them
in eternal oblivion. In this country there is nothing fixed, nothing
stationary, and never has been since the first white man swung his axe
against the outside forest tree; since the first green field was
opened up to the sunlight from the deep shadows of the old forests
that had stood there, grand, solemn, and boundless since this
world was first thrown from the hand of God. There will be nothing
fixed for centuries to come. The tide of progress will sweep onward in
the future as it has done in the past. Onward is the great watchword
of America, and American institutions; onward and onward, over the
ancient forests; onward, over the log-houses that stood in the van of
civilization; over the great fire-places; over the cricket in the
wall; over the old house dog that slept in the corner; over the loved
faces that clustered around the blazing hearth in the days of our
childhood; over everything primitive, everything, my friends, that you
and I loved, when we were little children, and that comes drifting
along down on the current of memory--bright visions of the returnless
past. Ah, well! it is best that it should be so. It is best that the
world should move on; that there should be no pause, no halting in the
onward march. What are we that the earth should stand still at our
bidding, or pause to contemplate our tears? Dust to dust is the great
law, but so long as a phoenix rises from the ashes of decay, what
right have we to murmur? Time may desolate and destroy, but man can
build up and beautify. True, his works perish as he perishes, but new
works and new men are rising forever to fill, and more than fill, the
vacancies and desolations of the past. Go ahead then, world! Sweep
along, Progress! Mow away, Time! Tear down temple and stronghold;
sweep away the marble palace and log-house! sweep away infancy and
youth, manhood and old age; wipe out old memories, and pass the sponge
over cherished recollections. The energy and the ingenuity of man are
an over-match even for time. From the ruins of the past, from the
desolations of decay, new structures will rise, and a new harvest,
more abundant than the old, will spring up from the stubble over which
Time's sickle has passed. Recuperation is a law stronger than decay,
and it is written all over the face of the earth."

CHAPTER XXIV.

THE ACCIDENTS OF LIFE--"SOME MEN ACHIEVE GREATNESS, AND SOME HAVE
GREATNESS THRUST UPON THEM"--A SLIDE--RATTLESNAKES AT THE TOP AN