XX. VELOCIPEDAL 516

How mixed Blood effervesces.—Of the Causes and
Developments of American Fastness.—Unrest in Prisons and
at Home.—Time lost in Sleep, etc.—The distressing Hurry
of Brains.—Compressing a Cow in a Milk-Pot.—Of Doctors’
Gigs and Apoplectic Whirligigs.—American Stomachs
considered.—A general Stomach; how employed and hired
out.—Doctors’ Bills.—Clothes Wringers and State
Wringers.—“Speedy Trials” secured.—The Common and
Un-common Law of the United States considered at
length.—Of Dower, and how taken.—Property administered
before Death.—Heirs cheated.—Injunctions used.—Illinois
Divorces.—Of Prohibited Degrees of Marriage.—Of Fat
People and Servants.—Boarding-Houses and
Hotels.—American Trade and its Feats at diminishing
Quantities.—Fast Americans in Europe.—How they overcome
Distances, History, and Landlords.—The Paris _Genus_.

XXI. PUZZLES AND CROSS READINGS; OR, JOHNSON’S ENTERTAINMENTS.
APRIL 14, 1865, TO MARCH 4, 1869. 526

Puzzles about Hemp and Paper.—Weak Brains at rest.—The
Return of the Holders of Sabres and Guns.—Our
Dead.—Fighters become Workers.—A Modern Sisyphus rolls a
Stone up Hill.—How it rolled back.—The Interpretation by
Congress of its own Rights.—Southern Delegates
declined.—Puzzles solved.—Vetoing made easy.—The New
Orleans Riots.—The Zig-zag Journey of the President to
the Tomb of Douglas.—The Fenian Republic in Union
Square.—The Sham-rock compared with other Rocks.—The
French Moths in Mexico; and how they were
singed.—Amnesties and Pardons.—Scripture
outdone.—Forgiveness forced upon the
Unrepenting.—Results of Congressional
Reconstruction.—The President tried and one found
wanting.—Value of one Vote.—Alaska and St.
Thomas.—Chicago, unalarmed, goes on dis-pairing but not
despairing.—The Narrow Escapes of New
York.—Fiske-Ville.—Johnson gets Mudd out of the Dry
Tortugas.

XXII. TAKEN FOR GRANTED; OR, WHAT IS EXPECTED OF GRANT AND THE
AMERICAN FUTURE. MARCH 4, 1869, TO ——. 534

The supposed Difficulties of writing History in advance
considered, and the Popular Delusions on the Subject
disposed of.—Lively Expectations of what our future
Presidents, Cabinet Members, Foreign Ministers, etc.,
etc., will be and do.—What Citizens will be exempt from
Executing and Garroting the Laws.—The Public Debt to
disappear.—The Ways considered.—Cut up into Dividends
and no more heard of.—What is expected of Common Schools
and Sunday Schools in improving Public Men and their
Speeches.—Certain Occupations to be dispensed with.—The
Uses to which their Pursuers are to be put.—Improvements
in Judges, Injunctions, and Court-Houses.—Extension of
Efforts of Society for preventing Cruelty to Animals, to
Employers, etc.—Woman’s Rights discussed from various
Aspects.—Men and Women equal,—especially Women.—How any
Differences between them are to be disposed of.—How
Children are to be utilized before they get to be
Twenty-one and lose their Activities.—The new Arts and
Sciences to be taught.—Secretary of the Treasury to
regulate the Fashions, and how.—The President and Sunday
Schools.—All Mining to be transferred to Wall
Street.—Advance Sheets of Reports for 1969.—What our
Railway System is to be.—Grumbling and Patriotism.—Of
the Future of Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, and
Boston.—_A Pax Vobiscum._

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THE COMIC HISTORY OF THE
UNITED STATES.

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THE COMIC HISTORY OF THE
UNITED STATES.

----------

PREFATORY.

TREATING THE READER TO AN ACCOUNT OF THE AUTHOR, AND OF THE PLAN, OBJECT, AND PRINCIPLES OF THIS HISTORY.

