A Trip Abroad by Don Carlos Janes
page 24 of 168 (14%)
page 24 of 168 (14%)
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I will only mention Nelson's monument in Trafalgar Square, the Parliament Buildings, St. Paul's Cathedral, Kew Gardens, Hampton Court Palace, and the Zoological Gardens. I also visited the Bank of England, which "stands on ground valued at two hundred and fifty dollars per square foot. If the bank should ever find itself pressed for money, it could sell its site for thirty-two million seven hundred and seventy thousand dollars." It is a low building that is not noted for its beauty. If it were located in New York, probably one of the tall buildings characteristic of that city would be erected on the site. The British Museum occupied my time for hours, and I shall not undertake to give a catalogue of the things I saw there, but will mention a few of them. There are manuscripts of early writers in the English tongue, including a copy of Beowulf, the oldest poem in the language; autograph works of Daniel De Foe, Ben Jonson, and others; the original articles of agreement between John Milton and Samuel Symmons relating to the sale of the copyright of "a poem entitled 'Paradise Lost.'" There was a small stone inscribed in Phoenician, with the name of Nehemiah, the son of Macaiah, and pieces of rock that were brought from the great temple of Diana at Ephesus; a fragment of the Koran; objects illustrating Buddhism in India; books printed by William Caxton, who printed the first book in English; and Greek vases dating back to 600 B.C. In the first verse of the twentieth chapter of Isaiah we have mention of "Sargon, the king of Assyria." For centuries this was all the history the world had of this king, who reigned more than seven hundred years before Christ. Within recent times his history has been dug up in making excavations in the east, and I saw one of his inscribed bricks and two very large, human-headed, winged bulls from a doorway of his palace. |
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