The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 09, No. 51, January, 1862 eBook
Various
“Standing upon a staging at an elevation of
about eight or ten feet from the floor, the Doctor
lifted and sustained, for a considerable time and
without apparent difficulty, a platform suspended beneath
him on which stood twelve gentlemen, all heavier individually
than the Doctor himself, and weighing, inclusive of
the entire apparatus lifted with them, nearly nineteen
hundred pounds avoirdupois. In the performance
of this tremendous feat, Dr. W. employed neither straps,
bands, nor girdle,—nothing in short but
a stout oaken stick fitting across his shoulders,
and having attached to it a couple of rather formidable-looking
chains. At his request, a committee, appointed
by the audience, and furnished with one of Fairbanks’s
scales, superintended all the experiments.”
The exact weight lifted on this occasion was eighteen
hundred and thirty-six pounds. A few evenings
after, I lifted, in the same way, in Lynn, eighteen
hundred and sixty; in Brookline, eighteen hundred and
ninety; in Medford, nineteen hundred and thirty-four;
in Maiden, nineteen hundred and two; and in Charlestown,
nineteen hundred and forty.
As my strength is still increasing in an undiminished
ratio, I am fairly beginning to wonder where the limit
will be; and the old adage of the camel’s back
and the last feather occasionally suggests itself.
I have fixed three thousand pounds as my ne plus
ultra.
* * * *
*
FREMONT’S HUNDRED DAYS IN MISSOURI.
I.
The narrative we propose to give of events in Missouri
is not intended to be a defence of General Fremont,
nor in any respect an answer to the charges which
have been made against him. Our purpose is the
more humble one of presenting a hasty sketch of the
expedition to Springfield, confining ourselves almost
entirely to the incidents which came under the observation
of an officer of the General’s staff.
General Fremont was in command of the Western Department
precisely One Hundred Days. He assumed the command
at the time when the army with which Lyon had captured
Camp Jackson and won the Battle of Booneville was on
the point of dissolution. The enemy, knowing
that the term for which our soldiers had been enlisted
was near its close, began offensive movements along
their whole line. Cairo, Bird’s Point, Ironton,
and Springfield were simultaneously threatened.
Jeff Thompson wrote to his friends in St. Louis, promising
to be in that city in a month. The sad, but glorious
day upon Wilson’s Creek defeated the Rebel designs,
and compelled McCulloch, Pillow, Hardee, and Thompson
to retire.
