"Lost World Books & Paper"

Travel-Exploration-Expedition-Discovery

A sampling of the author's writings... The leading rivers of our globe have played a most important part in its development. They are more than mere currents of descending water. Ideas float along their surface. They have ever been the great boundaries of nations. They are the grand avenues of commerce. Their beds have been held sacred as the dwelling-places of gods. They form natural barriers to ambition, and halting - places for conquest. The destinies of mankind have, therefore, been determined by their channels. Their interest increases in proportion to the historic souvenirs which seem to mingle with their foam and murmur with their waves. In this sense one of the first among the world's great rivers is the noble Rhine. Others can boast of greater breadth and volume, a longer distance traversed to the sea, and even mightier commerce borne upon their waves; but none, except the Nile, is richer in historic memories, and even that, from its remote antiquity, cannot appeal so closely to our sympathies. The Rhine is the great avenue of central Europe, and on its silver thread, for seven hundred miles, are strung the pearls of love, adventure, romance, tragedy, and comedy, till one may fancy it a necklace of transcendent value, rich, like the "page of knowledge," with the " spoils of time." It is, in fact, its constant succession of beautiful and historic objects, each crowned with its appropriate legend, that gives to this great stream of Germany its matchless charm. Viewed as a river merely, the Hudson is in some respects superior to the Rhine ; but add to the latter the legends and the memories of two thousand years, and the scales turn. What wonder, therefore, that the Rhine is to the Germans what the Nile was to the Egyptians, — a source of national pride and delight, a never-ending theme of song and story. Within its depths are treasures of golden memories. Let down the net of fancy at almost any point, and you can bring up gems of greater value to the world than any pearls that divers find. Two thousand years ago its name was as well known beside the Tiber as it is now along the Hudson. Navigable for more than six hundred miles through the very heart of Europe, its dominion has been battled for through- out the centuries. Its banks have echoed to the shouts of war- like Gauls, Teutons, Romans, Franks, and Normans, and on its placid surface have been cast the shadows of the world's great conquerors and chieftains, — Caesar, Attila, Charlemagne, Napoleon, and Von Moltke.