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twg_000000038400 | my quarter of that." "Foolish man!" continued the Doctor; "I say I was alone; let me demonstrate my proposition. Blackstone says, and what he says every lawyer will concede is the end of the law, and the beginning too, for that matter, that when a woman becomes a wife, she loses her identity, becomes nobody; that her husband absorbs her | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038401 | existence, as it were, as he does her goods and chattels, in his own. Now, sir, do you comprehend? My wife was with me, and she, being according to law nobody, of course I was alone. You, sir, being a law abiding man, must admit that my proposition is Q.E.D. "The doctrine of absorption, as I call it, is convenient. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038402 | It promotes harmony of action, by subjecting it to the control of a single will, thus avoiding all embarrassment from a conflict of opinion between man and wife. So, on my way to the trout stream (I say _my_ way, for though my wife was on horseback by my side, yet she being, according to the best legal authorities, nobody, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038403 | you see I was alone), I thought I would enlighten the good lady in regard to the true position, or rather the no position at all, which she occupied. Our way lay for a couple of miles along an old road, towards a clearing which had been abandoned, and through which the stream flowed. The tall old trees spread their | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038404 | long arms over us, clothed in the rich verdure of spring, and the breeze, so fresh and fragrant, moaned, and sighed, and whispered among the leaves. "'My dear,' said I, blandly, as we rode along, the birds singing merrily among the branches above us, 'do you know that you are NOBODY?' "'Nobody, Mr. W----,' (I was simply Mr. W----then; I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038405 | had not become, nor even dreamed that I should become a Doctor), 'Nobody, Mr. W----? Did you say nobody?' "'Absolutely nobody,' said I. 'A perfect nonentity. You are less even than a legal fiction.' "'Look you,' said she, as she applied the whip to her pony, in a way that brought him, with a bound, across the road directly in | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038406 | front of me (she rode like a belted knight), obstructing my progress, 'Look you, Mr. W----,' and there was a red spot on her cheek, and her eye sparkled like the sheen of a diamond, 'let us settle this matter now. I can bear being of small consideration, occupying very little space in the world, but to be stricken out | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038407 | of existence entirely, to possess no legal identity, to be regarded as absolutely nobody, is a thing I don't intend to stand--mark that, Mr. W----.' "'Keep cool, my dear,' said I; 'let us argue this matter.' I was calm, for I knew the law was on my side; I had the books, and the courts, and the statutes all in | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038408 | my favor. I was fortified, you see. "'Argue the matter!' she exclaimed; 'not till it is admitted that I'm somebody. If I'm nobody, I can't be argued with, I can't reason, nor talk. Now, Mr. W----, I've a tongue.' "'Gospel truth,' said I, 'whatever the authorities may say. But we will admit, for the sake of the argument, that you | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038409 | are somebody; Blackstone says'---- "'Out on Blackstone,' she exclaimed; 'what do I care for Blackstone, whose bones have been mouldering in the grave for more than a hundred years, for what I know. Don't talk to me about Blackstone.' "'But, my dear, you are _my_ wife, and Blackstone says'-- "'I don't care a fig what Blackstone says. If I _am_ | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038410 | your wife, I am my mother's daughter, and my brother's sister, and Tommy's mother, and there are four distinct individualities all centered in myself.' "'But,' said I again, 'Blackstone says'-- "'Confound that Blackstone,' she exclaimed; 'I do believe he has driven the wits out of the man's head. Now, look you, Mr. W----, you invited me to ride with you; | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038411 | you now say I am nobody. Very well. If nobody leaves you, I suppose you won't be without company, for somebody certainly left home with you this morning, and has rode with you thus far. So, good-bye, Mr. W----; success to your fishing, Mr. W----,' and she struck into a gallop towards home. "'Hallo!' said I, 'I give up the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038412 | point. I take back all I said. _Culpa mea_, my good wife. If Blackstone does say'-- "'Not a word more about Blackstone,' said she, shaking her whip, half serious half playfully, at me; 'if I go with you, I go as somebody--a legal entity.' "'Very well,' said I, 'we'll drop the argument.' "'Not the argument, but the fact, Mr. W----; | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038413 | and admit that Blackstone was a goose, and that his law, like his logic, is all nonsense when measured by the standard of common sense and practical fact. Admit that a woman, when she becomes a wife does not become a mere nonentity, or I leave you to journey alone.' "'Very well, my dear, let us see if we cannot | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038414 | compromise this matter. Suppose we allow his philosophy to stand as a general truth, making you an exception. We'll say that wives in general are nobody, but