YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

TEN YEARS

THE UNITED STATES.

TEN YEARS

THE UNITED STATES:

BEINO AN

ENGLISHMAN'S VIEWS OF MEN AND THINGS

NORTH AND SOUTH.

BY

D. W. MITCHELL,

1 1-
rOKMEBLY RESIDENT IN EICHMOND, VIRGINIA.

"Why should not the Truth be spoken ? "

LONDON:
SMITH, ELDER AND CO., 65, CORNHILL.

M.DCCC.LXII.

{The right of Translation is reserved.1

5^4 ?

PREFACE.

The sudden and unexpected Dissolution of the great
American Union, accompanied as it is with a fierce war of
devastation between men who but yesterday were fellow-
citizens, and exulting, as it seemed, beyond all other people,
in the Government of their own creation — excites more and
more the attention and interest of the British people ;
and will probably continue to do so, until they satisfac
torily understand the immediate causes of these startling
convulsions in a great community, apparently so healthy
and vigorous.
Never was there a social and political derangement in
which almost the whole turn of events so entirely differed
from the common expectation. And, perhaps, the most
unexpected circumstances are yet to happen before the
close of this great Transatlantic drama, of which the first
act is now just over.
Two years ago, had the question been debated as to
what important national Government would next undergo
a great revolution, very few would have named the United
States, then so flourishing and powerful, so favoured by
a 3

vi Preface.
nature, and their people so satisfied with their condition
and their institutions — as tbe world believed.
It is mainly with the hope of explaining the most active
and powerful causes of this great revolution, that I offer
this volume to the world. Those causes, little known as
they were in this country, have long been seen and pointed
out by the few who, amidst the universal whirl of life in
the United States, took time to reflect upon the tendency
of things ; but who uttered their warnings in vain, to ears
filled with the roar of the passing hour.
A residence of some ten years in the United States,
commencing at that memorable epoch of European con
vulsions, 1848, has afforded me a better opportunity of
observing and understanding the people of whom I write —
their habits and feelings, their private and public life — than
is often enjoyed by those who endeavour to make people
better acquainted with their distant brethren.
While observing human nature and studying American
politics, I had to work for my Hving ; and I became so
far Americanized that I ceased to be regarded or treated
as a stranger or foreigner. For some years, indeed, I
looked upon the now famous city of Richmond as my
home, and only left it with a view to escape from the
national scourge, dyspepsia.
The present volume is based upon memoranda and
materials accumulated from time to time in various places,
for the purpose of illustrating the social and political
peculiarities of the United States people. The facts here
given were collected, and to some extent arranged, before
the present troubles arose. In considering and explaining
them, I have had to abandon many preconceived ideas

Preface. vii
and theories of my own, formed before I went to the
States; and no doubt some of the statements here put
forth will conflict with the prejudices and principles of
many of my readers. I have, however, regardless of
feelings, presented leading and plain facts, carefully and
conscientiously ; trusting in the disposition at present pre
vailing in this country, to arrive at the truth as to the
right and wrong of this momentous struggle ; sinking, for
a time, sectarian and party prepossessions.
I have endeavoured, as far as possible, to let the people
of the United States describe themselves, and to let the
parties and factions state their own views ; and many re
marks and reflections which are not printed as quotations,
may be taken to be the deliberate opinions of enlightened
Americans, expressed in conversations and discussions, at
times when hackneyed professions and party cries were,
for the hour, forgotten. I habitually courted the acquaint
ance of the most intelligent and independent men with
whom I met ; and the greater liberality of the people in
regard to social intercourse with each other enabled me
to command a wider range of experience than one similarly
circumstanced could in England, The views that, from
time to time, occurred to me, I tested and weighed in
familiar friendly discourse ; and I soon found a surprising
discrepancy between private and public opinion.
When I commenced preparing these chapters for the
press, I felt that the volume would require a very apolo
getic introduction, conflicting so greatly as it did with what
was almost the national sentiment with regard to the
question between the North and South. But no such
requirement exists now, so great has been the change

dii Preface.
n public opinion, forced as it were by a series of events,
it first very unwillingly received ; except, however, with
¦egard to the facts and theory submitted concerning the
ioloured population — whose true rights and interests are,
: think, here advocated, though in danger of being quite
lisregarded amidst the vast interests of the North, the
50uth, and Manchester.
r *^ f . .
(There are not a few,' in this country \who still think that
he success of the South, thus far, is quite unaccountable.
The very attempt to secede seemed to them strange and
incalled for; (and that secession should become trium-
ihant independence appears to them incredible. ) I hope I
hall be able to convince some who hold those opinions,
hat this success, andfthe separation of the South from the
Torth, are not only natural, but desirable ; and that true
iberty and real progress will suffer no drawback from
he fact that such a government as that now swayed by
Abraham Lincoln is not destined to rule over the whole
ontinent of North America. )
D. W. MITCHELL.
London, Nov. 24, 1862.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTEE I.
PdGli
Discontent — Condition of England in 1848 — The New World much
like the Old — The Star-spangled Banner — Virginia a Young Eng-
land^Scene of the Merrimac' s Exploits, and of M'Clellan's Strategic
Tactics — Lightning Bugs — Stuck on a Bar ... l

CHAPTER n.
First Sight of a Slave — An Exploring Expedition in the since famons
Chickahominy Eegion — ^Meet with an Uncle — Reach a Farm-house
near the James — ^Virginia Fanner's Family, Dwelling, Habits —
The Negro Question . . 8

CHAPTER ni.
Farm-house Interior — Garden — Farm — Crops — Maimer and Looks of
the People — Domestic Servants — Southern Agricultural Population
compared with that of the. North — The Press — The Slaves— The
Union . • 20

CHAPTEE IV.
FROM WHITE-OAKS TO RICHMOND.
Chewing— Manifest Destiny— Country Tavern— The News— Subjects
of Conversation— Electioneering Betting . . 45

X Co7itents.
CHAPTER V.
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA. PAGE
Natives, Jews, Germans, Foreigners — Negro Progression — Indian
Eetrogression— Eetum of the Red Man ? — Laying-off Cities —
Gossip— Slave A.uction— Sovereign or Courtier ?— The Capitol of
Virginia— The Legislature— Men not in their right Places— Ap
pointing Legislatures by Lot— Disappointment— The next great
Movement • ^^
CHAPTER VI.
Composition of the Population as to National Origin — Societies —
Institutions — " Americans " — Publications — Idea of Washington —
Convicts — Effects of Climate on White Men — Victuals — Cookeiy
— Lager Beer — Hint to Teetotalers — How to Travel — Social
Amusements — " Jogging Along " — Complexion — The Church . 77
CHAPTER Vn.
City of Washington, D. C, Seat of the Federal Government — General
Taylor — ^His Eulogy — The United States Presidents — North and
South compared . . 101
CHAPTEE VUI.
City of Washington — Mr. Seward's Great Speech on the Slavery-
Question (March 11, 1850) — Present Events Foreshadowed —
Seward's Career — Bennett on Seward — Disunion debated in Senate
— Negroes termed Accidents and Disturbances by Seward — Calcu
lations a la Bobadil — On Califomian" Secession — An uncompro
mising Statesman — The United States Arch Fiend 1 ] 2
CHAPTEE IX.
The House of Eepresentatives at Washington — Lobby Members 
Wholesale Conniption of the Legislature of the young Western
State of Wisconsin— Angry CoiTespondence between General Scott
and Jeff. Davis . . . . 127
CHAPTEE X.
New York City— The City Government— Sanitary Condition— The
Condition of the Irish— The Poor— Tenement Houses— Needle
women — The Potter's Field .... , aj

Contents.
CHAPTEE XI.

PAGE

United States Anglophobia — Inquiry as to whence it arises— Another
Instance of the Majority being ruled by a Minority in the American
Democracy . 177
CHAPTEE Xn.
North and South — The national Foible — Distinctions between the Slave
holder and Yankee— Their Types— Public Life— Publicity— Dis
play — Modes of Life — " Grass Widow's " Eevenge — Failure of
Democracy — " Mason and Dixon's Line " . 192
CHAPTER Xni.
Some amusing Statistics — Inferiority of the South demonstrated by
Abolitionist Figures — As to Christian Benevolence — Area and
Population — Value of Churches — The Press — Education — Libraries
— Colleges — Southern Ignorance — Agriculture — Cotton — Manu
factures — Commerce — Explanations — Reflection — Miseducation —
New England Education — Quotation ft-om Bishop Potter . . 208
CHAPTER XIV.
" STRIKE, BUT HEAR ME."
' The Dangers of Philanthropy — The Question : Negro Slavery in the
Confederate States — Under whom is the Negro likely to fare best :
Northerners or Southerners ?— The Tree to be judged by its Fruits
— Condition of the African in Africa and elsewhere — In the Southern
States — Negro Progress — Effect of Slavery on the Slave-owner —
Effects of Demagogue Rule on Free-men — Abstract Injustice — Men
not Equal — Origin of Slavery — Good to one Man may he Evil to
another — Negro's cerebral Inferiority — ^Fate of the Negro should
the North triumph — To distinguish and classify Men the great
Problem 224
CHAPTER XV.
Early Settlers of the now Northern States — The Mayfloioer and
the Puritans — Colonization of Virginia and the now Confederated
States — Handsome young Englishwomen sold in Virginia — Cavalier
Emigrants — Rebels sold — Huguenot Immigrants — The Puritans
and Roger Williams — The Yankee Character — Respect shown to
Women — On the Stump— Know-nothings — Popular Sovereignty
insulted — Insanity on the subject of Natural Grandeur . 254

xii Contents.
CHAPTER XVI. PAGE
The CathoUc Irish- Americans— The " Democrats "—First Suggestion
of the Atlantic Cable— Irish Press— On England— On United States
Politics — Irish Influence • ¦ ^' ^

CHAPTER XVn.
United States AboHtionists— Clashing Theory and Practice— Aboli
tionist Meeting— Desire for Disunion— Equality— Woman's Rights
-"Free Love"— Daniel Webster— Wendell Phillips— Majority
ruled by a small Minority . -291
CHAPTER XVin.
State Constitutions — New York Constitution — Theory of Equal Rights
abandoned — Extent of State Sovereignty — Coloured People —
Extent of Powers of the United States Constitution — A Treaty
between Sovereign States for Foreign and Inter-State Purposes
— Fugitive Slave Provision in the Constitution of United States
— Repudiated by Pennsylvania, &c. — Constitutionality of the South
— Written Constitution no Safeguard against actual Powers— Con
stitution of Mexico for Example . 305

CHAPTER XIX.
Unsettled State of Society — Want of Home Influences — The West
— Emigrating — ^Malaria — The Land — Land Speculations — ^Effects
of Success and Prosperity — Trading in the Progress of the Country
— The Railway System — Western Land Mania — The Panic — John
BuU's Stamina acknowledged — Charitableness and Generosity of
the People . . . .322

TEN YEARS

m

THE UNITED STATES.

CHAPTER L

Discontent — Condition of England in 1848 — The New World much like the
Old — The Star-spangled Banner — ^Virginia a Young England — Scene
of the Merrimac's Exploits, and of M'Clellan's Strategic Tactics —
Lightning Bugs — Stuck on a Bar.
I KNOW not what it was possessed me all at once, when I
was a much younger man, to start off on a visit to the
then little known great trans- Atlantic republic. Of course,
I had plenty of reasons to give when asked, since it is
very easy to give reasons for any conduct not palpably
insane; but I suspect I hardly ventured to confess the
real motive even to myself. I was too comfortable per
haps ; things went on too easily and prosperously, and life
was becoming monotonously pleasant. At any rate, I
wanted a change, and to see the world. England seemed
to me to have seen her best days, to be overdone, over
crowded. What sort of a career had she to offer to her
sons? especially to that large and dangerous class, com
posed of those at the same time poor, proud, ambitious, 1

2 Ten Years in the United States.
and energetic, unable to command, and ashamed to beg,
the assistance of any " influence ? " I speak of the gloomy
period which reached its worst in 1847 and in the
memorable 1848, about the time when Mr. Cobden
declared that the age of warfare bad ceased. In the
subsequent interval England has altered for the better, to
an extent which is very surprising to one who left the
country before the revolutionary year and returned after
the Indian nmtiny and the Crimean war.
I was one day sitting at my small desk, in a little dark
cage of a room, with no other business than to look out on
the crowded thoroughfare. I had just finished The Last
of the Mohicans. The mildness, the freshness, the freedom
of the New World, its abundance of land and scope for
enterprise and adventure, all delighted and tempted
me. I gazed almost with disgust and disdain on the
anxious hurrying streams of people. " Yes," I said to
myself, descending from my three-legged stool, and but
toning my coat, " I will get out of this artificial state of
things; I will go and dwell with Nature herself, her
works and her children " — ^with much more in the like
strain, that now appears sufficiently ridiculous to myself.
I did not know how much I loved poor old England
until, on the deck of the parting ship, I saw her white
cliffs and green fields flitting away, and gradually dis
appearing in the darkness and distance; a light only
remaining to tell of her whereabouts. That, too, was soon
below the horizon ; and I walked up and down the deck,
or sat wherever I could find a seat, or leaned over the
bulwarks. I looked at the billows and the stars, but I
thought little of them; the grandeur, and beauty, and

Point-no-Point — First Disappointment. 3
novelty of the scene and situation had no charms for me.
Familiar faces and voices, and the few last words so sweet,
so painful, filled my mind. I pictured to myself one fire
side now more sad and silent than the dark deck around
me. But fatigue, and sleep, and pleasant dreams came
at last.
How we crossed the once vast and awful Atlantic I
need not relate ; that has now become a small, every-day
matter. I was as many weeks crossing the Atlantic as
an ocean steamer now takes days. Our destination was
Richmond, at the head of the tide water, on the James
River ; for I wished to avoid the beaten track of
travellers. The first American land we saw was Point-no-Point ;
and all safe and well, every sail set, we gaily entered
Chesapeake Bay. How eagerly we looked around us to
catch the first glimpse of anything that might indicate the
character of " the New World ! " We were rather dis
appointed at its looking so much like the Old. Gradually
we saw the low shores; at a little distance we passed a
fort — Fort Monroe; a town — Norfolk. Aided by the
glass, we made out, too, that the houses had quite an
English look; and, in answer to the inquiries of the
children, the captain informed us that the people, in
cluding even the blackamoor slave, spoke English; that
these poor slaves did not wear chains or iron collars ; and
that, though they were sometimes whipped, it was quite
out of public sight.
We passed, close to a rough round fortification, rising
perpendicularly from amidst the waves. Over it floated
the Stsff-spangled Banner, at which we looked with
1—2

4 Ten Years in the United States.
much interest ; and after considerable discussion, with the
exception of our captain, we unanimously agreed that it
was not so handsome as our own — ¦
The flag that's braved a thousand years.
The battle and the breeze.
" Well," said our captain, " perhaps — (they caU It the
Rip-Raps, my son," interrupting himself to answer one
of the juveniles) — " perhaps, ours Is not so showy a
piece of bunting as yours ; and to be sure. It ain't quite
so antiquated. But you must give It time. It's expanding,
I guess. We've Improved and extended a little since the
Battle of Bunker's Hill. Why, you might look over the
map of America, and not notice this magnificent bay we're
In ; and yet you could put England In this very sheet
of water, and still have sailing room. It'll be a great
country, this will, when It's all fenced in, I tell you."
*' Very true ; but it seems to me you think too much of
your mere numbers of people and extent of land. I look
at quality rather than quantity. To Increase and multiply
rapidly Is, perhaps, all very well ; still. If all Africa were
under one flag, with its present population. It would be,
mentally (and 'the mind's the stature of the man'), a
smaller nation than Switzerland — less Important than the
single city of Rome or Paris, or even Florence."
" Take In those stunsails," answered the captain, walking
forward among the men.
It was quite a pleasure, yet somehow disappointing, to
find that the State, with the pretty name of Virginia,
seemed, so far as the map showed, quite an English sort of
a country. It was named after our Virgin Queen and
many of the counties after those of the old country 

Old Virginny — The James River, 5
Surrey, Sussex, Middlesex, York, Lancaster, New Kent,
and so on ; towns and rivers being christened In honour
' of once-distinguished English personages. Richmond, our
destination. Is said to have been so called from the resem
blance of Its site and scenery to those of the Richmond
on Thames. As the river we were ascending became
narrower, and its banks more pleasing and interesting, we
agreed that It should have been " The Thames " Instead of
" The James." The Old Dominion, as Virginia Is often
called, is full of English reminiscences ; and considering
the origin, speech, feelings, habits, and mode of life among
the people — excluding, perhaps, the negroes and the newer
settlements — it might be called "Young England" with
more justice than any other part of the world.
Soon we were slowly sailing between high banks covered
with dark, luxuriant, green old woods, or presenting large
open spaces verdant with that noble crop, the Indian corn,
or maize. Here and there we perceived large mansions,
generally of red brick, which. In some cases, had been
brought from England, and surrounded with abundance of
trees for shade. The river wound about as if In no hurry
to reach Its destination : Its waters became clear and of a
deep green. As the sun sank behind the masses of forest
around us, the calm and quiet, the rich verdure of the
banks, the refreshing, yet balmy coolness of the air, made
it truly delightful to lounge on the deck and give oneself
up to pleasant Impressions and anticipations. I had
never before so well understood the Italian's "dolce far
niente," and felt that we were In a more southern and
sunny clime than that of England.
As It grew darker, we were surprised at seeing what

6 Ten Years in the United States.
seemed large sparks moving about gracefully, curving,
as It were, among the dark foliage, each gliding through
the air for two or three yards, then going out for a
moment, then re-appearlng. Of course, we soon con
cluded they were fire-flies ; * but we were rather disgusted
to learn that In the American vernacular the meteor-like
insects were termed "lightning-bugs." We afterwards
found that almost any insect is a "bug," — June-bugs,
candle-bugs, besides other better known species. The rich
and Influential, the aristocracy, are " big bugs." The use
of the word " bug " to signify any sort of Insect, Is, I
believe, originally English — like most Americanisms. In
some of our eastern counties the children say —
Fly away, lady hug, fly away home,
Your house is on fire, your children at home;
which the young cockney alters to —
Fly away, lady bird, &c.,
addressing the pretty little red-bodied, black-spotted, cole-
opter, which keeps down the numbers of the devouring
aphides. Slowly we ascended the gracefully winding river,
watching the last gleams of sunset and the rising moon,
when suddenly a sullen grating sound and a tremor and
shock caused us all to stare at each other and then at
*  Borne
In circles quaint, and ever-changing dance.
Like winged stars, the fire-flies flash and dance.
Pale in the open moonshine; but each one
Under the dark trees seems a little sun,
A meteor tamed, a fixed star gone astray
From silvei7 regions of the milky way. — Shelley.

Stuck on a Bar. 7
the captam, who was giving orders and swearing, irritated,
we were glad to see, rather than alarmed.
"D  and  the river to  " (our captam
swore shockingly sometimes), he growled, between his
teeth ; continuing as I went nearer to him — " Any white
men on the face of the earth, except these cursed lazy
VIrgmlans, would keep this stream fit for the largest liner
to go up and down In safety. Here we are, stuck on
a  bar, and got to stick on It half the night ! Tide
going down. Wind getting up, too,  them. I wish
 — would take all the cuss't niggers they're so fond
of to heaven or to Africa. By  , I'd buy a farm here
myself, then. I guess I'd show some of the F. F. V.s
how to farm, too, by  ! "
" There's no danger. Is there, captain ? " said Mrs.  ,
approaching on one side, anxiously, her three little ones
round her, eyes and mouths wide open.
A true American the captain was — cool and polite In a
moment, as he turned and assured her there was none.
Then, In compliance with the wishes of our steward, who
had procured some luxuries from the shore, we adjourned
to supper ; and chickens, eggs, bacon, tomatoes, green com,
asparagus, enabled us to make a pleasant meal. *
* Since the year when this was written, what unforeseen and, then,
incredible scenes and events have taken place on the banks of the James !
In no country, so far as any human foresight or speculation extended, were
such things less likely to happen than in the region now strewed with
human carcases. About that very time, the wealth and respectability of
London were in a state of alarm which it is now hard to realize ; while
America looked on Europe, labouring in the pangs of universal revolution,
with mingled condolence and encouragement, pity, aud self-satisfaction, in
*he belief that the Old World was merely struggling to imitate the insti-
i-ationa of the New. Let no nation, then, believe itself beyond the reach of
the greatest of misfortunes.

Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER IL
First Sight of a Slave— An Exploring Expedition in the since famons
Chickahominy Region — ^Meet with an Uncle — Reach a Farm-house near
the James— Virginia Farmer's Family, Dwelling, Habits — The Negro
Question.
I WAS sitting alone on deck, enjoying the delicious night,
whose quiet, however, was to my ear somewhat disturbed
by the croakings of numerous frogs. My eye followed a
moving light on the river, which proved to be In a boat
containing two men. As they passed alongside, I felt
inclined to enter Into friendly communication with them ;
so I asked what they were doing there, and where they
were going ?
English travellers used to be much annoyed by the
Yankee practice of asking questions of strangers ; but It
is. In fact, a practice much to the stranger's advantage,
since it allows him to question In return, and to learn
much which he could arrive at in no other way.
" We've been fishing, massa, and we'se going home now,
down the river a bit to Mr. Amery's, close by Nockatock,"
was the reply.
" Got a few fish to spare, boys ? " asked our mate, who
now stood by my side.
"WeU, massa, we ain't had much luck; but I s'pose
as you're come a mighty long ways, you won't be verj
'ticklar ; and I reckon we must  "

First Slave Negro Acquaintance. 9
The old negro kept saying something as he stooped
down among his fish ; and It occurred to me that I might
be able at once to introduce myself to the natives of the
region. So when the fish business had been transacted,
I inquired of the negro who seemed to be in command
whether there was au inn at Nockatock ?
"I don't 'zackly understand the gen'leman," said the
negro, turning to the mate ; " I reckon he don't 'long to
these parts."
"Is there a public-house or a tavern at Nockatock —
any house where a traveller could get a bed for the night,
and a something to eat ? "
The grey-headed old fellow looked inquiringly and
shyly at us as he replied, " Why, mass'r, I speck ther's
mighty few houses hereabouts where a gen'lman travelling
couldn't get that much."
" Yes, yes ; but is there a public-house at Nockatock,
old man ? " asked the mate.
" WeU, it's mighty late now, mass'r."
" How far is It from here ? " I Inquired. " How long
wUl it take you to get there ? " *
It was with much trouble that, assisted by the mate, I
at last found I could get to Nockatock in about an hour.
I had soon bid good night to him and the one or two men
in sight, and was floating down the James in the fishing-
boat with my two rude companions.
*' In what few pages the author speaks of himself and of private persons
in this volume, names, dates, and localities are changed, so as to avoid the
possibility of annoying any one by bringing their domestic habits, circum
stances, and affau-s before the public. This plan, however, does not affect
debateable facts; for all of which authority is given, since I wish to make
this little book indisputable testimony on the subjects concerning which the
United States have been pointed to as the living illustration.

10 Ten Years in the United States.
For various reasons I thought it best to say little, and
we soon reached our rough landing-place, where it was
arranged that the younger and more taciturn negro should
carry my small vaKse and walk with me to my destination.
He was not well acquainted with the road, but he was
told he couldn't miss It with a little care.
At first we walked along the carriage-way; the dark
forest on both sides, with a few lightning-bugs gUding
about; a number of frogs, of all voices, from shrillest
treble, and higher,, down to a deep bass, interfering very
much with my reflections and with the night's serenity. I
congratulated myself on having left the ship, and thus
plunged in medias res, instead of waiting and disembark
ing at the ordinary landing-place. I was now, I presumed,
in a portion of the virgin forest of the New World.
Not wishing to run the risk of appearing ridiculous,
I refrained from asking my guide whether wolves or
bears, or other wild beasts, still infested the country,
and whether the Red Indian had entirely disappeared. In
fact, although Virginia has been so long settled, both bears
and wolves are common in some ranges of the not very
lofty mountains which run through the ceiitre of the
State, dividing it into Eastern and Western Virginia ;
and, at no great distance from where I was, there stUl
remained a village of inoffensive red men.
All at once my guide broke silence by exclaiming,
" Ah ! all right, massa ! here it is. I gan to tink I lost de
track — dat is fact."
« What is it ? " I Inquired.
"Why, I tort we had somehow passed dis ole boss's
white head," said he, pointing to a white object on the

M'Clellah's Woods. U
ground at our feet, which I guessed to be the bleached
skull of a horse. " Now, we've only got to take dis left
fork, and then we come to a fence and an ole field  "
He continued rehearsing to himself the route, which
comprised so many points that I anxiously hoped he might
make no mistake; the more so as we heard the roll of
distant thunder, and a stillness and sultriness aU round —
not a leaf moving — seemed to give warning of au
approaching storm.
" The quicker we gets out of dis de better, massa, I
reckon," said my guide, as be lumbered along a few feet
ahead of me. " It looks mighty like we're going to have
aU sorts of a storm 'fore long."
I now began to wish I had been contented to sleep on
board, and had checked till daylight my curiosity to
explore the stUl to me New World. At night the sea Is
solemn and awe-inspiring; so Is the desert.; but in the
midst of an unknown forest, danger seems more imminent
and there is something more awful than in either. Now
and then my guide would mutter to himself. The distant
thunder murmured. I with my London eyes couldn't
avoid roots, small ponds, and other obstacles so easily as
he did ; and we had to cross two or three stony gullies,
with which the heavy rains cut up the country, and the
wood seemed to get thicker and darker.
This was the nature, I afterwards found, of a great portion
of Virginia ; three-fifths of It being still in its original forest
state. Such appears to have been the natural condition of
the whole of the eastern side of the continent ; one vast
forest covering the uneven surface, from the Gulf of Mexico
northward, till the climate stunts and thins vegetation.

12 Ten Years in the United States.
"'Sense me, massa," said my guide, interrupting my
meditations, and touching his hat, "I reckon we'd best
be gitting along ; if it rains like it lightens, I don't know
how we'll git across the branch."
"The what?"
" The branch, sir; and I 'spected to got dar 'fore now,
but the lightning sort o' bothered one, I 'spose."
"What branch do you mean?" said I, wanting to arrive
at a better understanding.
"We caUs it de branch, massa — dat's de only name
I ever heerd. It runs into de river away down yonder."
I found that he meant a stream of water ; any fordable
running stream being so called in this section.
" Well, sit down a minute or two, and try this," I said,
handing my guide a small drink of brandy from a little
flask with which the provident mate had supplied me.
He drank it off, every drop, with evident satisfaction, and
seemed all the better for it, physically and mentally.
The negro evidently began to suffer considerably,
breathing heavily now and then. Remembering the In
structions of my friend the mate as to how to speak and
behave towards the " nigger," I said to him, " Boy, why
don't you sit down and rest yourself."
" Goramlty, massa, tank you ; I just wants to git out of
dis — dat's all I wants. It beats my time."
He was evidently in a state of suppressed alarm.
" Don't you often have such lightning as this ? " I
asked. "Never in my born days, massa!— I swar, never! It
puts me in mind of de words of de preacher at de revival
not long ago. It Is mighty awful. I'm right glad dar

An Old Uncle. 13
laln't no more thunder, or it would be like judgment
day." I had sat down on a log, and told him he had better do
the same for a few minutes.
"WeU, massa, I'se mighty tired, but there's snakes
in these woods, and I don't 'zackly like -sitting down
promiscus." " Snakes ! " I cried, jumping up as if electrified, and
causing Washington to strike an attitude of alarm. I
at once began to inquire Into the ways, and habits, and
numbers of the species of the hated and accursed genus
which infested the country; and then I ventured to sit
down again on a protuberance from the foot of a tree,
first spreading my white handkerchief to sit upon. I,
for my pairt, have not that horror and disgust at sight
of ophidian reptiles which seems natural to most people,
especIaUy to negroes ; for when I was a boy, one of my
fancies was to keep a tame common English snake.
After walking a little farther my pioneer stood still,
lost ; then suddenly exclaimed, " Dar's a dorg," meaning
that he heard a dog bark. We pushed on, and came to
a farm road, then to a wooden gate, and soon saw a light.
The negro now warned me to look out, as he reckoned
that was a "mighty severe dorg," and that most likely
there were a lot more — enough to eat us up — all loose
at this hour, when visitors on foot were not expected.
And In fact, as soon as my black cicerone had got near
enough to call out, " Uncle I " to an old black who was
moving about a sort of stable-yard with a lantern, several
" dorgs," little and big, rushed towards us, notwithstanding
uncle's caUs to them to come back. After no little alarm ,

14 Ten Years in the United States.
uncle went with us towards " the house," the occupier of
which appeared In the porch. My guide seemed to have
explained things, and the gentleman, in an affable, un
disturbed sort of way, Invited me to walk In and rest
myself. I had merely noticed that the house I was entering
was large, not very new, mostly of brick, with a plain
whitened portico of wood in front, around the corners
of which clustered some climbing plant. From the wide
hall or passage. In which were an old-fashioned mahogany
table, two rush-bottomed chairs, a gun, and some hats
and coats, I was ushered into the family sitting-room, and
courteously and pleasantly Invited to take a seat In a large
leather-covered arm-chair. The first feeling I experienced
was one of surprise at finding myself in such a homely,
old-fashioned, pleasant, English-looking room. The mem
bers of the family were two grown young women, one
pale, one rosy, both plainly but neatly and comfortably
dressed, both rather good-looking, and having that ease
and self-possession which Americans rarely want ; a slender,
growing girl ; a boy, brown and bold ; and a fine young
man of some five-aud-twenty. The household had less of
strangeness to me than I had experienced In my own
country, under more favourable and usual circumstances.
I at once explained my situation, and narrated my
journey, and I happened to mention that my guide had
dated his misguidance to the time of finding the horse's
skull. Upon this, a little negro, who was sitting In one
corner, listening demurely, showed signs of interest, look
ing askance at his young master, who laughingly Informed
me that he and that young black rascal had passed that

Virginian Hospitality. 15
way yesterday with the cart, and that coming back the
boy had tied a string round the old skull, which had long
lain at that spot, and attached it to the cart ; so that It was
dragged some distance, and finally left where we found
it. This little incident set us all laughing, and seemed to
make us acquainted with each other better than the best
of regular introductions could have done. The father
of the famUy, a widower, some fifty years of age, a stout,
hearty, cheerful, thoughtful-looking man, declared that If I
was not particularly sorry, he was very glad of the
accident. This led to stories of being lost and "turned
round" in the woods. All took part in the lively and
unaffected conversation, except the youngest girl and the
negro boy, who lounged on the floor in one corner, and
a negro girl, some ten years old, who sat on a hassock in
another corner, with eyes and mouth open, looking and
Ustening, laughing and grinning, attending very little to the
occupation they had in hand — seeding cotton.
Some tea, boUed bacon, and chicken, eggs, wheaten
bread, and com cake — in American, " corn " means Indian
corn — were set In one corner of the large old mahogany
table for my benefit, the family having supped before my
arrival. To these viands, without the least hesitation,
I did full justice : there was such a feeling of ease and
security and goodwill in the people and the place, that
I went on eating, drinking, and talking as If quite at home.
It was the finest of hospitality, which I afterwards found
not uncommon in the South. Had Prince Albert walked
in, cognlto, he would have been received much as I
was: with as little constraint, pretension, or formality, and
with scarcely more attention or ceremony. And very

16 Ten Years in the United States.
sorry I am that, during his visit to America, the Prince of
Wales feU Into tbe hands of Yankees, who contrived to
prevent his seeing the Southerners at home, rendering '
even his hurried visit to Richmond almost an affront.
After supper, we sat for some time talking on various
subjects — on England and Europe ; then on America — the
North and the South— the "pecuhar institution." The
storm-cloud that has since spread over the whole country,
and burst at last, was then no bigger than one's hand, and
by very few believed to be a real storm-cloud. My host
did not set up for a philosopher or a politician, stUl less {
did he delight In argumentation : he took the total circum
stances In which he was placed as a fact of which it was
his duty to make the best. He had little care or curiosity
for abstract right. " I judge of the tree by its fruit," said
he ; "I maintain that my negroes and our slaves are, on
the whole, better off, better treated, and in every way in
a more improving and flourishing condition than niggers
or coloured people of any race anywhere else. Take
New Zealand, the Cape of Good Hope, Australia, East
and West Indies, Dahomey, or Massachusetts, and com
pare their histories with that of ours since the Africans
were first brought here, and no man can deny that our
negroes have in every way the advantage. We have,
of course, practical undoubted evUs, wrongs, enormities —
too many of them ; but when we compare the whole state
of things here with what exists elsewhere, we have the
best of reasons to let well alone, and to advise the rest
of the world, including our Northern brethren, to mind
their own business."
I asked my host If he thought there was any real

Confidence in the Federal Union. 17
danger of future civil war or separation on account of the
peculiar institution. He replied,
" Well, no ; I reckon not. The Northerner looks upon
the negro as an outcast, au obstacle, a nuisance — much
as the Western pioneer looks on trees, and wolves, and
Indians. I was once in New York and Boston. I had
some trouble, for certain abolitionist scamps tried their
best to persuade old Joe, this boy's father, to let them run
him away ; but they couldn't manage It. The abolitionists
are a mere fanatical, wrong-headed, one-sided set, and
I don't see how they can overcome the instinctive dis
like of the Northerner against the black man. I should
think nothing of all the dangers which some imagine,
only one of our best men, C. J. Calhoun, Is of opinion
that a coUision will some day come, and he Is one of
the very few of our politicians in whom I for one really
believe." Such, with even a fainter shadow of apprehension, was
the general tone of public opinion in the South ; the few
who thought that a clash between the two sections was
preparing were pooh-poohed as alarmists or croakers.
This was in 1848. Almost in the neighbourhood where
this conversation passed was fought the edifying battle
of Bull Run. For the benefit of demagogues, and poli
ticians, and Intelligent majorities, I shall in the course
of these chapters show by what means a free, humane,
money-loving population permitted itself to be stultified,
disgraced, cheated wholesale, plunged Into the wildest
extravagance, led into a cruel, dishonourable war, and
subjected to a rigorous, worse than Russian or Jacobin,
despotism ; finally becoming a warning to all lovers of
2

18 Ten Years in the United States.
Uberty, a by-word and an example for the use of everj
supporter of despotism.
After some further miscellaneous conversation, I was
surprised to see the youngest daughter place a large Bible
on the table. The little circle became quiet, two or three
black servants entered the room, and the father opened the
sacred volume, and commenced reading — ^having chosen
that appropriate chapter In which we are exhorted to
be kind to strangers, and are reminded that some, while
practising the duties of hospitality, had entertained angels
unawares. After the reading, all knelt down during a
short prayer; then the servants left the room, the two
youngest daughters kissed their father and retired, and the
rest of us sat talking. A short time after, I asked to be
shown my bed, which I had been informed was ready; and
soon I was comfortably refiecting on the Interesting events
of my first day In America.
Certainly aU my preconceived notions of domestic life
and manners among slaveholders were entirely falsified.
The people amidst whom I had fallen recaUed to my mind
" The Cottar's Saturday Night " of Burns, although thei-e
was nothing rustic in the dress or behaviour of the members
of the family ; on the contrary, they had the air of well-
to-do people accustomed to society. Gradually my mind
wandered back across the Atlantic, and I feU into a slumber
agreeably enlivened by dreams of home scenes and home
faces and voices — the usual dreams of the wanderer, until
new Interests and affections have overgrown the old ties
and feelings.
If the reader thinks I enter too much into detaUs, I have
only to say, by way of apology, that this chapter fairly

Rural Life in Virginia. 19
represents the ordinary life of a large portion of the popu
lation of Eastern Virginia — a plain, self-respecting, quietly
religious people, Uving in abundance on their carelessly-
cultivated farms, surrounded by woods, with large numbers
of horses, more than plenty of dogs, and rather an excess
of the much talked-of troublesome " nigger."

2—2

20 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER III.
Farm-house Interior — Garden — ^Farm — Crops — Manner and Looks of the
People — ^Domestic Servants — Southern Agricultural Population com
pared with that of the North — The Press — The Slaves — The Union.
Eaklt in the morning, as early as the sun, I got up and
looked around me inquisitively. The walls and celUng of
the room were whitewashed, the floor was clean and bare,
an old-fashioned looking-glass hung on the wall, and also
two or three cheap coloured and framed engravings of
ideal Annies and Maries, issued, I afterwards found, from
Nassau Street, New York, and widely diffused by Yankee
pedlars over the whole of the States. There was one old
landscape in oil, of some merit, it seemed to me, who am
no connoisseur In such things ; and I rightly guessed that
it came from Europe. There were plain white window
curtains to the two windows. A large old mahogany chest-
of-drawers from England, three or four unpainted, rush-
bottomed chairs, of Southern manufacture, very comfortable
to sit in, and wash-stand, &c., completed the furniture ;
except that a Bible, a Whole Duty of Man, one volume of
Clarissa Harlowe, and a yellow-paper-covered New York
edition of Pelham, price twenty-five cents, all dilapidated, the
last by legitimate wear and tear, lay on the mantel-piece.
(In reading books of travels I was always fond of details
myself, and rarely found travellers sufficiently minute In
this respect.) The farm, the family, and the dwellmg of

Walk round the Farm. 21
which I now speak, formed. In most respects, a fair, but
perhaps somewhat favourable specimen of what may be
called the middle class In Virginia, and of a large portion
of the older settled of the Southern States. Names, dates,
and localities I may generally alter ; but I shall aim to
depict scenes and Incidents without varnish, extenuation,
or exaggeration.
A little dark-brown negro brought In my boots, polished,
and proceeded to brush my clothes. He then showed me
the way downstairs and to the porch in front of the house,
where the eldest sou pleasantly wished me good-morning,
inquired how I had slept, and Invited me to " take a turn
round the house " till breakfast was ready.
In front of the dwelling was something of a garden,
very slightly cultivated ; the principal flowers being holly
hocks, sunflowers, and luxuriant rose-bushes. Two noble
white oaks gave abundant shade, very grateful and neces
sary in tho hot summer days. Passing through a gate
in the whitewashed paling, we walked round a patch of
about an acre devoted to cabbage (" cabbage and bacon,"
both boiled together. Is almost a sort of national or State
dish with Virginians), " sweet corn " (a variety of Indian
corn used as a vegetable, which Is worth the attention of
our market-gardeners), vegetable-marrow, potatoes, and
tomatoes. These last are very much used In the States.
Few like them at first, but gradually one comes to be
extremely partial to them. They are used In all possible
ways, cooked or uncooked, and are said to have a special
beneficial action on the liver ; which Is very fortunate, if
true, considering the great prevalence of liver complaints
in the country.

22 Ten Years in the United States.
Then we came to the turnip-patch, about an acre in
extent. A careless ploughing, a little rotten manure, a
quantity of seed sown broadcast — that was all the care the
turnip usually received ; although I afterwards remarked
that land in this part of the country abundantly repays
good cultivation.
Through another gate we entered the field of Indian-corn
— a noble crop, about my own height (which is consi
derable), of a healthy dark green, each stalk surmounted
with its plume-Uke tassel, and each ear displaying its
purple-tipped silk. It is planted in rows, about three
feet every way between each plant. The field averaged
about two ears to each plant — considered a fair yield.
This is the most reUable, and frequently the most Important
crop of the farmer throughout the northern, western, and
middle States. It helps largely to feed the famUy and the
negroes, and also the pigs, cattle, and poultry. A few
pumpkins, used for the cattle, and for pies, were growing
among the com.
Next we came to a small patch of buckwheat, which,
among other uses, furnishes the deservedly famous but,
I fear, rather indigestible luxury of buckwheat cakes.
Then we came to a field of some thirty acres of fine
wheat, just ready to cut. But most striking and pleasant
to me was the orchard. The ground was in parts yellow
with fallen apples, which were to be collected to make
cider and to feed the pigs. A number of peach-trees
were laden with fruit not yet ripe. There was all around
a look of carelessness and abundance. We had got back
near " the house " again, and I could see my young
black attendant walking about with the hand-beU for

Breakfast — Personal Observations. 23
breakfast, ringing it, apparently for his own gratification,
for an unnecessary length of time. We went In and
found the family awaiting us. I was received with a slight
bow or a quiet good-morning from all. On the table were
coffee, small hot wheaten rolls, batter bread, and hoe-cake,
made of Indian flour ; milk, eggs, and rashers of bacon ;
a loaf of cold wheaten bread, — "stale," they called It —
and a pitcher of dellclously cool spring water. Before
we commenced, the head of the family briefly said grace.
A negro girl attended assiduously to my wants, and when
ever she handed me any white dish, I involuntarily looked
to see a black mark from her fingers.
The chief peculiarity that struck me In manner and
conversation was the greater coolness and deliberation,
compared with the English. The seniors seemed to
think twice, at least, before speaking, and to keep think
ing even while talking, weighing their words well. All
impressed me as being more acute, guarded, considerate
and self-possessed than English people. And after I had
been among Americans for years, and had studied and
insensibly acquired their manners and idiom, I still felt
my decided inferiority in this constant guardedness and
deUberateness of speech; and, I may say also, of action.
Englishmen generally, I believe, are conscious of this
characteristic difference ; and, though less so, even Scotch
men feel it.
The tone of voice, I observed, was somewhat higher
than the European average. But this, and the nasal
peculiarity, are most strongly developed " down east," or
in the Yankee States, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode
Island, Vermont and Malne^

24 Ten Years in the United States.
As to the physique of the family, there seemed a want
of robustness, a lack of hearty cheerful health ; except In
the two sons, who displayed as fine a physical condition as
could be desired, tempered with a highly developed
nervous system.
Much observation has since convinced me that the
American descendant of Europeans has not constitutional
physical stamina equal to that of the European. Were
the Americans subjected to poor and scanty fare, insuffi
cient shelter and clothing, excessive labour and mental
depression as extensively and frequently as great numbers
in Europe, the population of the United States, I am
convinced, would show an unmistakable deterioration. I
speak of the most populous portion of the continent of
North America ; the atmosphere of which, for two-thirds
of the year coming from the west, has passed over the
vast breadth of land bounded by the Pacific, and Is,
therefore. In a condition very different from that of the
air we breathe in the west of Europe, which also coming
from western quarters for about two-thirds of the year. Is
a sea air. Our scientific knowledge on this subject is
probably very imperfect; but that in a long course of
years such au atmospherical difference must tell ou the
human constitution, every one will believe who notices
the respective effects In England on his own feelings, and
on vegetable life, of the east and west winds.
It was, of course, very pleasant to find myself all at
once dropped into such an agreeable set of circumstances.
I could hardly realize that I was among strangers In a
strange country: that I was so, however, the negroes
more than anything else constantly reminded me. I

