Page:Sketch of Connecticut, Forty Years Since.djvu/13

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SKETCH

OF

CONNECTICUT,

FORTY YEARS SINCE.

CHAPTER I.

"August she trod, yet gentle was her air,
Serene her eye, but darting heavenly fire,
Her brow encircled with its silver hair
More mild appear'd; yet such as might inspire
Pleasure corrected with an awful fear,
Majestically sweet, and amiably severe."
Bishop Lowth.

Not far from where the southern limits of Connecticut meet the waters of the sea, the town of Norwich is situated. As you approach from the west, it exhibits a rural aspect, of meadows intersected by streams, and houses overshadowed with trees. Viewed from the eastern acclivity, it seems like a citadel guarded by parapets of rock, and embosomed in an ampitheatre of hills, whose summits mark the horizon with a waving line of dark forest green. Entering at this avenue, you perceive that its habitations bear few marks of splendour, but many of them, retiring

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