Category: Evening Book

The island of St. Helena stands entirely detached from any group, and is about 1200 miles from the nearest land, on the eastern coast of Southern Africa. An imperceptible point in the Atlantic Ocean, this rock is nine leagues in its greatest circumference. Steep shores form for it a natural and nearly impregnable rampart. It […]

The heart must indeed be cold that would not glow among scenes like these. Rightly did the French call this stream La Belle Rivière, (the beautiful river). The sprightly Canadian, plying his oar in cadence with the wild notes of the boat-song, could not fail to find his heart enlivened by the beautiful symmetry of […]

Travellers in Europe, even those who may have, passed over the Pyrenees or Alps, can have but a faint idea of the labor and danger of crossing the Andes, that immense mountain-chain by which the continent of South America is intersected, from its southern to its most northern extremity, dividing Peru and Chile, on the […]

Dutrone calls sugar the most perfect alimentary substance in nature, and the testimony of many physicians establishes the fact. Dr. Rush, of Philadelphia, says, in common with all who have analyzed it, that sugar affords the greatest quantity of mat-ter of any subject in nature.” Used alone, it has fattened horses and cattle in St. […]

There is an unaccountable antipathy to clever women. Almost all men profess to be afraid of blue stockings that is, of women who have cultivated their minds ; and hold up as a maxim, that there is no safety in matrimony, or even in the ordinary intercourse of society, except with females of plain understandings. […]

Near the town of Orotava, in the island of Teneriffe, there is an enormous many-headed palm of the species called the Dragon-Tree (in French, Dragonnier), which has been described by the scientific traveller Humboldt, and more recently Dy Maria Graham. This tree is situated in the garden of M. Franqui. There are existing documents, which […]

Wolves–The following narration may have before met the eyes of many of our readers : it is certainly of a nature not to be easily forgotten. We may premise that in Russia, during a severe winter, the wolves are often induced by hunger to prowl around the city of St. Petersburg in search of food. […]

Persian account of the origin of Wine.— Jerusheed, the founder of Persepolis, is by Persian writers said to have been the first who invented wine. He was immoderately fond of grapes, and desiring to preserve some, they were placed for this purpose in a large vessel, and lodged in a vault for future use. When […]

There are but three animals of the horse. The horse, which is the most stately and courageous; the ass which is the most patient and humble; and the zebra, which is the most beautiful, but at the same time, the wildest animal in nature. Nothing can exceed the delicate regularity of this creature’s color, or […]

From Chamber’s Edinburgh Journal Subsequent to the disastrous attack on the American lines before New Orleans, on the 8th of January 1815, the British army proceeded to Isle Dauphine, :n the Gulf of Mexico, where the troops remained until peace was concluded between Great Britain and the United States. As the men had been for […]