United States or Iraq ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !


We now came to a series of sheer descents, long, excessively steep slopes of half a mile or more each. They were of a more treacherous character, and required as much caution. We first cut down as many trees, with their branches on them, as we had wagons, and secured the butt-ends to the axle-trees, while the thick branchy tops trailed behind digging into the ground.

They export also the wood of a tree named luma, for axle-trees and the poles of carriages; of a particular kind of hazle for ship-building, which answers excellently for oars; they likewise make chests and boxes of a species of cypress, and of a tree named ciruelillo.

Whilst the crowd incessantly paced hither and thither, vehicles barred the road; and Florent, in order to pass them, had to press against some dingy sacks, like coal-sacks in appearance, and so numerous and heavy that the axle-trees of the vans bent beneath them. They were quite damp, and exhaled a fresh odour of seaweed.

It took place on the morning of June 8th, 1848, just twenty-nine years after I first left America for India. It should have taken place on the preceding afternoon; but one of the axle-trees of the car, which was to support the machine on which the man was to be elevated in the air, was broken. Nothing, of course, could be done until it was repaired.

But even where Patroklos saw the folk thickest in the rout, thither did he guide his horses with a cry, and under his axle-trees men fell prone from their chariots, and the cars were overturned with a din of shattering. But straight over the ditch, in forward flight, leaped the swift horses.

We started on the 26th, on a course somewhat to the N.W., and traversed plains of the same wearisome description as those I have already described. The wheels of the drays sank up to their axle-trees, and the horses above their fetlocks at every step.

He neither had nor wished to have colonies. His judges, his fiscal officers, were meanly paid. His ministers at foreign courts walked on foot, or drove shabby old carriages till the axle-trees gave way. Even to his highest diplomatic agents, who resided at London and Paris, he allowed less than a thousand pounds sterling a year.

An' lars' rains Jimmy Nowlett, the bullick-driver, gets bogged over his axle-trees back there on the Blacksoil Plains between two flooded billerbongs, an' prays till the country steams an' his soul's busted, an' his throat like a lime-kiln. He taps a keg o' rum or beer ter keep his throat in workin' order.

Four hogsheads of ale were broached, a great oven full of bread was baked, plenty of cheese and butter bought, and meat cooked for the more respectable people. The ship was provided with four wheels, or rather four great rolling stocks, fenced about with iron, with great big axle-trees in them, well greased against the appointed day.

But let him be as enthusiastic as he may, he will find enough to damp his ardor. His wagons will stick in the mud; his horses will break loose; harness will give way, and axle-trees prove unsound. His bed will be a soft one, consisting often of black mud, of the richest consistency.