Elba

“ Prepared to choose their location as they deemed the exigencies of the great cause demanded, they settled at North Elba in what was then a wilderness in Essex county, and commenced to live a life of sterner simplicity than before, hewing in the forests, and clearing with axe and fire the land which they then proceeded to cultivate, obtaining food and clothes as those must who have neither store nor tailor near. ”

“ They embarked late that evening in the tardy Santa Lucia, and Ellinor immediately went to her berth. She was not sea-sick; that might possibly have lessened her mental sufferings, which all night long tormented her. High-perched in an upper berth, she did not like disturbing the other occupants of the cabin till daylight appeared. Then she descended and dressed, and went on deck; the vessel was just passing the rocky coast of Elba, and the sky was flushed with rosy light, that made the shadows on the island of the most exquisite purple. ”

“ The main head of Wadi Aideib is on the east side of the main peaks of Elba. Coursing at first north-eastward, this drainage channel runs through an open sloping plain about one and a half kilometres wide between the mountain spurs, its channel here dividing into a great loop with numerous feeders from the ranges on either side. Passing west of the high isolated granite mass of Karam Elba, it runs northward over the sloping plain, receiving the Wadi Yahameib from the west near the low red granite hills called Ti Hamra, and then courses north of east to the sea. ”

“ The island of Elba, farther north, forms a small world of its own.
The rivers of Tuscany have wrought great changes in the plains through which they flow, and along the sea-coast. Their labour has been facilitated by the nature of the soil which they traverse. The least rain converts the barren hill-slopes into a semi-fluid paste, which is carried by the rivers down to the sea. The mouth of the Arno has thus been pushed forward to the extent of seven miles in the course of a few centuries. ”

“ On the south side of the mountain are two other wells called Bir Salalat O Sir, and Bir Sararat Serimtai. In times of rainfall there must be scores of rock pools along every drainage line.
Karam Elba is a granite hill rising to 586 metres above sea, close to the north-east foot of Gebel Elba, from which it is separated by a narrow wadi. Close north of Karam Elba are some low granite hills called Takrat Riba, while on the south side is another small granite hill called Mikeriba. ”

“ He keeps his eye on North Elba even after his wife and part of the family returned to Akron and writes: "The colored families appear to be doing well, and to feel encouraged. They all send much love to you. They have constant preaching on the Sabbath; and intelligence, morality and religion appear to be all on the advance." ”

“ During the summer he enjoyed another telegraph cruise in the Mediterranean, a sea which for its classical memories, its lovely climate, and diversified scenes, is by far the most interesting in the world. This time the Elba was to lay a cable from the Greek islands of Syra and Candia to Egypt. Cable-laying is a pleasant mode of travel. Many of those on board the ship are friends and comrades in former expeditions, and all are engaged in the same venture. Some have seen a good deal of the world, both in and out of the beaten track ”

“ They fear the gifts of fortune from the apprehension of losing them, and, lest they should be miserable, they embrace a life of voluntary wretchedness.’ Elba, however, is visible, which the wiseacres whom Providence, for mysterious reasons of its own, at one time permitted to rule over European affairs, fixed on as the residence of the Corsican adventurer, in the childish belief that he who had aimed almost at universal empire, and had in vain attempted to grapple with and overthrow the pride and power of p. ”

“ From an angle of the wall on the summit of the citadel is a small observatory, erected by Napoleon, which gave him views from all points of the compass. The house where he lived, a few miles from the city, still stands, and is now the property of Prince Demidoff, who is erecting a palace which will contain all the relics which have been preserved of the Emperor. The island of Elba is only about sixty miles in circumference, and about fourteen hundred troops are kept there by the Tuscan government. The bays and shores are picturesque, and the valleys are fertile. ”

“ The predominant types of scenery are extensive sandy plains and gaunt rugged mountains. In the low-lands, pleasant relief from the stony monotony is afforded by the trees and scrub which occur along most of the wadis, though their struggle for existence is often evidenced by miles of withered and blackened scrub in places which a few years ago were green and flourishing. The bareness of the mountains becomes slightly relieved in the Elba district, where beautiful trees and flowering plants thrive high up the mountain-side along all the drainage lines. ”

