Chapter 10

Where there are steep and lofty precipices, crumbling rocks, and overhanging cliffs, such as those which obstruct the path of the party whose toilsome journey is illustrated in the accompanying engraving, the feat of climbing a Mountain is hazardous and difficult enough; but when heights are reached where the rocks are covered with ice, where deep clefts are concealed by a treacherous covering of snow where avalanches threaten the traveller at every step, and where the mountain-side often seems as difficult to climb as a pane of glass, the prospect seems as if it ought to appal the stoutest heart.

But some hearts are stouter than we think, and up those icy rocks, along the edges of bewildering precipices, over, under, and around great masses of rock, across steep glaciers where every footstep must be made in a hole cut in the ice, brave men have climbed and crept and gradually and painfully worked their way, until at last they stood proudly on the summit, and gazed around at the vast expanse of mountains, plains, valleys, and forests, spread far and wide beneath them.

In Europe there are regular associations or clubs of mountain-climbers, which at favorable periods endeavor to make the ascent of lofty and difficult Mountains. Nearly every peak of the Pyrenees and the Alps has felt the feet of these adventurers, who take as much delight in their dangerous pursuits as is generally found by the happiest of those who are content with the joys of ordinary altitudes.

We have very many grand Mountains in our country, but we have not yet reduced their ascent to such a system as that which these Alpine clubs have adopted. But very many of our countrymen have climbed to the loftiest peaks of the White Mountains, the Catskills, the Alleghenies, and the Rocky Mountains.

Mountain-climbing is certainly dangerous, and it is about the hardest labor of which man is capable, but the proud satisfaction of standing upon a mountain-top repays the climber for all the labor, and makes him forget all the dangers that he has passed through.

ANDREW'S PLAN.

"Oh, Andy!" said little Jenny Murdock, "I'm so glad you came along this way. I can't get over."

"Can't get over?" said Andrew; "why, what's the matter?"

"The bridge is gone," said Jenny. "When I came across after breakfast it was there, and now it's over on the other side, and how can I get back home?"

"Why so it is," said Andrew. "It was all right when I came over a little while ago, but Old Donald pulls it on the other side every morning after he has driven his cows across, and I don't think he has any right to do it. I expect he thinks the bridge was made for him and his cows."

"Now I must go down to the big bridge, Andy, and I want you to come with me. I'm afraid to go through all those dark woods by myself," said Jenny.

"But I can't go, Jenny," said Andrew; "it's nearly school time now."

Andrew was a Scotch boy, and a fine fellow. He was next to the head of his school, and he was as good at play as he was at his books. Jenny Patterson, his most particular friend, was a little girl who lived very near Andrew's home. She had no brothers or sisters, but Andrew had always been as good as a brother to her, and therefore, when she stood by the water's edge that morning, just ready to burst into tears, she thought all her troubles over when she saw Andrew approach. He had always helped her out of her difficulties before, and she saw no reason why he should not do it now. She had crossed the creek in search of wild flowers, and when she wished to return had found the bridge removed, as Andrew supposed, by Old Donald McKenzie, who pastured his cows on this side of the creek. This stream was not very wide, nor very deep at its edges, but in the centre it was four or five feet deep, and in the Spring there was quite a strong current, so that wading across it, either by cattle or men, was quite a difficult undertaking. As for Jenny, she could not get across at all without a bridge, and there was none nearer than the wagon bridge, a mile and a half below.

"You will go with me, Andy, won't you?" said the little girl.

"And be late to school?" said he. "I have never been late yet, you know, Jenny."

"Perhaps Dominie Black will think you have been sick, or had to mind the cows," said Jenny.

"He won't think so unless I tell him," said Andrew, "and you know I won't do that."

"If we were to run all the way, would you be too late?" said Jenny.

"If we were to run all the way to the bridge and I was to run all the way back, I would not get to school till after copy-time. I expect every minute to hear the school-bell ring," said Andrew.

"But what can I do, then?" said poor little Jenny. "I can't wait here till school's out, and I don't want to go up to the school-house, for all the boys to laugh at me."

"No," said Andrew, reflecting very seriously, "I must take you home some way or other. It won't do to leave you here, and no matter where you might stay, your mother would be troubled to death about you."

"Yes," said Jenny, "she would think I was drowned."

Time pressed, and Jenny's countenance became more and more overcast, but Andrew could think of no way in which he could take the little girl home without being late and losing his standing in the school.

It was impossible to get her across the stream at any place nearer than the "big bridge;" he would not take her that way and make up a false story to account for his lateness at school, and he could not leave her alone or take her with him.

What in the world was to be done?

While several absurd and impracticable projects were passing through his brain the school-bell began to ring, and he must start immediately to reach the school-house in time.

