United States Books

PREFACE. All creation is musical—all nature speaks the language of song. 'There's music in the sighing of a reed,There's music in the gushing of a rill;There's music in all things, if man had ears;The earth is but an echo of the spheres.' And who is not moved by music? "Who ever despises music," says Martin Luther, "I am displeased with him." 'There is a... more...

Mr. President, Mr. Speaker, Senators and Representatives in Congress: I come before you at the opening of the Regular Session of the 73d Congress, not to make requests for special or detailed items of legislation; I come, rather, to counsel with you, who, like myself, have been selected to carry out a mandate of the whole people, in order that without partisanship you and I may cooperate to continue... more...

CHAPTER I. The Man Who Caught The Vision Inland America, at the birth of the Republic, was as great a mystery to the average dweller on the Atlantic seaboard as the elephant was to the blind men of Hindustan. The reports of those who had penetrated this wilderness—of those who had seen the barren ranges of the Alleghanies, the fertile uplands of the Unakas, the luxuriant blue-grass regions, the rich... more...

CHAPTER I. PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION OF NORTH CAROLINA. The State of North Carolina is included between the parallels 34° and 362° north latitude, and between the meridians 752° and 842° west longitude. Its western boundary is the crest of the Smoky Mountains, which, with the Blue Ridge, forms a part of the great Appalachian system, extending almost from the mouth of the St. Lawrence to the Gulf of... more...

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION In the following volumes the authors seek to present a brief account of the beginnings, development, and final unity of the people of the United States. There are many histories of the country, many biographies which are in large measure histories; but these are exhaustive works traversing minutely certain periods, like Rhodes's History of the United States from 1850 to... more...

CHAPTER I THE CIVIL WAR The military successes of the United States in its Civil War maintained the Union, but entailed readjustments in politics, finance, and business that shifted the direction of public affairs for many years. In the eyes of contemporaries these changes were obscured by the vivid scenes of the battlefield, whose intense impressions were not forgotten for a generation. It seemed as... more...

I. THE BATTLE OF PEA RIDGE, OR ELKHORN, AND ITS MORE IMMEDIATE EFFECTS The Indian alliance, so assiduously sought by the Southern Confederacy and so laboriously built up, soon revealed itself to be most unstable. Direct and unmistakable signs of its instability appeared in connection with the first real military test to which it was subjected, the Battle of Pea Ridge or Elkhorn, as it is better known... more...

PREFACE. The object of this work has been from historical data to show that the Southern States had rightfully the power to withdraw from a Union into which they had, as sovereign communities, voluntarily entered; that the denial of that right was a violation of the letter and spirit of the compact between the States; and that the war waged by the Federal Government against the seceding States was in... more...

O civilized humanity, world-wide, and especially to the descendants of the Pilgrims who, in 1620, laid on New England shores the foundations of that civil and religious freedom upon which has been built a refuge for the oppressed of every land, the story of the Pilgrim "Exodus" has an ever-increasing value and zest. The little we know of the inception, development, and vicissitudes of their... more...

Fellow-Citizens of the Senate and of the House of Representatives: It is to me a source of unaffected satisfaction to meet the representatives of the States and the people in Congress assembled, as it will be to receive the aid of their combined wisdom in the administration of public affairs. In performing for the first time the duty imposed on me by the Constitution of giving to you information of the... more...