was described as a “neat building”; but of the meeting-house in
Chatham, a neighboring town, for there was then but one, nothing is
said, except that it “is in good repair,”—both which remarks, I trust,
may be understood as applying to the churches spiritual as well as
material. However, “elegant meeting-houses,” from that Trinity one on
Broadway, to this at Nobscusset, in my estimation, belong to the same
category with “beautiful villages.” I was never in season to see one.
Handsome is that handsome does. What they did for shade here, in warm
weather, we did not know, though we read that “fogs are more frequent
in Chatham than in any other part of the country; and they serve in
summer, instead of trees, to shelter the houses against the heat of the
sun. To those who delight in extensive vision,”—is it to be inferred
that the inhabitants of Chatham do not?—“they are unpleasant, but they
are not found to be unhealthful.” Probably, also, the unobstructed
sea-breeze answers the purpose of a fan. The historian of Chatham says
further, that “in many families there is no difference between the
breakfast and supper; cheese, cakes, and pies being as common at the
one as at the other.” But that leaves us still uncertain whether they
were really common at either.
[Illustration: A street in Sandwich]
The road, which was quite hilly, here ran near the Bay-shore, having
the Bay on one side, and “the rough hill of Scargo,” said to be the
highest land on the Cape, on the other. Of the wide prospect of the Bay
afforded by the summit of this hill, our guide says: “The view has not
much of the beautiful in it, but it communicates a strong emotion of
the sublime.” That is the kind of communication which we love to have
made to us. We passed through the village of Suet, in Dennis, on Suet
and Quivet Necks, of which it is said, “when compared with
Nobscusset,”—we had a misty recollection of having passed through, or
near to, the latter,—“it may be denominated a pleasant village; but, in
comparison with the village of Sandwich, there is little or no beauty
in it.” However, we liked Dennis well, better than any town we had seen
on the Cape, it was so novel, and, in that stormy day, so sublimely
dreary.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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