And now his anxiety and perplexity became more intense than ever, and Jenny, looking up into his troubled countenance, began to cry.

Andrew, who never before had failed to be at the school door before the first tap of the bell, began to despair.

Was there nothing to be done?

Yes! a happy thought passed through his mind. How strange that he should not have thought of it before!

He would ask Dominie Black to let him take Jenny home.

What could be more sensible and straightforward than such a plan?

Of course the good old Schoolmaster gave Andrew the desired permission, and everything ended happily. But the best thing about the whole affair was the lesson that young Scotch boy learned that day.

And the lesson was this: when we are puzzling our brains with plans to help ourselves out of our troubles, let us always stop a moment in our planning, and try to think if there is not some simple way out of the difficulty, which shall be in every respect _perfectly right_. If we do that we shall probably find the way, and also find it much more satisfactory as well as easier than any of our ingenious and elaborate plans.

THE WILD ASS.

If there is any animal in the whole world that receives worse treatment or is held in less esteem than the ordinary Jackass, I am very sorry for it.

With the exception of a few warm countries, where this animal grows to a large size, and is highly valued, the Jackass or Donkey is everywhere considered a stupid beast, a lazy beast, an obstinate beast, and very often a vicious beast. To liken any one to a Jackass is to use very strong language.

In many cases, this character of the Donkey (with the exception of the stupidity, for very few Donkeys are stupid, although they try to seem so) is correct, but nevertheless it is doubtful if the animal is much to blame for it. There is every reason to believe that the dullness and laziness of the Donkey is owing entirely to his association with man.

For proof of this assertion, we have but to consider the Ass in his natural state.

There can be no reasonable doubt but that the domestic Ass is descended from the Wild Ass of Asia and Africa, for the two animals are so much alike that it would be impossible, by the eye alone, to distinguish the one from the other.

But, except in appearance, they differ very much. The tame Ass is gentle, and generally fond of the society of man; the wild Ass is one of the shyest creatures in the world; even when caught it is almost impossible to tame him. The tame Ass is slow, plodding, dull, and lazy; the wild Ass is as swift as a race-horse and as wild as a Deer. The best mounted horsemen can seldom approach him, and it is generally necessary to send a rifle-ball after him, if he is wanted very much. His flesh is considered a great delicacy, which is another difference between him and the tame animal.

If any of you were by accident to get near enough to a wild Ass to observe him closely, you would be very apt to suppose him to be one of those long-eared fellows which must be beaten and stoned and punched with sticks, if you want to get them into the least bit of a trot, and which always want to stop by the roadside, if they see so much as a cabbage-leaf or a tempting thistle.

But you would find yourself greatly mistaken and astonished when, as soon as this wild creature discovered your presence, he went dashing away, bounding over the gullies and brooks, clipping it over the rocks, scudding over the plains, and disappearing in the distance like a runaway cannon-ball.

And yet if some of these fleet and spirited animals should be captured, and they and their descendants for several generations should be exposed to all sorts of privations and hardships; worked hard as soon as their spirits were broken, fed on mean food and very little of it; beaten, kicked, and abused; exposed to cold climates, to which their nature does not suit them, and treated in every way as our Jackasses are generally treated, they would soon become as slow, poky, and dull as any Donkey you ever saw.

If we have nothing else, it is very well to have a good ancestry, and no nobleman in Europe is proportionately as well descended as the Jackass.

ANCIENT RIDING.

There are a great many different methods by which we can take a ride. When we are very young we are generally very well pleased with what most boys and girls call "piggy-back" riding, and when we get older we delight in horses and carriages, and some of us even take pleasure in the motion of railroad cars.

Other methods are not so pleasant. Persons who have tried it say that riding a Camel, a little Donkey, or a rail, is exceedingly disagreeable until you are used to it, and there are various other styles of progression which are not nearly so comfortable as walking.

There were in ancient times contrivances for riding which are at present entirely unknown, except among half-civilized nations, and which must have been exceedingly pleasant.

When, for instance, an Egyptian Princess wished to take the air, she seated herself in a Palanquin, which was nothing but a comfortable chair, with poles at the sides, and her bearers, with the ends of the poles upon their shoulders, bore her gently and easily along, while an attendant with a threefold fan kept the sun from her face and gently fanned her as she rode.

Such a method of riding must have been very agreeable, for the shoulders of practised walkers impart to the rider a much more elastic and agreeable motion than the best made springs, and, for a well fed, lazy Princess nothing could have been more charming than to be borne thus beneath the waving palm-trees, and by the banks of the streams where the lotus blossomed at the water's edge, and the Ibis sniffed the cooling breeze.

But when the father or brother of the Princess wished to ride, especially if it happened to be a time of war, he frequently used a very different vehicle from an easy-going Palanquin.