Negro Domestics. 25
watched them curiously, almost anxiously ; for some time
the predominant idea they suggested was, that they were
slaves, Uable to be bought and sold.
But it was not long before I felt instinctively that
between them and the white man there was a difference,
however it originated, which It would take a long time —
how many generations I would leave to Mr. Darwin — for
circumstances and education to remove; even supposing
the white to stand stiU, whUe the negro was mentally and
physically advancing.
The negro who does nothing but work at agricultural
labour — the field hand — Is coarsely, but In most cases
sufficiently, clad. He wears a round felt hat, thick
bluchers, and jacket, &c., dark-coloured or blue grey, of
northern manufacture. But there are ranks and classes
among the slave population ; and perhaps more than In
most societies do the duties and position of the negro
depend on his fitness and capacity. The smartest, best-
looking girl wiU, most likely, be selected to serve In the
house, or wait on the mistress or her daughters ; the most
inteUigent and trustworthy man will be employed in
various ways, at something better than mere hoeing, and
so on. These fortunate Individuals dress and fare very
weU ; and though they must not be hurried or worried,
and require humouring, no one once accustomed to them
would wUlIngly replace them by an ordinary London or
New York servant : a fact worth notice.
After breakfast my host told me that the stage would
pass by to Richmond early In the afternoon, and at the
same time every other day ; he and his sons would be busy
for some time, as they werft commencing getting in the

26 Ten Years in the United States.
wheat; but there was my own room, and the family sit
ting-room, and all the farm; and with some books and
newspapers at my disposal, I was to make myself at home :
so being inclined for rest, I took the papers and sat down
in a large chair under the shade-trees in front of the
house ; my little canine enemy of the night before coming
and making peace with me, and lying down by my side.
Intending some day to write a book about America (an
intention of which every EngUsh traveUer is suspected),
I set myself to making observations.
The house was of dark red brick, quite old. The brick
had been brought from England, as It always or mostly
was before the Revolution. The roof was of wooden
shingles. Two dormer lattice windows looked to the
front; the rest of the windows had green shutter blinds
outside, white curtains inside. An ample wooden porch,
painted white, and rather rickety, extended along the
whole front of the house, having two or three steps in the
centre opposite the door, and shaded and beautified at one
end by a climbing rose blooming splendidly. Such a
house might stand in many parts of England and present
no appearance of strangeness to the passing observer,
except the wooden shingle roof, and the green external
window blinds,
A coloured servant-girl appeared. The word " slave,"
by the by, is seldom used; the term is generally "ser
vant," sometimes man, boy, coloured person, or negro, or
nigger ; but this last Is an insulting epithet, and though
commonly used when speaking of the slave, it Is only used
to them in anger or contempt. The girl placed a large
rocking-chair at the rosy end of the porch, and soon an

Agriculturists: North and South. 27
< elderly lady occupied it, knitting and gently rocking her
self. On seeing her the small dog left me and took up his
place by her ; for which she slightly scolded him, and asked
him whether he didn't know better than to leave a visitor
alone in that abrupt way.
The farm was entirely surrounded by the woods, con
sisting of oak, walnut, chestnut, maple, and other trees of
temperate climes. They were mostly deciduous, but here
and there was a cedar or other evergreen. The house of
the nearest neighbour was nearly a mile off, only the
smoke from the chimneys was visible. From the spot
where I sat in the grateful shade of the two white-oaks, in
front of the house, I could survey the greater part of the
: farm, surrounded by the level horizon of forest, through
which a pathway led to the neighbouring farms and roads,
aU hidden amidst the trees at various distances ; but It was
pleasant to know they were there. In a distant field I
could see the labourers at work cutting down the wheat ;
so I folded up the newspapers and walked that way.
But I must first give my Impressions of the news
papers. The bad printing and poor paper, and number of
quack advertisements, strike one at once ; next the variety
and brevity of the items and articles, and an absence of
that formality and stiffness — or dignity, as the case may
be — which are very generally maintained by the European
press. Indeed, an Englishman at once feels that the
American usuaUy exercises his organ of veneration much
less than an Englishman; while much more energy Is
thrown into his self-esteem. At the period of which I
write, Europe was convulsed with the struggles of demo
cracy. Louis PhUIppe had taken flight; France was a

28 Ten Years in the United States.
repubUc once more ; everywhere the masses were rising,
thrones were falUng quickly, one after another, and the
peoples were demanding and proclaiming their "inaUenable
rights." An Important journal thus descanted upon the state of
things, in Europe on the one hand, and in the United
States on the other. The remarks are here condensed, but
the quoted matter fairly represents the style and spirit of
the United States— or rather of the Northern press— at
that memorable revolutionary saturnalia of the peoples —
to use Kossuth's word : —
" At length the benighted nations of the Old World are
following our example and Imitating our institutions.
They have seen the peace and prosperity and power and
growth of America ; they have studied the laws and insti
tutions to which those blessings are owing, and have
determined to be the prey of priests, kings, and aristocrats
no longer. Oppressive dynasties a thousand years old
have come to an end ; the rights of man, which we first
proclaimed, are being everywhere asserted ; human equality
will ere long be universally acknowledged. The days are
at hand when the lion shaU lie down with the lamb, and
men beat their swords Into ploughshares. While the
world is thus in the throes of a new birth, and every day
may bring us the news that at last even England, the most
aristocratic of all countries, has become republicanlzed
(we publish In another column the triumphs of the Irish
patriots at the great and bloody battle of SUevegammon),
the Stars and Stripes float calmly and proudly over our
vast country, in which the child of the foreign pauper has
au equal right and chance with his milUons of felloW'

The Newspapers. 29
sovereigns of arriving at the greatest wealth and the
highest honours, — even at the Presidency. Soon our flag
will be the flag of the whole of North America. Canada
must desire to share our wealth and greatness. Our sway
is rapidly extending over the whole of the Pacific coast,
and the profoundest human wisdom can see no limit to the
increase of our grandeur, the extent of our progress, the
continuous rapid growth of our prosperity."
I am not caricaturing. In most- of the papers which I
read — leaders, or " editorials," and speeches — there was a
total blindness to any possible dangers or misfortunes hap
pening to America or her institutions, an assumption
that the United States was the model republic ; and, mingled
with much liberality and good feeling, there was an amount
of self-confidence and self-glorification greater than indivi
duals or nations can safely indulge. I hoped that I had
not met with a fair average of the American press, or that
the press was not a true reflection of the national character.
I shall have more to say on this subject hereafter.
In this volume, condensed from materials Intended to
form more than one work, and which I gleaned during my
sojourn In Unistatia — as It has been proposed to call the very
awkwardly named republic under consideration — the reader
may occasionally meet with sudden breaks and transitions,
which I hope he will excuse as unavoidable. In going
from place to place, also, I have not troubled him with
describing the railways, railway carriages, hotels, and
steam-boats — of all which there are many ample and
amusing descriptions — or the intervening space. Having
thus propitiated the reader, let us return to life in
Virginia,

30 Ten Years in the United States.
It Is curious that while the Virginians and Southerners
generally are a very social people, exchanging uncere
monious visits — the younger portion of the family spending
great part of their time, days and weeks together, with
neighbours and relations — they are also fond of a rural
life ; more so even, I think, than the EngUsh. Probably
three-fourths of Virginia are still In forest, and the bulk of
the population Is scattered amidst this forest ; the farm
houses for the most part being so far secluded as not to be
visible to the nearest neighbours. Almost every man of
any wealth, carrying on business, in the few small towns,
has his farm, easUy accessible, where he and his family
spend much of their time. In this respect it is very
different in the North, where rural life seems to be a Ufe
of repulsive drudgery, and the towns are looked to for
pleasure, ambition, refinement, aud social intercourse.
But on this subject the following remarks of a distin
guished citizen living in this part of Virginia, a leading
scientific agriculturist, and, of course, a slaveholder, wiU
be found interesting. He says, addressing a meeting of
the Virginia State Agricultural Society : —
The most distinguislied men, and especially statesmen, of the
South, have at least as often been natives and continued resi
dents of the country as of to-wns ; and in talent and in numbers
they have far exceeded all from the North in our public councils.
In the northern states there are indeed many men of the highest
talents, education, and learning; and, it may be, in the latter
respects exceeding any in the South, because of the greater advan
tages offered by great cities for literary and scientific pursuits. But
these great men are either produced in or gathered to the great
cities only. They are men who have acquired their just renown
either as lawyers, physicians, divines, or professors in scientific and

Rural Life in Virginia. 31
literary institutions. AU of great intellectual power that now
exists in the great states of Massachusetts, New York, and Penn
sylvania, is to be found in their populous cities only ; and almost
exclusively in their respective great capitals. Some truly great
men may be, and sometimes are, famished from these cities to aid
the public councils. But never does one such come from all the
twenty-fold greater country and -village constituencies — ^which, even
when disposed thus to honour the highest talent {which is not often
ihe case, either in town or country — north or south) (Mr. Euffin
says), could not possibly find among themselves any high talent
to honour. The difference between the intellectual conditions of
the northern and southern agr' cultural population is the cause of
the usual long existing and well kno-wn commanding influence of
the southern states in the Federal government, through their repre
sentatives, in whatever measures of national policy are directed by
wisdom, or intellect, or for the benefit of general interests. But
we are now much the weakest in votes, and in whatever of public
poHcy is connected with sectional interests, or stUl baser private
self-interest, superior intellect has no influence, and we are
governed by the brute force and cupidity of superior numbers.
To return from this long sociological digression: it
was now past nine, and the sun was hotter and more
glaring than was pleasant. My young negro attendant
came running after me, sent by " missus," with an
umbrella, with which I was glad to shade myself. I
strolled along leisurely, observing the trees and wild-flowers,
to see wherein they differed from those of England. It is
years before one loses this habit of comparing the new with
the old. In whatever city he comes to, the cockney com
pares its largest edifice with St. Paul's. With pleasure I
saw the old familiar blackberry-bush in the hedges ; how
many pleasant recollections it Immediately awakened !
And then there was the wild-rose, with Its bright blooms.

32 Ten Years in the United States.
and hips and haws too. One field had a hedge of the weU-
remembered " May " bush, as the London schoolboys caU
it. Then there was the oak, and the holly, and other
trees, very like those that grew In the fields aud woods of
old England ; while there were many others, and weeds
too, quite strange to me. Fine butterflies, some rather
larger and gaudier than the English, were floating about ;
a dried up, neglected piece of ground was aUve with
grasshoppers, of which one kind was as long as one's little
finger. I sat down for some time on a stump to watch the
interesting operations of a burying beetle, called by ladles
the tumble-bug, by others by a stUl less elegant name.
These Industrious beetles were of a bluish-black colour,
about half an Inch in length, of a thick, strong, roundish
make. I watched them at their curious work of rolling
the ball they had formed, for a considerable time ; and the
same black boy, having again overtaken me on his way to
his master with some message, stood watching me, evi
dently wondering what sort of a white man I could be to
take so much interest In what he passed by many times
every day without deigning to notice. What finaUy the
busy beetles did with their prize I did not wait to see.
Like ourselves, they were little aware of the ultimate end
of their labours — to contribute very materially to preserve
and Increase the fertility of the mother earth, by bury
ing safely beneath the surface for the use of the vegetable
world the invaluable material which otherwise, acted upon
by sun, and wind, and rain, would most of it be washed
down the rivers, and so Into the sea.
Let us not be in a hurry, but take our time; using
the microscope as well as the telescope, and observing

Concerning Travelling. 33
little as well as great things : sometimes sitting down
quietly on a faUen tree, watching the clouds, or studying
the weeds, till the birds and other creatures move about
and near us, unconscious of our presence; or again,
standing at street-corners, lounging about amidst the
thoroughfares, auctions, markets, theatres. Thus we may
not only see, but think, and compare. What though
this Is the age of raUways, telegraphs, photographs ? It
takes as long now to digest a meal as it did In the dark
ages ; on the whole, rather longer, considering the preva
lence of dyspepsia in these days : and so, to observe, reflect,
think, and digest our thoughts, we must take about as
much time as our ancestors did. I hope I have all due
respect for a steam-engine, and appreciate Its services to
mankind ; but rushing through extensive regions at twenty
or fifty miles an hour — trees, fields, villages, and distant
towns, whirling by — stopping now and then at large hotels,
glancing at remarkable places and large buildings, collect
ing the names, and outsldes, and prominent features of
things — all this Is a very Imperfect and deceptive sort of
travelling. " Go ahead I " is the cry of Young EnglancJ,
Young France, and Young America. Ah! " Go ahead"
had become the motto of this last juvenile. He thought
lessly borrowed and abbreviated the saying of his brave old
pioneer : " Be sure you're right, then go ahead ! " The
youth thought he had no time to be sure he was right ; so,
spite of many warnings, he went ahead — till he met with
the shocking collision at BuU Run.
I believe every one should study — not merely read
— GUbert White's Natural History of Selborne, or some
¦ such work, before commencing the Kosmos. We all
3

34 Ten Years in the United States.
love to hurry to conclusions. To suspend the judg
ment, to refuse to form an opinion, is to many disagreeable,
difficult, even painful. Men like to believe ; only an in
tellect considerably cultivated can restrain itself In a state
of doubt, even when good grounds are wanting for a more
satisfactory mental condition. We have no time, we fancy,
for ample details, for numerous facts Illustrating one truth,
for queries and qualifications. We want to arrive at the
end as rapidly as possible : to condemn or approve, to sup
port or oppose. As the operations of civilization become
more rapid, this tendency increases ; but it Is a dangerous
tendency. So, If at times I am slow, hesitating, appa
rently over-cautious, the reader will pardon me. In a new
and vast field of observation the observer should take
nothing for granted.
I reached at length the field where the reaping was In
progress, and as the sun was now hot — 90° in the shade at
least — I was glad to find a small clump of trees in one
corner from which I could look on the scene. Four black
men, three " boys " and a lad, were at work ; these were
/jutting with scythes and cradles, a contrivance new to me
— the cradle consisting of five or six thin strips of wood
as long as the scythe-blade, eight or ten inches apart, so
that the wheat as it faUs Is caught, and at the end of each
sweep of the machine the whole swath slides off regularly
on to the ground. The men went at their work In a sing-
Song mechanical manner, -without much spirit or nervous
energy; but they were longing for dinner and rest, the
time for which was near at hand.
I regarded the poor slaves with much interest. The oft
quoted sic vos non vobis, &c., came Into my mind. I

The Slaves. 35
wondered how often my host used on them the whip of
which I had so often read, and for which I could hardly
help looking round. He, a quiet, easy, circumspect, yet
frank-looking man, by no means corresponded to my idea
of a slaveholder. But then the best of men get used to
the worst of systems ; and I thought of what British
officers, and Uberal mill-owners, and humane proprietors of
collieries, and others, had done, and maintained their right
to do, in England, within a few years. But what seemed
to me the hardest part of the slave's lot was, that he could
feel no Interest In his labour, that he could take no pride
or pleasure in his work.
I recalled my own experience as to how soon even a
moderate quantity of exertion at any occupation to which
we are averse, and from which the mind Is absent, becomes
a wearying, disgusting drudgery. And here were these
poor fellows, condemned to perpetual labour for others;
at the command of others ; wanting alike the wholesome
stimulus of ambition, and of necessity. I thought how
slowly the shadow of the sun must move to them. I
wondered how long they worked. What a revolutionary
world this is ! It was .1848, the year of revolutions In the
Old World, America looking on patronizingly and pity
ingly. A few years previously deer, bears, and Indians
roamed in these woods ; not long ago the chlvalric Captain
John Smith — worthy of a higher-sounding name — was the
first white man to sail up the James ; at a little distance
still lies the rock on which he was about to suffer a
captive's death from his red foe. King Powhatan, when
he was rescued by the king's beautiful and pitying
daughter, Pocahontas, claiming him for a husband. He
3—2

36 Ten Years in the United States.
was an adventurer worthy of the time of PhUip Sidney
and Sir Walter Raleigh; though, it is said, he did not
treat his wife so well as she and we might have expected.
Her grave, I beUeve, Is at Gravesend ; his. In the church
whose bell tolls unhappy wretches from Newgate Into
eternity. The Red-man was gone — disappeared, as we
say. The pale-faced descendant of the Saxon and Norman
was lord of the land, and to serve him as hewers of wood
and drawers of water the brawny savage sons of benighted
Africa had been brought, perhaps from horrible Ashantee
or Dahomey. May we not hope that In time the true
philosophy of these changes will be understood, and that
' ethnology and anthropology will emulate and advance
with natural history and geology ?
The master was In the field looking ou; for he was
his own overseer, as is very commonly the case among
all but the more extensive and wealthiest farmers In
Virginia. Seeing me, he came towards me ; having first told the
hands to get their dinners. They dropped their Imple
ments very promptly, and started off, swinging along
under the burning, glaring sunshine, towards a long shed
partly sheltered by trees. We proceeded towards the
house, talking about the strange revolutions In Europe.
I was stmck with the difference between the guarded ,
expressions, the moderate expectations and views of my
host, and the rash predictions, the hasty and extrava
gant conclusions of many of the papers I had been
reading. As we went along I told my kind entertainer that I
would take the coach when it came by. He invited me

A Virginian Dinner. Z1
to call again should I ever pass, or have a day or two
to spare. A black lad met us before we reached the
house, and, touching his hat and making his bow in negro
fashion, handed me a letter : to my surprise. It was from
a friend who happened to be at his farm a few miles
off, apologizing for not at once coming over, but Intro
ducing me to the gentleman whose hospitality I was
already enjoying. This was very pleasant, and It placed
me quite at my ease ; though I was pretty much so already
— thanks to the kindly unembarrassing manner of the
whole family. We refreshed ourselves by a slight wash
in cool water, and then went in to dinner. The meal
consisted of a tomato soup, cabbage and bacon (boded
together), fowl, wheaten and corn bread, potatoes, green
corn, and apple-dumplings, with water deUciously cool
from the weU — a plain and plentiful repast, and a genuine
Virginian dinner. I afterwards found that throughout the
States, outside the largest cities, fresh meat is not much
used ; very much less so than in London : in the West,
especially, roast beef is about as great a rarity as it is
to an EngUsh agricultural labourer. Water is drunk to
an extent rather surprising to a genuine Englishman, who
regards mere cold water as a poverty-stricken and rather
unwholesome article of diet ; except, perhaps, occasionally,
after Indulging a Uttle too much In something better — to
his notions.
My host, I found, kept port, sherry, whisky, brandy,
and cider in the house ; but none of them was placed on
table at dinner. People living In a more fashionable style
follow pretty nearly the New York and European fashions
in such matters, according to their means. At the time

38 Ten Years in ihe United States.
I write of, the current of pubUc opinion had set In against
the old drinking habits of the State, and consequently there
was much larger consumption of Intoxicating liquor than
met the public eye.
Rising from the table after a moderate time — enough hv
mingling a little conversation with the proper business, —
the company proceeded to an adjacent room, considerably
better furnished ; tbe outer shutter blinds being closed to
keep out the mid-day glare, and the windows opened, to
admit the slight breeze. My host sat down by me on a
sofa, asking about England ; the rest of the family sat
scattered about ; the eldest and the youngest in rockmg
chairs, some chatting about their own affairs, one or two
Indulging in that dolce far niente which one soon learns to
enjoy under the influence of a southern clime. Though,
in fact, the true American only half enters Into that con
dition to which the ItaUan abandons his whole self; the
mind of the former, the observing faculties especially,
being usually quietly and somewhat secretively active,
while the body Is In a state of repose.
" I reckon I may as well go and see how those boys are
getting on," said the eldest son to his father, meaning the
men reaping. In the South they " reckon ; " the Yankees
"guess; " in the West they "calculate."
" Yes, do," answered the father ; " and as our friend
wishes to take the stage to-day, you had better tell Bob to
look out and stop it."
" Yes, sir," was the reply. " Sir " being still often used
in the United States by chUdren to their parents : It has
now been discontinued In England for perhaps half a
century past. Its use being regarded as an instance of the

Little Fear about the Union. 39
unsocial distance formerly maintained between parent and
child. " Suppose we go and have a pipe ? " said my host ; " I
always do, myself, after dinner, and probably you will
have no objection to join me."
I thought it best to say yes ; and bowing as I left the
room, received in return a slight bow from the ladles.
We seated ourselves In easy chairs at one end of the
porch, my host taking off his coat — a dark frock-coat
which he knocked, about the farm In.
" I see, sir," said I to him, removing from my lips the
long reed forming the stem of my pipe, " things are not
quite settled, even In this country. I read some remarks
in more than one paper, about the dangers arising to the
Union fr-om abolitionist feeling In the North."
" Ah ! yes ; you mustn't mind all the papers say. They
must talk strong now and then. The Union won't be
dissolved In our time. The abolitionist clique — for it don't
amount to a party — Is a mere humbug. Go to New York,
and you'll hardly meet with one In general respectable
society. The Northern people know very well that they
despise the nigger every way, while we In the South like
the nigger very well — in his place. No, sir, I reckon
there's very little danger In that direction."
Such at this time were the views of, I should think, a
large majority of the Northern people with regard to dis
union. The Americans fully Inherit all the excessive
self-confidence of their British ancestors. The apprehen
sions as to the possibility of dismilon, however, were more
lively among the most experienced and enlightened men
of the country. My host, Indeed, was a man of exceUent,

40 Ten Years in the United States.
sense, and of much general information ; but his life had
been rather closely occupied with restoring his farm to a
profitable condition, and his politics and opinions were, on
the whole, formed by his wishes, feeUngs, and Interests : as
is the case with very many, I beUeve.
" Hullo ! here are some folks coming up to the house ! "
said my host, rising to put ou his coat and call some of
the family, two of whom soon came on to the porch to see
who the visitors were. Two one-horse vehicles —
"buggies," holding each two persons, — followed by a
small close carriage, and two men on horseback, came up a
road through the farm.
"Miss Brown and her cousin are in the first buggy,"
said one.
" And Miss Harrold Is in the second," said another.
" Miss Harrold ! Well, that is lucky : she Is a fellow-
countrywoman of yours, sir," said my host, " and you may
be proud of her. You must give up the idea of leaving
to-day." (I should have stated that my having mentioned persons
in_ the city from whom I had letters, and with whom Mr.
Burton was acquainted, had put me on a better footing
than I should otherwise have been.)
The party had pulled up outside the slight fence, servant
la.ds holding the horses ; and the gentlemen having assisted
the ladies from the carriages, they walked towards us,
talking and laughing gaily enough. They were wai'mly
welcomed by the family. There was shaking hands all
round, and kissing between the ladles; and after they
had got on to the porch, Mr. Burton turned to me and
gave a sort of general introduction, mentioning my name.

