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I had read in the works of various philosophers, that all animals degenerated in America, and man among the number. A great man of Europe, thought I, must therefore be as superior to a great man of America, as a peak of the Alps to a highland of the Hudson; and in this idea I was confirmed by observing the comparative importance and swelling magnitude of many English travellers among us, who, I was assured, were very little people in their own country. I will visit this land of wonders, thought I, and see the gigantic 25 race from which I am degenerated.

It has been either my good or evil lot to have my roving passion gratified 26. I have wandered through different countries, and witnessed many of the shifting scenes of life. I cannot say that I have studied them with the eye of a philosopher; but rather with the sauntering gaze with which humble27 lovers of the pittoresque stroll from the window of one print-shop to another; caught, sometimes by the delineations of beauty, sometimes by the distortions of caricature 28, and sometimes by the loveliness of landscape. As it is the fashion for modern tourists 29 to travel pencil in hand, and to bring home their portfolios filled with sketches 30, I am disposed to get up a few for the entertainment of my friends. When, however, I look over the hints and memorandums I have taken down for the purpose, my heart almost fails me at finding how my idle humour has led me aside from the great objects studied by every regular traveller who would make a book. I fear I shall give equal disappointment with 81 an unlucky landscape painter, who had

25) spr. dscheigantik, das sch wie franz. j gesprochen.

26) to have mit einem Object und einem appositiven Particip des Passivs gebraucht hat eigentlich seine selbständige Bedeutung oder die verwandte Bedeutung: bekommen (vgl. franz. il eut le bras cassé); deutsch ist es zu übersetzen durch lassen oder durch das Passiv. Hier: dass meine Neigung zum Herumstreifen befriedigt wurde, oder: meine Neigung zum Herumstreifen befriedigt zu sehen.

27) humble (franz. humble, lat. humilis), hier etwa: bescheiden, anspruchslos.

28) caricature franz. caricature zu ital. caricare zu lat. carrus dtsch. Karre, vielleicht celt. Urspr. laden, überladen, in Zeichnung oder Rede übertreiben, vgl. dazu die organ. Ableitung charge und dessen Compositum overcharge überladen.

29) spr. túhrist.

30) sketch Skizze, fr. esquisse, ital. schizzo vom lat. schedium bei Apulejus,,aus dem Stegreif gemacht"; vgl. den Titel des Buches: Sketch Book.

31) deutsch: gleich, ähnlich wie; in Bezug auf equal with vgl. das latein. idem cum, aequalis cum.

travelled on the Continent, but following the bent of his vagrant inclination, had sketched in nooks, and corners, and by-places. His sketch book was accordingly crowded with cottages, and landscapes, and obscure ruins; but he had neglected to paint St. Peter's 2, or the Coliseum 33; the cascade of Terni 84, 32 the bay of Naples; and had not a single glacier 35 or volcano in his whole collection.

or

32) St Peter's sc. Cathedral: Die St. Peterskirche (San Pietro in Vaticano) in Rom, von 1506-1626 an der Stelle errichtet, wo Konstantin und Helene über dem angeblichen Grabe des Apostels Petrus eine Basilika erbaut hatten, in welcher Karl der Grosse von Leo III. gekrönt ward, und die Nicolaus V., nachdem sie in Verfall gerathen, abtragen liess.

33) the Coliseum: Das Colosseum (ital. Coliseo, mittellat. coliseum v. colosseum v. colossus, gr. xoλoooós Koloss, Riesenbildsäule über Lebensgrösse, besdrs. der 70 Ellen hohe, dem Sonnengotte zu Ehren errichtete eherne Koloss auf Rhodos) oder Amphitheater des Vespasian, dessen ansehnliche Ueberreste vornämlich dem Umstande ihre Erhaltung verdanken, dass das Gebäude als geheiligt durch das Blut der wilden Thieren zur Speise vorgeworfenen Märtyrer mit Kreuzen und Altären ausgestattet ward.

34) the cascade of Terni: Der 200 Fuss hohe Wasserfall des Velino (Cadutta delle Marmore), in der Nähe von Terni (Interamna in Umbrien, Geburtsort des Tacitus), in der italien. Provinz Perugia, früher zur päpstlichen Delegation Spoleto gehörig. M'. Curius Dentatus, der Besieger der Samniten, der Sabiner und des Pyrrhus liess den See Velinus mittelst eines durch den Marmorfels gebrochenen Canals ab, der das Wasser bis zum Rande eines Thals führt, von dem es sich in den Cascade delle Marmore in den unten fliessenden Nar (jetzt Nera) ergiesst. Papst Clemens VIII. liess 1596 unter Fontana's Leitung den alten Canal des Curius wieder eröffnen und erweitern.

35) glacier v. franz glacier zu lat. glacies Eis, dtsch. Gletscher, spr. gláss-i-er od. glàceer.

THE VOYAGE.

Ships, ships, I will descrie1 you
Amidst the main,

I will come and try you,
What you are protecting,
And projecting,

What's your end and aim.

One goes abroad for merchandise and trading,
Another stays to keep his country from invading,
A third is coming home with rich and wealthy lading.
Hallo! my fancie, whither wilt thou go?

Old Poem.

To an American visiting Europe, the long voyage he has to make is an excellent preparative". The temporary absence of worldly scenes and employments produces a state of mind peculiarly fitted to receive new and vivid impressions. The vast space of waters that separates the hemispheres is like a blank page in existence. There is no gradual transitions by which, as in Europe, the features and population of one country blend almost imperceptibly with those of another. From the moment you lose sight of the land you have left, all is vacancy until you step on the opposite shore, and are launched at once into the bustle and novelties of another world.