He sprang into his war-chariot, and his driver lashed the two fiery horses into a gallop, while their master aimed his arrows or hurled his javelin at the foe.

Riding in these chariots was not a very great luxury, especially to those who were not accustomed to that kind of carriage exercise. There were no seats, nor any springs. The riders were obliged to stand up, and take all the bumps that stones and roots chose to give them, and as they generally drove at full speed, these were doubtless many and hard. There was in general no back to these Chariots, and a sudden jerk of the horses would shoot the rider out behind, unless he knew how to avoid such accidents.

We of the present day would be apt to turn up our noses at these ancient conveyances, but there can be no doubt that the Egyptian Princesses and warriors derived just as much pleasure from their Palanquins and rough-going war-chariots as the ladies of to-day find in an easy-rolling barouche, or the gentlemen in a light buggy and a fast horse.

BEAUTIFUL BUGS.

We are not apt--I am speaking now of mankind in general--to be very fond of bugs. There is a certain prejudice against these little creatures, which is, in very many cases, entirely unwarranted. The fact is that most bugs are harmless, and a great many of them are positively beautiful, if we will but take the trouble to look at them properly, and consider their wonderful forms and colors. To be sure, many insects to which we give the general name of bugs are quite destructive in our orchards and gardens, but, for all that, they are only eating their natural food, and although we may be very glad to get rid of our garden bugs as a body, we can have nothing to say against any particular bug. None of them are more to blame than the robins and other birds, which eat our cherries and whatever else we have that they like, and we never call a robin "horrid" because he destroys our fruit. True, the insects exist in such great numbers that it is absolutely necessary for us to kill as many of them as possible, and it is very fortunate that the robins and black-birds are of so much benefit to us that we are glad to let them live.

But all this should not make us despise the bugs any more than they deserve, particularly as they are just as beautiful as the birds, if we only look at them in the right way. A microscope will reveal beauties in some of the commonest insects, which will positively astonish those who have never before studied bugs as they ought to be studied. The most brilliant colors, the most delicate tracery and lace-work over the wings and bodies; often the most graceful forms and beautifully-contrived limbs and bodies and wing-cases and antennæ, are to be seen in many bugs when they are placed beneath the glasses of the microscope.

But there are insects which do not need the aid of magnifying glasses to show us their beauties.

Some of the Beetles, especially the large ones, are so gorgeously colored and so richly polished that they are imitated, as closely as Art can imitate Nature, in precious stones and worn as ornaments.

There are few living things more beautiful than a great Beetle, glittering in resplendent green and gold, and the girl (or woman either) who will hold one of these in her hand or let it crawl upon her arm while she examines its varied colors, shows a capacity for perceiving and enjoying the beauties of nature that should be envied by those who would dash the pretty creature upon the floor, exclaiming, "That horrid bug!"

There are many insects with which we need not desire to be too familiar, such as Mosquitoes, Fleas, Wasps, and Bees; but when a "bug" is harmless as well as beautiful, there is no reason why we should not treat it as a friend. Who is afraid of a Butterfly?

And yet a Butterfly is really just as much a bug as a Beetle is. The fact is that the term "bug" is applied with a certain propriety to many insects which are not at all pleasant (although the Lightning Bug is an exception), and we should therefore be very careful about giving what has grown to be a bad name to insects that do not deserve it, and should avoid treating such as if they were as ugly and disagreeable as the name would seem to imply.

A BATTLE ON STILTS

In the year 1748 the great Marshal Saxe, who was travelling through the Low Countries, came to the town of Namur in Belgium. There the citizens did everything in their power to make his stay pleasant and to do him honor, and among other things they got up a battle on stilts. These inhabitants of Namur were well used to stilts, for their town, which has a river on each side of it, lay very low, and was subject to overflows, when the people were obliged to use stilts in order to walk about the streets. In this way they became very expert in the use of these slim, wooden legs, and to make their stilts amusing as well as useful they used to have stilt-battles on all holidays and great occasions.

The young men of the town, two or three hundred on each side, would then form themselves into opposing armies, and with flags flying and trumpets blowing they would advance to the attack.

And they fought hard and well. It was against the rule to use any club or similar weapon, or to strike with the fists. Punching with their elbows, to push each other down, and kicking with their stilts, to knock their opponents' legs from under them, were the methods of assault in this kind of warfare.

The battle often lasted for an hour or two, the armies fighting and shouting, advancing and retreating; while their wives and sisters stood around them, encouraging them by shouts and hand-clapping, and when an unfortunate fellow was knocked down, these women would hasten to his assistance, and help him up again as soon as he had recovered from his fall.

This was pretty rough sport, for the combatants fought as if their lives and fortunes depended upon the victory, and although they did not often seriously injure one another, there must have been many a sore head and bruised leg and arm after the battle was over.