Convalescent Look of the Women. 41
When Miss Harrold happened to be near me, he intro
duced me to her, particularly, as a countryman just arrived
from the other side of the Atlantic. I was Indeed proud to
see that among more than half a dozen ladles, most of
them near their prime. Miss Harrold was favourably dis
tinguished as to figure, complexion, and carriage ; though
surpassed by some in delicacy of colour, fineness and
regularity of feature, and grace and vivacity of manner.
By the side of her, most of the ladles had a convalescent
appearance ; she being no more rosy or robust than one
likes to see a young Englishwoman of two and twenty, of
cultivated mind and manner, and enjoying all the essentials
to health.
When we find ourselves amongst strangers in a strange
land, we turn with pleasure and with a friendly feeling of
recognition to whatever belongs to or reminds us of home :
it may be au old book, a picture, a flower ; and with a
countryman or countrywoman we seem to have a right to
claim acquaintance, as a vessel sailing In some unfrequented
ocean would hail and speak another. It was, therefore,
with no little gratification aud even pride that I entered
into conversation with a charming, young, and admired
Englishwoman. At once I seemed to cease to be an alien,
a stranger, an "outsider;" and felt myself within the
social circle of which the domestic hearth is the centre.
Miss Harrold had been in America only two years, and
yet in manner. In conversation, in a certain je ne sais quoi,
she was decidedly Americanized. Yet it was but slightly ;
and her deeper voice and English accent fell pleasantly on
my ear amidst the [^higher notes and somewhat to me
pecuUar speech of the others.

42 Ten Years in the United States.
The elderly lady whom I mentioned before, evidently in
feeble health, approached me. " I am glad Miss Harrold
came before you left, sir," she said ; " you must try and
give us a call before she leaves us— If you are still deter
mined to leave to-day."
One of the youngest of the family had, taken my fair
countrywoman's left hand In both of hers, while half shyly
looking at me.
" Ma," she said, " you know we have an all-day meeting
next Sunday ; why don't you Invite this gentleman to come.
down and drive Miss Harrold to church, and I'll go in
their buggy: won't you let me. Miss Harrold?"
" You are talking too much, miss. You be off and tell
Dmah to cut up those water-melons and put them on the
table ; — ^but that was a good suggestlou of Jinny's. I reckon
you had better come down on Sunday. There will be an
unusual number of people at our church. The belle of
our county is to be there too, and numbers of other yoimg
ladies." To a Londoner it is curious to see how important a part
young ladles play In the amusements, the attractions, the
conversation, and thoughts of the single men especially,
and of society generally, in the South. But as so many of
the ways of spending time wlilch offer themselves to young,
men in large European cities — theatres, concert-rooms,
billiards, public-houses, lectures, and so on — are out of
reach, and the people are of a very sociable turn, the un
married but marriageable portion of the fair sex acquire aU
the more Interest and Importance.
I accepted the Invitation conditionally. My host and
two other gentlemen approaching, the ladles joined the rest

Americans Keen Judges of Men. 4
I of the party, who were entering the house. On being Intro
duced, I observed the searching, pehetrating look which
the American bestows ou a new , acquaintance. The
Southerner especially often deliberately reads one, com
mencing with a steady look In at the eyes — much to the
annoyance of many persons. I doubt whether any people
are such good judges of human nature as the Southerners, — •
so able to look through externals and appearances Into the
real man. The English reader may perhaps say they
ought to be good judges of an article in which they deaL
We talked of England, her wealth, her power, extent,
and so on. Was she going to turn republican like the rest
of the world? England was second only to America.
Had I been In Kent ? for one had relations there ; another
in Durham. Of one the father was EngUsh, of another
the mother was Scotch ; and the house and street m which
she lived in Edinburgh were mentioned. Then we turned
to America. Only one of the party seemed to have any
doubts as to the perfection and permanence of the Union.
Yet of those who were on that day assembled within that
farm-house one lies burled on the melancholy field by
Manassas Gap — among the first who fell at Bull Run,
two are In the armies which now defy the Northern hosts,
one of the girls, now a wife aud mother, lives on a farm
within sight of the invaders, where day and night she and
her family are exposed to such dangers as those which
surrounded the English In India during the mutiny ; and
the whole now regard with hatred and contempt the then
glorified flag of their Union.
" Coach '11 be at de gate dreckly, sa," said a young black
boy, who had been watching.

44 Ten Years in the United States.
" Run aud stop it," said Mr. Burton, my kind and
courteous host.
I shook hands with him, and with those to whom I was
speaking, and I looked round to see whether more of the
family were In sight.
" TeU the girls to come here — that our visitor wishes to
bid them good-by," said Mr. B. to one of the small blacks
who seemed always about. They soon came, one after
another, bringing with them my fair young countrywoman.
A shake of the hand all around, and lastly with the mistress
of the house, who said they would be pleased to see me
again, and then I turned my back on the cheerful dweUing
where I already had begim to feel like an inmate ; so much
that was new, pleasant, and interesting to me had passed
within the few hours of my accidental sojourn beneath the
friendly roof of a Virginia farmer.

45

CHAPTER IV.
FROM WHITE-OAKS TO RICHMOND.
Chewing — ^Manifest Destiny — Country Tavern — The News — Subjects of
Conversation — Electioneering Betting.
I TOOK very little notice of the dingy, yellowish two-horse
vehicle that was waiting. I gave a bit of EngUsh silver
to my coloured attendant, who had first opened the gate
for me and then the coach door. He looked at the coin
with open mouth, rather suspiciously I thought, then
brightened up as he pulled at his old straw hat, wished
me " good-by," and hinted Inquiringly that I should " see
de folks again nex Sunday ? "
Travelling at the rate of about seven miles an hour,
we passed pieces of wood or forest, crooked fences, " worm
fences" — consisting of rails roughly split, about ten feet
long, and laid with the ends overlapping each other, held
together by their own weight, — fields of corn, wheat,
clover, mangold-wurzel, "old fields" covered with dry
weeds, grass, and a few pines ; and now and then a farm
house. But throughout there was more wood than any
thing else, though no trees that would be called very fine
in England, rarely any two feet In diameter. Sometimes
fifty or a hundred acres would be totally cleared, looking

46 Ten Years in the United States.
painfiiUy hot. Too many Americans Uke to see their
fields thus bare ; not unnaturally, perhaps, since It shows
a complete conquest over the native and obstructive forest.
Oppressed by dust and heat, I thought that were I a
farmer I would have shady walks in all directions over
my land; and I have little doubt that an enlightened
economy will In time lead Americans so to shade their
paths and 'roads as to enable them to move about more
out of doors at aU hours and seasons than they now do,
or can with due regard to health. The Anglo-Saxon has
as yet scarcely begun to modifyby scientific arrangements
the climates and the effects of climate In the various
countries to which he has migrated.
Things .gUded by, as though they were a mere painted
panorama. My head was full of recollections — now, of
the events, the conversation, the scenes, the persons of the
last few hours ; then, away amidst London smoke or Eng
lish green fields. After leaving the little spot, the small
circle, amidst which you have been living, moving
amidst strangers and localities totally disconnected with
your former life, you cease to be an actor and become
a mere spectator. A real landscape Is no more to you
than a fine picture. The intellect may be amused and
occupied with the novelties, but the heart Is ever reverting
to old faces and places, feeUngs and interests ; and this is
one reason why It is so difficult to give a fair estimate of
what to us Is new and foreign. I endeavoured to form a
correct Idea of the people I had seen, wherein they were
like, wherein they were different from the English. At
present, I will only say that to a Londoner there was less
that was unusual, remarkable, or peculiar, than he would

Spitting and Chewing. 47
find among people of corresponding position In many parts
of England. He would look upon them as persons of
superior bearing and address, free from rusticity or vul
garity, yet with au air, a mode, a character distinguishing
them from English people.
But their spitting and chewing ! WeU, that Is a most
unpleasant way of using tobacco, about which enough has
been said. I was rather worried to see a fine young man,
talking very familiarly with the English lady I mentioned,
turn away now and then and discharge the brown saliva
from his mouth over the porch railing. I don't think any
one has ever arrived at, or at least published, the philo
sophy of the use of tobacco. To see the struggles of
boys to become accustomed to it, aud find youths and
men using stuff in which there is really no tobacco or
nicotine, one might think It a mere acquired habit ; but
the Indian, the hunter, the saUor, the Irishman, and the
American, with his over-excited nervous system, would
never permanently indulge in so troublesome a practice,
unless it were something more than mere custom or habit.
I had only two fellow-travellers with me in the coach,
which was built, I beUeve, to accommodate nine. Of
"these, one was a fine, large, rather sensual-looking man,
in black, with elegant boots (the only white man I had
noticed with boots fit for country wear was Mr. Burton),
and a careless, rough, yet not ungentlemanly manner,
very inconsistent with his attire. My attention was
directed to him by his cursing his black dress hat, which
incommoded him when It was on by preventing him from
stretching himself at his ease, and when off by tumbling
about. He was a great chewer and spitter. I calculated

48 Ten Years in the United States.
that he must have emitted the nauseous fluid from his
mouth through the coach window at the rate half of a
pint per hour. How his system could stand such a drain,
he still looking robust, fat, and muscular, I could not
understand. Perhaps by nature he was a Daniel Lambert,
kept down by nicotine ?
He seemed to have been aware that I was internally
pre-occupled, for when I began to look around with au
evident Interest In external objects, he remarked, with the
calm, examining look which I before mentioned, that the
wheat thereabouts was looking very fine. I replied that
I was no judge of what was expected In Virginia, but to
me It looked rather light.
" I guess you're not long from the old country," joined
in my other companion, a younger, smaller, thin man, an
inferior animal, also In black, but with a thin, high voice
which yet indicated more of mental culture.
Being myself in search of information, I made it a point
to give It whenever asked for. I could never sympathize
with those squeamish travellers who were unhappy because
they could not, wherever they might go, always get nice
tea and thin bread and butter in their own rooms, or
who were annoyed at being asked where they came from,
where they were going, what was their business, and
so on.
We were soon engaged in conversation, and the feebler
and genteeler of my companions let us know that he was
from Boston, born close by that city ; that he was in poor
health, and trying to get employment as teacher. At
that time New England supplied a large proportion of
teachers and schoolmasters to the South. It is curious

Manifest Destiny. 49
that the native population of Massachusetts emigrate very
extensively. The unfailing topic, the wonderftd greatness,
progress, and extent of the Union, was broached, aud the
Bostonlan expatiated on it more extensively than any one
I had yet heard. I know not what wonders he foretold.
" It's a good thing for the rest of the world that we're
a peaceable, enlightened nation, and have no kings or
aristocrats to lead us Into useless and aggressive wars."
" But perhaps," I s,rfggested, " Providence may see fit
to prevent any country becoming so Immense and Irre
sistible." " Waal, that is to me a new Idea," he said, laughing
at my absm-dlty; "It's just for the good and enlightenment
of the world — to show it how to git along with equal
rights, and just laws, and by peaceable means — that Pro
vidence is developing this country so wonderfully."
" You think there Is no danger of disunion ? "
I noticed he looked sideways at our companion, who
sat a quiet, but I thought not altogether a pleased listener.
" Disunion I " Then he added, after a pause, during which
he was evidently thinking, " No : I guess the British
Government would Uke to see that, but we're not such
fools as to gratify them."
This was in 1848. In 1861 the Southern States raised
the Confederate flag. In 1860, had Washington risen
from the dead to warn the Northern people of the dis
grace, the bloodshed, the foUy, the dangers, the madness,
they were bringing on themselve.s, not one in twenty
would have believed him. Preachers, politicians, literary
men, newspaper writers of all sects and parties, had all
agreed in one course — to flatter the national vanity, to
4

50 Ten Years in the United States.
stimulate the national self-confidence and self-esteem, till
a belief in the perfection of American institutions had
become a part of the American religion.
A heavy cloud had suddenly come over us, and large
drops of rain were falling ; the horses were walking up
a bad piece of the road, when the driver's face appeared at
an opening for the purpose of speaking to us.
" There's a very heavy shower coming on, gentlemen,
I reckon. I've got two servants outside here ; If you don't
mind, I'll put them inside till it blows over."
No one objected. " Oh I to be sure," said the larger
of my companions. " I said nothing, because I know you
Northerners," — looking at the Bostonlan, — " are more par
ticular as to the presence of niggers than we are down
here." " Oh ! I guess not."
" Now, I reckon you never travelled In your parts In
a public carriage with two nigger fellow-passengers ?"
The conversation was interrupted by the coach-door
being opened, and the two coloured people getting In, rather
shyly and awkwardly, seeming to feel as an English farm-
labourer might in the presence of the squire or parson.
They occupied the back seat. For some time little was
said. All were looking at the storm raging around us, —
trees bending and writhing beneath the fierce gusts ; wheat-
fields sadly undulating ; fields of corn apparently con
quered by the wind and rain, and borne down towards the
earth, half uprooted. But a few days' sun, I -was told,
would draw It up and set all right again. Thick yellow
torrents rushed along the road-sides, or. In some places,
formed large ponds. Nature operated more suddenly.

Country Tavern. 51
violently, and, as one might say, wastefuUy, than in the
temperate climate to which I had been accustomed ; yet
I have seen in England a stoim of rain which would be
called very heavy In any part of the United States.
The whole party were very glad to reach the tavern at
which we were to change horses. It was a house with
a large whitened wooden porch, reached by some dozen
wooden steps; a substructure of brick a few feet high
supported the frame building, which was roofed with
shingles. At each gable end was a brick chimney. In
front was a spreading shade-tree, a pump and water-
trough, and, here and there, pigs, chickens, turkeys, and
ducks were standing up for shelter from the wind and
rain. Close to the house was a piece of ground, in which
was au old sleigh, a waggon, a dust-heap ; some cabbages,
melons, and potatoes growing; aud all around was a
considerable field of corn.
" Walk in, gentlemen, walk In," said the landlord, as
the first of our party, the large man, reached the porch.
The two shook hands, evidently acquainted. The landlord
had not, to my eye, the look or manner of a landlord,
or farmer, or anything else In particular, but stUl had
a pleasant, easy way about him. We entered a room,
which, having only a table or two and a few old chairs, aud
pictures of Susan and Virginia, looked rather cheerless.
However, our leader was not disheartened. " WeU,
gentlemen," said he, " do me the pleasure of drinking with
me. I reckon a good julep, considering the state of the
weather, won't hurt us. This gentleman, Mr. Landlord,"
turning to me, " Is just from the old country — the greatest
country in the world — next to our own, of course ; for
4—2

52 Ten Years in ihe United States.
I wouldn't give a cuss for a man who don't stand up first
of all for his own country. So, landlord, will you be good
enough to let us have juleps for the crowd, not forgetting
yourself." The landlord, having evidently formed his estimate of
us two strangers, walked leisurely out of the room.
" That's a first-rate old feUow, I tell you. When he
gives his word, you may be sure he'll be thar. I know
him like a book. He's got one fault, though, and that
he'll never get rid of: he's the damnedest old Whig,
double-dyed In the wool, in this country."
A negro "boy" of some twenty years here entered,
grinning a how-d'ye-do at us, and at the speaker especiaUy,
and placed the juleps on the table.
" Well, Joe, how are you now ? By-the-by, just ask
those two coloured persons In the stage what they wIU
like to drink, and to step out if they're so inclined."
" Yes, massa," and out he goes.
The landlord having re-entered, we followed the example
of our foremost man, and took our tumblers full of ice
and whiskey, sweetened with sugar, and garnished and
flavoured with mint.
" Gentlemen," said he, " here's to our better acquaint
ance," and he swallowed the greater part of his julep, as
did the landlord, while I, and our Yankee companion,
merely took a few sips.
« Well," said the landlord, « what's the news, gentle
men?" The "news" in the United States Is the commonplace
starting topic, instead of the "weather;" and certainly
it is preferable. You have soon done with the weather,

The Mexican War. 53
and it happens to be about the worst possible subject for
conversation ; but " the news " opens an Infinity of inter
esting and suitable matter for talk with all persons under
all circumstances. I would respectfully suggest to the
mysterious Uttle circle of the ilite, the creme de la crime,
who set the fashions, that after "How do you do?" is
settled, and the weather remarks are exhausted, the
" news " be considered the next question In order.
"Have you ever heard anything of that wild young
fellow, the son of old Mr.  , down towards the swamp
yonder ? " asked the gentleman at whose expense we were
drinking. " Ah, yes ; poor fellow ! I heard lately that he went to
Mexico, and fell among the foremost at the storming of
Chapultepec." " Well, that was a more glorious death than he'd have
met with had he stayed hereabouts, I reckon."
" I guess you English have been a little astonished at
the M'ay In which we carried everything before us in the
Mexican war," said the Yankee. " History don't record
many such events as the taking of Chapultepec, the battle
of Buena Vista, Monterey, and, in fact, the whole cam
paign." I replied that I took no Interest In battles or campaigns,
because a civilian reader had to take for granted the truth
of the narration, however one-sided; the nature of the
subject, and his want of Information, making it impossible
for him to use his judgment.
"Why, you know, the Duke of Wellington declared
that General Scott had laid down and carried out his
plans in the most masterly manner."

54 Ten Years in the United States.
' I repUed that I had no reason to doubt it.
" I guess we rather surprised the kings and aristocrats
of Europe, winning battle after battle; 4,000 or 5,000
Americans whipping four and five times their numbers as
fast as they could get to them; our men, too, most
of them volunteers just picked up, electing their own
officers." Nothing would suit this gentleman, who had a clerical
rather than a military air, but to talk of the prowess
of his countrymen. I have no doubt that the brilliant
success of the Americans In the war with the Mexicans
contributed not a little to Inflate the national mind to that •
extent which rendered a collapse almost inevitable.
" You must remember," said the landlord, " that our
army was, to a very considerable extent, composed of Irish
and Germans, and other nations ; and I never heard but
wJiat they all fought as well as our boys."
" Yes ; but the officers were Americans."
" And then the Mexicans are a damned mongrel breed,
half-Indian, halfrSpanish, and a little nigger. Of course,
I ain't going to run do-wn our own doings, but they ain't
white men, no how. But, to change the subject, who are
you Whigs going to run for President, landlord ? "
" Well, that's hard to say, just yet. I go In for Harry
of the West. I'd rather be beat with Henry Clay than
win with any other man, myself."
" That's right ; he's a trump card. I'd rather see Clay
in myself than any man in the country, except a good
Democrat. I hope you'll run him ; first, because he's a
good man, and It's your duty to stand by him ; and,
second, because he's sure to lose : he's not available."

The United States Derby. 55
" ' Available ' be damned ! I despise that word."
" So do I ; but In politics It must be kept In mind."
" Well," said the landlord, " I shan't see you for some
time. Now I'll bet you a double X that we get our
man in."
" Well, it's time you Whigs had a turn In office ; but,
just for old acquaintance sake, done. I'll make a note of
it. This Is the first bet I've made as yet on the next
election." I afterwards found that the presidential elections were
the occasions of a vast amount of betting. It is difficult
to arrive at a very exact estimate on such a subject ; but
probably much more money changes hands every presi
dential contest than Is annually lost and won in England
in connection with the turf.
The conversation now turned on politics. One or two
neighbours dropped in and joined the group. I remained
a listener. Political principles formed no part of the dis
cussion. The question was, how the constituencies would
go, how they had gone before, whether any would this
time change, what majority such and such a county, or
city, or state, had given, and would next give. The
acquaintance with the numbers polled in different places,
at different times, displayed by some of the party, sur
prised me.
It was now time to resume our journey. In fact, it was
owing to a slight accident having, happened to the vehicle
that we had stayed so long. We shook hands with the
landlord ; our leader bidding good-by to Joe, who had not
forgotten to drink his health while helping our coloured
fellow-travellers. They had resumed their seats outside.

56 Ten Years in the United States.
the rain having ceased, and the sky being now all blue
and clear, the sun shining, the country fresh and bright,
the air delightfully cool. When we came to a " branch,"
which we had to cross, the bridge was gone — ^washed away :
It was only with much delay and trouble we got to the
other side of the swollen stream. Shortly after dark we
reached our destination, the capital of Virginia, the City of
Richmond.

