W. H. BARTLETT.
Handsigned: Yours truly
W. H. Bartlett.
AMERICAN SCENERY;
OR,
LAND, LAKE, AND RIVER
ILLUSTRATIONS OF TRANSATLANTIC NATURE.
FROM DRAWINGS BY W. H. BARTLETT,
ENGRAVED IN THE FIRST STYLE OF THE ART,
BY
R. WALLIS, J. COUSEN, WILLMORE, BRANDARD, ADLARD, RICHARDSON, &c.
THE LITERARY DEPARTMENT
BY N. P. WILLIS, ESQ.
AUTHOR OF “PENCILLINGS BY THE WAY,” “INKLINGS OF ADVENTURE,” ETC.
VOL. I.
LONDON:
GEORGE VIRTUE, 26, IVY LANE.
MDCCCXL.
LONDON:
RICHARD CLAY, PRINTER. BREAD STREET HILL.
PREFACE.
Either Nature has wrought with a bolder hand in America, or the effect oflong continued cultivation on scenery, as exemplified in Europe, is greater thanis usually supposed. Certain it is that the rivers, the forests, the unshornmountain-sides and unbridged chasms of that vast country, are of a characterpeculiar to America alone—a lavish and large-featured sublimity, (if we may soexpress it,) quite dissimilar to the picturesque of all other countries.
To compare the sublime of the Western Continent with the sublime of Switzerland—thevales and rivers, lakes and waterfalls, of the New World with thoseof the Old—to note their differences, and admire or appreciate each by contrastwith the other, was a privilege hitherto confined to the far-wandering traveller.In the class of works, of which this is a specimen, however, that enviableenjoyment is brought to the fire-side of the home-keeping and secluded aswell; and, sitting by the social hearth, those whose lot is domestic and retired,can, with small cost, lay side by side upon the evening table the wild sceneryof America, and the bold passes of the Alps—the leafy Susquehanna with itsrude raft, and the palace-gemmed Bosphorus with its slender caïque. So greata gratification is seldom enjoyed at so little cost and pains.
In the Letter-press, it has