that you shall be exempt from the general rule, and be considered always hereafter, and as between ourselves, as somebody.' "You see the shrewdness of my proposition. Firstly, it saved Blackstone; secondly, it | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038415 | saved _me_, let me down easy; and thirdly, it appealed to the womanly vanity of my wife, and it took. "'Oh, well,' she said, as she brought her pony alongside of me, and we jogged along cosily together, 'I see no objection to that. Other wives can take care of themselves. But this compromise, as between _us_, Mr. W----, must | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038416 | be a _finality_. No Nebraska traps, Mr. W----. No Kansas bills hereafter. It must be a finality, mind.' "'Very well,' said I; and a robin that was building its nest on a limb that hung over the road, paused in its labors, and burst into song, and the burden of its lay seemed to be a compromise, which, in truth, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038417 | should be a FINALITY. "We were successful in our fishing, and we followed the old-fashioned custom as to bait. We discarded the fly, using only the angle-worm. At the foot of the ripples; under the old logs; where the water went whirling under the cavernous banks; in the eddies; among the driftwood; everywhere, we found trout--not large, none weighing over | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038418 | six ounces, and few less than three. We caught my basket full in less then two hours, and then rode home. It was a day of enjoyment to us, you may be sure. "And now I appeal to you, in all seriousness, my friend," the Doctor continued, addressing himself to Spalding, "if there is not something due to the wives | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038419 | and mothers of the present generation? Is there not some relaxation of the law necessary in vindication of the civilization of the age, against the legal barbarisms still remaining on the statute books, and adhered to by the common law, in regard to wives and mothers? Is the current of progress to flow by them for ever, bearing no reforms | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038420 | which shall affect them? Do not misunderstand me. I am no advocate of the practices of the 'strong-minded women,' who hold their conventions and public meetings, who unsex themselves by mounting the forum, and, throwing off the retiring modesty of the true woman, seek to secure notoriety at the price of popular contempt. But there are evils which bear heavily, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038421 | too heavily, upon the women even of this country, and which, for the credit of the civilization of the age, should be corrected. As calm-minded, philanthropic men, we, the American people, should look into this subject, and, regardless of jeer and scoff, do what justice, humanity, and the right demand of us, in regard to some of the social and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038422 | legal inequalities between the sexes, pertaining to the married state." "It is one of the mysteries of our system of jurisprudence," replied Spalding, "that while everything else is on the move, while progress is written in letters of living light upon all other things, that remains stationary--at least in a comparative sense. The world moves on, civilization advances, science and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038423 | the arts stride forward, but the law stands still. A principle which may have been somewhat changed, modified, bent, if you please, into an adaptation to the exigencies of the present, and a fitness for the changed circumstances of the times in which we live, is suddenly thrown back into its old position by the exhumation of some 'decision' from | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038424 | the dust of ages, made by some judge away back in the olden times, resurrected by the research of some antiquarian lawyer, who loves to delve among the rubbish of past generations. The learning, the wisdom, the philosophy of the present is discarded, and the spirits of a lower civilization are conjured from the darkness of vanished centuries, to settle | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038425 | rules for the government of commerce, personal conduct, and the social relations of the times in which we live. There seems to be something paradoxical in the idea that the older the decision the better the law--the more ancient the commentator, the profounder the wisdom of his axioms. This might be well, were it true that civilization is 'progressing backwards,' | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038426 | the science of government retrograding. In that case, it would of course be true, that the nearer you approach the fountain, the purer the stream would be. But such is not the fact. In all these attributes the world is on the advance, the science of government progressive; and to make the wisdom of centuries ago override the wisdom, or | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038427 | overshadow the light of the present, is a paradox peculiar to our system of jurisprudence. There are lawyers and judges, who enjoy a high reputation, whose fame rests upon their profound research among the worm-eaten tomes of black-letter law, and whose glory consists in their familiarity with the opinions and axioms of men who lived and died so long ago | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038428 | that their very tombs are forgotten. This class of lawyers and jurists hold in contempt all the learning, the