The Author, proposing to be intimate with the Reader, deems an
Introduction desirable.—Born Early and Poor.—How the Two Facts were
managed and overcome.—School Days and Nights.—College Lines, crooked
and straight.—Father’s Face against his.—A New American
Decalogue.—Into the Married and other States and Territories.—Settling
down.—Advantages of a Sub-urban Residence.—Outside and Inside Views of
the Author’s Head.—Plans and Purposes of the Work.—Laughing
Facts.—Roman Precedents.—Impartiality holding the Shears and
Tape.—Sources of our Information.—Acknowledgments to Smith and
Brown.—Our Illustrations.

Due it is alike to the originality and dignity of this work, and to the respectability, comfort, and good understanding of the reader and ourself, that a formal introduction should take place at the very outset.

For although we feel sure that without this we shall, after keeping company together a few evenings, exchange confidences and hearts with each other for life, yet to avoid needless suspicions,—mute and silent though they be,—and to obviate the hazards and discomforts of injurious side-glances, interrogative of my origin, person, parentage, education, and moral character,—which the _paterfamilias_ may, and naturally would, cast upon a new teacher, who offers to take a place in his household, sit in one corner of the family room when the lamps are lit, and to sleep in the spare bedroom when they are turned down,—I propose to state at once who it is that comes with this friendly audacity, what are his intentions, and how he expects to behave himself in a relation at once so familiar and responsible, viz. that of a good-natured, equable, humorous companion and friend, indicating and painting facts in a pleasant, genial, and healthy way.

_First_, then, as to ourself. I say not myself; for this would be to roll immediately my complex egoism out of the manifold garments which a historian wears of course; but I say Ourself, that gathered, round Impersonation which may be well supposed to be a crystallized something, like a cunning frost-work on the long window-panes of history,—an armless hand writing _Mene_ and other hieroglyphics on the wall, or a Briareus with his hundred hands, heads, and feet, running in a hundred different ways, staring through a hundred telescopes at the calm ages, and writing with a century of hands the doings, undoings, and misdoings of the race. This manifold, dignified mystery I mean to put on and wear after this chapter; but in order to insure the confidence which I now seek, I shall slip, for a few minutes, out of my state gear, and taking your hand,—now no longer withheld nor even hesitatingly given,—look trustingly into your eyes, and mention a few of those particulars of myself, which you have a gracious right to know, in order to judge of my standing in the world, my intellectual competency and fitness, and the plumptitude of my moral proportions.

I was born very early in life; so early, in fact, that although present, and making such an effort as befitted my first appearance, I was so inexpressibly interested in the matter, that I forgot my future office, that of recorder of passing events. The fact of my birth—a fact which is apt to happen to most people—is not perhaps so singular as that, being born in the United States, I contrived to live beyond the first five years, that fatal semi-decade. I ought, perhaps, now to add, in order to quiet any apprehensions after my last alarming remark, that “I still live”; and that, having survived the perils and plums of parental kindness in infancy, I hope to outlive the equally fatal neglect and indifference which marks our treatment of old age.

My parents, at the time I was given to the world, were poor, and, therefore, not respectable. They had been simple enough to marry young, and for love; and although they had mated each other well, they had failed to put a yoke upon the neck of fortune. These early struggles, however, stiffened in them the moral elements, and marbleized, so to speak, the soft woods of their country natures, making a substance very different from that thin, moral veneering which is upholstered from the beechen groves that timber the sunny slopes of life. Both of them were Presbyterians; always attending the Sunday services, sitting in a gallery seat, close to the pulpit, and so taking the brunt of the hard blows which were rightfully felt in, and—I sometimes thought—spent themselves upon, our uncushioned pew.

An offer from my father’s brother, who had become rich in mercantile business, drew my father and the family in my fifth year to the city of Philadelphia. With this change of base came sharper tactics against the army of poverty; and at last, by fighting it on the same line, although it took all the summer of his life, he achieved the victory. I was then sent to the best schools; took lessons at home in some branches from a private teacher; took—I own it now—lessons in other branches privately, out of the house, without my father’s knowledge, although at his expense for the tuition; and at last I went to college.

