Athletics and manly sport (1890) (14796158813)

Identifier: athleticsmanlysp00orei (find matches)

Title: Athletics and manly sport

Year: 1890 (1890s)

Authors: O'Reilly, John Boyle, 1844-1890

Subjects: Boxing Games Canoes and canoeing

Publisher: Boston, Pilot publishing company

Contributing Library: The Library of Congress

Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

Text Appearing Before Image:

. The waves that should mur-mur and break on a strand of incomparablebrilliancy, are pushed beyond their proper limits,and compelled to soften and sap the productiveearth; to wash bare and white the sinews of thefriendly trees, and inundate a wide region ofextraordinary fertility. The bleached roots ofthe doomed trees seem to shudder and shrink fromthe weltering death. There is an evident bend-ing upward of the overtaken roots to escapesuffocation. The shores of the lake are like ascene from the - Inferno. Matted, twisted, andbroken, the roots, like living things in danger,arch themselves out of the dark flood, pitifullystriving to hold aloft their noble stems andbranches. The water of the lake, dark almost asblood, from the surface flow of juniper sap andother vegetable matter, is forced from six to tenfeet above its natural level, and driven by windshither to this bank to-day and thither to-morrow,washing every vestige of earth from the helpless 354 ETHICS OF BOXING AND MANLY SPORT,

Text Appearing After Image:

CANOEING IN THE DISMAL SWAMP. 355 life-givers, till its whole circumference is a wofulnet-work of gnarled trunks and intertwined fibres,bleached and dry as the bones of a skeleton, andsheltering no life, but that of the blue lizard andred-throated moccasin. These bare roots and blasted stumps circle thewater like a hideous crown, till the lake becomesa realization of the Medusa. Here, far from thevoices of mankind, the Gorgon stares at heaven,but sees with introverted eye only the writhinghorror of her own brow ; hears only the hiss, andshrinks from the kiss of her serpent locks, gazinginto no living eyes but those of her own damnablestrands. The Lake of the Dismal Swamp is a victimwaiting for deliverance. Release her, and she isno longer Medusa ; the snake hair will give placeto bands of gold and light; the region contami-nated by her oppression will rejoice and blossomlike a garden. The Lake of the Dismal Swamp is the well ofthe swamps desolation. The SAvamp is not fromitself, but f

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1890

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