CHAPTER V.
RICHMOND, VIRGINIA.
Natives, Jews, Germans, Foreigners — Negro Progression — Indian Eetro
gression — ^Return of the Red Man ? — Laying-off Cities — Gossip — Slave
Auction — Sovereign or Courtier ? — The Capitol of Virginia — The
legislature — Men not in their right Places — ^Appointing Legislatures
by Lot — Disappointment — The next great Movement.
Richmond, the capital of the State of Virginia, Is one of
the oldest places on the North American continent, settled
by people speaking English; for it claims about equal
antiquity with Boston, New York, Baltimore, Raleigh, and
Charleston. It is situated at the head of tide water on the
winding, unbusiness-like James, which rolls carelessly aud
pleasantly through the coimtry, as if choosing to be
as long and see as much as possible before dying In
the vast 'Atlantic. The principal thoroughfare is Main
Street, which commences In the lower regions of the
town, among warehouses and waste places, and docks,
and old dUapIdated buildings. The neighbourhood (called
Rocketts) is enUvened by mules, and waggons, sailors, negro-
drivers and labourers, merchants and their assistants :
negroes, mules, and waggons especIaUy. Thence the street
runs nearly parallel with the river, up hill. In a straight
Une. " Stores " of all kinds are on each side ; provisions
and such things at the lower end'; " dry goods," confec-

58 Ten Years in the United States.
tloners, hotels, bakers, druggists, &c. &c., higher up, for
about a mile; then private dwellings, mostly of brick,
some of wood; a storehouse here and there, business
gradually going up town. The outskirts consist of fields,
some fenced In, some open ; here a respectable dwelUng,
there a shanty; then a fresh building going up, and so
on. Beyond Is the ample ground for agricultural fairs,
surrounded by whitewashed shedding and stabling ; and
farther on, to the left. Is the beautiful cemetery of HoUy-
wood. The city Is laid out at right angles, the cross streets
commencing up town, with four or five named after once
distinguished men ; then " First," " Second," and so on,
down to " Thirty-first," which runs at the foot of a hill,
Chlmborazo, 200 feet high above tide water. At the time I
first saw it. In 1848, the city contained some 35,000 people;
of these about half were black, or incUning to that colour, and
slaves; so that there would be about 3,500 adult white males.
A large portion of the outskirts of the city consisted of
poor, mean, low, neighbourhoods. Probably there were not
many more than 3,000 white men In the whole population
who would mutually call each other " respectable ;" though
the term would be applied to the well-conducted journey
man mechanic working for weekly wages as well as to
the mlllionnaire — ^if there were one, but I believe there
was not.
It was curious, In walking along the street, to observe
that the dealers In old clothes and cheap slop-clothing
were Jews — Cohens, Moseses, Isaacs, Abrams, and so on.
There they were, with their sharp eyes and hooky noses,
sitting, standing, or walking about their stores, ready to

Foreigners — Native Americanism. 59
sell you a bargain, just as in the Old World. The dealers
in fruit and confectionery were Italian, so cleverly keeping
the business In their hands that even a Yankee had a poor
chance. Most of the few bakers were Scotch. The best
butcher In the market, I was proud to hear, was au
Englishman, " a jolly good fellow," and related, I was sur
prised to find, to an old acquaintance of mine. Few people
have any adequate idea of the number of surviving and
ascertainable relationships between the people of England
and those of the various States.
The " Dutch" — that is, the Germans, form a considerable
portion of the population of this and of most American
cities. New York and other places were In early
times settled by the true Dutch, and the Germans and
others were classed -with them. In the popular mind and
language ; all being called " Dutch," or, not unfrequently,
" the damned Dutch." For the native American Is exclu
sive in his ideas ; he allows, indeed, English and Scotch,
and the better sort of Irish, to associate with him on terms
of social equality, but no others ; although be rather likes
the French, partly out of national gratitude, partly because
the French met with out of France — unless in numbers
too great to be regarded as pleasant visitors — are of a class
i above the mere labourer.
Having the advantage of taking my first surveys of
the city with a shrewd old resident, I saw many things
"which escape the traveller who has to trust to bis own
\ hasty and superficial observation. The foreigners, I found,
: formed social circles of their o"wn — Irish with the Irish,
Dutch with the Dutch, and, to some extent, English with
their feUow country people ; so that it is quite rare, con-

60 Ten Years in the United States.
sidering the gi-eat proportion of Europeans In the United
States, to encounter one as a friend or visitor in an
American family. The men meet and talk together in
the streets, or at their places of business, and that Is all.
Of course, all look down on the negro. It Is one cause
of bad feeling against the lower classes of Germans, that
they are often on too familiar terms with the coloured
people ; while a respectable negro rather affects to despise
a mean poor Irish or Dutchman, and even native "poor
white trash." He must, indeed, be careful how he shows
his contempt. There are classes and grades of the negro
population recognized among themselves, and by the
whites, depending very much on individual character and
conduct; and throughout the South those considerations,
I believe, affect a man's position and standing among his
neighbours more than in England or in the Northern
States. It seems to be the result of the " peculiar institu
tion" to give more weight to the personal merits and
character. Still, the remark of Mr. Ruffin, which was
quoted a few pages back. Is too true of the Southern
people : like the rest of the world, they are sadly defi
cient In the art of bringing their best men forward.
At the time of which I am now writing — it is necessary
to be particular and circumstantial in speaking of a country
which every year makes changes as great as occur in de
cades and centuries in Europe — there were few Irish in
the South. Shortly afterwards they began to appear as
domestic servants. In Baltimore, the most northerly large
city In which slavery exists, they are more often found In
that capacity ; but the employment of white girls as house
servants has increased very slowly in Richmond. Nor is

Negro Progression — The Aborigines. 61
Irish labour much used there. In the North, the railways,
canals, sewers, excavations, and buildings, are the product
of Irish muscle. Thus even In the New World men fall
into their old ways and habits. In spite of their apparent
liberty to betake themselves to others.
Externally, as far as appearance goes, no race now
peopling America has changed more than the negro
slave. He goes to church, wears hat and trousers — the
last, I beUeve, a great point with missionaries — talks
EngUsh better than many Englishmen, contributes im
mensely to the wealth of his country aud of the world at
large ; and Is on the whole in a cheerful, healthy, flourish
ing condition, fulfllllng the command to Increase and
multiply. No doubt he has a good deal to complain of;
but we must bear in mind the horrible state of things in
his native continent, and the degradation and destruction
of the negro elsewhere.
" Lo ! the poor Indian ! " Looking on the perpetual
horizon of forest, one cannot help thinking of the red
man. The first I saw were dark brown, quiet, sedate,
rather sad, but resigned -looking Individuals, clad in
coarse blue blankets which cover the head and reach to
below the knee, slowly walking along in noiseless moc
casins, carrying articles worked with beads to sell to any
one who chose to buy. They had come from Canada to
Richmond. Yes, he ought not to be forgotten, although
he is a disagreeable fact. Only a hundred years ago he
was master of the North American continent, save a few
patches and strips of land. He has been left a freeman,
almost an equal of the white ; he was aud is at liberty to
farm or work at any trade; to turn merchant or poUtician;

62 Ten Years in the United States.
to vote In some places, I believe, even it may be to run
for Congress, or be run for the Presidency ; though to
this last career there may be constitutional objections
arising from the Constitution. Yet the Red Indian has
"disappeared" — that is the phrase, the euphemism; for
that. In fact, he has been ruthlessly destroyed is as clear
as that the wolves, and bears, and deer have been exter
minated ; and you, my phUosophlcal, phllanthropical New
England friend — you especially are his destroyer. There
are, it is true, remnants of the red race here and there ;
but not even Elihu Burrltt or Horace Greely has a word
to say against their being speedily and finally " improved
off the face of the earth."
Thus we may learn that statute laws may be the merest
nothings, or may give In their practical workings a total
contradiction to what most men would expect from their
words and provisions. The Indian perishes, in spite of a
seemingly Uberal and beneficent course of legislation con
cerning him, especially of late years. The negro flourishes
like a green bay-tree by the river-side, compared with his
former condition, although the legislation regarding him
seems to us. In England, terribly imjust and cruel in Its
leading features.
Recent events remind me of what a writer, well worth
reading, has said concerning the Red Indian and his in
vader. He considers the destruction of the race as by no
means settled. He shows how aboriginal races of men
still stick to their native seats; how the United States
man displays signs of deterioration — the fat disappearing,
the muscles becoming stringy and prominent, the tendons
: showing on the surface, symptoms of premature decay

Return of the Red Man. 63
manifesting themselves ; the women losing their teeth early,
infant life more uncertain, and families smaU. All these
facts, he thinks, prove that the Anglo-Saxon and the
American climate do not suit each other; and he specu
lates on further degeneration, physical, mental, political,
when Immigration ceases, and on a gradual return of the
red men to their own vast domains.
Much of this seems more possible now than It did In
1848. There Is nothing absurd In the supposition that
the States are commencing a downward career of dis
organization, social and political, which may ere long
reduce them to a level with Mexico. Changes more In
credible have lately taken place in the world.
In this city of Richmond the native-born American
population predominates In wealth and in social and poli
tical influence. Most of the adults own more or less slave
property, and, of course, many look forward to possessing
servants by purchase or Inheritance. In considering the
proportion of the population pecuniarily interested in slave
property, those having expectations must be taken Into
account ; and when this Is done, I believe It will be found
that three-fourths or more of the native-born citizens are
thus interested. This belief, however. Is founded mainly
on my own personal acquaintance and observation.
Foreigners and Northerners generally hire their servants
by the year, though many of those who can afford It o-wn
slaves. And there is no doubt that the permanent pos
session of their domestics adds greatly to the comfort of
families. A portion of this city at the west end Is, to EngUsh
taste, very pleasing. The streets are wide, and quiet, aud

64 Ten Years in the United States.
clean; the foot-pavement is mostly shaded with horse-
chestnuts, Otaheitan mulberry, silver-leaved maple, and
other trees. Many of the houses are detached ; some of
them are of red brick. In modern styles, others stuccoed,
others of wood, and of various sizes. They are surrounded
with well-kept gardens, or with trees, and there Is a little
green space In front ; the neighbourhood having an airy,
comfortable, cultivated, home-like look, which one seldom
meets with in American towns. About a tithe of the space
built on is of this character ; while In other quarters, on
the extensive outskirts — Rocketts, Shed Town, Horse
Heaven, Butcher Town, Gully Nation, ScreamersvIUe, —
expressive names ! — one Is wearied and disgusted with old
wooden shanties, waste fields, patched tumbling stables
and dwellings, dusty or muddy roads, and aU the appear
ances of a slovenly, don't care population, out of the pale
of respectability, and not ambitious even to get in. I am
sorry to say that more than a tenth — ^more than two-tenths
— of the city is of this inferior character.
The plan almost universally adopted in America, of
laying out the cities in straight streets crossing each other
at right angles (Louis Napoleon is adopting it in Paris),
looks weU on paper to one accustomed to old cities that
have grown up by accident ; but It Is, in fact, a meagre,
monotonous plan. The greatest mmilclpallty in the
States has spent millions in destroying the beauty and
advantages of one of the finest sites in the world for a
vast metropolis.
Were I to lay out a city — and I have laid out many
splendid and extensive ones, in my mind's eye ; for build
ing castles in the air I thought too small au operation

Hints for City-founders. 65
when I was young, and it cost no more to establish a
complete Utopia — I would reserve here and there, accord-
zing to the topography, ample spaces for public buildings,
churches, chapels, theatres, which should be surrounded
by well-kept ornamental grounds; or perhaps I would
reserve a whole street, or an extensive crescent or circus,
for such purposes, and so concentrate the finest edifices
Into one splendid view, adorned with trees, flowers, and
fountains ; while the main thoroughfares I would have so
wide as to afford room in the middle of the street for the
healthy growth of one or two rows of trees, with footpaths
underneath them. For I hold it to be highly desirable,
and It is quite practicable In such a climate, to make out
door exercise as pleasant and healthful as possible. And
then there should be terraces— real ones, — and crescents,
and ovals, and one or two circular roads, running entirely
round the suburbs ; and no house should occupy less than
a certain sized lot — say thirty feet, the proportion of
inhabitants to each house being limited by law ; for atten
tion to all which matters the community would be well
paid by increased morality, strength, health, and length of
life. The EngUsh reader will pardon this little digression,
which I hope will not be thrown away on those who dwell
in new countries, where the founding of new cities Is a
commonplace affair.
I had put up at one of the hotels ; and in the morning,
about nine o'clock, after breakfast, my friend, followed by
a coloured waiter, entered my room, and proposed to take
a look round town before It got too hot. On our way to
Main Street, we entered a door, by the side of which hung
a small red flag, and I found myself amidst a number of

66 Ten Years in the United States.
business-looking men, many of whom were watching a
negro-boy running up the room and back again.
" This Is a sale-room for one of the leading staples of
Richmond," said my cicerone. " You see things are
different here from at home. There, at this moment [1848],
I read, you would willingly pay a considerable sum to any
of your labouring population just to be off, so that you
might lessen by one the ' over population ; ' here we
value our labourers: this one, a mere boy, vrill fetch
500 or 600 dollars, and yield some six per cent, to the
buyer, besides increasing In value for some years."
We soon get accustomed to strange things. Within an
hour, I saw some half-dozen of my fellow-creatures
" knocked down " by the mild-speaking auctioneer, in
whom I soon recognized my stage-coach companion ; and
who, after nodding to me, came round, when the lot then
up was disposed of, and shook hands with me. We were
then regularly Introduced by my friend, who seemed to
know everybody.
" ' A bad business this,' you're thinking, I reckon,
Mr. Smith," said he. " Of course, very sliocking at first.
But what's to be done ? You must make servants of these
niggers ; they must have masters, or else they become
lazy, thieving nuisances. They know that themselves.
Well, you wouldn't make a man keep a servant when he
don't want him ? That would do no good to either
party." I inquired whether it was a fact that negroes were bred
for sale In Virginia, as I had read It was one of the " slave-
breeding" States.
« Pooh ! pooh ! Reading be  . The people of Vir-

A Member of the Church. 67
ginia are constantly migrating to the West and South-
West, for various reasons. White and black alike have
to go where there's more scope for them. Well, for the
present, good morning."
" Let's get out of tlils," I said ; and soon we were on
Main Street, taking the shady side, for already the sun
was hotter than was pleasant.
" Do you see that large red-faced man, walking very
erect, seeming to exert himself to do so ? That Is ' Peter
Pompous.' He Is worth about 100,000 dollars — a good
deal in a town like this. A short time ago he quietly
turned over to his wife all he was worth. Next, he called
his creditors together, told them he was burst up, but
thought he could manage to pay twenty per cent.. If they
chose to accept that, and clear him. They came in to his
terms, not being able to help themselves ; and now he
walks about an independent man : a member ot the church,
too, I am sorry to say — that very church you can see the
spire of yonder. Still, I don't think his money or his
reUglon do him much good. He feels that he Is branded
and condemned by pubUc and private opinion, although
we are rather liberal In such matters."
" But," said I — however, my own remarks are of no
consequence, being merely such as any EngUshman would
make. "Here comes another character," said my friend, "at
least, one of our great men — a staunch Whig, an influen
tial bank director, almost a miUIonnaire ; " and he directed
my attention to a highly respectable-looking man — one
who would be called so In London or on 'Change : a stout,
middle-sized, easy, self-satisfied looking man, dressed in
5—2

68 Ten Years in the United States.
black, walking slowly along, and seeming to notice
nothing. " He Is rich, liberal, has befriended many In the
city, his private conduct and character are unimpeachable.
Still, he Is unpopular. He is looked upon as aristocratic,
exclusive; and with some reason. You see he walks
straight on, without moving aside In the least to make way
for that lady, no more than If she were a nigger. In this
country, even here in the South, the people wUl forgive
almost anything in a man rather than unpopular manners."
" But," I asked, " what are popular, and what unpopular
manners ? "
"Well, now. It's easier to ask than to answer such a
question. You see, in a little place like this, as It seems to
you coming from London, almost all the residents know
more or less of each other. Now, a man of popular
manners, a good fellow, readily recognizes slight acquaint
ance to whom he guesses the recognition will be acceptable
— nods as he passes them, has a pleasant ' How are you '
for them, is always ready to shake hands, or perhaps
occasionaUy take a drink -with his numerous friends ; and Is
able to avoid disagreeable rencontres with tact, so as to give
as little offence as possible. There, for instance. Is a
young man, whom I know to be utterly selfish, mean, and
cowardly (and a coward has no reliable, good, manly
quality), and by no means smart ; yet he knows the value
in this community of these popular manners ; and he Is a
rising man, every one being wUling to oblige him as a
pleasant, good-hearted fellow."
I replied that politeness everywhere passes for more
than it is worth.
"But here, in this whole, great coimtry of ours, far

How Mutual Respect is Maintained. 69
more tlian In most places — more than In France, I believe,
and you know I have lived there. You see we, the people,
call ourselves sovereign ; and, by a natural confusion of
terms, each calls himself sovereign, while, in fact, he Is
only a fraction of a sovereign. But he is wholly a
courtier ; he Is ever In presence of his sovereign — at least,
much more than your European courtiers — on the street,
everywhere except at home: and not always excepting
home, there is so much visiting among us. The American
citizen Is continually at court, and acquires the ways, the
frame, and habit of mind of the courtier to an extent I
would rather not correctly state at a public meeting."
"And yet," I said, "foreigners, and I among them,
consider the most striking and peculiar feature of the
American character, as compared with that of Europe, to
be the perpetual assertion and maintenance of individual
Independence." " Very true ; and were the wealthiest and most respected
man in this city decidedly to insult, — to give what an
English or French gentleman would consider an insult
from an equal — a man such as that journeyman carpenter,
with his basket of tools in his hand, the workman would
resent It on the spot, and whip him as well as he could.
If resisted. Yet you wiU find what I said to be quite
correct." " Let's step In here," continued my friend, walking Into
a merchant tailor's ; " you may as well change that thick,
high-walsted coat and short vest for something more in our
style. Well, Ned, how are you?" he said, addressing
a light, almost red-haired young man, who might have
been shopman or shopkeeper.

70 Ten Years in the United States.
" Ah ! good morning, good morning ! how are you? I've
not seen you for a month of Sundays. What's the news?"
" Nothing particular, that I know of. Let me make you
acquainted with my friend Mr. Smith — Mr. Anacharsis
Smith, I may as well say, as Smith is a very coramon
proper name. Mr. Smith, Mr. Keeling."
We shook hands very unceremoniously, and the conver
sation was resumed about neighbours and city events and
doings. [I must here inform the reader that I had Intended to
put forward this book under this unassuming name of
J. A. Smith, fancying there was something egotistical in
repeatedly and unnecessarily putting one's own name in
print. It has been thought best however, under present
circumstances, to"publIsh the volume with my insignificant
real name.]
" Well, our friend, Mr. Smith, has just arrived from
the old country — from the big village of London, and I've
brought him In here for you to Americanize him, as to the
outer man, anyhow, for the present. No doubt. In time,
we'll make a good citizen of him."
" Well, you English ain't so ready at becoming citizens
as some of our visitors and emigrants from Europe. You'd
think so. If you were to see what I saw in New York
the last time I went on there to buy some goods. They
do the naturalization business there wholesale. No time
lost, I tell you. Now, what do you say to something of
this sort?" Mr. K. continued, bringing me a thin, loose,
black, sac coat, ready made.
I was soon attired in the American style, then more
different from ours than it Is now — loose and easy, long

Manner of Recognition. 71
waists, and turn-down shirt-collars, preferable in every
way to the short-walsted tight coats and muffled necks,
then the fashion in England ; which differences of costume
a philosophical, or, which often passes for the same thing, a
theorizing editor of that day considered characteristic of
the national characters.
After a Uttle more desultory conversation, interrupted
by customers and others, and resumed In an easy, off-hand
manner, we bade our tailor friend good day, getting
a careless invitation to look In when I happened to be
passing again. There is an ease, an absence of formality,
a readiness In the manner and intercourse of the Ameri
cans, which contrasts very pleasantly with the rigidity
that, as a general thing, the English maintain outside their
ovm homes and family circles. You are not afraid of
Incommoding the American, or putting him out of his
way. He is not so entirely different an individual at home
and in bis place of business.
Continuing our walk, my friend would frequently nod
to persons he passed, who would return his nod, looking
at me. They nod at each other much as Londoners do,
but bowing, lifting the hat slightly. Is practised by all
classes towards women of all ranks — wliite, that is.
We stood at the corner of a street, as I wished to notice
in what respects the passers-by differed from an English
population. I came to no satisfactory conclusion that day,
save that there was less red and white in the colouring
of the complexions, a greater number of thin, sallow,
harassed-looking men, and fewer fat, fleshy, large, ruddj',
or what we caU "jolly "-looking fellows than one would
see in a like town In England— or even in London — except

72 Ten Years in the United States.
in the poorer parts : — the East End, for Instance, which has
quite a different looking population from the West End.
We strolled on, and came to the State Capitol, an
unfinished Greek building of white stone, tastefully and
commandingly situated, amidst a green and shady square
of some twelve acres, and conspicuous to all the surround
ing country. The flag of Virginia, a very Indistinct and
unpretending one, floated over the roof. Its emblem Is a
goddess of liberty, setting one foot on a prostrate tyrant,
as appears from the motto, " Sic semper iyrannis." The
State Legislature meet there every winter. It consisted
of two bodies — a House of Representatives and a Senate ;
then elected by freeholders only, now by universal suffrage.
The framers of the State Constitution were not reckless
innovators. They endeavoured to make the " Old Domi
nion " a " New England," never losing their respect for
the mother country ; and to this day Old Virginia is more
like Old England than Is any part of New England or
the true Yankeedom. Although half the population are
black, one of the first things I learnt was that here,
and indeed In many other parts of the South, an English
man feels himself more at home than elsewhere in the now
dIs-Unlted States.
"^ Waal, I guess so," said a New Englander— he whom
I had met in the coach, and met frequently again. " Eng
lishmen are accustomed to have some one to look down on
and domineer over, and here the poor niggers just suit his
habits." The jurisdiction of the Virginia State Legislature extends
to all State matters, except such as the Federal Consti
tution placed under the control of the United States

Character of Public Men. 73
Government. The suffrage, the form of the State govern
ment — save that it must be republican, which amounts
to nothing, — the laws relating to property, criminal juris
prudence. State education, the construction of roads, rail
ways. Incorporation of companies, the laws relating to
banks, to negroes, slave and free; — with aU such things
the State Legislature deals, and with them Congress has
no power to interfere.
The reader will remember that we knew much less
about the United States ten or twelve years ago than
we do now. I was eager to learn what sort of men their
public men were ; how far the Americans managed better
than we to have their affairs of State managed by their
worthiest and most capable men; whether ability and
virtue, apart from birth and wealth, were more freely
and generously recognized than In old respectability-ridden
England. I was much mortified to find that no one claimed any
superiority In this respect for America over England. So
far from their best citizens being called to offices of trust,
or to seats In the Legislature of the States, or in Congress,
I met with some who asserted that their public men were
— I wiU not repeat what they said. But It was generally
admitted that there was a growing disinclination on the
part of thinking, spirited, refined, and conscientious men
to take a prominent part In politics ; and since that time,
the disinclination has grown with fatal rapidity. The
political arena, I found, was, in many parts of the country,
gradually abandoned to smart, plausible, superficial men,
able to talk, able and determined to please the majority,
and able to get elected.

