AND ACHIEVEMENTS OF AMERICAN S; SERIES OF NARRATIVES ILLUSTRATING THEIR HEROISM, SELF-RELIANCE, GENIUS AND ENTERPRISE. BY HENRY HOWE, AUTHOR OF HISTORIES OF VIRGINIA, OHIO, AND THE GREAT WEST; TRAVELS OF Ilustrated by F. O. C. Barley and others. CINCINNATI: HENRY HOWE, 111 MAIN STREET. NEW YORK: GEO. F. TUTTLE, 102 NASSAU ST. Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, BY HENRY HOWE, In the Clerk's office of the District Court of the United States, for the Southern District of Ohio. E. MORGAN & SONS, 111 Main Street. ALDINE BOOK CO. NOV 25 42 LIBRARY SETS SINCE when, by the right of birth and the lapse of years, we were privileged to walk up, take the freeman's oath, and drop a ballot in the little box, so potent in this government of "the people," we have been almost wholly engaged in the preparation and in the publication of books for circulation by traveling agents exclusively. In the meanwhile, we have attained to a point where it has become "past meridian" with us, and we now pen the preface to our sixth octavo. All of these, derived from varied sources, original or published, in our own or in the language of others, have been constructed with an especial reference to the wants of that class, who, either from habit or their isolation, rarely or never enter a bookstore, and who would, in a measure, be destitute of the information imparted by books, were they not brought for purchase to their very doors. We have the gratifying evidence that among these our publications have been widely popular; and have proved the means, as we believe, of lasting pleasure and instruction to the inmates of many a humble cabin that dots the prairies or skirts the forests of the more remote West. The title of this book was made before the book itself was begun. We have endeavored to adapt the contents to the name, in a collection of articles exhibiting national character, and mainly by individual examples. Such as are already sufficiently familiar to the public are, in general, not inserted, from a desire to render the work more attractive to our readers by its novelty. We have further aimed to gratify a variety of tastes, and to make this such, that it will be a favorite volume with every American family that may possess it. This work, in its variety, is adapted to all classes; both male and female, young and old, the Christian, the philanthropist, those who read simply for excitement and those who read solely for information, will all find it a source of pleasure. We believe there is no work of our day that tends so greatly to gratify one's patriotism-to make one glad that he is an American citizen as this; which shows so well the Heroism, Self-reliance, Genius and Enterprise of our Countrymen, in the Olden Time and in Our Time-in Peace and in War-on Land and on Sea-at Home and Abroad. Those who obtain it will be proud of the facts it contains, for there is much, very much in it to send a thrill of exultant joy to the heart of every American. EMINENT AMERICAN INVENTORS. The triumphs of some of the most Eminent American Inventors. Eli Whitney, inventor of the Cotton-Gin. Robert Fulton, the Steamboat Inventor. Charles Goodyear, the inventor of Vulcanized India-Rubber. Samuel Colt, inventor of the Repeating Fire-Arm. ADVENTURES OF A REVOLUTIONARY SOLDIER. Remarkable Adventures of Israel R. Potter, who was a soldier in the American Revolution, and took a distinguished part in the Battle of Bunker Hill, in which he received three wounds; after which he was taken prisoner by the British and conveyed to England, where for thirty years he obtained a livelihood, for himself and family, by crying, "Old chairs to mend," through the streets of London. He did not succeed in obtaining a passage to his native country until the year 1822, when he was in the seventy-ninth year of his age, and The pretended desertion of John Champe to the British, in the War of the American Revolution, for the purpose of Capturing the Traitor, - 251 |