AMERICA - Joel Cook

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Railroad," whereby fugitive slaves were secretly passed from one "station" to another from "Mason and Dixon's Line" to Canada, mainly through the aid and active exertions of philanthropic Quakers. All through Chester and Lancaster Counties and northward were laid the routes of this peculiar line, whose ramifications became more and more extensive as time passed, making the Fugitive Slave Law almost a nullity during the decade before the Civil War. There were hundreds of good people engaged in facilitating the unfortunate travellers who fled for freedom, and many have been the escapades with the slave-hunters, whose traffic long ago happily ended. At Middletown the Swatara River flows in from the hills of Lebanon County, there being all along the Susquehanna a prodigious development of the steel industry as well as rich farms on the fertile bottom lands. Here is the historic estate of Lochiel, which was the home of Simon Cameron, who for many years ruled the political destinies of Pennsylvania. He was born in 1799 at Maytown, near Marietta, on the Susquehanna, a few miles above Columbia, in humble circumstances, and came as a poor printer's boy to Harrisburg, rose to wealth and power, and when he was full of years and honors placed the mantle of the United States Senatorship upon his son. Their "Clan Cameron" which ruled Pennsylvania for two generations has been regarded as the best managed political "machine" in the Union, having in its ranks and among its allies not only politicians, but bankers, railway managers, merchants, manufacturers and capitalists, and men in every walk of life, ramifying throughout the Keystone State.

      Harrisburg, the capital of Pennsylvania, stands upon the sloping eastern bank of the river in the grandest scenery. Just above, the Susquehanna breaks through the Kittatinny at the Dauphin Gap, giving a superb display of the rending asunder of the towering mountain chain. Opposite are the forest-clad hills of York and Cumberland bordering the fertile Cumberland Valley spreading off to the southwest, while behind the city this great Appalachian Valley continues between its enclosing ridges as the Lebanon Valley northeast to the Schuylkill River at Reading. Market Street is the chief Harrisburg highway, and the Pennsylvania Railroad is the back border of the town. The State Capitol, set on a hill, was burnt, and is being rebuilt. A pleasant park encloses the site, and from the front a wide street leads down to the river, making a pretty view, with a Soldiers' Monument in the centre, which is an enlarged reproduction of Cleopatra's Needle. The Front Street of the city, along the river bank, is the popular promenade, and is adorned with the Executive Mansion and other fine residences, which have a grand outlook across the broad expanse of river and islands. Bridges cross over, among them the old "camel's back," a mile long, and having its shelving stone ice-breakers jutting up stream. This is the old wooden covered bridge that Charles Dickens wrote about in his American Notes. On his first American visit he came into Harrisburg from York County on a stage-coach through this bridge, and he wrote: "We crossed the river by a wooden bridge, roofed and covered on all sides, and nearly a mile in length. It was profoundly dark, perplexed with great beams, crossing and re-crossing it at every possible angle, and through the broad chinks and crevices in the floor the river gleamed far down below, like a legion of eyes. We had no lamps, and as the horses stumbled and floundered through this place towards the distant speck of dying light, it seemed interminable. I really could not persuade myself at first as we rumbled heavily on, filling the bridge with hollow noises—and I held down my head to save it from the rafters—but that I was in a painful dream, and that this could not be reality." The old bridge is much the same to-day as when Dickens crossed it.

      Harrisburg was named for John Harris, who established a ferry here, and alongside the river bank is the little "Harris Park" which contains his grave. The stump of the tree at the foot of which he was buried is carefully preserved. A drunken band of Conestoga Indians came this way in 1718, and, capturing the faithful ferryman, tied him to the tree to be tortured and burnt, when the timely interposition of some Indians from the opposite shore, who knew him and were friendly, saved him. His son succeeded him and ran the ferry, and an enclosure in the park preserves this spot of historic memory.

      LINCOLN'S MIDNIGHT RIDE.