philosophy, the practical wisdom of the present --rejecting everything that is not bearded and hoary with age. Seated in their libraries, in the midst of their ponderous octavos, their Roman and black-letter volumes, they reject with disdain the commentators, the opinions | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038429 | of the jurists of the present century; and brushing away the cobwebs and dust from the covers of their treasured relics of bygone ages, they clasp them in a loving embrace close to their hearts, exclaiming, 'These are my jewels.' Whatever has not the sanction of ancient authority, is folly to them--worse than folly, for it is innovation, and that | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038430 | is rank impiety. "I remember an anecdote of the celebrated William Wirt, related to show how ready his mind was, how instant in activity, and how suddenly it would flash with an eloquence, superior to that exhibited by the most elaborate preparation. He was arguing a cause before the Supreme Court of the United States, and laid down, as the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038431 | basis of his argument, a principle to which he desired to call the particular attention of the judges. The opposing counsel interrupted him, calling for the authority sustaining his principle,--'The book--the book!' demanded his adversary. 'Sir, and your honors,' said Wirt, straightening himself up to his full height, 'I am not bound to grope my way among the ruins of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038432 | antiquity, to stumble over obsolete statutes, or delve in black letter law, in search of a principle written in living letters upon the heart of every man.' If the idea contained in this answer of Wirt, were more fully appreciated by our modern jurists, it would be all the better for the country. "The common law is said to be | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038433 | the perfection of reason. This is doubtless true, but it is the perfection of the reason of the present, as well as of the past. Its principles are elastic, suiting themselves to the civilization of all ages. They are progressive, keeping pace with the progress of all times. They are not immutable, save in the element of right, and they | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038434 | therefore shape themselves to all circumstances, moving along with the onward march of trade, the commerce, the social relations, and business of the people. The learning of to-day, the wisdom, the philosophy of to-day is profounder than that of any preceding century, and it is folly to overthrow it by, or compel it to give place to, the learning, the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038435 | wisdom, the philosophy of departed and ruder ages. "In regard to your question, whether there is not some relaxation of the law necessary, in vindication of the civilization of the age, against the legal barbarisms remaining upon the statute book, and in the common law in regard to our wives, I answer frankly that I do not know about that. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038436 | The law, as you read it in Blackstone, and as you expounded it to your wife, on your fishing excursion, has been somewhat modified. Wives have been given a _status_ by modern legislation; and a woman, by becoming a wife, does not now cease to be a legal entity. The law permits her to retain and control her property irrespective | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038437 | of her husband, and she has, therefore, thus far, ceased to be 'nobody.' But my private opinion is, that, as a general thing, the women of this country get along very well, even under the pressure of the 'barbarisms' of which you speak. They manage, one way and another, to get the upper hand of their legal lords, law or | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038438 | no law. If their existence, in the light of authority, is 'less than a legal fiction,' they come to be regarded, or make themselves felt in the world as practical facts. They are quite as apt to be at the top, as at the bottom of the ladder, notwithstanding what 'Blackstone says' about their legal position. There is, doubtless, a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038439 | good deal of abuse of authority on the part of husbands, but the women get their share of the good that is going in the world, as a general thing. If the law is against them, they manage to usurp full an even amount of privilege and authority, and keep along about in line with the other sex. I never | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038440 | knew an out and out controversy between a man and his wife, in which the former did not get the worst of it in the end; and as to the impositions, which as a melancholy truth are too frequent, they are about as much on one side as the other. It is not to legal enactments that we must look | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038441 | for the cure of unhappiness incident to the married state, but to a reform in temper and habits of life. Besides, I do not believe the wives of this country would accept of a strict legal equality at all, if it were tendered them as a FINALITY. I believe they would prefer remaining as they are; for by being so, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038442 | they are left to the resources of their own genius, to win by their tact, what is not guaranteed by law. I know that there are a good many crazy-headed people in pantaloons as well as petticoats, who go about laboring for the 'emancipation of