Passages from the American Notebooks, Volume 1

The semblance of a human face to be formed on the side of a mountain, or in the fracture of a small stone, by a lusus naturae. The face is an object of curiosity for years or ce...

This man was formerly a lawyer in good practice; but, taking to drinking, was reduced to the lowest state. Yet not the lowest; for after the amputation of his arm, being advised...

Salem, June 15, 1835.--A walk down to the Juniper. The shore of the coves strewn with bunches of sea-weed, driven in by recent winds. Eel-grass, rolled and bundled up, and entan...

Remarkable items: the observation of Mons. S------ when B------ was saying something against the character of the French people,--"You ought not to form an unfavorable judgment...

My walk forth had been an almost continued ascent, and, returning, I had an excellent view of Graylock and the adjacent mountains, at such a distance that they were all brought...

The old Dutchman's exhibition being over, a great dog, apparently an elderly dog, suddenly made himself the object of notice, evidently in rivalship of the Dutchman. He had seem...

One of the most sensible men in this village is a plain, tall, elderly person, who is overseeing the mending of a road,--humorous, intelligent, with much thought about matters a...

Here is an Englishman,--a thorough-going Tory and Monarchist,--upholding everything English, government, people, habits, education, manufactures, modes of living, and expressing...

Maine, July 5th, 1837.--Here I am, settled since night before last with B------, and living very singularly. He leads a bachelor's life in his paternal mansion, only a small par...

Salem, October 14th.--A walk through Beverly to Browne's Hill, and home by the iron-factory. A bright, cool afternoon. The trees, in a large part of the space through which I pa...

Salem, August 31st, 1836.--A walk, yesterday, down to the shore, near the hospital. Standing on the old grassy battery, that forms a semicircle, and looking seaward. The sun not...

Started for Northampton at half past nine in the morning. A respectable sort of man and his son on their way to Niagara,--grocers, I believe, and calculating how to perform the...

Penobscot Bay is full of islands, close to which the steamboat is continually passing. Some are large, with portions of forest and portions of cleared land; some are mere rocks,...

Returned home, and took a lesson in French of Mons. S------. I like him very much, and have seldom met with a more honest, simple, and apparently so well-principled a man; which...

Tremont, Boston, June 16th.--Tremendously hot weather to-day. Went on board the Cyane to see Bridge, the purser. Took boat from the end of Long Wharf; with two boatmen who had j...

I have never had the good luck to profit much, or indeed any, by attending lectures, so that I think the ticket had better be bestowed on somebody who can listen to Mr. ------ m...