Migsa 
Written for Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
AMONG THE MOUNTAINS.—No. Ill, 
GOSSIP ABOUT AUTHORS 
Rev. Henry Hart Milman, Doan of St. Paul’s, 
died recently in London, aged seventy-seven years. 
He was a man of varied literary tastes and acquire¬ 
ments. and for many years had been known as one 
of the most,accomplished of English authors. Hav¬ 
ing graduated from Oxford, he took orders in 1817, 
and a few years later was elected Professor of Poetry 
in his Alma Mater. Later, he became Dean, and for 
twenty years had officiated at St. Paul’s, lie wrote 
plays, as well as poetry in his younger days, some 
of which we believe still retain a place upon the 
stage. As an historical writer he is mod favorably 
known. His be&t works are a “ History of the 
Jews,’’ a "History of Christianity,” and a “His¬ 
tory of Latin Christianity.” He was an interest¬ 
ing preacher, yet without imposing personal ap¬ 
pearance. 
Mrs H. B, Stowe is described by Borne one as 
“small and slight in figure, with delicate features, 
full of intellectual refinement, and a quiet grace of 
manner which, though perfectly unobtrusive, be¬ 
speaks the lady at all times, and would always make 
her recognized as a person of high culture.” Those 
who are familiar with her published likenesses will 
feel a trifle in doubt as to the “ delicate features.” 
She is usually represented rather the reverse. 
Da Horatius Bonar, author of “ Hymns of Faith 
and Hope,” is a gentleman of medium height and 
rotund figure; has a high, massive forehead, bushy 
locks of silver gray hair at the sides of his head, a 
'kin white as a woman’s yet detracting nothing from 
the strong, masculine tone of his face; lips firm, full, 
and handsome, and eyes largo, dark, and peculiar. 
He looks the very man to write those sweet hymns 
which carry truest consolation to many hearts. 
Jean Ingblow, —that sweet 6inger with a mu¬ 
sical name,—is a native of Boston, England. Her 
father is a country banker, her mother a Scotch wo¬ 
man, as her Christian name shows. She is one of 
eleven children, of a shy and retiring nature. Her 
first poems were published in 1868, and one hundred 
thousand copies of her works have been published in 
America alone, and nearly as many in England. 
Mr. A. Bronson Alcott, whose last boob, en¬ 
titled “ Tablets,” we have just received, but have- 
not found time to read, lives at Concord, Mass., in 
a quaint, picturesque house such as they used to 
build a century ago, with many gables and porches, 
and a huge stack of chimneys rising in the middle. 
Anna Dickinson’s home Is a small, simple three- 
story house iu Locust street, Philadelphia, neatly 
kept, and plainly, though tastefully furnished, where 
by her genius, she supports her mother, sister, and 
younger brother. 
Come, white angels, to baby and me; 
Touch his blae eyes with the image of sleep, 
In his surprise he will cease to weep; 
Hush, child, the angels are coming to thee 1 
Come, white doves, to baby and me; 
Softly whirr in the silent air, 
Flutter about in his golden hair; 
Hark, child, the doves are coming to thee * 
Come white lilies, to baby and me; 
Drowsily nod before hla eyes 
So full of wonder, so round, so wise; 
Hist, child, the lily-bells tinkle for thee! 
Come, white moon, to baby and me; 
Gently glide o'er the ocean of sleep, 
Silver the waves of its shadowy deep; 
Sleep, child, the whitest of dreams to theet 
ON THE SUMMIT. 
The summit of Mount Washington is about an 
acre in extent. A more wild, desolate place it 
would be difficult to imagine. No green thing 
grows there, save moss and a few Alpine flowers. 
All is bleak barrenness. Heavy granite boulders 
are piled promiscuously upon each other, as though 
thrown there from surrounding peaks by some old 
Titans, in Titanic sport. They are of a greenish- 
gray color, dotted with white by the mica they 
contain, and will repay a search among them for 
“specimens.” Tolerable garnets have been found 
in detached portions. 