women,' as if the heavens and earth were coming together. But those of them who | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038443 | wear skirts, generally have delicate white hands, flowing curls, flashing black eyes, and the gift of oratory--and a desire to exhibit them all; while those in pantaloons have their hair combed smoothly back, as if preparing to be swallowed by a boa-constrictor, wear white cravats, talk softly, and show a good deal of the whites of their eyes, from a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038444 | chronic habit of looking up towards the moon and stars. As a general thing, these latter are of no practical use in the world, and make as good a tail to the kite of the 'strong-minded women' as anything else. But these people represent a very small portion of the American women, and until the masses demand 'emancipation,' I rather | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038445 | think that matters had better be permitted to remain as they are. The women will take care of themselves--no fear of that." . A BEAUTIFUL FLOWER--A NEW LAKE--A MOOSE--HIS CAPTURE--A SUMPTUOUS DINNER. We started the next morning on an exploring voyage up the right-hand stream, which enters this beautiful lake some half a mile west of the one we had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038446 | looked into the day before. On either hand, as we passed along the narrow channel, was a natural meadow, covered with a luxuriant growth of rank grass and weeds, conspicuous among which was a beautiful flower, the like of which I have never seen anywhere else. I am no botanist, and therefore cannot describe it in the language of the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038447 | florist, so that the learned in that beautiful science might classify it. It resembles somewhat the wild lily in shape, growing upon a tall, strong stem, almost like the stem of the flag. The flower itself is double, and its deep crimson--the deepest almost of any flower I have ever seen--shone conspicuously, as it waved gracefully in the breeze above | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038448 | the surrounding vegetation. It has one defect, however; it is without fragrance, I infer from the fact that its roots spread far out every way, and reach down into the water beneath, that it can hardly be transferred to the garden, or become civilized. It would be a great acquisition to the collection of the florist if it could, for | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038449 | I know of no flower that excels it in richness of color, gracefulness of appearance, or in gorgeousness of beauty. We saw abundance of deer feeding quietly upon the narrow meadows, and upon the lily pads on our way. We had no inclination to injure them, and we let them feed on. Some of them were hugely astonished, however, at | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038450 | our presence, and dashed away, whistling and snorting, into the forest. Two miles from the lake, we came to a rocky barrier, down which the stream, came rushing and roaring, for fifty or sixty rods, in a descent of perhaps sixty feet in all. Around these rapids the boats were carried, and we found, above them, the water deep and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038451 | sluggish, flowing through a dense forest, the tall trees on the banks stretching their leafy arms across the narrow channel, forming above it an arch delightfully cool, through which the sunlight could scarcely penetrate. We followed this channel a long way, when we came to a little lake or pond, four or five miles in circumference. It was a perfect | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038452 | gem, laying there all alone, so calm, so lovely in its solitude, with no sign of civilization around it, no sound of civilization startling its echoes from their sleep of ages, no human voice having perhaps ever been heard upon its shore since the red man departed from the hunting-ground of his fathers. The shores all around it were bold | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038453 | and rocky, save on the western side, where a broad sandy beach, of a quarter of a mile in extent, lay between the water and the shadow of the deep forest beyond. A solitary island of half a dozen acres, covered with majestic pines and tall, straight spruce trees, rises near the centre of the lake, adding a new charm | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038454 | to its quiet beauty. The waters of this little lake are clearer and more transparent than those of any other we had seen; we could see the white shells on its sandy bottom, fifteen feet below the surface. This peculiarity induced us to believe that we were above the stratum of iron ore which seems to underlay most of this | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038455 | wild region, coloring, while it does not render impure, the waters of most of these lakes and rivers. I have frequently, in my wanderings in these northern wilds, stumbled upon outcropping orebeds, which, were they nearer market, or more accessible to the energy and enterprise of the American people, would be capable of building up gigantic fortunes, but they are | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038456 | all valueless here, and probably will continue so for generations to come. We saw the fresh tracks of a moose on the sandy beach, tracks that had been made that morning, and we concluded to spend the day here, in the hope of securing one of these gigantic deer. We rowed to the island, intending to encamp there. We entered | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038457 | a little bay, of half an acre, the points forming it coming within a few yards of each other, and the branches of the trees intertwining their long arms lovingly above. As we landed, our dogs began nosing and dashing about, as if suddenly roused into excitement by the hot scent of some animal that had been disturbed by our | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038458 | coming. They broke into a simultaneous cry, and plunged like mad into the thicket. We pushed our boat back towards the open water, when we heard the plunge of some animal into the lake, on the other side of the island. Martin, who was in the leading boat with me, by a few vigorous pulls at the oar, rounded the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038459 | point between us and the spot where we had heard the plunge, and there, not ten rods from the shore, making for the mainland, was the game which, of all others, we most desired to see. "A moose! by Moses!" exclaimed Martin, in huge excitement. "Hurrah! hurrah! A moose! he's ours! he can't escape!" and away he dashed in pursuit. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038460 | The other boats now hove in sight, and a loud hurrah! went up from each, when they saw the nature of the game that had been started. There was no difficulty in overtaking the animal, desperate as were his efforts to escape. We shot past him, and turned him back in a direction towards the island again, and I picked | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038461 | up my rifle to settle the matter. "Don't shoot him," said Martin; "don't shoot him yet; he can't get away, and if you kill him, he'll sink; and if he don't, we can't get him into the boat. Let us drive him back to the island." The other boats were, by this time, up with us, every man in a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038462 | wild state of excitement, eager to be first in at the death. We had headed the animal towards the island, with our three boats so arranged, as that he could swim in no other direction, without running one of them down. The dogs had started a deer that had taken to the water, on the other side of the island. | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038463 | "Look here!" said I; "gentlemen, this game is mine. I claim him by right of discovery, and my right must not be interfered with." "Very well," the Doctor answered, "we'll only take a hand in his capture if he's likely to escape. So, go ahead." As we came within a few yards of the shore, and we could see that | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038464 | the animal's hoofs touched the bottom, I aimed carefully at his head, and fired. He made one desperate lunge forward, and turned over on his side, dying with scarcely a straggle, the ball having passed directly through his brain. This was the first and only live moose I have ever seen. He was not a large one, being, probably, a | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038465 | three-year-old, but well-grown. We should have called him a monster, had we not, before that time, seen in various museums the stuffed skins of those a quarter or a third larger. He would have weighed, as shot, probably between five and six hundred pounds. He had made this solitary island his home, as we ascertained by his spoor and other | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038466 | signs that we found upon subsequent explorations. We saw his bed but a few rods from where we landed, and from which our dogs had aroused him, though they, in their excitement, had overrun his scent, and dashed off after a deer. We had now accomplished one of the objects of our journey in this direction, and as the law | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038467 | we had imposed upon ourselves had reached its limits, prohibiting our shooting another moose that day, even should an opportunity occur, we concluded to return to our shanty, on the lake below. We, therefore, dressed our moose, and taking with us the skin and hind quarters, started down stream to a late dinner on Little Tupper's Lake. Indeed, there was | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038468 | a sort of necessity for our doing so. We had left our provisions there, calculating to return in the afternoon, not having taken with us even pepper or salt, wherewith to season the food which, upon constraint, we might cook during our absence. A few crackers, in the pockets of each, was all, in the provision line, that we had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038469 | provided ourselves with, and though, when we saw the moose-tracks in the sand, we had concluded to rough it, for a single night, for the chance of securing such rare game, yet having secured it, that part of our mission was accomplished, and we turned towards home. On our return to the lake, Spalding and myself rowed across to the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038470 | mouth of a cold brook, to procure a supply of fresh trout, upon which, with our moose and bear-meat, to dine. This we soon accomplished, and on our arrival home, we found huge pieces of moose and bear roasting before a blazing fire. The meat was supported upon long sticks, one end of which was sharpened, and the meat spitted | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038471 | upon it, and the other thrust into the ground, in a slanting direction, so as to bring the roasting pieces into a proper position before the fire. The meat was removed occasionally, and turned, until the roasting process was completed, and then served