“ Portoferraio was originally one of those headlands, so characteristic of Elba, that grow out from the mainland on a narrow stalk, and then widen and heighten into rocky peninsulas. It is now, however, an island, for Cosimo I., Duke of Tuscany, cut a moat through the stalk, and severed the peninsula from the mainland. The peninsula consists of two heights, on one of which is the fort known as the Falcone, on the other, that of the Stella ”

“ In and near the temple ruins von Heuglin found copper nails, fragments of statues, Roman coins, a quartz sistrum and pieces of beryl, besides potsherds and broken glass. Passing Mersa Shab (Sherm Hel el Madfa) , he notes a few fishermen’s dwellings on Seyal Island, and a pearl fisher from Jidda plying his calling at a small anchorage called Gota, near Ras Fatma. He mentions Kwolala as “Geziret Elba,” close to the “peninsula of Halaib” (now an island, Geziret Halaib) . ”

“ O, yes, nature, nature abhors a vacuum, and these Alfar are by far the most numerous of all the supernatural beings. The White Elves, or Elves of Light, are seldom found out of Norway and Sweden, but the Brown Elf you have in Scotland as well. He works in metals of all sorts, though he delights most in silver and gold. It is the Brown Elf that is the fitful capricious being, which gives their meaning to the words elf and elvish: these are the creatures which pinch untidy maids, and drink up the milk, and light up their evening candles as Wills’-o’-the-Wisp, and lead men into bogs and marshes. ”

“ On the other side of the town is the stately river of Elbe, one of the chief of these parts of Germany, which also by boats brings down out of the country great store of all sorts of provisions and merchantable commodities; and which is much more advantage to them, affords a passage for merchants hither, and from hence to vent their merchandises to all parts of the world. It is the best neighbour they have, and the branches and arms of it run through most of their streets by their doors, to the great advantage of their commerce ”

“ ELSA AND THE TEN ELVES From Sweden
Once upon a time a little girl named Elsa lived on a farm. She was pretty, sweet-tempered, and generous, but she did not like to work. Her father was very proud of her, and sent her to school in the city. She learned to read, write, sing, and dance, but still she did not know how to cook, sew, or care for a house.
When she grew older, she was so good and beautiful that many young men wished her for a wife, but she said “No” to all except to her neighbour, Gunner, a handsome, industrious young farmer. Soon they were married, and went to live on his farm. ”

“ Miles apart from one another, out of the ridge of mountains between Sweden and Norway, come the east and west Dal-elvs, which first become confluent and have one bed above Balstad. They have taken up rivers and lakes in their waters. Do but visit this place! here are pictorial riches to be found: the most picturesque landscapes, dizzyingly grand, smilingly pastoral, idyllic; one is drawn onward up to the very source of the elv, the bubbling well above Finman's hut; one feels a desire to follow every branch of the stream that the river takes in. ”

“ The elf of England and Germany, the alfr of the North, was a being dear to the imagination of the people. His name means the white, the same word already mentioned as forming the Latin albus, and designating the Elbe and the Alps, as well as appearing in the Elphin of Cymric legend. The elves, or white spirits, were supposed to be beautiful shadowy gifted beings, often strangely influencing the life of mortals, so that in old Germany the Alfr were the genii of man’s life, like the Disir of the North; and Elberich probably originally attended Otnit in this capacity. ”

“ A few minutes before sundown they entered the small pueblo of Cienaga. Six hours in the saddle; Elbert was tired, athirst; the early May sunlight had been burning, but except for the occasional oppressive doubt as to his power to carry on without his two friends finding out his real mission, and the fear that his tenderfoot ways might slow up their adventuring, Elbert was possessed by an extraordinary elation; as if part of his lungs that had never known air before, had quietly opened, alive at last. ”

“ In the Elbe, between the old town and the Friedrichstadt, lies an island whereon stands the citadel; this is united with both banks by bridges. With the exception of the Breite Weg, a handsome thoroughfare running from north to south, the streets of the town proper are narrow and crooked. Along the Elbe, however, extend fine promenades, the Fürstenwall and the Fürsten Üfer. To the south of the inner town is the Friedrich Wilhelms Garten, a beautiful park laid out on the site of the celebrated convent of Berge, which was founded in 968 and suppressed in 1809. ”

