A true politeness does
not result from any hasty and artificial polishing, it is true,
but grows naturally in characters of the right grain and quality,
through a long fronting of men and events, and rubbing on good
and bad fortune. Perhaps I can tell a tale to the purpose while
the lock is filling,--for our voyage this forenoon furnishes but
few incidents of importance.
Early one summer morning I had left the shores of the
Connecticut, and for the livelong day travelled up the bank of a
river, which came in from the west; now looking down on the
stream, foaming and rippling through the forest a mile off, from
the hills over which the road led, and now sitting on its rocky
brink and dipping my feet in its rapids, or bathing adventurously
in mid-channel. The hills grew more and more frequent, and
gradually swelled into mountains as I advanced, hemming in the
course of the river, so that at last I could not see where it
came from, and was at liberty to imagine the most wonderful
meanderings and descents. At noon I slept on the grass in the
shade of a maple, where the river had found a broader channel
than usual, and was spread out shallow, with frequent sand-bars
exposed.
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