A person to be in the possession of something as perfect as mortal man
has a right to demand; he tries to make it better, and ruins it entirely.
A person to spend all his life and splendid talents in trying to achieve
something naturally impossible,--as to make a conquest over Nature.
Meditations about the main gas-pipe of a great city,--if the supply were
to be stopped, what would happen? How many different scenes it sheds
light on? It might be made emblematical of something.
December 6th.--A fairy tale about chasing Echo to her hiding-place. Echo
is the voice of a reflection in a mirror.
A house to be built over a natural spring of inflammable gas, and to be
constantly illuminated therewith. What moral could be drawn from this?
It is carburetted hydrogen gas, and is cooled from a soft shale or slate,
which is sometimes bituminous, and contains more or less carbonate of
lime. It appears in the vicinity of Lockport and Niagara Falls, and
elsewhere in New York. I believe it indicates coal. At Fredonia, the
whole village is lighted by it.
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