American union. [volume] (Morgantown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1855-1859, 1856-03-15
LIBERTY AND FoREvERoNE AND NsEpARABIR-
MEMORABILIA OF 1856.

Fifty or s ixty years hence. the winter
of le55-56 will! be quoted aud referred to
as an extr eme winter. ii will rank
among the maximums of cold seaso ns.
The little boys and girls ofthe present
time, who will then begin to be classed
among the oldest inhabitants, will gath
er their children and grandchildren a.
round them, TO tell them how the lher-
mometer used to go below zero how
there was sleighiDg in Philadelphia for
nearly two m >nths; how the fast young
men at first hired sleighs at ten dollars
an hour, but soon found it rather too
costly; how the streets are filled with
the frozen snow; how when thaw
came, the crossings were in an awful
condition; how the contractors to clean
the streets took two months holiday.
constituting their duties to be only to
maui away Legitimate mud, and not the
snow that is great deal more.trosble.
some; how the cutters were choked up
and the pavements and cellars flooded !;
how the Delaware River was frozen up
and how the City Ice Boat was sent
down the river to tow vessels in the Bay
instead of Keeping the harbor open
how the Philadelphia merchants, after
suffering for weeks from the suspension
OF navigation, had to hold meetings and
raise subscriptions, and advertise for a
Thousand men to cut channel through
the ice; how. in the course of a few
weeks. there were about half million
OF falls in the street among the half
million inhabitants of what was then the
little city Of Phiadelphia.
| They will have marvellous narratives
for gaping listeners about the cold all
over the Union; about the rivers being
frozen over at New York, and about
people going on foot from Brooklyn to
Governors Island about railroad trains
detained for hours, or even days in all
parts of the land /; about the Mississippi
being closed nearly its entire length /,
about sseighing in Louisiana and ska
ting in Texas; about frosis in the trop-
ical States and ice bridges ovor the
Washita aud Red Rivers; about multi
tudes of greievances on account Of de.
layed mails; about travellers perisl,inq
with cold on the desolate prairies, and
homeless wretches perishng with cold
in the streets of populous cites
Yes, when little Master Bobby -
shall have become "our much esteemed
and venerable fellow citizen, Robe rt
--- ESQ.," and little Miss Fanny
----- shall have been promoted to a
serene old dame with different surname
and grandchildren clustering around her
they will have many other queer things
to tell Of the months Of January and
FEBRUARY in the year 1856. Beside the
weather, they will have other queer re-
miniscences. They will make their
young descendants stare when they
tell them how Congress was nine weeks
electing a Speaker; how the great bus
mess Of the season afterwards was to
plot for Presidential nominations; how
in all the cities of tho Union there was
a large class Of people devoted to the
highly profitable and exhilarating pur.
suit Of Spiritualism how in certain
class of uncertain reputation. who advo.
Gated and practiced certain strange doc
trines commonly called Free Love !;
how the fashionable men of ths day
wore enormous shawls, and the fashion
able women enormous hoops how
there was man in the Presidential
chair long since forgotten, named Pierce,
andhow there were great many moro
also already forgotten who had strong
parties in favor Of making Presidents
out of them; how besides the falls in
in the streets, there we're a great many
fatal slips and falls on the treacherous
pavements of fpollitics, and how there
was never any one ready to help up
such sufferers though there were ma.
ny to give Them thrust or kick that
would more efectually establish their
downfall.
They will have strange stories to tell
OF how there was class of people in
1855, know as "old fogies," who did
not believe In "manfest destiny" de-
nounced flibusterism, and opposed the
movements To revolulionizo Nicaragua,
Mixico, Cuba and other States OF the
American Union; how in fact there was
a very strange population in 1856, who
we're looked back upon by the more en-
lightened generation of 1906 as very
slow, absurd, uncooth and wretcbedly
ignorant race ofboings. - CNmmings' Il.
eeaing Bulistin.
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