No. 216.] 521 



craft, hauling hither and yon their huge burdens, and the vigilant 

 steamer going out to greet and tender its hospitalities to the weary 

 and heavy ladened ship, on her return from a foreign land. Go 

 further, embark in one of our capacious floating castles for the city 

 of refinementj mount there the towering monument, erected in com- 

 memoration of the scenes of Bunker Hill ; view thence the hundred 

 and three passenger trains of cars plying daily to and from thatcityj 

 see that group of laboring locomotives, as they return from their long 

 journey, with a trail of cars half a mile in length, and all ladened 

 with the rich products of the distant west ; observe with what dis- 

 patch their contents are transferred to the huge vessel lying in readi- 

 ness at the dock to receive them, and how soon upon the wings of 

 the wind, she is borne far away upon the heaving bosom of the ocean. 

 Pass up to Lowell, that city of art; behold there the grand strife be- 

 tween steam and water, in their trial of ability as moving power ; 

 stand at the entrance, and look through one of their capacious ma- 

 chine apartments, metal yielding to metal, one machine curiously 

 making another, and presenting together a mass of movements, as 

 devious and confounding to the observer, as the restless foliage of an 

 aspen forest, and yet every motion in exact accordance with tne plan 

 of the genius which produced it. 



For the contrast with the observation of this tour, penetrate tWfe 

 wilds of a western wilderness; scan the habitation of untaught sava- 

 ges, where no rattle of machinery, whistle of engines, or splashing 

 of steamers is heard, and where inventive genius has not scattered its 

 mills, railroads, printing presses, and its other agencies of civilizationj 

 and where man and beast alike, feed upon the spontaneous produc- 

 tions of the earth; and returning, you can the better realize what in- 

 ventive genius has done, and be prepared to anticipate what it slill 

 may do. For there is still room, its march will be onward. 



Some doubt this. In view of the wonders already wrought, they 

 fear the secrets of nature are well nigh exhausted, and startle at the 

 idea of going further. What can you next do? say they. You have 

 already pressed the elements into service, and compelled them to per- 

 form your labor ; contracted oceans and brought the opposite shores 

 of the Atlantic within twelve days of each other; you have presumed 

 to arrest the lofty flight of the proud wind, entangled it in your ma- 

 chinery, and compeUed it to lug round your gigantic wheels ; you 

 have imprisoned caloric in your steam chambers, ahd then applied its 

 angry efforts to escape to the moving of your huge engines; you have 

 pointed your tubes to the heavens, and protracted your vision, until 