The clouds seem to take peculiar delight in kiss¬ 
ing Washington’s rocky crown. The number of 
clear days seen upon it, in a summer, is surpris¬ 
ingly small. It is nearly all the time encircled by 
light, fleecy clouds, such as you see often drifting 
against the blue far above you, and admire, but 
which you do not admire at all when enveloped by 
them. Hundreds who make the ascent expecting 
a perfectly clear outlook, and instead are shut in 
completely by this chilling, disagreeable mist, feel 
like saying, as did Daniel Webster once, “ Mount 
Washington, I have come a long distance, have 
toiled hard to arrive at your summit, and now you 
seem to give me a cold reception.” 
But you have been highly favored. 8uch a sunset 
as is seen only once or twice in a season has glorified 
all the mountain tops, and flooded the valleys with 
golden sheen, and is now fading away into dim twi¬ 
light before your enraptured vision. A recent rain 
storm has purified the atmosphere, and on every 
hand the prospect stretches away and away, un¬ 
dimmed except by distance. Any view from the 
summit is worth a deal of toil and discomfort; 
this is ample return for a thousand miles of journey¬ 
ing. It will corne np before you in after summers, 
when life seemB narrow and clrcumscrihed, in all 
itB grandeur of comprehension, and thought and 
feeling will grow broader and brooder, reaching out 
to the sea of the Infinite even as now your sight 
reaches out to the wide ocean, distant an hundred 
miles. 
The day is half an hour longer here than in the 
valley below, yet it is all too short. Oh, for some 
Joshua to stop the down-going sun, while this 
magnificence of near and clear distance is still 
bathed in its splendor.! Fainter grow the wondrous 
tints over the mountain peaks, and deeper the shad¬ 
ows far beneath. The long, narrow cloud-line span¬ 
ning the West has been suffused with all shades of 
richest crimson and purple, but is now only of a 
dull gray color, edged a-top with rare, delicate ame¬ 
thystine light. Evening Is stealing on, through a 
matchless twilight. One by one the stars come out, 
and look down upon Washington as benignantly as 
during long ages gone by. And you stand there, 
with eyes uplifted reverently towards then), know¬ 
ing not whether stars or mountains be old or 
young,—whether their “Has Been” be much or 
little compared with their “Shall Be,”—only say¬ 
ing from out the earnest fullness of your heart,— 
“ Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever 
Thou had&’t, formed the earth and the world, even 
from everlasting to everlasting Thou art God ! ” 
Yon are to spend the night on tv#» cuminn, ana 
yon look about for shelter. There are two struc¬ 
tures for the accommodation or visitors, kuown as 
THE “Tir TOP” AND “SUMMIT” HOUSES. 
The Tip Top House stands within a score of feet 
of the highest crag, and is 6,285 feet above the sea. 
It is eighty-five feet long by tweuty-eight feet broad. 
Its walls, which are built, of rock —material very 
plenty here, are eight feet high by four feet thick, 
laid in cement. Heavy bolts bind the sharp gothic, 
roof to the side walls, and five strong iron cables 
gird it down, anchored firmly in the solid rock. 
Tho one story proper of this odd-looking edifice 
contains a large, sitting-room, dining-room, and culi¬ 
nary deprrtment; the roomy attic is divided in two 
sections 5y a narrow hall running the entire length, 
and there are subdivided intoModging-rooms, very 
small, ff course, but neatly kept, and each pro¬ 
vided rith a large, excellent bed. 
