Excerpt from Reminiscences of Henry Clay Barnabee: Being an Attempt to Account for His Life, With Some Excuses for His Professional Career N o, it s not a dream! The name of Henry Clay Barnabee is the magical open sesame to the days and nights that lie buried beneath the sunshine and shadows of fallen years. Like the Ancient Mariner, the venerable exponent of the golden age of song and story takes us and leads us from the noises of the struggling present to where the mists and rain bows gather o'er the slumbering past. And now, before we proceed on our memorable journey, allow me to say that nearly eighty long and eventful summers have passed through the hour glass of time since Mr. Barna bee first saw the peep of dawn. Think what it all means. Think of the advancements and achievements that have been made in the arts and sciences since his chalice was first inverted; think how the geographical world has changed; think of the growth in the religious, scientific, medical, literary and historical fields; think of the losses, the crosses and the piles of pillaged plunder; think of the fall of king doms and the clash of arms; think of the cost of human en deavor and the price of our National laws; think if you will of the few honored names that have found a place on our lips, and think of the shafts reared to our unknown dead. Yea, think of a thousand of things, too numerous to mention, that have had their birth and inception since the cradle gave us the namesake of Henry Clay. After you have done all this - searching records and studying cold statistics - and have scanned the present horizon, you have some faint idea of what Henry Clay Barnabee could point out to us or assist Clio in recording on the pages between these covers. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.