Hard study, matched by an irrepressible love of pranks at night; a knowledge of Euclid’s lines and clothes line; of belles-lettres and unlettered belles; of geometrical and other squares; of chemistry applied to known uses and to experiments for which there were no precedents in the books; prizes offered by the faculty, and prizes offered by Mrs. Green and Mrs. White in the persons of their handsome daughters,—these all braided together the threads of my university life into a pattern which, if not unusual, was made up principally of figures little admired at home.

My father was not at all pleased with the well-red bill I brought with me, and quite as little with the unsigned ones which followed me, from college; and, concluding that I might run my own face for a while, set his sharply against me.

I took to teaching; sounding over again the shallow depths of old studies, but often striking the lead on the rocky bottom of a temper too long indulged not to be stern when touched by children’s thoughtlessness.

My father’s death cast upon me responsibilities for my mother and the estate, which dropped the curtain upon my dream-life, and lifted it from the long perspective of actual work and business cares. Among my father’s papers I found the following original document, which I reproduce here, as showing his shrewdness of observation, and the character of the parent who helped to form some elements of my own.

“A NEW AMERICAN DECALOGUE.

“Hear, O Jonathan, the commandments which thou hast made,—teaching them to thy infants, thy Freedmen, thy Irishmen, thy office-holders,—the asses within thy gates.

I.

“Thou shalt have no other God but Gain. Trade, and labor, husband-ry and all other brokerage, shall be his profits.

II.

“Graven images and pictures other than greenbacks and fractional currency thou shalt not make.

“These shalt continue to be unlike anything elsewhere, in the heavens above or in the earth beneath; and to them, therefore, thou mayst bow down thyself unto the thirty-third or thirty-fourth generation, using up in their pursuit all thy soles, thy health, and thy neighbor as thyself.

III.

“Thou shalt not mistake any other god for the aforesaid, such as Religion, True Worship, Charity, Virtue, Obedience, Truth; for Gain, being a jealous God, requires all your time, strength, health, soul, and body, and will show no mercy upon those who keep not his day-book, ledger, and cash-books.

IV.

“Remember the Sabbath day to keep it wholly to thyself.

V.

“Honor thy children, bowing down to them and worshipping them, giving them what they least require, that their days may be the shortest, in the United States, of all lands whatsoever.

VI.

“Thou shalt not kill the goose which lays the golden eggs.

VII.

“Thou shalt commit adulterations with almost everything in the earth beneath, and especially by the waters which are throughout the world.

VIII.

“Thou shalt steal whenever an official opportunity offers.

“Making a Cæsar of thyself, thou shalt render unto him all the money that is brought unto thee.

IX.

“Thou shalt forbear all witness against thy neighbor; lest thy time be consumed needlessly in the public service, and he afterwards, also, witness against thee.

X.

“Thou shalt acquire so much by the foregoing commandments, as not to covet thy neighbor’s house and lot, nor any other real or un-real estate of his whatsoever.”

Settling up the property which my father had accumulated, although disregarding this code, and unsettling myself, I roamed abroad long and widely; practically dog-earing in Europe, Asia, and Africa the leaves of that illuminated volume of travel which I had all my life been intent to own.

Then came marriage,—religious convictions,—studying for the ministry,—children in the house,—studying them, and how to feed them,—ordination,—a call to a rus-urban congregation in the vicinity of New York,—only a short hour’s ride on a rail, and well feathered, without tar, by plentiful dust,—preaching to an assemblage, gathered from behind sharp counters on week-days, to measure my discourses critically, and to secure their money’s worth on Sundays,—and all the nameless little experiences that roll over the cog-wheels of a suburban parson’s life. Two bronchial attacks commissioned me to look up a better throat,—once in a journey to South America, and once across the prairies to California.

These experiences, added to their predecessors, have accumulated, with my readings, the materials for a history which the leisure half-hours, paragraphed between the compact duties of my thirty years of ministerial work, have permitted me to put together, and which now, dear reader, I place, as my _cor cordium_, in your hands.

