File:Children's stories of American progress (1886) (14781023574).jpg

Identifier: childrensstories02wrig (find matches)
Title: Children's stories of American progress
Year: 1886 (1880s)
Authors: Wright, Henrietta Christian. (from old catalog)
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, C. Scribner's sons
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: Sloan Foundation

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he fleur-de-lis of France, but the thenunknown flag, whose little cluster of stars in itsfield of blue shone as purely as the mountain-snows that gleamed against the summer skiesunder which it was first unfurled. CHAPTER V. THE FIRST STEAMBOAT. In the early ages of the world, when the sea wasyet to man a thing of awe and terror, whoseuttermost limits were supposed to be peopledwith demons and the spirits of darkness, theboldest sailors never ventured beyond a daysjourney from the shore. Skirting slowly along the coasts, their littleopen boats would move from place to place, andcity to city, carrying rare and valuable merchan-dise from the East to the Mediterranean towns,or creep cautiously along the Spanish andFrench shores up to Britain in search of tinand other metals, while all the time the sailorswould be carefully examining the earth and sky,looking anxiously for good harbors as the nightcame on, and dreading nothing so much as thelight of the first star, which often only came to
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THE FIRST STEAMBOAT. THE FIRST STEAMBOAT. 105 them as a solemn messenger, warning them thatthe day was past and they were still far fromport. For hundreds of years this method of sea-voyaging was kept up, and even much later on,when the fierce and courageous Norse vikingshad begun to sail the northern seas in theirstaunch vessels, the ocean still seemed an awfuland mysterious place, where sudden dangersmight easily overtake, and unseen perils encom-pass, the adventurous mariner. And as the viking ships plunged throughthe stormy waves of the northern ocean, some-times lost in fogs, and often in danger of beingcrushed between great icebergs, or dashed topieces against inhospitable shores, whose out-lines shone dimly through the shrouding sea-mists, the brave sailors on board felt that, fondas they were of the sea, it was still full ofthreatening evils, and as much to be feared asloved. After the invention of the compass, oceanvoyaging became less dangerous, the Atlanticand Pacific came

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