ThcBummit House, four or five rods removed, is 
a litt'e smaller, but similar in appearance. It is 
fitter 1 up mainly for lodgings. About one hundred 
and twenty persons can be accommodated in both 
homes. Commissary supplies for guests are drawn 
u; three times a week, by a six-horse team; and the 
good matron of the Alpine makes the ascent twice 
iach week to supervise domestic affairs. The 
amount of labor involved in constructing these 
houses, and maintaining them and visitors, can 
Every stick of timber must 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
TALKS WITH YOUNG MEN.—NO. Ill, 
Travelers have told you they have seen a land 
away off in the West where gold lies just under 
the sod, and the sod Is uot tough. They have writ¬ 
ten of its blooming prairies and cool, shady valleys; 
of its fresh, unclouded mornings, and golden, glori¬ 
ous sunsets; of its eternal Springs, and its never 
ending harvests. They have painted winning pic¬ 
tures of ease and plenty and happiness in quiet 
homes on the ever green banks of its smooth, run¬ 
ning rivers. They have said, “ Come and reap I” 
Boys, be not wild with excitement and high-hop- 
iugs over such talk. Cotne and sow and reap! 
When you leave tho old homesteads in the East to 
search out in this land that spot seen in your 
dreams, where you are to build a name and a home, 
von little reckon how many dark days you will live, 
how many hopes will be bom only to die, and how 
many yours of unrecompcnsed toil are yours before 
your goal is reached. Yes, you will know trials, 
but you must boar and dare. Better risk and some¬ 
times lose than never have anything to lose. No 
rnan ever has made or ever will make a fortune 
without risking something. 
Thousands of young men,—good, steady boys,— 
have left their Eastern homes and come West fully 
expecting to pick up a fortune for the bending. 
Foolish boys, how many have never found that 
laud! How many have gone back, like the prodigal 
son, and, like him, been welcomed homo again. 
Aud many, in their wild recklessness, have been 
drawn down aud down by stranger friends, until 
they drained tho last cup of crime and shame, and 
were dragged from tho cities’ alleys dead. They 
were buried in the common yard, under the com¬ 
mon turf, and the common world went on. But 
somewhere each morning and even iug is heard the all¬ 
meaning prayer of an anxious mother, and somebody 
dfearns of somebody’s coming. Others have wan¬ 
dered aud wandered—are wandering yet. 
But, boys, 1 would not discourage you. Than 
the W est there is no better laud under the shining 
sun for workers, and none so poor for Ullers. For¬ 
tunes and names and homes are waiting for you, 
but you must earn them. The plow, guided by 
steady, earnest young men, must and will soon 
make the Valley of the Mississippi uot only the 
Eden of America but of the world. Already ?fche 
wealth aud products of it and its people have .’been 
the admiration of our transatlantic brothers, and 
they, too, from proud old England, snowy Sw/eeden 
aud brick walled Holland are coming to And it. 
Germany, I reckon, must be all here now. 
Yes, boys, come; but when you come don’t rush 
to the cities, — there is no chance for yovi there. 
Go into the country. There are thousands ol beau¬ 
tiful valleys for happy homes yet unknown. Farm¬ 
ing is the safest, the surest, the healthiest, the best. 
1 may as well finish this talk with a few words on 
farming aud farmers. 
The time has now come in which the wealthy 
and the educated are looking at farming as it should 
be. It is fast changing from the dirty occupation 
it has been to a studied profession. Ouce the farm¬ 
er was reckoned as one who didn’t know enough 
about anything to do anything else. Now he walks 
from the plow to the Governor’s chair and the halls 
of Congress. His rough hands are writing a new 
history for the world. His children are students 
with the lawyer’s and the “gentleman’s.” And 
I’m glad farmers’ boys are being educated for 
fanners. But there are many yet, — old fogy farm¬ 
ers,—who believe the poorer the cow the richer the 
milk, and grain fed is grain wasted,—who hold that 
if a boy intends becoming a tiller of the ground, 
the less “ book knowledge” he possesses the better. 
I tell you, boys, a good education of things taught 
iu books will not unfit you for any work. And en¬ 
joyment, which after all is the great aim for which 
we live, whether we should or not, is much more 
perfect to the educated man than to the ignorant. 
Things in which the last can see nothing worthy of 
notice, the former finds rich in bearpv aud pleasure. 
But it’s well if you intend to become farmers to 
Study such book? Si will aid you in your work. A 
good paper, like the Rural, carefully read, is worth 
more to you much than Latin or Greek. But with 
such sweet music floating around me I cannot 
write. It takes me out of my Ixead, or m y k ea< i 
out of me. 
