Lamoille newsdealer. [volume] (Hyde Park, Vt.) 1860-1877, 1867-08-28

Foreign Correspondent of the Boston Journal.
Letter From Carleton"
Down the Rhine.
A LETTER FOR BOYS AND GIRLS.
Geography, History and Story.

To The Eitor cf ths B ston Journal
Being assured by friesds from America
that the great army of boys and girls who
read The Journal are interested in your
foreign correspondence, desire from time
to time to write a letter for their especial
benefit. They are studying geography
and history III the common schools, and
1t will be pleasure to imagine that they
are with me to day, for am sailing down
the most beautiful Of Ill the rivers of
Europe-the Rhine. They will like to
look upon the hills covered with grape.
vines and crowned with old castles: it
will be delightful to listen to one or two
legends of the ancicn! times, when brave
Knights with steel helmets and stout lau.
ccs rode over these hills, and it will be
instructive to look upon some scenes where
great events have transp,red affecting the
welfare Of the human race
They can all describe the course of the
Rhine-that it rises among the A !ps and
has general course northward and emp,
ties INTO the German Ocean. If we were
to 20 Switzerland we should behold away
up among the mouuta MS river OF ice--a
glacier, seeming motionless. but yet ever
iu motion, gliding slowly down--slowcr
than the hour hand on a clock---so
slow that you cannot see it move. 1t is a
mountain of ice broken into great blocks,
some of them as large as meetinghouse
There are holes and glps between the
blocks SO wide and deep that if We should
miss our footing we should go down fifty
or an hundred feet iuto dark caverns
never again to be heard from by our
friends
This great ice river, as it descends into
the valley, gradually melts away and be.
comes a stream of water, issuing from an
ice cavern. You can walk into the cavern
several rods and look through the icy
walls from which the waite is constantly
dlipping-drop after drop, enough Of
.ham to form the river--wbich you will
see, by looking at your map, luus through
Lake Constance aud then goes on its
northern course to the ocean. taking the
river NJ ,in from the east aud the Aloselle
from the west. From the Lake Of Con
stauce down to the Main i. flows though
wide and fertile valley. You see Downs
villages, broad fields of wheat, orchards
aud meadows. and people ut work in the
fields just below the mouth of the Main
the grand beauties of the Rhine commence
We take steamboat at the town OF May.
ence, on the western bank.
MAYESCE
1t is very ancient place, for the Rom
ans were here bcfJre the birth of the Sav'
iour. In the lst verse Of the second chap
ter of the Gospel according to Luke, it
the New Testament, we read that there
went out decree from Cesar Augustus,
that all the world should be taxed. Just
about that time the son-in law of Angus
tus came with an army o t Roman soldier:
into the valley of the Rhine and began tc
build this city Of Mayence. 1t was Gen
eral Drusus, aid here is his tomb, 0
crumbling stone mound. How wonderful
aud strange it is to stand here--our fee
upon the stones which were laid by Re-
man soldiers eighteen hundred and sixty
or seventy years ago--wben Jesus Chris
was 10 the world Standing on tbi'
mound we connect ourselves with thost
distant years. We can see the world al
it was then. England, France, Germany
Russia, now SO great and powerful, wer'
peopled with barbarous tribes Their,
was no London, or Ia is or Berlin. Rom'
was the all conquerlng nation--mistrssl
Of the woId.
We see an old building. its walls of rec
sand stone, with curious round towers
rising high above the surrounding houses
1t is tie Cathedral which was built mor'
than one thousand years ago. Among th'
many tombs inside its walls is tha} o
Lady Pastrada, wife of Charlemagne, whit
died in 704 Gf
About 475 years ago there was a boy
running about these streets Of Mayencc
named Johnny Gooseaesh, who by hi
study and meditation, brought out an in
vention which has proved to be one 0
the greatest blessings ever bestowed upoI
the human race--the art of printing In
real name OF Gutenberg was John Gcus
Heisch (GooseAesh). Here is the hous
in which the first book from movable typ
was printed Gutenberg used 1t as
printing Office from l443 to 1860.