74 Ten Years in the United States.
"On the whole," said my friend, "we are better off
in Virginia than In many other places In the States ; but
we have nothing to boast of. If the electors were to draw
lots among themselves to settle who should be our legis
lators and representatives, I rather think the State would
be better governed and represented than it is now."
I laughed at this as rather an amusing Idea. " Well,"
he replied, "it sounds new and strange, and, therefore,
ridiculous. But, after all, look at your House of Lords —
it Is, in fact, pretty near the result of accidents no surer
than a lottery ; and, till lately, your House of Commons —
nominees, very much, of the Lords — was, of com-se, much
the same. Your kings and queens, too, have been the
results of the accident of royal birth ; and yet England, If
we consider and compare It with the rest of the world, and
not with our own private theories as to how things might
be and should be, has been a tolerably well-governed
country. The United States, as yet, are no example
or authority to refer to, being a mere half-tried experiment.
Were men appointed to our Legislatures by lot — excluding,
of course, criminals, paupers, and perhaps those unable to
read and write, and such others, as might be settled by
law, — each citizen would really have a fair and equal
chance of serving his country in pubUc Ufe, and each class
and interest would be better represented than now: It
would, that is, be more sure of being represented ; and the
representatives would be drawn more equally from all
parts and classes of the community, and consist of men of
every station and Interest ; while, at present, the tendency
of the suffrage Is to elect talkative, plausible, pliant men,
and to reject entirely a large class of miuds of the highest

Democracy versus Constitutionalism. 75
character, and worthy men who cannot and will not descend
and take part in such a contest as popular elections have
very generally become."
The reader must not jump to the conclusion, because
things In America are not exactly as he expected, that the
Americans are anything else but a great and most remark
able people. As they say there, " It's a great country, but
it's not aU fenced in yet." There has been a good deal of
fenclng-in done since then, 1848, that memorable year
when the Pope started as a radical reformer, setting
Europe in a blaze — that same Pope who has now become
an Irritating bore. At that time, a distinguished writer
had -written, " The battle of America is yet to fight." It
has since then been settling down, refining itself, getting
licked Into shape; and this present war of 1861 Is but a
part of this fencing-in process, for It is to determine the
respective boundaries and rights of the two leading
sections. Especially Is it to settle the question whether the
United States are to be ruled by a vast direct Democracy, or
by law and Constitution. Other issues will arise in due time.
The lion Is not about to lie down with the lamb just yet.
As the reader will hereafter see, I met at the very
outset of my explorations In the politics, morals, and social
system of the United States, many contradictions of my
preconceived notions, prejudices, and expectations. It
was very annoying, but I resolved to bow to facts, and,
if need were, to begin my study of such matters over
again. Has my young and liberal reader the courage to
do the same? Let him not shut up this book because he
finds in it some harsh truths about democracy. If he will
read on, he wiU find this a sufficiently revolutionary

76 Ten Years in the United States.
volume. True, I have now no faith In democracy, nor
have the people of England; nor have the people of
America, as I will show. Democracy may be unavoidable
— it may be necessary ; but It is no remedy for any of the
great evils of society.
The problem to which I shall often refer in the
following chapters, which Is destined to stir the hearts
and engage the Intellects of men of the new era now com
mencing. Is — How are the best and ablest men to be known,
selected, and brought forward to serve their fellows ?

77

CHAPTER VL
Composition of the Population as to National Origin — Societies — Institutions
— "Americans " — Puhlications — Idea of Washington — Con-victs — Effects
of Climate on White Men — ^Victuals — Cookery — Lager Beer — Hint to
Teetotalers — How to Travel — Social Amusements — " Jogging Along " —
Complexion — The Church.
We are still standing in front of that Greek building,
the Virginia State Capitol, amidst grassy slopes, wind
ing and straight walks, and shady avenues of trees; the
city lying all around, and rather below us, prettily
adorned with numerous turrets and spires. Some one
who loved the old far-away Richmond, famed for its
luxuriously verdant beauty, has given this then infant
city its name, and there are many places more unUke
each other. The leading features. Indeed, are very
similar; but it will be many years before American
scenery can be beautified with the rich masses of foliage
common in those parts of England where trees have been
cherished as they should be. With regard to the Virginia
Richmond, I tried to find out who gave it that name, but
in vain. There remains now only a tradition that it was
given on account of Its resemblance to its namesake on
the Thames. Richmond, Va. was founded only about
two hundred years ago ; and In the Interval the Americans
have not Improved in their mode of naming places. There
must be now nearly forty Richmonds in the United States,

78 Ten Years in the United States.
about a dozen Londons, as many Dublins, as many
Edinburghs, rather a larger number of Berlins, about
twenty Waterloos, nearly as many Parlses, two Auster-
lltzes, one Wagram, some thirty Washlngtons, one Uncle
Sam ; and of Unions — Union Cities, Union Towns, Union
Villages and Villes, Unities, &c. &c., — upwards of one
hundred. " What's In a name ? "
Well, there Is much In names worthy of the traveller's
attention. They yield useful information. In this very
city we are looking at, the names over the shops, stores,
and offices help to Inform you of the origin and propor
tions of the populations — a very Important matter. To
understand, to reason about, to know what to expect from
any given community, you must learn the race or races of
which it Is composed, and especiaUy those which are
jredominant. Hence, I think it is to be regretted that the
negroes have not retained their native African names. In
one neighbourhood you will see; written or painted, up^
AUberger, Bachrach, Emmenhauser, Fleischer, Guggen-
helmer, Schleischer, and so on : you know at once that
they or their progenitors came from some part of the
Fatherland. Examining the directory of this city of
Richmond, I found (In 1856) that about five-sixths of the
names were decidedly English or Scotch — that is Anglo-
Saxon: EngUsh, lowland Scotch, and Scotch or Anglo-
Irish. In tills little city there are about thirty churches. The
largest, handsomest, and most fashionable Is St. Paul's,
episcopalian — that is, as near as possible lu America to
the Church of England ; the service substituting president
for queen In the lltm-gy. It is frequented by the "big

Societies — United Americans. 79
'. bugs ; " It Is built of stone, the body Greek, surmomated with
an Incongruous spire — something like St. Martin's, Charing
Cross, but about half the bulk. Many other spires and
towers you may see, but the greater part of the places of
worship don't show themselves, and only make themselves
heard by an unmusical single bell.
•There are In the city a Young Men's Christian Associaj-
tion, an American Tract Society, a Bible Society of
Virginia, a Board of Foreign Missions, Southern Baptist's
Convention, — that italic word already indicates the com
mencement of disunion, — and other religious societies;
and there are three orphan asylums. There Is an
Athenaeum, with a good library, but not much used — the
Americans Uke cheap and light literature ; and a Virginia
Historical and Philosophical Society, which has " done the
State some service," by preserving historical facts, records,
&c. There are several good schools and colleges, but not
sufficient means of education for the " lower classes " — [a
want now supplied]. There are three banks, capital about
2,000,000 doUars each — discount 6 per cent, per annum —
respectable, reliable Institutions ; several small savings'
banks ; two or three insurance companies, with a capital
each of say 200,000 dollars or 300,000 dollars ; a dozen
Masonic lodges ; nearly as many of Odd Fellows ; several
divisions of Sons of Temperance; a council of "United
American Mechanics" — a germ of a remarkable political
movement to take place In a few years, and sweep the
country ; several German Societies ; no Irish, English,
or Scotch. No building societies yet. No gas company.
A few oil lamps are lit on dark nights.
Nearly twenty newspapers and periodicals are pubUshed

80 Ten Years in the United States.
In Richmond ! But only three of these are political — one
Whig, and the Enquirer and the Examiner, both democratic
The last, a leading paper of the democratic party, was I
1848 conducted by the son of. the father of democrati
editors, Mr. Ritchie, editor of the Washington Union.
It requires considerable thinking to understand how
population containing only some 5,000 adult males, ca:
carry on such a variety of schemes, societies, compauies
institutions, churches, &c.
At a side entrance to the capitol (the noble flight o
steps that should lead up to the pillared front has beei
forgotten) I observed on guard a soldier in a uniform o
blue, red, and yellow. He belonged to the Virginia Stat
Guard, a company of perhaps sixty or seventy men, kep
up by the State. It is almost a solitary Instance of th(
maintenance of any military force by a State, and in thii
case It is retained only from the force of habit. It Is i
well-drilled and disciplined body ; but the great difficulty
despite the excellent pay and treatment, is to supply thf
ranks suitably; for the English prejudice against th(
profession of arms, so far as the " common soldier " ii
concerned, is inherited In increased strength by Americans,
We walked up the 'side steps Into the buUding. A plain
exact, correct,- unpoetical figure of Washington stands ir
the hall, on a pedestal. I suppose It is the fault of Ameri
can literature ; but, however that may be (and possibly tht
fault Is in myself), I never felt any great pleasure oi
fervour of admiration In the Idea recalled by the name ol
Washington. To me he is a plain, sensible, thoroughly
honest, good, brave, but uneuthuslastic man. In this 1
am by no means alone ; and I think an impression so

Washington — Convicts. 81
Inadequate of that good and great man, must be owing to
a deficiency In the Yankee literature, through which chiefly
he is known to the world.
We went where we pleased : into the Senate Chamber,
into the Hall of the Representatives, very fitting appa
rently for their purposes ; into committee-rooms, and info-
a considerable library. There was no policeman to stop
us, no porter or other hanger-on to accept a sixpence.
There were portraits of Washington and other worthies,
and one of Judge Marshall, I think, a great lawyer, of
whom old residents are fond of telling an anecdote. He
used to do bis own marketing, as It Is still not uncommon
for men to do ; and one morning, having his basket on his
arm, he heard a young fellow wish for some boy or servant
to take home for him a turkey he had just bought, offering
a shilling as pay ; whereupon the greatest lawyer in the
State offered to do the job for the money, and took the
turkey to the young man's dwelling, leaving the by-standers
to tell him who it was he had employed. The moral of the
story is, that a genteel young man need not be ashamed to
carry a parcel for himself through the streets.
On reaching the entrance at the other side of the build
ing, I noticed a party of men, some of them white, others
black, in parti-coloured clothes, working on the grounds,
whUe a soldier kept guard near them. I was informed it
was a gang from the penitentiary, employed on public
work. The men seemed to labour neither excessively nor
cheerfuUy, but were much better off than confined In
cells or silent workshops. By a recent law of Virginia a
man sentenced to the penitentiary is regarded as legally
defunct, and his wife may marry again ; the law indeed
6

82 Ten Years in the United States.
having been passed for her especial benefit. It is a humane
law in such a community, since a man once imprisoned as
a convict would find no class or position In which he could
live unknown or hold his head up.
The morning had been very hot and close, and I felt
that I had seen enough for one day ; so we turned back,
my friend to attend to his business, I to my hotel. It is
curious how much nonsense Is circulated about such a
simple matter as the effects of the heat of the climate In
the States. Like many Englishmen, I found that I could
stand exposure to the sun apparently better than natives ;
and It Is the fact that healthy people from Europe not past
their prime can do so generally, having the advantage of
the greater vital energy which they have brought with
them from Europe. Most hearty Englishmen can brace
themselves up to do an ordinary English day's work or
walk without much suffering, even when the thermometer
is at 95° in the shade. But the warm weather sets in per
haps in April ; the sun acquires great power early In the
day, and shines on very many more days than in England,
and the hot, dry weather lasts for probably three months,
warm pleasant weather frequently occurring up to the
end of November. This greater quantity of heat it is that
tells on the- white man's constitution, and makes eight hourS'
work of any kind In the United States equal to ten In Eng
land. In the central and southern States, or under
exposure to the sun, of course the waste of the system Is
still greater, and the aversion to physical and out-door
labour Increases, except during the mUd and agreeable
weather. I have met with native-born Americans, and
with Europeans, who boasted that the climate had no bad

Climate and Ijobour. 83
effects on them ; but on quietly watching these Individuals
I have observed that they habitually avoided all unneces
sary exertion In the middle of the day, and were consider
ably used up after what an average man In England
would call a moderate day's work. In fact I am convinced
that the amount of daily mental and physical exertion
which would merely keep up the strength of a European In
Europe would. In Virginia and the South generally, over
task, degrade, and enfeeble men of European birth or
descent. A class of white agricultural labourers in the South,
yielding nearly as much work as is expected from English
ploughmen, would in a single generation be far inferior to
the European labouring population, both morally and
physically. For proof of this, contrary as it is to the idle
talk of so many theorists, I point to the indolent, or rather
the inactive, habits of Americans, apart from business or
free from any excitement; to the universal tendency to
obtain Ught In-door employment and to avoid out-door
occupation — a tendency Increasing in England, but much
more general In America ; to the comparative absence of
Intellectual studies and systematic mental Improvement
among young men engaged in business, their energies
being sufficiently exhausted by the day's duties ; to the in
difference to manly, atldetlc games, such as rowing and
cricket, or the preference for driving, as an amusement.
Instead of riding on horseback.
In fact, viewing the white man as an animal, he requires
twice as much care In the United States as he does In
Europe. This conclusion I arrived at after having Uved in
the United States for several years, and when I had had
6—2

84 Ten Years in the United States.
but too good reason to give the subject full considera
tion. Well, here we are now at our hotel, one of the largest and
best In the United States, consequently In the world. You
walk in and enter your name and address in a book lying on
a sort of counter. The gong, with Its Inappropriate terrific
uproar, fit to announce a Chinese wholesale execution. In
forms you that dinner awaits you. You need not run for
fear of being too late. The Americans are improving in
their manners : hurrying to and at meals, displaying the
soles of the feet at hotel windows, spitting in omnibuses
and other improper places, Inquisitlveness as to a fellow-
traveller's intentions, and so on, are much less practised,
even within my recollection. A servant (a coloured per
son, of course, south of Washington) perhaps shows you
to a seat, places your chair for you, hands the extensive bill
of fare, half French, and waits your orders. As he hands
you your filled plate you look for the mark left by his
black fingers. The principal novelties to you will be the
tomatoes In various forms, with which only the more for
tunate classes in England are very familiar ; they are used
here in great quantities, as freely, when in season, as
potatoes In England. They are said to be very good for
the liver, producing effects in some cases nearly equivalent
to those of mercury, without Its bad consequences : but this
I doubt. I used them very freely, without any perceptible
benefit to that troublesome organ, though -without them it
might have been worse. Naturally and origlnaUy the
tomato plant is somewhat poisonous, and I have an abstract
prejudice against It on that account ; but I don't allow that
prejudice to prevent me from always doing It full justice.

Hotel Dinner — Viands and Cookery. 85
It is curious that scarcely anybody likes tomatoes at first.
In any form ; even natives, I believe, can generally remem
ber acquiring the taste. The more you use them the more
you like them, and some persons can pluck them off the
bush and eat them raw with pleasure. Whether this
natural dislike should not cast suspicion on their character
for wholesomeness I leave to those who can settle the
question. Another delicacy is the green com — the young
milky ear of the Indian corn. Most English people con
fess to liking this vegetable, though very few of them like
com In any other shape ; but this I think Is partly a matter
of principle, EngUsh people being rather averse from being
pleased with things to which they are not accustomed.
Generally they set their mouths against foreign articles of
diet, which, if they met with at home as a rarity or luxury,
they would declare to be delicious, or, as cockneys say,
beautiful. But I don't think that this green corn Is good
for any but strong stomaclis — an uncommon possession In
American cities — and for them only if well cooked, well
masticated, quite fresh, and gathered at just tbe right time.
It Is prudent for an Englishman to avoid using the variety
of food he will meet with ; especiaUy tbe numerous sweet,
greasy, and rich cakes and pastry preparations ; also the hot
bread at breakfast and supper. The beef, at a house like
this, you will be obliged, however un-willlngly, to declare
worthy of England. But as a general thing, neither beef nor
mutton Is so good or cooked so well as in England; Incre
dible as that may seem to English people, who despair of
being sure of getting a rump-steak and potatoes properly
done at home. By the way, don't ask for rump-steak
before ladles : there are several other indelicate delicacies of

86 Ten Years in the United States.
language you must notice. In conversation, where a word
is susceptible of two meanings, one In the least coarse or
indeUcate, you had better not use it ; for ordinary people
of both sexes have an aptness In detecting a double entendre
where an EngUsh person would not think of one.
The origin of this discreditable fastidiousness I do not
know, but I rather think it came from the " tmco' guid and
the rigidly righteous " of New England; the witch-burners
and blue-law makers.
Anything you want to drink, besides water, you can
have brought to you ; but few Indulge at table : people
drink at the bar, or in their own rooms. Suppose we
go and try some lager-bier? They may not keep It at
the bar. It Is a new beverage, of German origin, but used
everywhere, by everybody (except, perhaps, by private
families) In Immense quantities. It is a fermented liquor,
made from malt only, I believe; and it must be drunk fresh,
v>'bile effervescent. It affords another instance of an
acquired taste; nobody liked It at first, but mo.st people
who use drinklng-houses get to take It in surprising quan
tities. Germans have sworn to taking sixty glasses in an
evening without being Intoxicated. You will not like it
for some time, because it is quite different from Barclay
and Perkins's beer.
Here, as in most places out of New York, and the largest
cities, respectable people are rather shy of being seen in
public-houses or drinking-saloons ; even with young men
this is the case. The consequence of tlils approach to a
moral anti-liquor law Is that people get to the bars by
side or back ways, or keep supplies of brandy or wliiskey
at their rooms or offices. It is very hard to deal with

Lager-beer — A Hint to Teetotalers. 87
tastes and habits, or vices even, which a large portion of
the population determine to Indulge In: yet this vice of
drinking, inveterate as It Is, changes in degree — volun
tarily, as it were. A dozen years ago, brandy and whiskey
were the popular drinks; now they have. In a great
measure, given place to this lager-bier, with Its three per
cent, of alcohol. The fact is, that the larger portion of
people who frequent public-houses don't want alcohol par
ticularly. I would advise temperance people to set their
wits to work to supply wholesome, palatable, and invigor
ating drinks, which people could drink and talk over, as
they do over their stronger liquors. The use of lager-
bier proves the practlcablUty of this course.
I was very glad when the cool of the evening came
on. With the friend of whom I have so often spoken
I sat on the wooden steps of the porch of his drab-
coloured frame-house, both smoking ; only he had a pipe
formed of a long reed and a thick Powhatan pipe-head, and
I a cigar. Young people of both sexes were sitting on
chairs In the porch, enjoying themselves in their own way
very heartily ; some regaling themselves with a pound of
candy, barley-sugar, and such stuff, which one of the girls'
"beaux" had brought with him. As one after another
walked up, I was Introduced, but I had the discretion
soon to take a seat -svith my elderly friend — the paterfami
lias, I may as well call him ; and while the young folks
chatted and talked on subjects exclusively "local and
personal," I — who was no longer a youth, though only
just arrived at that point of Ufe where youth and middle-
age meet — gravely conversed with him on England and
America.

