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between Maine and Florida, in the heart of the Alleghanies, a mighty gateway lifts its head and discloses a scene which, a century and a quarter ago, Thomas Jefferson said was "worth a voyage across the Atlantic." He continues: "You stand on a very high point of laud; on your right comes up the Shenandoah, having ranged along the foot of the mountain a hundred miles to find a vent; on your left approaches the Potomac, in quest of a passage also. In the moment of their junction they rush together against the mountain, rend it asunder, and pass off to the sea."

This is Harper's Ferry and this was the point which John Brown chose for his attack on American slavery. He chose it for many reasons. He loved beauty: "When I met Brown at Peterboro in 1858," writes Sanborn, "Morton played some fine music to us in the parlor,—among other things