      It was from Harrisburg that Lincoln took the famous secret midnight ride, "in long cloak and Scotch cap," which enabled him to escape attack and possible assassination when going to be inaugurated President in 1861. Lincoln arrived in Philadelphia on his way to Washington February 21st, and had arranged to visit Harrisburg next day, address the Pennsylvania Legislature, and then proceed to Washington by way of Baltimore. In Philadelphia General Scott and Senator Seward informed him that he could not pass through Baltimore at the time announced without great peril, and detectives who had carefully examined the situation declared his life in danger. Lincoln, however, could not believe that anyone would try to assassinate him and made light of the matter. On the morning of February 22d he raised a flag on Independence Hall in Philadelphia, and then went by railway to Harrisburg. There his friends again urged him to abandon his plan and avoid Baltimore. He visited the Legislature, and afterwards, at his hotel, met the Governor, several prominent people being present, among them Colonel Thomas A. Scott, then Vice-President of the Pennsylvania Railroad. Again the subject was discussed, and he was urged to avoid the danger threatening next day, being reminded that the railway passenger coaches were drawn through the Baltimore streets by horses, thus increasing the chances of doing him harm. He heard them patiently and answered, "What would the nation think of its President stealing into the Capital like a thief in the night?" But they only the more strenuously insisted, and finally he yielded, consenting to do whatever they thought best. Colonel Scott undertook the task, and during the early evening quietly arranged a special train to take Lincoln to Philadelphia, where he would get aboard the regular night express and be in Washington by daylight. Colonel Ward H. Lamon, a personal friend, was selected to attend Lincoln. As the party left the hotel a large crowd cheered them, and the Governor, Andrew G. Curtin, the better to conceal the intention, called out in a loud voice, "Drive us to the Executive Mansion." This was done, and when they had got away from the crowd the carriage was taken by a roundabout route to the station. Lincoln and Lamon were not noticed by the few people there, and quietly entering the car, left for Philadelphia. As soon as they had started Scott cut every telegraph wire leading out of Harrisburg, so nothing could be transmitted excepting under his control. Lincoln got to Philadelphia without trouble, was put aboard the express at midnight, and then at dawn Scott reunited his wires and called up Washington, a group of anxious men around him. Soon the message came back, slowly ticked out from the instrument, "Plums delivered nuts safely." Scott knew what it meant; he jumped to his feet, threw up his hat and shouted, "Lincoln's in Washington." The Baltimore plotters were thus foiled, as the new President passed quietly through that city before daylight, and several hours earlier than they had expected him.

      THE CUMBERLAND AND LEBANON VALLEYS.

      Harrisburg stands in the centre of the great Appalachian Valley, where it is bisected by the broad Susquehanna. To the southwest it stretches away to the Potomac as the Cumberland Valley, and to the northeast it spreads across to the Schuylkill as the fertile Lebanon Valley. The high mountain wall of the Kittatinny bounds it on the northwest, with all the rivers, as heretofore described, breaking out through various "gaps." In the Colonial days, when Indian forays were frequent, the Province of Pennsylvania defended the entrances to this fertile valley by a chain of frontier forts located at these gaps, with attendant block-houses, each post garrisoned by from twenty to eighty Provincial soldiers, as its importance demanded. Benjamin Franklin, who was then commissioned as a Colonel, was prominent in the advocacy of these frontier defences, and he personally organized the settlers and arranged the garrisons. Fort Hyndshaw began the chain on the Delaware, there were other forts on the Lehigh and Schuylkill, and Fort Henry located on the Swatara, now Lebanon, while just above Harrisburg was Fort Hunter, commanding the passage of the Susquehanna through the Dauphin Gap.

      Over in the Cumberland Valley, about nineteen miles from Harrisburg, is Carlisle, a town of some nine thousand people, in a rich country, and the chief settlement of that valley. Here is located in what were formerly the army barracks, coming down from the time when this was a frontier post, the Government Indian Training School, where about eight hundred Indian boys and girls are instructed, being brought from the far western tribes to be taught the arts and methods of civilization. These Indian children are numerous in the streets and on the railway trains, with their straight hair, round swarthy faces and high cheek bones, and show the surprising influence

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