Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1870-02-19
Mr.. 1ndersOn's Column.
How we are Photographera.

'N00'"" nuiNeyOTb lnsUumchlt On hlc HOnt
lens of which there is plainly seen beautiful
landscape with all the varied hucs Of nature.
Some fifteen years ago, according to the own
er's account, the instrument was left standing
for a time on the plain, in scorchng mid
days sun, fronting woodland. When again
brought into use, correct pictufe of the 'front.'
ing woodland, with all the various colofs of
the landscape was photographed on the lens,
and has remained unclangable to TIC present
time"
have no doubt that il Is quite remarkable.
But the thought came to me that we do not
esteem 1t straiige when there come such pho.
tographs on the lens through which the sur.
veyors themselves (the pun aside,) look over
these same landscapes There is daguerreo-
typed on the retina of the eye the beautiful
picture, and it is made into perfect view and
hung upon the walls of memory, to be as last
ing as is memoty itself
On this thought shut my eyes and gaze
within, going from picture to picture, calling
up scenes of tiy boyhoodi twenty-five years
ago. There are pictures Of Boston Common
in its gala-dress of Independence Day or Gen
and having still the sounds that came with the
days.
The old apple women are there STILL prepar-
ed for chatter with the boys again, ovef an
apple or a Gen. Washington ginger-cake, leach
equally indigestible to any but Boston boy
There walks by my side a little tow-headed
boy,-in my picture the same boy still, Though
la, -, l.. 4
"bearded like pard." Holding our hands is
fresh looking middle aged man,-so yet in
the pcture,-though now the dear white-hair-
ed father who has passed the three score years
and ten God grant him decades yet.
Not only is the picture one OF moving sights
and exciting sounds, but it grows panoramic
as look on. There follows the weary walk
home at even-tide ;-and then come days and
weeks followlng~-a reverie of pictures
There come to mind Braman's baths, over
which now vast piles Of masonry sand the
Narrow Neck between Boston and Roxbury,
no longer neck, and never again to be seen
doing its primitive duty as receptacle for oys.
ter-shells ;-Roxbury itself, lost in the High
lands the buckle berry fields of West Rox
bury and Jamaica Plains, now grown into
fashionable drives, and beautiful parks -
"The orchard, the meadow, the deep tangled wildwood,
And every loved spot which my infancy knew.
The widespreadng pond, and the mill which stood by 1t
The bridge and the rock where the cataract fell;
The cot of my father, tho dairy house nigh it,
And cen the rude bucket which hung in the we'll"
All these pictures are pcrfect,-evcn to the
flower, or leaf just tinted with autumn, that
trembling hands gave to some sweet little sylph,
who is now so buXom a matron, that smile
at the dear old picture
SO my gallery stretches on. am calling
up just such pictures as follow, in their panoA
ramic way, over the long lines of railroad to
the far distant west where the buffalo ranged
like black clo-d. see Lawrence, in Kan
sas, with the ruins of its Free State Hotel
Once again there are councils of war held in
the little Cincinnati House on Massachusetts
Stand before me is the tall form of John
Brown, and the wiry body of Jim Lane and
the portly Judge Wakefield There is the tent
near Lecompton with the calm-faced Robinson,
and the fiery Editor whose press had been
pitched into the Kaw. There is watermelon
eaten in the Free State Legislative Hall at To-
peka;-and then the picture changes to the lit
tic village of Nebraska City, and the wild wood
scenes Of Tabor, Iowa, where now is college
On, on, 60 the pictures, coming faster and fast
er,-now with orange blossoms and then with
the deep Grape of death ON through the
bloody years of war till find myself seat
ed, on the deck OF a steamer just coming out
of Lake Pepin, in Minnesota, en- route for ST.
Paul, and forgetting, among the wonderful
scenery, to read the "Campana THAI of Rich
ter, which held in my hand.
Somebody said at my elbow =
ut may be all very well to read the unintel-
ligible Jean Paul, when one would study CUES
tions about the soul of man,-but tell me,
why God can create and re.create only to de-
stroy-plants, animals, the world itself, or
words-so the theory goes,-and leave man
the only being that is to be immortal 2"
My skeptical medical friend had set before
me question whose answer is the theme of
this little paper
"God does not create TO destroy He makes
beautiful subjects for pictures. You will never
forget that grand rock, The Maiden's Leap
You will always remember the mysterious
Point Nopoint, toward which we are coming.
What is your memory but picture2
"God makes gorgeous sunset in the even
ing, and it is gone in an hour from the sky !;
but ii will never be gone from your memory
No painter can put it on canvass as you saw
it; but score of years hence you will see it
as you do tonight
Here are thousands of cattle, birds, insects,
creeping things, on whose eyes God paints
these pictures as on yours. Even dog has a
memory the memory must be the pic
ture. What seems to be decay is only max
ing way for new picture that there may be
change, variety. So day unto day uttereth
speech" FH
So as the doctor left me, thought on,-and
am thinking still,-of this wonderful photo
graphing that is going ou,-with our eyes the
Cameras, and uor brains the picture galleries
1t seems to me more wonderful than the pic
ture no the surveyors instrument.
Dear Old Fossils.
Who doubts that there are human Fossils
living ghOsls-who walk the strpats so Rasilv