Various

“ Vines and cereals grow admirably on the higher ground surrounding it, to the very verge of the salt marshes, which are utterly bare. Looking towards the sea, the marks of its fury are apparent, as if Nature wished to collect all her weapons of defence for the inhabitants. ”

“ The marvel of the enterprise has been its universal success. High and low are equally pleased. Professing no particular knowledge in music, but yielding to none in an ardent admiration of the simpler class of national ballads and songs, we have listened to the melodies of the Jubilee Singers with heartfelt delight. Whether with or without instrumental accompaniment, the melodies might be described as supplying a new relish. ”

“ Tiger-shooting in India differs a trifle from the tame pursuit of game in England—a very different thing indeed from the miserable amusement of the battue, in which hundreds of defenceless creatures are shot down without any chance of danger to the shooter. To go out tiger-shooting is to run the risk of encountering a deadly enemy, which on grounds of public policy it is of importance to destroy. ”

“ With mystery of charms she comes near to us, and melts down our admiration into love; but when we take her to us as something familiar and delicious, she floats away to the far heights of fame, and looks down on our despair with countenance of peaceful lustre and smiles as sweet as spring.’ If the lady did not reciprocate, her heart must have been of adamant. ”

“ Thus a man on foot following the fresh tracks of a tiger up to his lair, and shooting him as he lies, or following him up on foot when wounded, incurs the maximum risk. In all cases, after being wounded, ungovernable fury and a fierce longing for revenge take the place of that instinctive fear or shyness of man which tigers share with all other wild animals. This instinctive dread of man is so well known to the tribes who inhabit the forests of India, that even solitary individuals will hail the prospect of suddenly encountering a tiger, provided, of course, that he is not a man-eater. ”

“ Amidst the frauds and commercial rascalities of pompous pretenders that are becoming a scandal to the age, the unselfish and noble endeavours of these humble melodists stand out in marked contrast, as something to applaud and to redeem human nature. ”

“ Nothing is more easy to describe than a salt marsh. Imagine a market-garden divided into squares; but instead of the green vegetables, each square filled with water, and the walks not level with, but raised above the spaces about ten inches in height. ”

“ We have now in brief told the story of the Jubilee Singers, and it is more than ordinarily remarkable. A handful of freed negro slaves undertaking by voluntary efforts to collect funds wherewith to establish and support a University, having for its object the higher education of the coloured population in the United States. The enterprise has had no parallel. These negroes do not beg, nor do they trouble people for subscriptions. They only try to raise funds by the exercise of their talents in an honest line of industry, by communicating pleasure to countless audiences. ”

“ Eager and enthusiastic for the fray, and for the thrill of satisfaction which the all-important moment of the actual kill inspires, the inexperienced sportsman is too apt to overlook those precautions and preparations which are essential aids to success; or he relies upon others for doing in the above respects what he should attend to himself. The first thing to be done on arriving at the ground where a tiger has safely been marked down by the early despatched scouts is to acquaint one's self thoroughly with its topography. ”

“ On the contrary, in many instances they shewed a kind indulgence to their ‘servants,’ as they called them, and were pleased to see them singing, laughing, and making merry in the intervals of rest from labour. Perhaps this is not saying much, for the singing of slaves may be compared to the notes of a bird in captivity, to be admired, but pitied. Anyway, there was a disposition to seek solacement in the outpouring of song. If not intellectually brilliant, the negro is naturally vivacious. Even when he grows old, he is still something of a boy, with an inherent love of frolic. ”

“ We rose one morning to find her gone, and to hear that Mr Bertram had also disappeared, after forging his father's name for five hundred pounds. It was useless to pursue the fugitives, even if we had had any clue to their flight; and our desire was frustrated by orders from Squire Peregrine to abandon all search. Day after day we waited and hoped. But it was some months before poor Ruth made her way to us, footsore and weary, and begging forgiveness for her sin. Then we knew that he had not married her; and my father went nigh mad with anger. We had been poor, but free from shame. ”

“ If they go away, it is never for more than twenty leagues, to sell the salt from door to door. Driving before them their indefatigable mules, borne down at starting with too heavy a load, they penetrate through the devious narrow lanes, knowing the path to every hamlet or farmhouse where they hope to meet with a customer. ”

“ Nathan gazed at his visitor inquiringly, then gathering his resolution together, he said: ‘If your object, Colonel Lindsay, be to bring the offender to justice, I must utterly decline either in this place or any other to open my lips upon the subject. I will never betray him. ”

“ The nature of the ground varies very much; consisting sometimes of a pile of rocks rising from a plain, of a confused mass of hills, or of a large single hill, a river or small water-course stocked with green bushes, and with level jungle or perhaps open ground bordering on both sides; and so on. On being roused from his lair in say a water-course by the beaters, a tiger is very likely to cross over into the jungle, especially if another ravine is not far off to which he can retire. ”