ST. NICHOLAS, COOK’S INLET, ALASKA 
All Rural readers have doubtless read somewhat 
of the territory newly acquired by the United States 
Government in the far Northwest, and we feel as¬ 
sured that the accompanying view of scenery in that 
distant region, together with the portrait of a native 
inhabitant, will prove not without interest. The 
jokes that have been perpetrated by press and peo¬ 
ple In regard to the purchase of Alaska have been all 
very well, in their way; but the territory is little 
more to be laughed at, after all, than much of Cau- 
ada. It resembles Northern Canada, in many par¬ 
ticulars, quite closely. It is as well timbered, is uot 
less fertile, and the climate is not more rigorous. 
And there are strong indications of great mineral 
wealth, which need only Yankee enterprise to put 
them to the test. 
Excellent harbors abound on the coast of the 
Alaskan islands. Cook’s Inlet forms one of the, best 
of these. Fort 8t. Nicholas, situated upon the east 
side, upon a peninsula inclosed by the Inlet and 
Prince William Sound, has .ong been an important 
Russian trading post, aud may, at some future day, 
be the metropolis of Alaska. It. is in the midst of 
the most fertile portion of the territory, where the 
land is moderately rolling, for the most part, and 
the climate a fair counterpart of that in Vermont, 
both summer and winter. This section is probably 
the only one in which agricultnre will ever bo re¬ 
munerative. Elsewhere the far trade, lumbering, 
mining, and similar pursuits, will offer the only 
inducements. That they will attract many settlers 
is a supposition approximating to a certainty. 
TROLOSK INDIAN, ALASK V. 
Written for Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
ALL ABOUT THE OYSTER.—No. IV, 
PRICE, 
This, as in every other tr^le, varies according to 
circumstances. Before tb/) war, which upturned 
prices In every thing,—who^ for example, “ a dozen 
raw, " of larger, fatter and curtain!y fresher oysters 
than ever find their way V'jjdie central portions of 
tho Lniou, or the wide apitauiug prairies of the 
Great, West, could be purchased for a “hit,”—the 
price ranged from 25 cents tJ 50 cento per bushofcln 
the shell. Nyw during the season they run down 
sometimes to 25 cents, but these are of u rather 
poor quality. Ordinarily they sell two qualities, 
at 62 cents for the small size, and $1.25 for the 
largest size, per bushel. 
THE MYSTICAL “ R.” 
You have heard it said, reader, that the oyster is 
not eatable in any month that does not contain in 
its name the letter R, but I tell you that there is 
no month in the year when, on the seaboard, oys- 
teis relishahle, healthful and harmless cannot be 
fouud. There is no mysterious circumstance con¬ 
nected with the absence of that letter from the 
names of certain months but there is a rational 
and a natural one. Iu all in which It is not round. 
At. ___ 
painted by J. G. Taggart and engraved by H. B. 
Hall, Jr. Tho engraving is in line and stipple, and 
is finely executed. 
An engraved lithograph, life size, enUtled “ Re¬ 
trospection,” is just published by D. E. Fisk ite 
Go., Springfield, Mass., for sale by subscription. 
It Is from a drawing by George W. Fetth* of Phil¬ 
adelphia, and has more merit than lithographs 
commonly possess. As usual, the artist has choseu 
a woman’s face in which to embody hla idea, and 
the face is a beautiful one. The backward-looking 
eyes are suggestive of half pleasant, half-regretful 
recollections, and call vividly to mind those lines 
by Peuoival : 
“ Th ‘' r . e , arc , moments in life that are never forgot. 
Which brighten and brighten as time steaFs away 
They give a new charm to t lie happiest lot, y ’ 
And shme ui the gloom of the loneliest day.” 
