ELISHA KENT KANE. 19 



or web, ready to be afterward unfolded and de- 

 veloped by the exigencies of great occasions and 

 the perils of critical positions. The language of an 

 eminent writer may be applied to him with peculiar 

 propriety : " That inconsiderable figure of his con- 

 tained a whole spirit-kingdom and Reflex of the 

 All ; and, though to the eye but some Jive standard 

 feet in size, reaches downwards and upwards, un- 

 surveyable, fading into the regions of Immensity 

 and Eternity. Life everywhere, as woven on that 

 stupendous ever-marvellous Loom of Time, may be 

 said to fashion itself of a woof of light, yet on a 

 warp of mystic darkness : only He that created it 

 can understand it."* 



The first place of instruction which Elisha Kane 

 attended was that conducted by Mr. Waldron, in 

 Eighth street near "Walnut, in his native city. This 

 gentleman, who has since become a priest of the 

 Roman Catholic Church, was a man of superior 

 education, and fully competent to perfect his pupils 

 in all the elementary branches of learning. After 

 spending some time under his tuition to little pur- 

 pose, Elisha was sent to the University of Virginia, 

 where he entered one of the subordinate classes. 



* Vide Miscellanies of Thomas Carlyle : Essay on Diderot, Boston 

 ed., Phillips, Sampson & Co., 1855. 