“ He rose and grappled with his antagonist, who maintained a dead silence, until slipping over the steps into the interior of the church, they fell with violence on the stone floor; at the same moment Bertram felt a sharp wound in his side, and uttered a loud cry as Nathan rushed from the belfry bearing a candle in his hand. He saw before him Oliver Peregrine about to escape from the scene, while his cousin lay on the floor of the church bleeding and unconscious. ”

“ The tiger will often yield the right of way; but if the human subject finds it necessary to set that example in the way of politeness, he knows it to be absolutely essential to the preservation of his life that he should do so with every appearance of self-possession, and without any signs of fear or precipitancy. ”

“ Here, by the help of a mechanical apparatus, the sea-water is pumped into enormous squares, where it crystallises, and the evaporation is accelerated by a continual circulation. With a warm temperature and a cloudless sky, the water requires to be renewed only at intervals, whilst the salt itself is not collected until the end of summer. Thus the poor workmen of Brittany have a more laborious and less remunerative task, though the salt is acknowledged to be of a finer quality.
The family life is necessarily of a very hard and parsimonious character. It is impossible to buy animal food ”

“ It is a bright sunny land; the acacia hedges divide the fields with their elegant white blossoms; the vineyards are loaded with purple grapes, the apple orchards give abundance of cider; a lazy kind of land where the idler may kill time to his heart's content. ”

“ A grown-up brother is, in the eyes of good girls, a hero by right of birth, and with Lucy and Blanche the captain was a privileged person, not to be judged by the standards of ordinary ethics.
‘If the governor,’ said Jasper, after a pause, ‘would ask people down here—I mean of course after town is empty—a houseful of people of the right sort, why then, one might get through the autumn and winter without being moped to death.’
Lucy shook her head. ‘There is no chance, brother,’ she said, ‘that papa should fill his house with what you would consider people of the right sort. ”

“ In the grasp of power, they knew that resistance was worse than useless. Close by were cow-hide whips handled by heartless ruffians voraciously chewing tobacco, as if to keep up the proper inspiration of brutality. ”

“ At the same time, an elephant that bolts jeopardises his rider's life in a worse degree, by the reckless manner in which he pursues his flight. Should the jungle consist of trees, there is almost a certainty of the howdah being dashed up against them, or of its being swept off by some projecting bough, which affords a clear passage to the body of the elephant, but not to the howdah and those seated in it. ”

“ A very slight noise, such as slight coughing, will sometimes start a tiger; while he will at other times refuse to move, although even shots should be fired into the bush or among the rocks where he may be lying concealed. As Colonel Rice, late of the Bombay army, very justly remarks in his book entitled Tiger-shooting in India—and the writer's own experience is entirely corroborative of that statement—no two tigers can be depended on for behaving exactly alike under the same circumstances. ”

“ The sweetness of the voices, the accuracy of the execution, the precision of the time, and the wild simplicity of the words, astonished the audiences who listened to them; the wonder being of course augmented by the fact of their colour and the knowledge that only a few years ago these singers had been slaves. Although generally well received, they had at first numerous difficulties to encounter. The expense of travelling from town to town was considerable. ”

“ In other words, any faint and accidental signs of a disturbance in a tiger's vicinity will rouse him from his lair, and drive him to green patch or snug retreat miles away, if the weather be cool and cover abundant; whereas with very hot weather and extensive denudation of shade, he will prefer remaining where he is until the sounds assume too decided a character to be mistaken; when the probabilities are that the sportsman will be perfectly ready on his making a move. ”

“ But it is of course absolutely necessary that the elephant should be one which can be depended on for making a firm stand before a tiger. The more steady the elephant, the better the aim that can be taken; but the uninitiated should know that there is always some slight oscillatory movement in an elephant, so that a small though perhaps an infinitesimal measure of calculation has to be applied in shooting from its back. ”

“ The method of blocking up the outlets which the sportsmen themselves cannot watch, is to place over them, on trees, the sharpest and most intelligent of the men that can be selected from among the beaters. They should be instructed to strike the tree with a stone taken up in the hand for that purpose, or to employ any other simple process of producing a noise, so that the tiger may be headed back the moment he is seen to be advancing, and his intention is unmistakable. A blank shot will be necessary to turn a rapidly advancing tiger ”

“ The great object to be kept in view in approaching a tiger for the purpose of obtaining a fair shot, is to do as little as possible towards startling the beast until within a few yards, even though obstructions such as bushes or rocks intervene; for when once a ‘scare’ is excited, a tiger will break through an inclosing line of elephants and probably escape altogether; whereas by being quietly followed up with scouts previously sent forward to note and telegraph his progress, the chances are all in favour of the sportsman. ”

“ There can, however, be no question that in large swamps and grass tracts, and in fact under all circumstances, an elephant is a most powerful auxiliary, whose importance cannot be over-rated. If trees and such positions are taken to meet the tiger when he first breaks, the advantage of afterwards following him up on an elephant if only wounded, is too obvious to need any comment. ”