Ticknor & Fields’ announcement of books to be 
published by them in November includes Dickens’ 
“Christmas Carol" with upwards of thirty illustra¬ 
tions, uniform with “8now-Bound;’’ “The Poetry 
of Compliment and Courtship,” illustrated and 
illuminated; “The Red Line Whittier,” only com¬ 
plete edition of Whittier ever published with 
illustrations; Longfellow’s “Hyperion,” a large 
illustrated quarto,—limited edition, price only $25; 
“Old Town Folks," a new novel by Mi's. Stowe ; a 
new volume of poems by James Russell Lowell ; 
“ Saul,” a dramatic poem by Charles Hbavyseqe 
and a new narrative poem by Robert Browning. 
A sew paper called “ TheSbrosis” has been started 
in Chicago. It is devoted wholly to the interests of 
women, comprising art, fashion, literature, house¬ 
keeping, and all other topics of advantage to woman¬ 
hood ; and is to be free from political partisanship 
and sectarianism. Mrs. Mary L. Walker and vr™ 
Never say you will do presently what your rea¬ 
son or your conscience tells you should be done 
now. No man ever shaped his own destiny or the 
destinies of others, wisely and well, who dealt much 
in present-lies. Look at nature. She never post¬ 
pones. When the time arrives for the buds to open, 
they open —for the leaves to fall, they fall. Look 
upward. The shining worlds never put oil' their 
risings or their settings. The comets even, erratic 
as they are, keep their appointments; and eclipses 
are always punctual to the minute. There are no 
delays In any of the movements of the universe 
which have been pre-determined by the absolute 
will of the Creator. Procrastination among the 
stars might involve the destruction of innumerable 
systems; procrastination in the operations of na¬ 
ture on this earth, might result in famine, pesti¬ 
lence, and the blotting out of the human race. 
Man, however, being a free agent, can postpone the 
peiformance of his duty; and he does so, too fre¬ 
quently to his own destruction. The drafts drawn 
by indolence upon the future are pretty sure to be 
dishonored. Make Now your banker. Do not say 
you will economize presently, for presently may be 
bankrupt; nor that j ou will repent and make atone¬ 
ment presently, for presently you may be judged. 
Bear in mind the important fact, taught alike by 
the history of nations, rulers and private individ¬ 
uals, that in at least three cases out of five, pres¬ 
ently iB too late. 
hardly be imagined 
be brought up the long and steep ascent of eight 
miles bound ou the back of a horse or mule. 
Through two-thirds of the year, the houses are left 
uncared for, at the mercy of storms the like of 
which dwellers in the valleys never know. Then 
when opened in the spring they are in a sorry 
plight, indeed, and putting them to rights is by no 
means easy. And when they are ready to receive 
guests, and the guests come, the caring for them is 
not more easy. Water, one great essential, is pro- 
Gravevard Scene in Munich.— The day before 
leaving Munich we visited the city cemetery, aud 
beheld a strange sight there. The law requires that 
all deceased persons shall bo brought immediately 
after death to a room at the cemetery, and there 
laid out for a certain length of time, each one within 
reach of a bell-cord. The object is to prevent too 
early burials and to provide for any giving a siguul, 
who may come to life after they have been supposed 
to be dead. I saw persons of all ages, from a few 
days old to eighty or ninety years, thus laid out, 
and most of them embedded in flowers. It was 
hard to look at them, and almost as hard to keep 
from looking at them. The children were laid out 
as if they were bolstered up in bed, and dressed as 
richly as the means of their parents permitted, and 
almost buried iu the most beautiful flowers.— Letter 
from Germany. 
Europe. The Jersey shore trade is a very large 
one, as will be seen from the fact that near 500 ves¬ 
sels are employed in it. Iu 1867 the aggregate cap¬ 
ital invested in the oyster trade at Fair Haven, 
Conn., was $1,000,000, and there were employed 
1,500 people. 1,000,000 kegs and 500,000 cans were 
used in the year. Twenty-six vessels made six voy¬ 
ages each to the shores of Maryland and Virginia, 
and brought in the aggregate 500,000 bushels to 
plant, and these, when opened, produced 2,640,000 
quarts. 
