The Lightning Conductor Discovers AmericaWilliamson, C. N. (Charles Norris)
General
The Lightning Conductor Discovers America
Williamson, C. N. (Charles Norris)
Automobiles -- Fiction
There can't be _sweeter_ country anywhere than this, which I'm trying to
lure you to come and see when you and Monty can take your second
honeymoon, as we are doing; but it has no look of being _undiscovered_
like some we saw the day before. Rich people, but luckily people of
taste, know all about that cup of crystal, Pompton Lake, the sweet
singing Wanaqua River, and lovely Pequannock Park. They have made homes
for themselves, quite wonderful in beauty, and never pretentious; never
a staring house or grotesquely expensive gates to shock the dear little
childlike mountains and shady river. Along the winding roads, where
trees trailed shadows like dragging masses of torn Spanish lace, there
were fine stone walls draped with woodbine, and among the folding hills
were orchards like great flower-beds, surrounding the most lovable and
livable houses. Every five minutes we would come to a picture which
might have been "composed" by an artist: a pond reflecting a quaint
little church with two guardian grandfather trees, and a funny old "gig"
with a yellow horse, waiting for some one we should never see; an
ancient white house born to make a background for cedars far more
ancient; a lake with shining surface half hidden under red water-weeds
like coral necklaces broken and scattered on a silver salver. Oh, and I
mustn't forget the funny fire-alarms in front of isolated houses! A big
thing like a split iron ring with a hammer to strike it. The ring
vibrates better if it's split; and you could see nothing quainter in
Holland. There was a very odd monument, too, which I loved. I think it
was in the nice, wide-streeted village of Pompton. It might have been a
Titan helmet smashed by a bomb, and I should have loved to stay and find
out all about it!
We'd come into northern New Jersey at Oakland, so no wonder we saw
splendid cedars, for New Jersey has lots of cedars and heaps of history,
and is proud of both. I hadn't realized that it would be such a
beautiful state of forest-clad hills, lakes and rivers that mingle so
you can't tell where they begin or end, and villages walled by woods and
tied together by silver ribbons of river or brook. This is the northern
part I'm talking about; the south is flat, where it becomes seacoast.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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