In travelling by land there is a continuity of scene, and a connected succession of persons and incidents, that carry on

1) Jetzt to descry entdecken, erspähen, ausspähen nach, franz. décrier to make an outcry on discovering something for which one is on the watch, then simply to discover. Jedoch haben das altfranz. descriver, lat. describere und franz. découvrir, engl. discover sich mit dem Worte vermischt und auf die Bedeutung eingewirkt. Die Verse sind aus dem Gedicht,,Hallo, my Fancy" von William Cleland (16611689), Anführer der Schottischen Covenanters, der hei Dunkeld fiel. Er schrieb eine Satire auf die Jacobitische Armee,,The Highland Host". 2) spr. prepárative Vorbereitung.

3) In transition ist das s scharf und das ti, wie weiches sh zu sprechen, nach Smarts Bezeichnung trancizhun. Es gibt kein zweites Wort, in dem die Endung tion wie zhun lautet.

4) you lose sight: unbezeichneter Temporalsatz: von dem Augenblick an, da man das Land aus dem Gesicht verliert.

5) spr. in to launch (franz. lancer v. lat. lancea, welches nach Varro bei Gellius ein hispanisches, nach anderen ein gallisches oder germanisches Wort ist) vom Stapel lassen, werfen, schleudern, das au wie dtsch. a aus, gemäss der auch vorkommenden Schreibweise lanch.

6) a continuity of scene, and a connected succession of persons and

the story of life, and lessen the effect of absence and separation. We drag, it is true,,,a lengthening chain" at each remove of our pilgrimage; but the chain is unbroken: we can trace it back link by link; and we feel that the last of them still grapples us to home. But a wide sea voyage severs us at once. It makes us conscious of being cast loose from the secure anchorage of settled life, and sent adrift upon a doubtful world. It interposes a gulf, not merely imaginary, but real, between us and our homes a gulf subject to tempest, and fear, and uncertainty, that makes distance palpable, and return precarious.

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Such, at least, was the case with myself. As I saw the last blue line of my native land fade away like a cloud in the horizon, it seemed as if I had closed one volume of the world

and its concerns, and had time for meditation, before I opened another. That land, too, now vanishing from my view, which contained all that was most dear 10 to me in life; what vicissitudes might occur in it what changes might take place in me, before I should visit it again! Who can tell, when he sets forth to wander, whither he may be driven by the uncertain currents of existence; or when he may return; or whether it may ever be his lot to revisit the scenes of his childhood?

I said that at sea all is vacancy; I should correct the expression. To one given to day-dreaming, and fond of losing himself in reveries, a sea voyage is full of subjects for medita

incidents deutsch etwa: der ununterbrochene Zusammenhang der landschaftlichen Scenerie und die beständige Aufeinanderfolge von Personen und Ereignissen.

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The Traveller",

1) vergl. Oliver Goldsmith (1728—1774), ersten Entwurf G. aus der Schweiz an seinen Bruder sandte, und das folgendermassen beginnt:

Remote, unfriended, melancholy, slow,

Or by the lazy Sheld, or wandering Po;
Or onward, where the rude Carinthian boor
Against the houseless stranger shuts the door;
Or where Campania's plain forsaken lies,
A weary waste expanding to the skies;
Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee;
Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain,
And drags to each remove a length'ning chain.
8) vergl. Byrons,,Childe Harold", Canto I.:

Adieu! adieu! my native land

Fades o'er the waters blue.

9) spr. horizon trotz dem kurzen in opisov, lat. horizon.
10) vergl. das franz. tout ce qu'il y avait de plus cher.

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tion; but then they are the wonders of the deep 1 and of the air, and rather tend to abstract the mind from worldly themes. I delighted to loll over the quarter railing 12, or climb to the main top, of a calm day, and muse for hours together on the tranquil bosom of a summer's sea; to gaze upon the piles of golden clouds just peering above the horizon, fancy them some fairy realms, and people them with a creation of my own; to watch the gentle undulating billows, rolling their silver volumes, as if to die away on those happy shores.

There was a delicious sensation of mingled security and awe with which I looked down, from my giddy height, on the monsters of the deep at their uncouth gambols. Shoals of porpoises tumbling about the bow 18 of the ship; the grampus slowly heaving his huge form above the surface; or the ravenous shark, darting, like a spectre, through the blue waters. My imagination would conjure up all that I had heard or read of the watery world beneath me; of the finny herds that roam its fathomless valleys; of the shapeless monsters that lurk among the very foundations of the earth; and of those wild phantasms that swell the tales of fishermen and sailors 14.

Sometimes a distant sail, gliding along the edge 15 of the ocean, would be another theme of idle speculation. How interesting this fragment of a world, hastening to rejoin the great mass of existence! What a glorious monument of human invention; that has thus triumphed over wind and wave; has brought the ends of the world into communion; has established an interchange of blessings, pouring into the sterile regions of the north all the luxuries of the south; has diffused the light of knowledge, and the charities of cultivated life; and has thus bound together those scattered portions of the human race, between which nature seemed to have thrown an insurmountable barrier.

11) aber hier sind es (they sc. subjects for meditation) die Wunder der Tiefe.

12) quarter-railing od. quarter-rails: narrow planks, reaching from the top of the stern to the gangway, serving as a fence to the quarterdeck Regelingen der Hütte und Schanze.

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18) bow spr. bau, dtsch. Bug zu biegen, ags. beógan, bûgan u. dem schwachen bŷgan.

14) that swell etc. deutsch etwa: von denen die Erzählungen der Fischer und Matrosen voll sind.

15) edge (dtsch. Ecke, urverwandt mit lat. acies, acumen, gr. άxý, axís, άnun von der Wurzel az) Rand, Schneide; along the edge of the ocean am Saume des Meeres: da, wo der Horizont das Meer begränzt, gleichsam abschneidet.

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