Spirit of Jefferson. [volume] (Charles Town, Va. [W. Va.]) 1844-1948, 1884-11-11

y
thus enabled to resist the destructive
effects of time.
The third day out it rained. Rain
is not an uncommon event at sea-
And to the boy who could see no sense
in Jacob ladder for the use of angels
who had wings with which they might
mount to heaven, the question readily
occurs, why rain at sea, where there
is no grass, no grain, and no trees to
nourish and keep alive, and apparent
iY no need of water? Fresh water is
as necessary to the living myriads of
the sea as to the inhabitants of dry
land. 1t is an old proYerb among
boys, that what goes up must come
down, and as the waters of the sea
arc constantly rising by evaporation,
they must return again. Aud it is
} we'll that they do, in a great measure,
fall back directly upon the sea, for if
they were all waited in the form of
mist or vapor to the continents, and
dropped upon them in the form of
rain, the school boys would have too
. many holidays, and the earth would be
ploughed upintohuge canons and rem
dered duninhabitable forman and beast.
1t is said that continents and seas
\ Fare two poles of IS circulating appa-
ratus-at one pole is condensation, at
the other evaporation. And that there
i4us been throughout all geological
times, q constant increase in the size
of continents and the height of noun
tains. And that if so, the circulation
of air and water has been becoming
swifter and swifter." This may be
so. But it must have its limits, for
as the continents increase the seas
must decrease, and in consequence
the evaporation must diminish and
with it condensation. So that there
can be no danger that by the increase
of continents, the evaporation and
condensation will be so rapid that We
may see the waters of the deep in vast
sheets rushing over our heads to the
mountains, there to be precipitated
and returned again to the sea in tor
rents and floods.
BY way of showing the difference
between the English, French, German
and Spanish languages in respect to
the number of words necessary to cx-
press the same idea, I give copy of
a notice 1 met with on ship in the four
several languages:
English-No smoking allowed.
Spanish-Smdka prohibited.
| French-H m'est pas permits de
Fumer.
Gcrman-Es est verboten hier su
RaucAem.
In the above case the Spanish Ian
guagc requires but two words, the
English three, the French seven, and
the German six.
IN Spanish TMuei1fs always implied,
more so than in either of the other
three.
: An Englishman, my state-room com
panion, who was on his return home
from Australia, where he had sought
to make q fortune and been disap-
pointed, named Griffith, Ca Welsh
nalne) and who was once captain in
the East India service, Cockney by
birth, C. c. one who in former times
was born within the sound of Bow
Bells in London, but ct present one
born any where in London educated
in the Island of Man in the Irish
Channel, hog at table and brute
every where, who could see nothing
good except as it approached the
English standard of excellence, took
great pleasure in setting forth Eng
lands power, her glory, her grandeur,
and her wonderful magnanimity which
. ICh o1V oh -, - i 4
sympathy for the weak against the
strong. l am sure he believed what
he said. Nor does he differ from
Englishmen generally in his views
He was man of intelligence. of wide
experience, and of extensive reading.
His father was colonel under Wei
lington, in the Peninsula campaign,
and he himself a captain in the Brit
ish service, who had witnessed the
horrors of the Sepoy revolt and par
ticipated in the assault and capture of
Delhi. From him learned that the
ship we were on, and the thousand
and one other ships chartered by the
; British Crown, are bound by the terms
of their charter to serve the govern
ment as transports in time of war if
: so required. An EngIishman will
never admit that his government is
otherwise than generous and magnan-
imous in its dealings With the world.
They claim that it is par excellence,
the friend of the weak, the champion
of the right, and the defender of the
true faith. They boast, and right
fully, that the bonds of slave are
instantly loosed on his setting foot on
the soil of England. But has their
policy not been to make slaves of
whole peoples, by reducing them to
commercial bondage and making of
them but hewers of wood and drawers
of water, for their own benefit, in all
cases where they had the power?
so! for the gift to gae us
TOsee ourselves as others see u.s."
. England's condition is such, I ap-
prehenu, that she is impelled by con-
, siderations of national existence to
. do many things that she might not do
were she differently situated and less
dependent. The constant dread of
: the English is lest her power should
: wane and her sun set never to rise,
/ and that like Greece and Rome she
: will be known only in history. Self
I