Page:The Homes of the New World- Vol. II.djvu/420

Rh running from the snowy north to the glowing south, the Alleghany, the Rocky Mountains, and Sierra Nevada, or the Snowy Mountains, which last chain is continued into central America, and into the Cordilleras and Andes of South America; east and west of these the land descends towards the two great seas of the world.

The country lying between the mountains and towards the seas is everywhere remarkable for its fertility, and is intersected by navigable rivers and lakes. No country is so well watered as North America, or affords more available opportunity for the circulation of life; nor does any country afford such free access to the beauties, the climates, and productions of every zone.

I behold advancing on this great stage various distinct groups of States, of various temperaments and conditions of life, united by community of customs, language and States'-government, as well as by outward and inward vital circulation. Here are the States of New England, with their Puritan descendants, legislating, educating, restless Vikings and heroes of peace. The natural scenery of these States reminds me of our Scandinavian north. Massachusetts has the romantic lakes and broken landscape of Sweden. New Hampshire the rocky valleys and white mountains of Norway.

New York and Pensylvania, the Emperor and the Quaker States, with a milder climate, emulate each other in wealth of population and in beauties of nature. Rivers and valleys become wider; commercial life grows like a giant.

Virginia and the Carolinas, as well as Georgia and Florida, form in the South another group of States, peopled by the sons of the Cavaliers, with their planters and slaves, with a strong conservative life, and much peculiar beauty, but devoid of higher social aspiration. These Northern and Southern States lie between the Alleghany mountains, which are contained within