Funding for the digitization of this title was provided by Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library.
About The countryman. (Turnwold, Putnam County, Ga.) 1862-1866 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 6, 1862)
? dk 4\o ? THE COUNTRYMAN BY J. A. TURNER. —“brevity is. the soul of wit ”— $1 A YEAR. VOL. HI. TURNWOLD, PUTNAM COUNTY, GA., .MONDAY, OCTOBER 6, 1862. • NO. 2. Anecdote of Rev. Wm. Arnold. Rev. Wm. Arnold was very much oppos ed to dancing, but manifested no opposition to a good joke at the right time, and in the righf place. Going home, one evening, with becom ing solemnity and without cracking a smile he said to his companion—(it was towards the close of the year)—“ Wife, I am going to have a dance here, Christmas !” Mrs. Arnold was dumbfounderecf. What in the world could her husband mean ? He have a dance at his house? He who of all others always opposed dancing to the death ? But Mr. Arnold still insisted that he ’’Would have the dance. There was no use in opposing it. His mind was made up. Have the dance at his house he would, let what might be said, or thought. Mrs. Arnold wms in deep distress. Re tiring in sorrow and agony, she sought her daughter, and said, “ Mary, I really am afraid your father has lost his mind. He says he is bent on having a dance here, Christmas !” And a dance he did have in 'his own house. But before cliristmas came, the good old divine’s family were re joiced to be told that the dance would be brother Thomas Dance of this county, a good old man and a class-leader, who was to be Mr. Arnold’s guest, some time during the cliristmas. But Mr. Arnold did have the Dance at his house, without being cra zy, and with the full approbation of his good wife, who always delighted to have her friends with her, even if one of them was a Dance. Blondin on the Rope. “ What have we here ? a man or a fish ?” Besides the large company generally congregated at Niagara during the summer months, crowds of people poured in from all directions for thirty or forty, perhaps a hundred miles around, on both the Cana dian and American side of the river—all to see one of those “ walkings,” about which the newspapers made so much noise, a few years ago. A two inch cable was stretched across the river, nearly a mile below the falls, where the banks are two hundred and thirty or forty feet high, and was stead ied by ropes extending diagonally from either side, to the shores of Canada and New York, respectively. Blondin mounted his rope from the Amer ican shore, and started across in the char acter of a galley-slave, with chains on his ankles and wtists—the chains being con structed of block tin, I believe, though that fact detracts very little from the daring character of his performance—cairying a balancing pole, over twenty feet long, said to weigh forty-eight pounds. He walked a short distance, and, * stopping, jsliook the rope. Going a little farther, he again slop ped, and lay down at full length on his back, keeping his pole at right angles across his body. Assuming a sitting pos ture, he moved along in a strange manner, putting one foot out as far as he could reach, the other hanging down below the rope, then rising on the extended foot", put ting the other out in the same manner as the first, allowing the first to hang down, and so on. Again he started off in a run, and then stopped to stand on his head, striking his heels- together, while in that position. He first placed the pole at right angles across the rope, his head either on or very near it, and then raised his body gently into an up right position. While walking or running, he held his arms extended, at neaily full length before him, and the pole well bal anced, at right angles with the rope. After getting from his head on his feet, he pro ceeded to the middle of the rope and paused. There he was, his life, almost literally, hanging on a thread. Two hundred and thirty dizzy feet stretched from him to the fierce torrent which rushed below. He was over the centre of one of the broadest rivers in the world. The only thing be tween him and eternity was a two inch ca ble, and this he was touching only with the soles of his feet. Yet there is no doubt he was as cool and self-possessed as if walking on a brick pavement. The least trepida tion would have resulted in instant death. At length he commenced playing all kinds of fantastic tricks. Encircling the rope with his arms and legs, ho-whirled over and over with singular rapidity; he “ skinned the cathe let himself down, head foremost, hanging by one leg hooked over the rope; he suspended himself at arms’ length, swinging back and forth like -a pendulum. Finally, having exhausted the li»t of daring and dangerous feats, he proceeded to the Canadian side, where he was received with deafening cheers, and was soon swallowed up and lost to view in the crowd. After a considerable interval, he again approached the river, in the dress of a French cook, with a sheet-iron stove on his shoulders. He walked firmly and rap idly to the middle of the rope, where he stopped, set down his stove, kindled a fire, broke eggs, cooked an omelette, and let it down in a plate, at the end of a cord, to the passengers on the Maid of the Mist, as she was moving about directly underneath him ! This was the crosvning and finish ing exploit of the most wonderful perform ance I ever witnessed, and I can testify that it was done fairly, without trick of any sort. After Blondin reached the shore, I had an opportunity of observing him closely. He was rather small, but looked hard, wiry and muscular. His complexion was some what cadaverous, his hair, moustache, and goatee nearly white. This, I suppose, was their original color, and age had nothing to do with it, for he appeared to be about thir ty years old. Blondin was one of the wonders of the age. w. W. T. Epigram. “New England’s dead, the poet said, On every field they lie: In fact a few live doodles do As much before they die.” Luther anti St. Bernard. “ St. Bernard (said Luther) was the best friar, whom I love above all the rest. Yet he dared to say, ‘ It were a sign of damnation it one quitted the monastery.’ He had under him 3000 friars, among all which was not one damned, if his sentence w.ere true. Sed vix credo. St. Bernard lived in dangerous times, under the Em perors Henry IY. and V., under Conrad and Lothaire. He was an experienced and well-taught friar, but he gave an ill example. The state and calling of a true Christian (which God ordained and found ed) consistSth in three hierarchies, name ly: in domVstic, temporal, aud church gov ernment.” So some will tell you, in the present day, it is a “ sign of damnation” if one. either quits a certain “ church,” or does not be long to that "church.” This is all improper, and at a future day will be cited as being as much a wrong, as that of which Luther complained.- “ The church” and “ Chris tians” will never be right, until they be come as perfectly tolerant of any and all opinion, let it be whatever it may, as the Lord and Master whom they profess to follow, was. 7370
