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Having dwelt so long on the WONDERS OF NATURE, and the WONDERS OF ART,
both ancient and modern, we pass to some of the wonders and curiosities
of the world of a miscellaneous nature. Some things are wonders only
through their associations, as is the case with many of the localities
of Palestine, for example, where the Saviour lived and walked, and
wrought his miracles of power and mercy. Some are wonders as exhibiting
the inventive powers of man, or the progress of our age as compared with
another; some as exhibiting the singularities of nature; and some as
combining the wonders both of science and art. The steamboat, the
printing-press, the air-balloon, the residence of Washington, the hut of
the Kamtschatkadale, the spot where the “Pilgrim Fathers” landed, the
telegraph, the diving-bell or armor, the prairie on fire, the nest of
the African tailor-bird, each of these, and of a multitude of other
things that might be enumerated, is, in some way, or for some reason,
associated to our minds with what is more or less wonderful, while still
it may not be strictly a wonder either of nature or of art. Some of
these we propose now to notice, interspersing them at intervals with
some of the more miscellaneous wonders of nature, or art, or both, so as
to give variety to the pages that follow. And the first of this class of
wonders we will notice, is,