88 Ten Years in the United States.
Shortly a band of music was heard at a distance, and
it was concluded that the performers were serenading
some one. This Is a common practice in many parts of
the States, every sort of music being employed, from the
voice or a guitar, up to a German brass band. In the
latter case, the performers are probably employed by a
few young men to perform before the houses of young
ladles of their acquaintance.
The young folks [speedily arranged among themselves
to take a walk, and hear and see what was going on;
the eldest daughter merely saying to her mother that they
wouldn't be long, and asking me to excuse her for a short
time. When they were gone, the mother of the famUy
came out on the porch. In the now prevailing quiet we
heard the perpetual gentle roar. If I may say so, of the
"Falls" about a mile off, and the loud and animated
singing at a revival going on at a neighbouring chapel.
"Now, Smith," said my host, "some of these days
you'll write a book on America, of course ; and I reckon,
if you set the right way about it, you won't find It a very
hard matter to get up a work full of real useful Infor
mation about us. Not that you can do It in a day or
a year : but it's worth all the time it will take. You may
not be such a philosopher as Combe, or such a writer as
Dickens, and so on ; but however smart a man may be,
his success must very much depend on his time and
opportunity, and on the way In which he sets about what
he wants to do. Now, a mere traveller, you must be
aware, knows little or nothing of the private social Ufe
and feelings of the people he passes among : mere common
politeness puts a false face on things to him. And if you

Hints to Travellers — The Jones's. 89
don't understand a people socially and familiarly, you
can understand very little about their morals, their politics,
their pubUc life. So I advise you to Americanize your
self, so that you wUl not be felt to be a stranger and a
foreigner. Never mind seeing all the sights, and visiting
a great number of towns and districts. Domesticate your
self somewhere. Mix with Americans. Read our books and
our papers. Study our politics. Then look this miserable
anti-slavery humbug right in the face. Never mind your
own opinions ; you have here before you the facts, so you
need not mind the opinions of the whole world. And don't
be misled by our press, or by our public speakers. We
are a nation of politicians ; we aU of us speak In pubUc
more or less. Out of his own family, or outside his little
circle of Intimate friends, an American Is always In pubUc,
and all politicians and public speakers understand the use
of speech according to Talleyrand. We don't yet com
prehend ourselves exactly, so of course a foreigner may
be mistaken as to some of our peculiarities."
Thus we sat for some time — Mrs. Jones in a chair In the
porch, Mr. Jones and I smoking, sometimes talking. Every
body seemed to be out of doors. Presently the young
people began to get home In couples, each girl with her
beau. " Well, girls, where have you all been to ? " inquired the
mother. " Why, ma, we went and heard that band play one or
two tunes, and then I reckon we all went different ways."
" Mr. AInsUe aud I walked over to Gamble's Hill, and
there's quite a fresh breeze there, ma."
"Ah, I reckon I was the luckiest, for I was treated to

90 Ten Years in the United States.
a nice strawberry Ice cream at Mr. PIzzinl's," said
another. " AVell, I'm very well pleased," said another. " We
ca])led round and had a long talk with Esther ; and I've
got some news for you, Mr. Smith. There's to be a hand
some young English lady where we're all going to-moiTOW
night, and I hope to have the pleasure of introducing you
to her."So they went on gossiping about the affairs and doings
of their acquaintance, who seemed to be very numerous ;
in fact, everybody appeared to know everybody. Miss
Someone was to be married at last ; So-and-so had joined
the church; a certain family had gone to the Springs;
poor Mr. A  died last night. Such were the topics
of conversation ; courtships and marriages being most fuUy
discussed. About eleven o'clock the streets began to be
deserted; the neighbours were closing their doors, aud,
with mutual good-nights, shaking hands, and Invitations
to call on each other, our little party broke up.
The persons of whom I have been speaking were of
the middle ranks. One young man was a baker, working
and helping m his father's business, another a medical
student, another a journeyman machinist, another a son
of a farmer living near the city. The various grades and
classes of society I found mixed together much, more freely
than ua England. There were, perhaps, some twelve or
twenty families who considered themselves, and were
tacitly allowed to be, the elite; tliey were regarded as
exclusive and aristocratic, standing principally upon supe
rior wealth and partly upon their old-established respecta^
bUIty, belonging to the much talked of F. F. V.'s. But,

"A Social Frolic." 91
generally, so far as I am acquainted with English social
distinctions, a young man of good manners and character
had access, in Richmond, to a larger circle of acquaint
ance than he would have in England ; while the alleged
prejudice against the hard-working calUngs, I found to
be altogether exaggerated. ,
Next evening, according to agreement, I escorted my
friend's eldest daughter — a plain, sedate person, verging
upon old maidenliood, and boasting of no regular beau, to
the party for which we had Invitations: at least it was
not to be a party, "just a frolic," so that there was no
necessity for being " dressed." Having left hat, bonnet,
&c. ui a small room, we walked up into the room where
the company was assembling; some one mentioned our
names ; the lady of the house came forward, and shook
hands with us. She welcomed me especially, as a stranger,
and hoped I should settle In the city ; then introduced me to
two or three persons, — the men offering their hands, ladies
merely bo-wing, — and turned to some other guests.
" Let us get into this corner," said my companion,
"' -srhere we can see what's going on, and be out of the way."
From our corner I looked round, and found the company
a very mixed one as to age and appearance, — delicate and
pleasing-looking girls in white, with a tasteful flower in
their hair, others neatly clad In sober hues, black, brown,
&c. ; boys In jackets, youtlis and elderly men, some In
frock-coats, some In sacks. The dress-coat is a garment
used as little as possible in America, and mostly by wealthy
people, as in New York, who follow European customs as
nearly as circumstances permit. A sofa was occupied by
four demure females, who were using their eyes with

92 Ten Years in the United States.
ceaseless activity. One of them I made sure was an old
maid, she was so primly dressed, severe and sharp looking.
Another was a pale, thoughtful-faced matron.
" She has had about eleven chUdren," said my friend.
" Only four are now alive ; two are here now, — those two
with blue sashes, for whom she Is killing herself: for they
can't afford servants enough just to keep them like a pair
of valuable dolls." Dolls they were, indeed, with com
plexions painfully beautiful, and arrayed so as to give
them the appearance of the utmost tenderness and fragility.
But one of them, at least, has turned out a true woman,
was foremost at raising a secession flag on the roof of her
seminary, and refused to say a word to prevent a young
man to whom she was engaged from going to thrash the
Yankees. The elder persons present, the married and the
self-acknowledged old maidens, sat behind, or out of the
way, like myself, observant lookers-on. Not a lad spoke
to a girl without their seeing it: things began to get
quiet and formal ; one could not speak -without several
hearing and looking. Then a married lady had the
com'age to say aloud,
" Is this to be a Quakers' meeting ? Do something, or
say something, somebody. Oh, Jinny, sit down at the
piano and give us a song, — something funny, never mind
that cold."
So Miss Jenny, In a proper young-lady-like manner, sat
down and sang The Irish Emigrant's Lament ; very sweetly
too, and then played, then sang again. Some cake, plum and
currant, and pound-cake, just the same regular unwhole
some compounds the English use so much of, and lemonade
and wine, orthodox port and sherry, were handed round

" Jogging-along." 93
by coloured servants, — slaves, I remembered, though they
seemed on much more pleasant terms with the guests than
any white servants I had ever observed. These " goodies,"
as a juvenile called them, disposed of, and talk subsiding, a
young man ventured to propose a dance. But it was
objected that there were too many members of the church
present; who, I learned, couldn't dance conscientiously, and
might be rebuked were they to stand up.
" Oh ! weU," said an elderly widower close by me, sotto
voce, "we must whip the devil round a stump, — let's
have a ' jogging along ; ' " which was carried by acclama
tion. This same lively widower, thereupon, asked one of
the dolls above-mentioned if she would be so good as
to be his partner in a "jogging along," to which she
smilingly assented. Then two or three couples rose up
spontaneously ; others had to be pressed and paired ; till a
large circle was formed. A young man sat down at the
pi.ino, and seeing all ready, commenced a tune, and all
started off, marching arm-in-arm, two-and-two, and sing
ing ; the words being —
Turn, all you young men, from your wicked ways,
And sow your wild oats in your youthful days,
That you may be happy.
That you may be happy
When you grow old.
Oh, the day is far spent, and the night's coming on.
So give us your arm, let's go jogging along.
Jogging along, jogging along:
So give us your arm, let's go jogging along!
At the words " So give us your arm," the gentlemen
suddenly leave their partners and have to secure the arm
of another lady for another walk round; some having

94 Ten Years in the United States.
their preferences, and managing to keep the same partner.
The same ditty and the same marching is repeated, with
an occasional right-about face, tiU the players get tired,
I was disposed at first to call it stupid and puerile; but;
when I saw how effectually It roused the spirits of the
company, promoting mirth, causing conversation, infro-
duclng aU to each other, and by the very absurdity of the
thing arousing a spirit of social fun, I concluded that It
was rather an Improvement upon the solemn old quadrille.
After that there was some more singing by timid, high
voices. There is a weakness, a deficiency, a lack of vigour,
usual in the American voice, analogous to that something
wanting In their physique generally. There was another
game more like a dance, only performed by walking and
running, called "Boston ; " and then " Jersey Boys," done
to these words : —
Oh, we're marching on to old Quebec,
The drums and fifes are beating,
The Americans have gained the day.
And the British are retreating.
Jersey boys, to you we caU,
The invitation's to you all.
The way is open, the road is clear,
Jersey boys, come volunteer, —
Volunteer, volunteer;
Jersey boys, come volunteer.
More singing, cake, lemonade. Ices, followed, and plenty
of conversation — not always general. I noticed several
couples who always managed to rejoin each other during
the evening. A young American, having fixed his mind
on a girl, and finding his advances not disagreeable,
courts with the greatest intensity. Whatever he sets

Courting — Comp lexion. 9 5
his hand to do, the American — the Yankee especially —
does with all his might, till he fails, or succeeds, or takes
to something else. There is a deal of serious business
done at such an entertainment as this between the young
people : very few are intent on mere amusement. The
slightest attentions and preferences are watched by the
old folks ; very Uttle Is allowed for mere pastime, and the
youth who takes much pleasure In any particular young
lady's society Is expected to repay her by proposing to
devote himself to her for life. Of course I am speaking
in comparison with English custom. In the North, at
least out of New York, society Is much more strict and
prompt In this respect.
Rather late there was a fresh arrival, creating more
stir than a new-comer is apt to do among people so cool
and self-possessed as I had soon found the Americans to
be. There was a little lively talk, and salutations, and
merry laughter outside the door, and in walked a lady
who seemed already an old acquaintance — Miss Harrold,
charming, handsome, commanding attention ; yet every
body seemed glad to see her, except one or two of the
elder ladies, who scrutinized her critically, and, after
asking who she was, admitted her to be a fine girl, but
doubted whether her splendid colour was genuine. This
reminds me that in those days I had a high clear colour,
and was more than once suspected of Improving It arti
ficially. Yet, on the other hand, to an English eye the
tints of the face of a trans-Atlantic girl or boy often appear
too beautiful to be natural.
My young acquaintance soon came to me to keep her
promise of last night; at least, she sent a youth to tell

96 Ten Years in the United States.
me she wished to speak to me, and as I crossed the room
to her. Miss Harrold and I came face to face, and Imme
diately shook hands ; upon which, the girl who had sent
for me, came up, shook hands with her, and playfully
addressed me —
" I reckon you can play possum very well, Mr. Smith.
What do you think. Miss Harrold ? I told him last night
I was going to introduce him to you, and he never said a
word about being already acquainted with you."
I explained how It was. During the rest of the evening
I made frequent comparisons between my fair country
woman and the other ladles, forgetting that she was a
choice and rare, yet truly characteristic, specimen of her
race. Mr. Bray, the widower, now Insisted on another game.
"Mr. Bray," said the young married lady, who' had
started the fun early In the evening, " you old widowers
are too frisky. I've been watching you."
The good-humoured widower replied by insisting on
commencing the next game with her, which was surpris
ingly like a reel.
" Miss Ellen, I shall report you, and have you turned
out of the church ; for if that ain't dancing, I'll be
blamed ! "
" Do you think so ? " said Miss Ellen, a fair, plump,
amiable-looking girl. " Well, It is too much like dancing ;
and I'm ^very tired, and must stop," and so saying, she
ran to a seat, amidst much laughter. I certainly felt very
Indignant at the tyranny of the " church," to which she
unwillingly submitted, depriving herself of the very amuse
ment and exercise which she so evidently needed.

Philopmna. 97
The " Church," which means In the United States all
i orthodox Christian bodies and connections, has much to
answer for in effectually checking what ought to be warmly
encouraged and judiciously regulated by the older portion
of the community.
So the time passed, my expectations as to the national
character being somewhat agreeably disappointed There
was no fussiness, no vulgarity, and the general spirit of
the company, most of whom were acquainted with each
other, was pleasant and sociable. Two or three young
couples, indeed, were selfish enough to keep themselves
to themselves, for which I heard one girl get a scolding
from her mama. Seeing me rather quiet. Miss Harrold very
kindly came to talk to an old lady sitting by me, observing
and " reckoning " to herself. It Is not very easy, amidst
a company generally and familiarly acquainted each with
the other, and forming a social clique, for a stranger to
come out advantageously even if he had plenty of assurance
and the gift of tongue — ^which I had not. So, to draw
me out, the fair Englishwoman gave me a "phllopoena"
(one of the kernels of a double almond).
" And what am I to do with this. Miss Harrold ? " I asked.
" Oh ! I forgot," she answered. " I am half Americanized
I do beUeve. Well, whichever of us, after to-night, on
meeting the other, first says ' Phllopoena,' Is entitled to some
forfeit — a big apple, a pair of gloves, or a new bonnet —
supposing the lady to win, and you wish to be extravagant.
I believe there Is no limit — Is there, Mrs. AUen ? "
" WeU, I reckon you wouldn't like to accept a handsome
new hat or dress from a gentleman as a phllopoena, would
you?"

98 Ten Years in the United States.
" Would I not. Indeed ! But let us talk sensibly. Mr-
Smith Is just from England, Mrs. Allen ; let me make you
acquainted with my friend — Mrs. Allen, Mr. Smith."
This was acknowledged by a mutual bow.
" And when this game is over, I -will do you the favour
of Introducing you to, Mrs. Allen's daughter," said Miss
Harrold. " It Is the custom of the country, Mr. Smith,
you will find, to take every opportunity of making our
mutual friends acquainted with each other."
The gentleman in whose house we were being enter
tained came and took a seat by us; he was a fatherly,
uncommonly hearty man.
" Ah ! " said be^ " I want to have a Uttle sensible con
versation. How have you been. Miss Mary ? Why didn't
you bring Mr. — Mr. B. — with you ? When am I to have
that large piece of cake you promised me, eh ? "
" When I promised it — when others get theirs."
" Well, I hope you've come to settle among us, Mr.
Smith. I like to see au Englishman come here ; though
you are rather too blunt and opinionated generally. But as
to the crowds of Dutch and Irish, I wish they would stay
in their own countries. They'U be the ruin of us, I do
believe." I had already noticed a strange discrepancy between
private feeling towards ftirelgners and the tone of the press,
in regard to the sons of oppressed Erin and the persever
ing, frugal Germans. I was about to Inquire of our host
on the subject ; but a girl came to bid him good^night, and
he left us.
At length, aU at once, the company broke upi as they
departed, shaking hands with the pleased host aud his

The Southern Climate. 99
wife, who invited all In turn to call again soon; some
getting their things, and coming back for a final chat. Two
or three blacks, whose faces I had observed several times
about the door of the room when there was more noise or
fun than usual, stood about the passage and doorways,
grinning, and good-naturedly bidding the parting guests.
good-night. " Oh I what a splendid night ! " " What a
magnificent night ! " said one after another, as they got out
side the house. Once more " Good-by," and " Remem
ber to come soon," and In separate couples we wended
leisurely on our respective ways, not many of the younger
ones taking the nearest route.
To me who had passed twenty-five years in the smoke
and climate of London, one great attraction of a life In a
more southerly region was the abundance — sometimes,
indeed, over-abundance — of clear sunny weather. In which
one could feel a pleasure In almost mere existence ; finding
a. languid, careless, content, if not positive happiness, in
nothing more than a cigar, and some cool, green, shady
spot, perhaps a pleasant companion, or an easy book ; or,
indulging in Idle reverie, fanned by real zephyrs,- watching
the clouds, listening to the bobalink, or the red bird, or,
better still, the mocking-bird, and the gently rustling
foUage — ^In all which there is an enjoyment very seldom
and imperfectly enjoyable in England. A sudden change
from such luxury of warmth and Ught to a foggy London
November chils. one to the very vitals. About and on the
dark side of the famous Mason and Dixie's Une — an
ominous and, as it were, prophetic disunion Une,- made long
ago (even before the Union) between North and South —
such weather prevails for months In the course of the
7-2

100 Ten Years in the United States.
year, until at last one wearies of it, and In the faU longs
for a sharp frost. The long, hot, bright daj's and dazzling
skies become enfeebling and exhausting, making the Anglo-
Saxon long for the mountains or the seaside ; but in the
hottest seasons the mellow evenings and the cool, calm,
genial, glorious night amply made up for the oppressive
ness of the day. The moon was larger, more radiant,
more queenly, than the orb to which I had been accus
tomed. The welcome air seemed as if respired by nature,
coming and going in soft milk-warm breaths, cooling with
out the least approach to chilling. On such a night Rich
mond, uptown and In some of the suburbs, wore a charming
aspect, more attractive than to most others to me, " raised,"
as they say there, and resident in a crowded part of Lon
don all my life, save now and then a brief hoUday.
Trees, gardens, verandahs, houses, cottages ; youths and
girls — the latter bareheaded — sitting in the porches, or
strolling about In couples, talking, whispering, laughing
aloud — on aU the moon poured her soothing delicious light.
At the open windows of milighted rooms parents sat
quietly, the father perhaps smoking, the mother possibly
watching their girls and boys. In various directions were
heard the tones of the piano, loud chirruping crickets, and
tree frogs; boys with accordions, and negroes with their
tinkling banjos, were scattered about unseen, making
night stiU more cheerful. If not more beautiful : for, un
fortunately, it at present takes much time and trouble to be
able to produce fine musical effects, and the Americans are
the last people in the world to go through the labour and
study necessary to produce a " concord of sweet sounds."

101

CHAPTER VIL
1 City of Washington, D. C, Seat of the Federal Government — General
Taylor — His Eulogy — The United States' Presidents— North and South ,
compared.
! Perhaps few scenes in the United States would Impress
; a stranger more favourably than one often to be witnessed
at Washington on a summer evening. The military
or marine baud Is playing excellent music in the garden
of the White House, everybody walking in and out and
about without restriction; the President perhaps strolling
over the la-wn among the company, ready to shake hands
with any one who chooses to introduce himself, or whom
any citizen, however humble, may please to Introduce.
Well-dressed women — amid all the sorts of people as
sembled not a poorly dressed woman is to be seen —
public men, clerks, and groups of various kinds, are prome
nading, while cliildren are gambolling about. Labourers
roughly dressed stand or lounge on the grass ; there is no
guard, no police : all behaving themselves properly. No one
— not the Irish Biddy taking her mistress's children out for
an airing, nor the neat negro wench engaged in like manner
— fears any annoyance or rudeness from any person.
Such a scene Is a clear unmistakable proof of the pro
gress of the people In self-government ; a proof that aU

102 Ten Years in the United States.
classes can mix freely together, each amply protected by
a general regard for order and propriety and by mutual
respect. I repeat that for whatever disorder and violence
have brought discredit on American institutions, " the mob "
have been very little to blame ; it Is owing to the want of
moral and disinterested courage among the wealthier classes,
and the absence of sound moral principle among the poli
ticians, who belong to those classes, that these evils have
arisen. More than once on these occasions I saw General
Taylor, and could not but conclude that he was a plain,
good-hearted, honest, hard-working man, of well-balanced
mind, but of no extraordinary capacity ; favoured by circum
stances and fortunate in the enemies whom he had fought
and conquered.
The war with Mexico (1846-7) had some very bad
effects on the United States. The actual bloodshed was
perhaps a trifling consideration, seeing how human life is
everywhere daily wasted ; and the causes or occasions of
the war — (the annexation of Texas by the United States'
Congress, and the neglect to pay certain stipulated indem
nities to American citizens,) — were as just as those which
powerful States usually find against weak neighbours.
The great evil of the war was that It brought forth an
excessive inflation of the national vanity. In battle after
battle in Mexico the Americans defeated two, three, and
four times their numbers of Mexicans. Every American
soldier knew perfectly well that the Mexican officers and
men were of a hybrid race, and in personal "pluck"
inferior to tlie Americans ; but the American public blinked
that fact, and glorified Itself and its army as much as
though they had vanquished Frenchmen or Englishmen at

General Taylor. 103
Palo Alto and Cerro Gordo. At last, as often happens,
they came to beUeve what they so often said and thought,
and In a vague manner, well enough for the 4th of
July, they considered themselves Invincible and irresistible.
The victories gained by Zachary Taylor In Mexico, the
character, the very nick-names he had acquired — " Old
Zack," " Rough-and-Ready " [General Scott was nick
named " Fuss-and-Feathers "] — made him the most avail
able candidate for the Presidency In 1848: "available"
meaning the man most likely to be got in. Henry Clay
was the renowned Whig leader, but for various reasons he
was miavailable, prIncipaUy because he was a man of
decided and known principles. As to political fitness,
Taylor had no more of that than President Pierce had of
either political or military ability ; his grateful country,
however, rewarded him with unsought honours, and the
poUticIans worried him to death. He died on the national
birthday, the 4th of July ; being the second Acting Presi
dent who died on that anniversary, John Adams having
expired on the 4th of July. Zachary Taylor was the
twelfth President of the United States, and the seventh
native of Virginia elected to the office.
According to the custom of the country General Taylor's
death was celebrated by military displays, by processions,
and by public eulogies. From one of these, delivered by a
Richmond editor, "a Northern man with Southern feel
ings," as the phrase is, I make some extracts, which the
reader may find Interesting : —
Zacbary Taylor -was bom in Orange county, in this State, in
1784. He inberited from Ms father. Col. Richard Taylor, the
heroic spirit of the Revolution, and inhaled with his flrst breath the