Marshal Saxe knew all about fighting, and on this occasion he declared, that if two real armies should engage with as much fury as these young fellows on stilts, the battle would be a butchery.

At another time, when the Archduke Albert came to Namur, the citizens had one of these stilt-battles, and it proved a very profitable one to them. Before the fight began, the governor of the city promised the Archduke to show him a battle between two bodies of men, who would be neither on horseback nor on foot; and when the engagement was over, Albert was so much pleased that he gave the town the privilege of being forever exempt from the duties on beer.

As the good folks of Namur were nearly as good at drinking beer as they were at walking on stilts, this was a most valuable present for them.

Things are different in this country. It is said that in 1859 a man walked across the rapids of the Niagara river on stilts, but I never heard of any of his taxes being remitted on that account.

DRAWING THE LONG BOW.

When a man has a bow and arrows as long as those used by some of the natives of Brazil, so that he has to lie down on his back, and hold the bow with his foot when he shoots, he may well be said to draw a long bow, but it is not of these people that I now intend to speak. Without describing any particular school of archery, I merely wish to give a few instances where "the long bow" has been drawn in words, about feats with the bow and arrows.

This expression, "drawing the long bow," does not always mean that a falsehood has been told. It often refers to a very wonderful story, which may be true enough, but which is so marvellous that it requires a firm trust in the veracity of the narrator for us to believe it.

So now let us see what long bows have been drawn about bows and arrows.

Such stories commenced long ago. The poet Virgil, in the "Æneid," tells of four archers who were shooting for a prize, the mark being a pigeon, tied by a cord to the mast of a ship. The first man struck the mast with his arrow, the second cut the cord, and the third shot the pigeon while it was flying away. There now being nothing for the fourth archer to shoot at, he just drew his bow, and sent his arrow flying towards the sky with such velocity that the friction of the air set the feathers on fire, and it swept on, like a fiery meteor, until it disappeared in the clouds.

It would be very hard, even in this progressive age, to beat that story.

The Greeks could tell tall stories, too, of their archers. An historian, named Zosimus, tells of a man who shot, at the same time, three arrows from the same bow at three different targets, and hit them all! It is to be hoped that his histories contained some things easier to believe than this.

But as we approach the present age we still find wonderful narrations about archers. Robin Hood, for instance, was a great fellow with the bow. It is said that on one occasion he shot an arrow so that it fell a mile from where he was standing! A long shot, and hard to be equalled by the crack rifles of the present day.

Sir Walter Scott, in "Ivanhoe," introduces Robin Hood under the name of Locksley, and in a shooting match, when his opponent had planted his arrow right in the centre of the bull's-eye, and everybody, of course, thought that nothing better than that could be done, Master Robin just steps up and lets fly his arrow, driving it into the arrow that was sticking in the target, splitting it from end to end!

And then there is that famous story about William Tell. Many persons have their doubts about this performance, and either assert that there never was such a person as Tell, or that no man could have confidence enough in his own skill to shoot at an apple on his son's head. But I prefer to believe this good old story, and, in fact, I see no good reason to doubt it. There was a Dane, named Foke, of whom the same story is told, and an Englishman, named William of Cloudesley, is said to have shot an apple from his son's head merely to show his expertness.

Most of the stories of bows and arrows relate to the accurate aim of the archers, but here is one which shows the tremendous force by which an arrow may be propelled, if the bow is strong and long enough. A French gentleman named Blaise de Vigenère, says that he _saw_ a Turk, named Barbarossa, an admiral of a ship called the Grand Solyman, send an arrow from his bow, right through a cannon-ball! He did not state whether the cannon-ball had a hole through it, or not.

But I think that the most wonderful, astounding, and altogether amazing story about arrow-shooting is told of the Indians who used to inhabit Florida. It is stated that these Indians were in the habit of assembling, in parties of ten or a dozen, for the purpose of having some amusement in archery. They would form themselves into a circle, and one of them throwing an ear of maize or Indian corn into the air, the rest would shoot at it and would shell it of every grain of corn before it fell to the ground. Sometimes, the arrows would strike it so hard and fast that it would remain suspended in the air for several minutes, and the cob never fell until the very last grain had been shot from it!

After such a specimen of the drawing of the long bow as this, it would not be well to introduce any feebler illustrations, and so I will keep the rest of my anecdotal arrows in my quiver.

AN ANCIENT THEATRE.

I suppose you are all familiar with pictures of the Colosseum at Rome, but unless you have carefully studied detailed descriptions of this edifice it is impossible for you to properly comprehend the grand style in which the ancients amused themselves.

This great theatre, the ruins of which are now standing in Rome, and which will probably stand for hundreds of years longer, was built nearly eighteen hundred years ago. It is a vast oval building, four stories high, and capable of containing ninety thousand spectators!