Ihese estimates do not include the transactions 
in the local trade. In December, 1807, a calcula¬ 
tion was made on the average Lade for the four 
years preceding, at Baltimore, and it wits found that 
4,800,000 bushels in the shell were disposed of, of 
which 2,895,UOO bushels were taken from Maryland 
waters, and 065,000 bushels from the Virginia waters, 
brom these Maryland waters there were taken in all 
4,880,000 bushels, and 2,005,000 from the Virginia 
waters, making an aggregate from both of 6,945,000 
busheH Of these 1,050,000 bushels went to New 
York, 700,000 to Fair Haven, 400,000 to Philadel¬ 
phia and 350,1100 to Boston. To dredge and get 
these oysters ready for shipment to the various 
cities supplied, were employed 1,000 vessels, aver¬ 
aging 50 tons burden, The average amount of oys¬ 
ters dredged by each vessel was 4,740 bushels during 
the six months of the season, which, at 45 cents per 
bushel, amounts to $2,128.70. In addition to these 
Thebe once was a man who fled from his master 
and hid in a cave. He had uot been there long ere 
a large lion came in. Seeing the man, he went 
moaning up to him. The lion had hurt his foot. 
The man bathed it and bound it up. For two 
long years the man and the lion lived together, 
the lion getting the game, and the man cooking a 
pan for himself, and giving the remainder to the lion. 
At the end of two years the man left the cave, and 
upon going to a certain city, was captured by the 
Consul’s soldiers. The slave was tried and con¬ 
demned to fight in the amphitheater with the wild 
oeasts. The day came, aud the man was put in the 
arena. The great door was opened. In leaped a 
large lion, and ran toward the man. The lion stop¬ 
ped, and, with sigsis of affection, caressed the aston¬ 
ished slave. It was the lion, once wounded, in the 
cave. He would not touch him; and the king, hear¬ 
ing of the circumstance, ordered that the man should 
have his liberty, and the lion be given to the mar, 
while the vast multitude approved with shouts of 
applause. 
Learn from this to be kind to animals. 
luo yyuuo uie t>u very in ice, me dull, damp air seems 
to permeate both completely. So you draw closely 
around the roaring fire, and while the cables over¬ 
head creak and the chimney’s stay chains rattle 
like a ship’s rigging in a storm, you listen to moun¬ 
tain legends, and sadder stories that are not legen¬ 
dary, with & shudder that is not wholly of the cold. 
Possibly you arc a trilie sea-sick, as many are when 
first here; but if so yon do not mention it, only 
seek one of the snug little rooms early, and go to 
sleep to the lullaby of the winds. 
In the morning you are up betimes to see the sun 
rise.- You are disappointed. The mountain spirit 
is in one of its most unpleasant moods. Looking 
out of your one little window in the roof yon see 
Use ok Harks —F.hn bark is very generally used 
in Norway for making leather, and it is said the fine 
Norway gloves are prepared from the elm bark, and 
that the softness and beauty are attributable to this 
bark. Tue white willow is used In Denmark for the 
leather used in the manufacture of gloves. Russia 
also uses this bark in the manufacture of fancy 
leather, the finished leather being impregnated with 
the oil of birch bark, which gives it a pecnllar agree¬ 
able smell. It is a noteworthy fact that the Norway 
tanners use birch and willow instead of oak bark. 
u, •» .. - — .. i vvr jvu OVVs 
P bu t thick, dark mist, with never a bright ray illumi- 
h nating it. The wind that last night was the only 
p desirable feature, and that seemed so powerful, was 
U but a mild zephyr as compared with the fearful blasts 
r th^ now sweep over the summit. You go out of 
j doors, and cannot stand up before them, and return. 
1/ Anon the mist thickens to fiercely driving rain,—the 
S tempest howls wilder and more tempestuous,—you 
> are on Mount Washington in a storm ! 
Impure thoughts are the seeds of sin. If drop¬ 
ped into the soil of the mind and heart, they should 
be cast out immediately; otherwise they will germi¬ 
nate, spring up, and bear the fruit of sinful words 
and acts. 
