The Nan's Language Study

  I was always fond of visiting new scenes and observing strange characters and manners. Even when a mere child I began my travels, and made many tours of discovery into foreign parts and unknown regions of my native city. As I grew into boyhood, I extended the range of my observations. My holiday afternoons were spent in rambles about the surrounding country. I made myself familiar with all its places famous in history or fable. I visited the neighboring villages, and added greatly to my stock of knowledge by noting their habits and customs, and conversing with their sages and great men. I even journeyed one long summer's day to the summit of the most distant hill, from whence I stretched my eye over many a mile of Terra Incognita, and was astonished to find how fast a globe I inhabited.

  This rambling propensity strengthened with my years. Books of voyages and travels became my passion; and, in devouring their contents, I neglected the regular exercises of the school. How wistfully would I wander about the pierheads in fine weather, and watch the parting ships, bound to distant climes! With what longing eyes would I gaze after their lessening sails, and waft my self in imagination to the ends of the earth!

  I visited various parts of my own country--the mighty lakes, like oceans of liquid silver; the mountains, with their bright aerial tints; the valleys, teeming with wild fertility; the tremendous cataracts, thundering in their solitudes; the boundless plains, waving with wild spontaneous verdure; the broad, deep rivers, rolling in solemn silence to the ocean; the trackless forests, where vegetation puts forth all its magnificence; the skies, kindling with the magic of summer clouds and glorious sunshine. Never need an American look beyond his own country for the sublime and beautiful of natural scenery.