Saying this, my father rose, and bringing a book, read as follows,—
"To me things are not as to vulgar eyes—
I would all nature's works anatomize:
This world a living monster seems to me,
Rolling and sporting in the aërial sea:
The soil encompasses her rocks and stones,
As flesh in animals encircles bones.
I see vast ocean, like a heart in play,
Pant systole and diastole every day.
The world's great lungs, monsoons and trade-winds show—
From east to west, from west to east they blow.
The hills are pimples, which earth's face defile,
And burning Etna an eruptive boil.
On her high mountains living forests grow,
And downy grass o'erspreads the vales below:
From her vast body perspirations rise,
Condense in clouds and float beneath the skies."
My father having closed the book, the profound Lieutenant, who did not conceive it possible that a thing so serious could be made the subject of a joke, said,—
"A happy illustration of my philosophy, sir, though I cannot commend the form in which it is put. If a man has anything worth saying, sir, he should use prose. Poetry is only proper when one wishes to embellish folly or dignify trifles. In this case it is otherwise, I admit; and I am happy to find so powerful a supporter of my animal theory of meteors. I shall consider the subject, and present it for the consideration of the philosophic world."
One prominent characteristic of this philosopher was, that when a great event came about, he fancied that he had foreseen and predicted it from the beginning. Now, about this time Fulton actually succeeded in his long-sought application of steam to navigation. The general opinion of the country had been, all along, that he was a monomaniac, attempting an impossibility. He was the standing theme of cheap newspaper wit, and a God-send to orators who were hard run for a joke. Lieutenant Smith, who was only an echo of what passed around him during the period of Fulton's labors, joined in the current contempt; but when the news came, in October, 1807, that he had actually succeeded—that one of his boats had steamed at the rate of five miles an hour against the current of the Hudson river—then, still an echo of the public voice, did he greatly jubilate.
"I told you so! I told you so!" was his first exclamation, as he entered the house, swelling with the account.
"Well, and what is it?" said my father.
"Fulton has made his boat go, sir! I told you how it would be, sir. It opens a new era in the history of navigation. We shall go to Europe in ten days, sir."
Now, you will readily understand, that in these sketches I do not pretend to report with literal precision the profound discourses of our Ridgefield savant; I remember only the general outlines, the rest being easily suggested. My desire is to present the portrait of one of the notables of our village—one whom I remember with pleasure, and whom I conceive to be a representative of the amiable, and perhaps useful race of fussy philosophers to be found in most country villages.