It is the cream, skimmed from my carefully kept dairy; or rather the condensed milk of my very being, left at your door, to make your tea pleasanter, and your pudding sweeter and richer.

As you may be curious to possess, and I am most happy of an opportunity to get off my latest photogram, I add, as an item serving to assist you in making up the sum of my qualifications, this

bare-ly remarking that as its unfurnished state may disappoint you, I will endeavor to restore your pleasing illusion, by giving you gratuitously

flattering myself that, although you may find nothing in it, you will at least confess, that seldom dare an author venture upon such an exposure of his stock in trade.

Having now furnished all the main elements which will enable my pupil readers to outline my intellectual portraiture, having frankly shown four sides of myself,—a lower side and an upper side, an outside and inside,—being the only sides, I trust, that I shall take in this history, I crave leave now to add, _secondly_, a word as to the plan, object, and principles of this history. They are, in brief, to put facts, veritable and authentic facts, whether agreeable or disagreeable in themselves, in that pleasing dress that will make them welcome visitors to the drawing-room, good chums in the bedchamber, chatty companions in the cars, on steamers and steamboats, jolly physicians to the dyspeptically lean, and pleasantly wise counsellors to the troubled.

I feel so sure that, as not one of the illuminated readers of these chronicles has ever mistaken dulness for wisdom, so not one will need be reminded that the most solid and trusted truths may wear the smiles of joy and hilarity.

The Romans on their solemn festival days were wont to carry in their processions the images of their ancestors, even those long deceased, wreathed with flowers. So carry we the images of the Past, garlanded with the rosy links of fun and jollity.

We shall not be tempted by the lure of originality, nor even by the attractive ambition of gaining credit for profound critical and historical acumen, to follow the late fashion of dressing up stale and unwholesome characters in fine clothes and qualities. We shall neither foist the virtuous regimentals and well-earned epaulettes of Washington upon Benedict Arnold, nor tease history to fling a mantle of false charity over Burr’s treason. We shall not worry the public conscience into any praise, however faint, of the crimson waistcoat of Mr. Jefferson Davis, nor waste any admiration upon the spotted neck-tie, perhaps too loosely drawn, of Jacob Thompson. Impartial justice shall hold our tape and handle our shears.

It is usual for historians to indicate the sources of their information; but as we have refused no means of enriching these annals, using for that purpose whatever materials our multiform reading could supply, from the Ramayana, the great Sanscrit epic, impressed on wax, down to the last published child’s primer, printed on patented wooden paper, we could not name all our authorities without giving a catalogue inconvenient for our publishers, and too long for the abridged lives of our readers. We cannot, however, refrain from acknowledging our obligations to John Smith, Esq., for original information, novel ideas, and new turns of thought around old notions, running through every page of this history; to Mr. Jones, for valuable public documents; and to Mr. Brown, the well-known sexton of Grace Church, New York, who in the course of his lifelong diggings, has exhumed several pieces of Americans, whom we have reconstructed and preserved in our historical cases.

As to the illustrations which flash upon and light up our pages, they will speak for themselves; if they do not, any word of ours would be, _Vox et preterea nihil_.

BOOK FIRST.

DISCOVERIES.
B. C. TO 1607 A. D.

“Through the ages one increasing purpose runs,
And the thoughts of men are widened with the process of the suns.”
TENNYSON.

“Here are old trees, tall oaks and gnarled pines
That stream with gray, green mosses; here the ground
Was never touched by spade, and flowers spring up
Unsown and die ungathered. It is sweet
To linger here among the flitting birds
And leaping squirrels, wandering brooks, and winds
That shake the leaves and scatter as they pass
A fragrance from the cedars thickly set
With pale blue berries. In their peaceful shades,
Peaceful, unpruned, immeasurably old,
My thoughts go up the long, dim path of years
Back to the earliest days.”
BRYANT.

“That would be wooed and not unsought be won.”
SHAKESPEARE.

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