American Notes for General Circulation, Volume 1Chapman and Hall, 1842 - 306 pages |
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Almack's America American Eagle amusements appearance Barrel-organs beautiful better blind Boston boys building cabin called carpet-bag cell chamber character Charles Dickens cheerful colours comfort Connecticut River course creature dark deck dinner door dress England eyes face favourable feel fingers friends gallery gentleman girl going hand handsome head hour houses imitate Institution jail kind labour ladies laughing Laura Laura Bridgman legs light lives look looking-glass Lowell Lowell Offering manual alphabet ment mind morning never night oakum officers party passage passed passengers persons Philadelphia pleasant portmanteaus pretty prison Queen Victoria racter railroad remember round seemed ship side sight solitary South Boston spirit spittoon stairs state-room station steamboat street strong thing thought tion town Transcendentalists turned walk wall Washington whole window words young
Popular passages
Page 134 - Essays, in which, among much that is dreamy and fanciful (if he will pardon me for saying so), there is much more that is true and manly, honest and bold. Transcendentalism has its occasional vagaries (what school has not ?), but it has good healthful qualities in spite of them ; not least among the number a hearty disgust of Cant, and an aptitude to detect her in all the million varieties of her everlasting wardrobe. And therefore if I were a Bostonian, I think I would be a Transcendentalist.
Page 242 - Over the head and face of every prisoner who comes into this melancholy house, a black hood is drawn ; and in this dark shroud, an emblem of the curtain dropped between him and the living world, he is led to the cell from which he never again comes forth until his whole term of imprisonment has expired.
Page 34 - ... goaded into madness, to be beaten down, and battered, and crushed, and leaped on by the angry sea — that thunder, lightning, hail, and rain, and wind, are all in fierce contention for the mastery — that every plank has its groan, every nail its shriek, and every drop of water in the great ocean its howling voice — is nothing. To say that all is grand, and all appalling and horrible in the last degree, is nothing. Words cannot express it. Thoughts cannot convey it. Only a dream can call...
Page 80 - Then small detached labels, with the same words printed upon them, were put into her hands; and she soon observed that they were similar to the ones pasted on the articles. She showed her perception of this similarity by laying the label key upon the key, and the label apoon upon the spoon.
Page 292 - ... strife of politics so fierce and brutal, and so destructive of all self-respect in worthy men, that sensitive and delicate-minded persons shall be kept aloof, and they, and such as they, be left to battle out their selfish views unchecked. And thus this lowest of all scrambling fights goes on, and they who in other countries would, from their intelligence and station, most aspire to make the laws, do here recoil the farthest from that degradation.
Page 81 - The poor child had sat in mute amazement, and patiently imitated everything her teacher did ; but now the truth began to flash upon her — her intellect began to work — she perceived that here was a way by which she could herself make up a sign of anything that was in her own mind, and show it to another mind...
Page 288 - All Men are created Equal; and are endowed by their Creator with the Inalienable Rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness!
Page 110 - They have among themselves a sewing society to make clothes for the poor, which holds meetings, passes resolutions, never comes to fisty cuffs or bowie-knives as sane assemblies have been known to do elsewhere ; and conducts all its proceedings with the greatest decorum. The irritability, which would otherwise be expended on their own flesh, clothes, and furniture, is dissipated in these pursuits. They are cheerful, tranquil, and healthy.
Page 235 - ... steps and portico thronged with groups of people passing in and out. The door was still tight shut, however ; the same cold cheerless air prevailed ; and the building looked as if the marble statue of Don Guzman could alone have any business to transact within its gloomy walls. I hastened to inquire its name and purpose, and then my surprise vanished. It was the Tomb of many fortunes ; the Great Catacomb of investment ; the memorable United States Bank.
Page 242 - He never hears of wife or children ; home or friends ; the life or death of any single creature. He sees the prison-officers, but with that exception, he never looks upon a human countenance, or hears a human voice. He is a man buried alive ; to be dug out in the slow round of years; and in the meantime dead to everything but torturing anxieties and horrible despair.