Indeed, there was not much to see, for the track lies on the inner and
uglier side of Staten Island. The last few miles lead through marshes,
with nothing taller growing than reeds and osiers.
For an hour or so after leaving Amboy, you look out on a country thickly
populated, well cultivated, and trimly fenced, bearing a strong
resemblance to parts of our own eastern counties. We passed through one
wood, in height of trees, sweep of ground, color of soil, and build of
boundary-fence, so exactly like a certain cover in Norfolk similarly
bisected by the rail, that I could have picked out the precise spot
where, many a time and oft, I have waited for the "rocketers." But the
character of the landscape soon changed; loose, sprawling "zigzags"
usurped the place of neat squared posts and rails; the stunted woodland
stretched farther afield, with rarer breaks of clearing; and the low
hill-ranges, behind which the watery sun soon absconded, looked drearily
bare in the distance.
It was pleasant, from the ferry boat, which was our last change, to meet
the lights of Philadelphia, gleaming out on the broad dark Susquehanna.
I can say little of that staid, opulent, intensely respectable city--not
even if the imputation of dullness, cast upon her by the more mercurial
South, be a slander; for the few hours of my stay there were spent
almost entirely with my Asiatic friend, whose invitations and
inducements to a longer sojourn were very hard to resist.
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