They also manufactured ivory that I could not tell from the real
article. I have previously spoken of their success in producing various
kinds of marble and stone. A beautiful table that I saw made out of
artificial ivory, had a painting upon the top of it. A deep border,
composed of delicate, convoluted shells, extended round the top of the
table and formed the shores of a mimic ocean, with coral reefs and tiny
islands, and tangled sea-weeds and shining fishes sporting about in the
pellucid water. The surface was of highly polished smoothness, and I was
informed that the picture was _not_ a painting but was formed of
colored particles of ivory that had been worked in before the drying or
solidifying process had been applied. In the same way they formed main
beautiful combinations of marbles. The magnificent marble columns that
supported the portico of my friend's house were all of artificial make.
The delicate green leaves and creeping vines of ivy, rose, and
eglantine, with their spray-like blossoms, were colored in the
manufacturing process and chiseled out of the solid marble by the
skillful hand of the artist.
It would be difficult for me to even enumerate all the beautiful arts
and productions of arts that I saw in Mizora. Our journey was full of
incidents of this kind.
Every city and town that we visited was like the introduction of a new
picture. There was no sameness between any of them. Each had aimed at
picturesqueness or stately magnificence, and neither had failed to
obtain it. Looking back as I now do upon Mizora, it presents itself to
me as a vast and almost limitless landscape, variegated with grand
cities, lovely towns and villages, majestic hills and mountains crowned
with glittering snows, or deep, delightful valleys veiled in scented
vines.
Kindness, cordiality and courtesy met us on every side. It was at first
quite novel for me to mingle among previously unheard-of people with
such sociability, but I did as Wauna did, and I found it not only
convenient but quite agreeable.
"I am the daughter of the Preceptress of the National College," said
Wauna; and that was the way she introduced herself.
I noticed with what honor and high esteem the name of the Preceptress
was regarded. As soon as it was known that the daughter of the
Preceptress had arrived, the citizens of whatever city we had stopped in
hastened to extend to her every courtesy and favor possible for them to
bestow. She was the daughter of the woman who held the highest and most
enviable position in the Nation. A position that only great intellect
could secure in that country.
As we neared the goal of our journey, I noticed an increasing warmth of
the atmosphere, and my ears were soon greeted with a deep, reverberating
roar like continuous thunder. I have seen and heard Niagara, but a
thousand Niagaras could not equal that deafening sound. The heat became
oppressive. The light also from a cause of which I shall soon speak.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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