The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1893-11-15

Sir Edwin Arnold says in the London
Telegraph: Among the experiences Of
travel few are more striking than the
manner in which locality will become
interesting, not by its historical or COM
mercial or personal associations so
much as by it's mention in literature or
song. A common example Of this is real
ICED by everybody who crosses the Dor
der into Scotland for the first time. BY
whichever road he enters the Land Of
Cakes" the tourist or visitor finds him
self tourneying with Sir Walter Scott
as an ever-present and invisible guide.
Everything reminds him of the "Wiz-
ard of the North and every scene
takes its character from the magic
pages of Sir Walter. On one hand il
will be Lindisfarne and TantaIIon, Ber-
wick and the Scotch marches, interest
ing at every stage because of Lord Mar
mion and Constance and the border bal
lads. On the other side, from where
the sun shines bright on Carlislewall"
over Cannoble Lea, where Young
Lochinvar carried off his bride, and
across the Solway Firth to Melrose and
Dryburgh and so on right away to the
highlands. and in their deepest recesses,
1t is all not so much Scotland as Scott's
land-possessed, embellished and made
famous by that great genius. 1t really
seems as If imagination and art can do
more to render a place memorable and
attractive than even the noisiest histori-
cal occurrences. No doubt it makes the
traveller look out of the windows of his
railway carriage or diligence with some
emotion when. say in Italy, he crosses
the little stream that was the Rubicon;
or hears from the conductor down in the
hills of Umbria that the rivuIet under
his feet flowing into the lake is called
Sanguinetto the bloody channel" and
instantly remembers that this is where
Roman and Carthaginian blood min
gled in such profusion that the noun
tain brook took its name from that red
day of the battle of Thrasimene. But it
stirs the artistic mind yet more to sit
on the hills near FiesOle in the spot
where the ladies and cavaliers of Boo
cacciO related to each other the stories
of the "Decameron;' or to see the stone
bench in Florence where Dante sat daily
meditating his "Inferno:" Or in Verona
TO recall, at the tomb of the Capulets.
the tender sorrows of Romeo and
Juliet. To take a more familiar instance
and one close at home, all the records
of the temple-the beginning of the
wars of the White and Red Roses in
its ancient garden; the old Templar
knights that sleep within its church,
ana the long roll of famous forensic
WORTHLESS with which its courts and It's
buildings are haunted-what are these
TO move the fancy and touch the heart
compared to the tomb of Goldsmith in
a corner of that legal labyrinth, or the
memories that cluster round the bit
of green foliage and bubbling water in
FOuntain court where Ruth Pinch
tapped her pretty foot on the gravel
while she listened to her lover?
These thoughts come to me, remem-
bering something that happened in a long
journey which 1 took last year between
New York and New Orleans, going round
by the south. and following what is
called by enterprising railway advertisers
there the Sunset Route" Train travel
ing i'm the states is wonderfully we'll
organized and fairly comfortable for long
! trips; but it can not be said that the
average scenery Of the great republic is
beautiful or interesting. There is an
aspect about the general American land
scape which can be best defined as
'stringy." The trees are spindly; the
wild growth of woods and wastes is
ragged. and even in some of the prettier
combinations hideOus collections of
black and half-burned stumps deface the
prospect and make the land seem like
q collection of cemeteries in memory of
It's bygOne forests. When once Won get
out of the large and well-built towns
and cities, the country regions are full
OF mean and ugly wooden houses made
of weather-board; and as you go farther
south these degenerate into ragged farm
houses, which paint upon their roofs the
names of patent medicines in staring
letters, or negro shanties scarcely more
human in appearance than pig-styes
South of Washington there are certainly
some charming regions under the Blue
| Ridge and among the woods of Virginia
and climate and scenery both after a
| little for the better when the train crosses
| into North Carolina, and you run down
| by Hendersham and Raleigh, Spartan
burg, Columbia and Augusta through
South Carolina. The eye saddened by
| the absence of furred and feathered life
| in the desolated rural districts of the
| North, sees here with pleasure the buzz
| zard and the hawk lowering in the sky
the void fowl clustering upon the inlets
| and swamps, and in the forests squirrels
and chipmunks playing about with,
| perhaps, a deer or two. The expresses
| and great white sycamores are a well
| come change from the live oak and maple
| and fir, and the negro population, grow
| ing denser. lends an interesting feature
to the prolonged journey.
Farther south your train goes march
| ing through Georgia. and you begin
| TO feel the influences of a subtropical
latitude in the vegetation and charac-
| ter of the common life. Types of the
southerner and his belongings enter
and leave the carriage, and divert by
| the novelty of their ideas and language,
while the odd mixture of American
| with Indian. French and classical
names for the towns entertain you in
passing from Columbia to Augusta, Au-
! gusta to Macon, Macon to Vienna and
| Abbeville, and so by Val d Osta, Trad
| ers' Hill. Jasper, Live Oak, Tallahassee
and dozens of strangely entitled spots
to Bristol. But il is ali somewhat tedi-
| Gus in its mOnOtOny until approaching
| Florida and the coast of the Gulf Of
| Mexico, you come into more special
| scenery, where the Spanish moss
swings upon the dark forest trees, and
| the palmetto shoots up from the
| lagoons; and over the interminable sea-
marshes between Apalachee bay and
| New Orleans flights Of long-tailed black
| shrikes and gray crows fill the air, and
| the stagnant water swarms with catfish
| and alligators. L like America, and
| have good reason to like her, but look
back upon the greater part of that
prodigious journey with the recollection
| Of fatigue and ennui such as few
/ railway trips ever left behind AS you
| get westward between New Orleans and
| the Pacific coast, passing through Lou
/ isiana and the immense deserts of
southern Texas. things are different
1