up on clean birch bark, just peeled from the trees, in the place of platters. We had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038472 | tin plates, knives, and forks, with us, also a tea-kettle, tin cups, and tea of the choicest quality, sugar, pepper, salt, and pork. The man who cannot make a meal where the viands present are moose-meat, bear, jerked venison, fresh trout, and pork, and for drink the best of tea and the purest and coldest spring water, had better keep | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038473 | out of the Rackett woods. The people, whoever they were, who prepared the camp in which we were domiciled, had an eye to convenience and comfort. The shanty was built of logs, on three sides, the crevices between which were filled with moss, and the sloping roof neatly covered with bark, in layers, like an old-fashioned roof, covered with split | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038474 | shingles. The front was open, and directly before it was a rough fire-place, with jams, made of small boulders, laid up with clay, regularly-fashioned, as if intended for a kitchen. This fire-place was three or four feet high, and served an excellent purpose, with reference to our cookery, and the lighting of our shanty at night. It served, also, to | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038475 | conduct the smoke upward, and prevented it from being blown into our faces, as we sat in front, at once, of our sleeping-place and our camp-fire. The only things that reminded us of civilization, aside from what we carried with us, were the innumerable crickets that, through all the night, kept up their chirruping in the crevices of this rude | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038476 | fireplace. There was something old-fashioned and sociable in their song. These, with the shrill notes of the little peepers along the shore, were old sounds to us, familiar voices, and they fell pleasantly on the ear. We had finished our meal, and taken to our pipes in the evening, as the sun went down among the old forests, away off | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038477 | in the west. The greyness of twilight came stealing over the water, and grew into darkness in the beautiful valley where that lake lay sleeping. The stars stole out silently, and set their watch in the sky, and calmness and repose rested upon everything around us. "I remember," said Smith, "the first year that I was in college, of hearing | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038478 | two learned professors disputing about what sort of animal it was that made the piping noise we hear in the marshy places, and stagnant pools, in the spring time, usually known as peepers. One insisted that it was a newt, or small lizard; and I remember that he went to his library, and brought a volume which proved his theory | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038479 | to be correct. The other denied the authority of the author, and insisted that the peeper was a frog. The discussion excited my curiosity, and I made up my mind to satisfy myself on the subject, if possible, by occular demonstration. There was a small marshy place, half a mile, or so, from the college grounds, from which I had | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038480 | heard, in my walks, the music of the peepers coming up every evening, in a loud and joyous chorus. I watched by it a number of evenings, and though there were a plenty of peepers, piping merrily enough, yet I could not get sight of one to save me. I began to think it was a myth, the viewless spirit | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038481 | of the bog, that made all the noises about which the learned professors had been disputing. At last, however, I got sight of a peeper, caught him in the act, and saw that it was, in fact, a little frog, nothing more, nothing less. He was not more than three feet from me, and though, when I moved, he hid | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038482 | himself in the muddy water, yet I managed to capture and take him home alive. He was a little animal, certainly, not larger than a half-dollar piece, and it was marvellous how a thing so small could make such a loud and piercing noise. I took him to my room, and placed him in a water-tight box, in which I | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038483 | fashioned an artificial bog, in the hope that he would confirm my testimony by his piping. The second evening, as I sat in my room, poring over the recitations of the morrow, he lifted up his voice, loud, shrill, and clear, as when singing in his native marsh. I hurried, in triumph, to the learned disputants about his identity, and | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038484 | in their presence, he furnished unanswerable evidence that the peeper was a frog, and not a newt. I was complimented by both the learned pundits, as though I had added a great item to the aggregate of human knowledge." "You _did_ do a great thing, my friend," said Spalding, "you solved a mystery about which men, wise in the learning | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038485 | of the books, had perhaps been disputing for centuries. What are the peepers? asked the naturalist, who listened to their piping notes from the marshy places in the spring time. It was a matter of small practical importance, what they were. Still it was a question which MIND wanted to have solved. Its solution would do no great amount of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038486 | good to the world. But then it was a mystery which it was the business of mind to lay bare; and what more has science done in tracing the history and progress of this earth of ours, as written upon the rocks, among which geology has been so long delving? 