Wild Western Scenes: A Narrative of Adventures in the Western Wilderness, Wherein the Exploits of Daniel Boone, the Great American Pioneer are Particularly DescribedJones, J. B. (John Beauchamp)
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Wild Western Scenes: A Narrative of Adventures in the Western Wilderness, Wherein the Exploits of Daniel Boone, the Great American Pioneer are Particularly Described
Jones, J. B. (John Beauchamp)
Boone, Daniel, 1734-1820 -- Fiction; Western stories; Wilderness areas -- Fiction
“‘This is a beautiful subject we have to-night, Glenn,’ observed one of
my friends, as we approached the dead body. He then threw up the white
cloth, and exposed the corpse, the head being still obscured. A
breathless silence reigned, while all gazed at the lifeless form in
admiration. She was a perfect Venus! Not having been wasted and
shrivelled by disease, the symmetry of her lineaments was preserved in
all the exactness of life and health. Her bust was full, plump, and the
skin of the most exquisite whiteness, except where it had been marred
by the fire that caused her death. Her limbs surpassed any model I had
ever beheld, round and tapering, smooth and white as ivory. Her ankles
were most admirably turned, and her feet of the smallest dimensions.
Her handsome and gently swelling arms were covered with a slight gauze
of short, dark hair, through which the snowy whiteness of her skin was
displayed to greater advantage. Her hands were extremely delicate, and
indicated that she had been accustomed to ease and luxury.
“I was requested to open her breast and exhibit to the students the
formation and functions of the heart. She was lying on her back, on a
long narrow table, around which the students stood gazing at her fair
proportions. Some reflected in sorrow that so beautiful and lovely a
being should die and be conveyed to the dissecting-room; while others
joked and laughed in a light unfeeling manner. When about to make an
incision with the sharp glittering steel in my hand, for the first time
since I had graduated, I confessed that my nerves were too much
affected by the sight of the subject to proceed, and I begged my
friends to be patient a few minutes, during which I would doubtless
regain my accustomed composure.
“‘What was her name?’ I inquired of the friend who had accosted me on
my entrance.
“‘Haven’t you heard?’ said he, smiling—‘I thought you all knew her.
Nearly every person in the city has heard of her, for she was the most
celebrated and notorious “fallen angel” in the city—celebrated for her
unrivalled beauty and many triumphs, and notorious for her heartless
deceit and reckless disregard of her own welfare. She has led captive
many an unguarded swain by a passing smile in the street, and then
unceremoniously deserted him to join some drunken and beastly party in
an obscure and degraded alley.’
“‘Her name—what was her name?’ I again asked, once more taking up the
knife, my nerves sufficiently braced by the above recital.
“‘Anne R____,’ he replied; ‘I thought,’ he continued, ‘no one could be
ignorant of her name, after hearing a description of her habits.’
“‘_All_ of us,’ I continued, rallying, ‘are not familiar with the
persons and names of the “fallen angels” about town. But let us look at
her face.’ Saying this, I endeavoured to lift the white cloth from her
head, but finding that the resurrectionist had tied a cord tightly
round the muslin enclosing her neck and head, I desisted.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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