The Isles of Summer; or, Nassau and the Bahamas

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER I. Man and the Migratory Birds. An Ocean Voyage in Mid-itinter. A Wasted Snow Storm. A Model Steamer. Savannah. A Pleasant run be- ttcean Vie Sen-Islands and the Mainland. The Cumberland Islands. Dun- gcnness. St. Mary. Fernandina and its Amelia Bcazh. Arrival at Jack- tonmile. Crossing the Gulf...
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Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER I. Man and the Migratory Birds. An Ocean Voyage in Mid-itinter. A Wasted Snow Storm. A Model Steamer. Savannah. A Pleasant run be- ttcean Vie Sen-Islands and the Mainland. The Cumberland Islands. Dun- gcnness. St. Mary. Fernandina and its Amelia Bcazh. Arrival at Jack- tonmile. Crossing the Gulf Stream. Landing at Nassau. The sails were filled, and fair ths light winds blew, As pleased to waft him i'rom his native land.?Byros. Nature's special favorites are the birds. With the speed of the wind, and a flight almost as noiseless, they ever follow Summer where she leads, bask in her sunlight, and repose in her grateful shadows. As Winter, snow-clad and frozen, advances or retreats, they follow in his footsteps, and sport in the forests of verdure, and in the fields and bowers of bloom, that soon clothe his track of desolation with wondrous beauty. What nature denied, man has acquired for himself?a speed superior to tha- of the birds and outstripping the wind. His thoughts travel with the lightning, and, practically, space is almost annihilated by his steam chariots upon iron roads. Science, meanwhile, has explored and mapped the great ocean world, sounded its profouudest depths, discovered and described its shoals and rocks and winding shores, and, wedded to mechanical ingenuity, has enabled man, in the glowing language of the east, to ' take the wings of the morning and fly to the uttermost parts of the earth. Hence, after the dwellers in the north have each in his generation for untold thousands of years been snow-bound and ice- anchored, their descendants in our day are able at winter's approach, to migrate with the birds, and thus secure perfect exemption from its discomforts. To many, suffering from disease, or with blood which age has made slugg...