The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1881-06-23
CLARION CoRREsRoxDExoE.l
NOTES OF TRAVEL.
By Rev. W. r. Sims.

= = ~ Nt%N1SiS AitStEOJ34k. uAI4E2 IL
e progress of the Olympic games Imagin
Il the immense Exposition Hall filled wit
). the products of Southern art, industry, a.
G rlcuiture and invention, and throneed wit
crowd OF visitors ranging from fifty t
seventy-hve thousand two large stock an
cattle sales, wish bidders from all parts c
the Union: a military drill with infantr
and artillery from Louisville, ST. Loui.
Memphis, New Orleans, and other points
and an assembly of eight thousand specta
tors TO witness their dress parade by sun
light IN the day, and by the scarcely les
brilliant electric light by night; the bicveI,
men IN full blast; two visiting State Pres
Associations; Taimage, Beecher, Colquitt
all lecturing till the crowd shouted and ap
plauded and wept, and Burdette. the Bur
Hngton Hawk-Eye funny man Iecturing til
they laughed; seven universities, college.
and schools with their commencements At
tracing hosts OF students, aluaani, trustees,
friends and visitors; countless array OF
skating-rinks, baby shows, mechanics con-
yention, carmen's associations, excursions.
plenics; brass bands, string bands musicaIeS.
soirees, professions, clubs, delegations, pub
/ lie dinners, breakfasts and suppers, baseball
players and to all the throng thus gather
/ d add stirring local population of sixty
thousand all at work or sport, making
themselves felt and heard and seen with all
the ardor of Tennessee vim and vivacity
Fancy, too, the various buildings and
places Of interest in and around the city
the tar-famed Capitol, and its famous hang
ing garden, surrounded by rows OF CAV
pdrferFeS, and glIstenlng fountains, statutes
OF bronze equestrian, and statutes of marble
pedestrian, ooquets of flower beds ana
avenues OF trees, miniature lakes spauned
by miniature bridges terrace and t1crct,
boulevard and bypath, tiagstone and ffesco
baiustrade and Banquet and grotto and
grove, and column and capital, and corridor
and cornice-and in the Whole building md
grounds, not one atom of material of any
kind foreign to the State lines OF Tennessee: F
the elegant new custom house, surprising
far, L think, IN architectural design ana +
symmetry, even the costly pile in New Or +
leans the tomb of President Polk, and the /
residence of his venerable widow who still /
survives; the various city and State hos /
pitfalls; the asylums, pre-eminently that fer /
the insane with its Incompatible l0yelness /
of landscape, its treasury of rare dollhouse
plants, and its well-kept and commodous
grounds; the water works, with their huge
Dean engines robblng the river at the rate
or thousands OF gallons every hour of the
twenty-iour; the conference.-the old city,
with its crowded network of intersecting
graves aud old moss-covered monuments,
(the place which man made for q cemetery
and the more modern Mt. Oivet. with
its magnificent approach and beautiful
.lf VIII old Il.
granite lodge keeps watch over the 81
lent city of the dead, (the place which
nature made for cemetery the
penitentiary, that modern Bastile OF filth,
sickness and cruelty which disfgures the
capital of Tennessee and disgraces her Leg
islature; the suburban gardens and city
fower-stands; the widely-known Cheatham
estate with its goldfish pond and tower, its
green houses, its princely furniture and
palatial attachments; the Belle Meade
stock farm residence, and huge deer park
with its two hundred shy, unsocaI inhabi-
tants; the Hermitage, the home OF that
stern old warrlor-statesman, Andrew Jack
son Vanderbilt University; Fisk Univer-
sity the Southern colored tor rs it is
familiarly called, the Negro Vanderbilt }
the Normal College; the Fogg; Wards
Prices and other seats OF
learning which have given to this city the
soubriquet of ''the Athens of the South )"
various public State and National buildings,
and retail stores, shops, factories,
stables, and private residences I
the great Maxwell House, whose large size, q
tesselated marble floors and luxurious APP t
purtenances, rank it alongside the Gait, ?
the st. Charles, and the Grand Central
and then, raising your eyes from the city, :
look up at the gloomy, battle-crowned, his !
toric hills that run in concentric circles, or I
rather in one main circle, around the great t
rocky basin in which Nashville reposes.
Away above fields Of waving green and
gold on the one side, ana above the tall
t1rest of spires and steeples and towers on
the other, rise old ruined forts, like grim d
,entinels watching, with jealous frown, the
progress of the Southland as she springs
from the ashes of past Nation
ii calamity and private disaster.
For one of the striking characteristics of
ibis city is the dauntless public-spirit and
business thrift of her citizens. In the
hangers and trying scenes of two interna-
.ional wars, it was no cowardly reticence or
ortunate exemption that has led up to her d
present prosperity and in the civil war,
The whole country knows how she stood in
The triple group of Southern cities, occu-
Pied exhausted and devastated alike by T
friend and foe, that have rendered the
names Of Nicksburg, Nashville and Rich
mond immortal in the annals of patriotic
devotion.
The fire of the incendiary, the food Of 9
The Cumberland, the gaunt hand of famine
the scathing scourge of the cholera have all
swept ruthlessly through her streets. But r
forth from them all she has CONS like pure tt
gold from the furnace.
Speaking of fires, my thoughts this morn
ing were suddenly precipitated from the
sublime to the ridiculous Last week a fire .
var HaSfrovaI half Tni1lior, AnlIarS u
IF property near the heart Of the city.
To-day, while the streets were thronged )
with visitors who were looking at ;
The vast area OF dismaltled walls
and fallen bricks, from piles of .
which the smoke was still ascending two
Young men from the rural districts appear
I'd on the scene. Suddenly one of them
caught sight of the smoking ruins. Calling 1
out to his companion who was tagging be-
hind, looking in at toy window, "Whew-
Wv, RUFF, F" be exclaimed, 'Whoo-eef lest
come here-er, Did YOU ever sec seob q big I
q
have statistics of commerce and some
historical data at hand concerning this sec
ton Of coutry, but have let my pen run
so fast and far, that [ know you would advise
me to omit them at present. Crops are 7
pretty fair. but while the smaller grains
seem TO be doing finely, / have seen no corn
as good as that left behind ne in Missis-
sfppi.
I shall also have to omit all mention of =
the press, the pulpit and the bar Of Nashville, p
as well as any description of the visiting ce- 0
lebrities. The closing scenes nf the Expo ?
sition have been of special interest, and }
every incoming t-aiE OF sLe six routes :
which centre here has borne a heavy bur. /
den of human freight. The hotels are taxed i
to their utmost capacity, and the streets
and all places of interest are filled with an =
eager, restless, surging crowd of humanity.
and to the hoarse mutter of the peoples
voices are added the shrek and roar of the Il
rushing railway train; the loud scream of
the steamboat whistle, caught up by a thous Il
aud reverberating hili-toPs, and dying u
away in the wild, ringing chorus of the
ieck-hapds and the harsh creaking q .ha b
,nrdage Tie nIacid Lar,.llllg IL tlln old Gum Il