“ Then it was northward among the foothills—the north star for Elbert’s eyes. At any moment he half expected to hear, ‘No, I’m not going to fall, Mister,’ but to-night it was: ‘Don’t worry about me. I’m sittin’ easy.’
Before daybreak they followed a little stream up higher—less volume but more noise all the way, and came to rest in the deep privacy of a sunless ravine. ”

“ Elbert was abroad in the streets of Tucson, long before the city was astir, his train having set him down at an unseemly hour. He passed a harness shop and peered in through the window, where his eye encountered the cocked ears and pointed head of a wooden horse. Evidently its place was the sidewalk, daytimes, being wheeled into the shop at closing-hour on castors.
It was as if he were in the Plaza at Los Angeles again. It was more: like a man coming back to find his old nursery unchanged. Elbert’s lips moved.
‘Wouldn’t Mamie shy if she passed that palfrey on a lonely road?’
His hand pained. ”

“ He is, in short, the Elf, or water sprite, whose birth-place is the Elbe, or flowing stream." If the name of the German river Elbe (Albis) be derived from this source, the probability is heightened that the Abus of Ptolemy may have intimate relationship to the Aryan Arbhus, or Ribhus. These mystic beings were followers, like the Bhrigus and the Maruts, of Agni and Indra, "personifications of fire and firmament." Kelly says:—"The element of the Ribhus is rather that of the sunbeams or the lightning, though they too rule the winds, and sing, like the Maruts, the loud song of the storm. ”

“ Wadi Ambaya is the chief valley of Mount Erba, and it runs right into the heart of the mountain. Up this we were conducted by Sheikh Hassan, in whose territory we now found ourselves. This valley is fairly well inhabited by pastoral people; they live in huts dotted about here and there, which are difficult to recognise from their likeness in colour to the rocks surrounding them, which they would almost seem to have been made to mimic. The slopes of Erba provide pasturage for a large number of flocks at all seasons of the year. ”

“ The next day we moved on to Quintanajar, and on the 15th, after a long march, we reached the Ebro, and halted at the village of Puente Arrenas, situated in the delightful valley of Veras. This is one of the most picturesque and beautiful valleys in Europe, I dare say. When you arrive at the brow of the high ground over the Ebro, a sight breaks upon you all at once which is indescribably grand and beautiful;—a large river rolling under you, beyond which a rich and fertile valley, laden with the fruits of a hundred orchards, with charming villas and farm-houses dispersed through all the lawn ”

“ Olbera is fourteen miles from Ronda. At the distance of rather more than a mile, a large convent, N. S. de los Remedios, stands on the right of the road, and a little way beyond this, the road descends by a narrow ravine towards La Torre de Alfaquime, and, after winding round the foot of the cone whereon that little town is perched, reaches and crosses the Guadalete. This point is about four miles from Olbera. The stream issues from a dark ravine in the mountains that rise up on the left of the road, and serves to irrigate a fertile valley, and turn several mills that here present themselves. ”

“ So Elidore dwelt in Elfinland, and day after day was fed with milk and saffron; and he played with the Elfin Prince, tossing gold and silver balls. When he walked in the meadows to pick flowers, he saw everywhere about him the Elfin people, with long, flowing yellow hair, riding on little horses and chasing tiny deer with Fairy hounds. For all the people in Elfinland played and rode about night and day, and they never worked. Sometimes on moonlit nights they rode through the dark passage to the upper world, and danced in Fairy Rings on the grass. ”

“ There was a gray wooden horse in the leather-store, fragile but full height, on which Elbert was accustomed to show bridles, saddles, blankets, and pack-gear, talking to customers a lot wiser than he felt, for he still resented life’s conspiracy which had kept him from sitting a live horse where he belonged.
In the evening he would go out and lounge in the Plaza under the dusty palms and sycamores. It was better than Heaslep’s in a way—the Mexicans had a friendly feel, and sometimes when the band played, he could imagine himself down in the City of Mexico, or in the heart of Sonora at least. ”