'What are the peepers?' asked the naturalist. 'They are newts, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038487 | little lizards,' answers a learned pandit. 'They are spirits of the bog, myths, that hold their carnival in the early grass of the marshy pools,' says the theorist and poet, who _believes_ in the idealities of a poetic fancy. 'They are frogs,' says a third, who is ready to chop any amount of logic in favor of his system of | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038488 | frogology, and hereupon columns of argument, and pages of learned discussion, have been held over the identity of the jolly peepers of the spring-time. "But you discarded logic, threw away argument, and came down to the sure demonstrations of sober fact. You watched by the marshy pool, and caught the 'peeper' in the act, took him '_in flagrante, delicto_,' as | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038489 | the lawyers say, and thus ended the theoretical discussion about the 'peepers.' You placed another fixed fact upon the page of natural history. "And how often has the wisdom of the schools, the philosophy of the profoundest theorists, been overthrown by the simple demonstrations of practical facts? For a thousand years the world was in pursuit of the giant power | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038490 | that lay hidden in heated vapor, the steam that came floating up from boiling water. That power eluded the grasp and baffled the research of human genius, which was looking so earnestly after it, until ingenuity gave it up, and philosophy pronounced it a delusion. Not far from the beginning of the present century, practical experiment began to develop the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038491 | mysterious power of steam. Rudely and imperfectly harnessed, at first, it still made the great wheel revolve, and men talked about making it a great motor for mechanical purposes. Philosophy volunteered its demonstrations of the absolute impossibility of such a thing. Still human ingenuity felt its way carefully onward, until the great fact was developed, that steam was in truth | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038492 | capable of moving machinery, was endowed almost with vitality, and could be made to throw the shuttle and spin. Ingenious men hinted that it might be made to propel water-craft in the place of wind and sails, and thus be harnessed into the service of commerce, as it had already been into that of manufactures. Here again philosophy interposed its | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038493 | axioms, and declared the scheme among the wild vagaries of a distempered fancy. But years rolled on, and the tall ship that swung out upon the broad ocean, and moved forward when the air was still and calmness was on the face of the deep, forward in the eye of the wind--forward in the teeth of the storm, that stopped | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038494 | not for billow or blast, gave the lie to philosophy, and scattered the theory of the wise like chaff. "The lightning, that fierce spirit of the storm, that darted down on its mission of destruction from the black cloud floating in the sky, became a thing of interest to the mechanical world, and the question was asked, 'Why cannot the | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038495 | lightning be harnessed into the service of man, and be made utilitarian?' Philosophy sneered at the wild delusion, but see how that same subtle and mysterious agency has been conquered? Note how truthfully it carries every word intrusted to its charge, along thousands of miles of the telegraph wire, with a speed, in comparison with which, sound is a laggard, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038496 | a speed that annihilates alike space and time. Men looked into a mirror, and seeing their own counterpart, a _fac-simile_ of themselves reflected there, began to ask, 'Why may not that shadow be fixed; fastened in some way, to remain upon the polished surface that gives it back, even after the original may be mouldering in the grave?' Here again | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038497 | philosophy laid its finger upon its nose, and winked facetiously, as if it had found a new subject for ridicule, in the stupendous folly of such an inquiry. But from that simple question, rose up the Daguerreian art; an art which fixes upon metallic plates, upon paper, the shadow of a man, of palace and cottage, of mountain and field, | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038498 | giving thus a picture ten thousand times truer to nature than the pencil of the cunningest artist. These and a thousand other mighty triumphs of human ingenuity have fought their way onward to their present position, against the fogyism of philosophy, the inertia of the schoolmen. They have been the sequence of cold, resistless demonstrations of experiment and fact. The | 60 | gutenberg |
twg_000000038499 | world would stand still but for the spirit of research for the practical; for experimental, and not theoretical knowledge, that is abroad. It is this spirit that moves the world in all its present matchless career of progress, and distinguishes our era above all others of the world's existence. You may be thankful, my friend, that you have been able | 60 | gutenberg |
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