104 Ten Years in the United States.
pure and bracing atmosphere of the early morning of our national
day. His father removed to Kentucky at a period -when the agri
culturist of that State could scarcely ensure the result of his
labours, unless the gun stood beside the plough, and when even the
child found his path to the school-house menaced by fierce savages.
It was under the influence of such a state of things, and among a
people marked by the simplicity, the frankness, and the homely
virtues of farmers, and the courage and tact of warriors, that the
boyhood and youth of Zachary Taylor were passed, and his early
character formed. To these peculiar circumstances of his educa
tion may perhaps be traced the marked characteristic, by which he
was ever afterwards distinguished, of devotion to the pursuits of
agriculture and of arms.
In 1845, the year which preceded active hostilities -with Mexico,
he had passed more than threescore years, and had reached a period
when most men begin to weary even of the common toils of life,
and to desire and expect nothing in existence but quiet and repose.
No one could have thought that, in the winter of years which spread
before his feet, a harvest of glory was to be reaped which would
throw into the shade the flowers of his spring and the fruits of his
autumn ; that, amid the snows of age, his old hand would gather
such evergreens of fame as have rarely decked youthful brows. No
one could have imagined that the old Eagle, gone to his nest
seemingly to repose and die, was once more, disturbed by the
clamour of the storm, to soar from his eyrie, and dart upward,
amid the thunder and the tempest, -with a -wing so bold and a flight
so majestic, that it would dazzle even youthfal eyes to follow him
in his sunward career. Yet such was the spectacle which, with
pride and amazement, we have all beheld.
The prestige of the brilliant victories of Palo Alto and Resaca
was felt throughout the whole subsequent war, and imparted that
feeling of inviucibility to the American troops and of inferiority to
their enemies, which inspired the one and palsied the other in every
subsequent conflict. The report of the battles soon reached
Europe, and, instead of the sneers with which malicious and envious
lips were prepared to greet the tidings they anticipated, the warmest

Specimen of Eulogy. 105
commendations were bestowed upon American skill and valour by
the first soldiers of Britain, France, and Russia. His gallantry
was appreciated by the first military men of Europe, and the great
Duke of Wellington declared, as Napoleon had declared of him on
a certain occasion, " General Taylor is a General indeed."
This man exhibited through his whole life the influence of one
controUing principle, which moulded and gave expression to his
whole character and career. This was a stem sense of Dutv
which took no counsel of interest, of passion, or of any earthly
motive. The only question with him was. What is the Right ?
If he ever hesitated, it was that he might discover the path of
Right, but when found, he pursued that path wherever it might
lead. " I have endeavoured to perform my duty," were the words with
which the spirit of Taylor passed from the toils of earth to the
rewards of Heaven.
Numbers and even discipline were truly on the side of
the Mexicans, but breed, blood, race — whatever It Is —
was against them. No British regiment would for a
moment boast of a victory over merely its own number
of sepoys ; and the Mexicans are little better, being mainly
amalgamated descendants of Indians and Spaniards.
I am compeUed to believe that the character of the
United States' people has greatly changed from what It
was when the Union was first estabUshed. They have to a
serious extent lost the simplicity, straightforwardness,
integrity, and individuality which belonged to the popula
tion In the colonial times, and In the first few years of the
republic. General Taylor, said the orator, was " a soldier
of defence, not of aggression." How they have changed
all that ! It would seem that every maxim with which the
United States started Is to be forsaken, and even Its con-

106 Ten Years in the United States.
trary adopted. At the present day it Is the most aggres
sive population In the world.
I would draw attention to the conclusion of this eulogy
— to the melancholy burden of the song about the Union,
repeated and reiterated upon every occasion. Its very
founders, in fact, seemed to have little faith in its
strength :-¦—
In conclusion, fellow-citizens, permit me to remark, that if
there was one passion that General Taylor had failed to conquer, it
was his love of the American Union. In the language of an Irish
orator, he had stood almost by the cradle of the Constitution ; he
did not desire to foUow it to its grave.
He himself emphatically declared that when the Union could
only be preserved by force, it would not be worth preserving. He
knew that reason, charity, and truth could preserve it, when fifty
thousand bayonets, led by a Napoleon, would only crash it in a
common ruin. Zachary Taylor was a man of the South, but he
who finks those words — South and Disunion — he who does not
know it is in the South that the purest, the most abiding, the most
disinterested love of the American Union is to be found, does foul
wrong to a great and generous people. Zachary Taylor was a son
of Virginia, and Virginia led the way to that Union which is now
menaced by the torch of insane fanaticism. Virginia •wUl be the
last to desert that citadel of the rights and the hopes of the human
race. This was said in 1850. Since that year, a "Young
Napoleon," -with 200,000 bayonets, has been trying to keep
together the fragile Union : in vain.
It is much easier to give the reader an idea of the
peculiarities, the real and seeming absurdities, and the
extravagancies of a distant people, than to give him a
fair representation of the average everyday commonplace

TJie Union. 107
state of things. This is not so amusing to the reader, and
therefore not so much worth the labour of the -writer who
may aim at making a popular book, a pleasingly coloured
description of unusual incidents or extreme developments
of natural character ; but it is the normal and general
condition that really most concerns us. I may, therefore,
here say that the eulogy on General Zachary Taylor,
from which I have just given extracts, may be taken, on
the whole, as a somewhat favourable specimen of such
effusions on like occasions. It is of the kind that might
be addressed to a general audience in any southern city ; an
audience, that is. Including ladies, and all classes of the com
munity. But it is proper to say that, on such an
occasion, few, if any, of the lowest classes would present
themselves. It is curious that while timid aud anxious prognosti
cations as to the Union have so long been common,
few have ever paused to look the ever-threatening evil
in the face, and to inquire what the Union was worth —
what disunion amounted to ? Was It altogether so desir
able a thing that New York should legislate more or less,
or to any extent, for Florida or South Carolina, with
their distinct Interests, their pecuUar prejudices and insti
tutions ? Was supercilious, self-righteous Massachusetts
Ukely to be the better for any share that slaveholders,
might have in legislating for her interests ? Was not the
Union upheld by sacrificing the individuality and character
of the States, their true independence, their self-govern
ment, self-development, and, above all, their respective
constitutions, as opposed to a vast national democracy?

108 Ten Years in the United States.
All these were disregarded in the hope of building up
an overwhelming empire, which should be able to
insult, defy, and dictate to the world ! Had the States
continued united much longer, the peace of the earth
would have been at the feet of the class of irresponsible
demagogues and politicians, who were rapidly becoming
the undisputed managers of the public resources and
destinies of the United States. The Northern people wiU
find they have lost no real aud honest advantage by the
secession of the South, while they will have received a
valuable lesson, essential to their progress and their national
education. They will be under less temptation to domineer
over, and look down superciliously, upon the nations of the
rest of the world. The chief results of the existence of
the Union have been, first, the maintenance of a large,
corrupt, demoralizing class of partisan politicians and
office-holders and seekers; secondly, the fostering of an
insolent and aggressive disposition In the national cha
racter. While we are in the City of Magnificent Distances,
which somehow has the look of a very extensive failure,
we may take a glance at the men who have in turns lived
in yonder White House that Uncle Sam built, and pre
sided over the government for whose accommodation the
city was founded.
The great Influence and preponderance of Southern men
in the Federal Government has been mentioned lately as
proving the undue share of power wielded by the South.
But in fact the North has been the gainer by having had
the benefit of the rule aud guidance of abler men than it

The Presidents of the United States.

109

could raise to power from its own growth. That this is
1 so is shown by the leading facts In the case — I mean the
Presidents themselves.

The Southerners were :—
1. Washington.
3. Thomas Jefferson, Va.
4. James Madison,Va.
5. James Monroe, Va.
7. Andrew Jackson, S. C.
9. Harrison, Va.
10. Tyler, Va.
11. Polk, Va.
12. Taylor, Va.

The Northerners were ; —
2. John Adams, Mass.
6. J. Q. Adams, Mass.
8. Martin Van Buren, N. Y.

13. FUlmore, N. Y.
14. Pierce.
15. Buchanan.
16. Lincoln.

Take away the two Adamses, and three-fourths of
the Northern people would very willingly give to the
South whatever honour can be claimed by the North on
the score of the other five Presidents whom it has raised
to the pinnacle of democracy. The striking difference
between these two columns Is worth considering and
examining into.
Of the Northern Presidents, three are already very low
in the estimation of the Northern mind, and a fourth promises
too weU to become the climax of high-seated incapa
city. Of the Southern Presidents, ou the contrary, there
is only one of whom any American except the genuine
Abolitionists will venture to speak disrespectfully. That
one was once regarded as a traitor by the party which
elected him; but it is now, I believe, very generally

110 Ten Years in the United States.
admitted that he was true to his own professions, and not
false to the party to which he owed his office ; though he
certainly gave it a sudden and severe and most aggravating
blow. Mr. Tyler was nominated by the Whigs for Vice-
President on the same ticket with General Harrison, and
that ticket won. In one month after bis Inauguration
Harrison died, exhausted by excessive labour and excite
ment ; and Tyler had to take his place. When the great
measure of the Whigs, the United States Bank Charter,
had, after immense efforts, been carried through Congress,
and awaited his signature to become law, he vetoed it.
The act, his friends say, was consistent with his openly
expressed financial views, though It excited great disgust
In the poor Whigs., However, his bitterest enemy will not
now deny that Mr. Tyler Is both an able man and a gentle
man, in the best and fullest sense of the word. From what
I have seen, heard, and read of him, I look upon him as
the last fit man who sat in the' Presidential chair of the
United States. George Washington, the first President,
showed what a good and fit man can do when he gets into
the right place : Abraham Lincoln, the last, seems destined
to give the world another lesson on the harm that even a
worthy and sensible man may do when he gets Into> a place
he is not qualified to fill, and Is entrusted with powers and
duties above his skill, knowledge, and strength.
One of the best, if not the very best, tests of tlie success of any
political system is the character of the men it brings into power.
In applying this test, of course, the average character of fhe
population must be fairly considered. ¦ On- examining the
list of Presidents, a suddten dtegeneration is observablei
Few if any citizens of the Northern States would claim

A Test of Political Systems. Ill
anything like an equality as to Integrity, statesmanship,
and general capacity for the last four Presidents with the
first four, even leaving out Washington. If we divide
the Presidents Into classes, calling Washington first class,
Jefferson and Jackson second class, aU after Andrew Jack
son would be only of the fourth and fifth classes. I
believe very few United States' men will object much to
this classification. Now this degeneration Is a momentous
and vital matter, and I shall in this volume endeavour to
show its cause, and draw to It the attention of those who
claim to form the party of progress.

112 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER VIIL
City of Washington — Mr. Seward's Great Speech on the Slavery Question
(March 11, 1850) — Present Events Foreshadowed — Seward's Career —
Bennett on Seward — Disunion debated in Senate — Negroes termed
Accidents and Disturbances by Seward — Calculations a la Bobadil —
On Califomian Secession — An uncompromising Statesman — The United
States Arch Fiend.
I HAPPENED to be in the City of Washington In 1850,
when the important question, whether the lately-conquered
California should be admitted as a State into the Union
was being discussed in the Senate. A long oral essay on
the subject was delivered by Mr. Seward, which was both
interesting and characteristic. Mr. Seward was then Gover
nor of New York State, and is now the right-hand man
of President Lincoln ; it may be said, " he was to have
come." He was the leader of all who were against the
South, and can conscientiously boast of having done more
than any other to bring about the present state of Ameri
can affairs. He has handled the several parties in the
political field In a masterly manner — better, I much sus
pect, than any Federal general will be allowed, while
Mr. Seward Is In power, to handle the myriads of men
now in arms upon the vast battle-field into which he has
mainly helped to turn his country. He has bided his time,
and has followed up his game with the tenacity of a

Disunion debated in the Senate, 1850. 113
' bloodhound. To ruin and triumph over the South — which
he hates Instinctively, because he Is the reverse, the oppo
site, of the Southern man — Is the height of his ambition.
The following extracts from the speech aUuded to deserve
attention as the deUberate opinions of the man who has been
the ruUng power in the present government of the United
States ; and as affording a specimen of the style of speaking
in the Senate, and an Ulustration of the feeling towards
the South which animated the school of which Mr. Seward
was a chief teacher.
Mr. Seward, having the floor, said, —
Mr. President [i.e. President of the Senat«]. — Four years ago,
California, scarcely inhabited and quite unexplored, was unknown
even to our usually immoderate desires, except by a harbour,
capacious and tranquil, which only statesmen then foresaw would
be useful in the Oriental commerce of a far distant, if not
chimerical, future.
A year ago, California was a mere military dependence of
our own, and we were celebrating with enthusiasm and unanimity
its acquisition with its newly discovered, but yet untold and
untouched, mineral wealth, as the most auspicious of many and
imparalleled achievements.
To-day (March 11, 1850), California is a State more popu
lous than the least, and richer than several of the greatest of our
thirty States. This same California, thus rich and populous, is
here asking admission into the Union, and finds us debating the
dissolution of the Union itself.
Thus the dissolution of the Union was a fair, open
question of debate. Is not this almost an acknowledgment
of the legal right of secession, should any State or States
desire It — should the North, for instance, have resolved to
Wash its hands of the sin of slavery? I should explain
8

114 Ten Years in tlie United States.
that the Senate, composed of two senators from each of
the thirty States of the Union, was at this tune very
equally divided between North and South ; consequently,
the admission of a new State was an important matter to
the great fraternity. . California presented herself as a free
State, and her admission was opposed by the South on
grounds which I need not now enumerate. Hear Mr.
Seward's plea for CaUfornia,
Let California come in. Every new State, whether she
comes from the East or from the West, coming from whatever
part of the continent she may, is always welcome. But Cali
fornia, that comes from the clime where the West dies away into
the rising East — California, which bounds at once the empire and
the continent — California, the youthful queen of the Pacific, in
her robes of freedom, gorgeously inlaid with gold — is doubly
welcome. If I recollect rightly, this was a written speech, not
part of a real debate; it was addressed to the country
through the press rather than to the Senate, such being
the custom with many members. Calhoun, Clay, Webster,
Benton, did really debate the question ; perhaps the last
great struggle in which they took part. As one after
another those national men followed Calhoun to the grave,
leaving none to fiU their places as supporters of the Union,
many felt that the bonds of the States were irreparably
weakened. This is Mr. Seward's view of the negro question.
I proceed now to state my reasons for the opinion that Cali
fornia ought to be admitted. The population of the United States
consists of natives of Caucasian origin and exotics of the same
derivation. The native mass readily assimilates to itself and

Seward's Estimation of the Negro. 115
1 absorbs the exotic, and these, therefore, constitute one homo
geneous people.
The African race, bond and free, and the aborigines, savage
and civilized, being incapable of such assimilation and absorption,
remain distinct, and, owing to their peculiar condition, constitute
inferior masses, and may be regarded as accidental if not dis
turbing political forces.
In these paragraphs we see the estimation In which
Mr. Seward holds the Indian and African — mere "acci
dents " and " disturbances ; " the one the original land
owner, the other a producer, so far as labour goes, of a
most important portion of the national wealth. At this
time Mr. Seward would hardly have avowed himself an
Abolitionist, an anti-slavery man — the party has always
been too unpopular, I may even say too much despised,
for that ; yet he has succeeded In playing off Abolitionism
against the South till he has abolished Abolitionism and
the Union too.
His anticipation of the aggrandizement of the United
States Is only to be paralleled by Bobadil's arithmetic.
WeU-estabHshed rules of political arithmetic enable us to
say that the aggregate population of the nation now is twenty-
two millions ; that ten years hence, it will be thirty milHons ;
twenty years hence, thirty-eight millions ; thirty years hence,
fifty millions ; forty years hence, sixty-four millions ; fifty years
hence, eighty millions j and a hundred years hence, two hundred
millions !
It is characteristic of the politicians who have ruled and
ruined the country since the death of Calhoun, Webster,
and their fellows, that they never contemplated the possl-
biUty of the separation of the different sections — the
Pacific, the Atlantic, the North, and South, from each
8—2

116 Ten Years in the United States.
other. The people were accustomed, by the constant
repetition of such calculations as those above, to rely upon
a continued triumphant progi'ess. It shows what a modest,
moderate people the English are, since they look forward
to the time when their empire shall gradually and volun
tarily dismember Itself, and Canada, AustraUa, and so
on. In turn peacefully secede. California is, practically,
farther from New York than Canada is from London,
while Maine is at least as far, sympathetically, from South
Carolina as England Is from the moon ; yet the North
is Incensed against its much-loved mother-country because
she good-naturedly advises it no longer to harden its heart,
but to let the South go. What says Mr. Seward : —
The question now arises, shaU this one great people, having
a common origin, a common language,, a common religion, com
mon sentiments, interests, sjonpathies, and hopes, remain one
political State, one nation, one republic ? Or shall it be broken
into two conflicting and, probably, hostile nations or republics ?
The world contains no seat of empire so magnificent as this.
The nation thus situated must command the empire of the seas,
which alone is real empire.
The Old World and the Past were allotted by Providence to
the pupilage of mankind under the hard discipline of arbitrary
power quelling the violence of human passion.
Thus Mr. Seward admits the various forms of slavery
to have been very good for the poor Old World ; though
there whites enslaved each other !
The New World and the Future seem to have been appointed
for the maturity of mankind, with the development of self-
government, operating in obedience to reason and judgment. We
have thoroughly tried our moral system, of Democratic Federal
Government, and we know that it is a system equally cohesive in its

Seward in 1850 on Califomian Secession. 117
parts and capable of all desirable expansion ; and that it is a
system, moreover, peifectly adapted to secure domestic tranquillity,
while it brings into action all the elements of national aggrandize
ment. This style of talk Is Indulged in by all public characters,
from the schoolboy at exhibition to senators and State
governors, and it has done as much as anything to make the
United States an object of compassion to that Old World
on which her people looked with so much contempt. The
national self-esteem and self-confidence were thus kept in
a diseased state of activity; the warnings of quiet and
thinking people were unheeded; and young America
desired only to " go ahead," without taking time and
thought to look ahead. The orator complacently pro
ceeds : —
The Atlantic States, through their commercial, social, and
political affinities and sympathies, are steadily renovating the
Governments and the social constitutions of Europe and of Africa.
The Pacific States must necessarily perform the same sublime
and beneficent functions in Asia.
The matter to be settled was, whether California was
then to be received into the Union. The reader will
understand, that if not received as a State she would
remain as a United States " Territory," under the protec
tion and laws of the Federal Government. Mr. Seward
continued : —
And now it seems to me that the perpetual unity of our empire
hangs on the decision of this day and of this hour. California
is already a State — a complete and fully appointed State — she
never again can be less than that. The question, whether- she

118 Ten Years in the United States.
shall be one of the United States of America has depended on
her and us. Her election has been made. Our consent alone
remains suspended, and that consent must be pronounced now or
never. I say now or never.
Nor wiU California abide delay. I do not say that she contem
plates independence ; but if she does not, it is because she does not
anticipate rejection.
Will you say that California could not aggrandize herself by
separation ? Will you say that California has no ability to become
independent ? Try not the temper or the fidelity of California,
at least not now — not yet. Cherish her and indulge her until
you have extended your settlements to her borders, £c.
California would not go alone. Oregon, so intimately allied to
her, and, as yet, so loosely attached to us, wiU go also, and then,
at least, the entire Pacific coast would be lost.
The manner in which the admission or rejection of a
new State, and the probability of Its establishing Itself as
an Independent Government, are here discussed, and the
significant hints, or, really, threats, thrown out by Mr.
Seward, show the weakness of the Union feeling at this
time. Mr. Seward almost tacitly admits the right of
secession of California — gold-fields and all — and of any
other Territory or State.
I would invite the reader's attention to the next para
graphs, as they show Mr. Seward's aversion to those
mutual sacrifices and compromises without which the
United States constitution could never have been formed,
and of which it Is hardly too much to say " the absm-d,
antiquated. Illogical British constitution " almost entirely
consists. Mr. Seward was accused of having asserted In
this speech that there was a " higher law " than the law of
the land ; by which higher law citizens must be guided

A Statesman against all Compromise. 119
when their consciences so Impel them. Mr. Seward denied
the charge, and asserted that he never used the words.
But it is insisted that the admission of California shall be
attended by a compromise of questions which have arisen out of
slavery. I am opposed to any such compromise, in any and aU
the forms in which it has been proposed ; first, because while
admitting the purity and the patriotism of all fr'om whom it is my
misfortune to differ, I think all legislative compromises essentially
and radically wrong and hidefensihle. They involve the surrender
of the exercise of judgment and conscience in distinct and separate
questions at distinct and separate times, with the indispensable
advantages it affords for ascertaining truth. Consent on my part
to the compromise would be disingenuous and fraudulent. It
is now avowed by the hon. senator from South Carolina (Calhoun)
that nothing will satisfy the Slave States but a compromise that
will convince them that they can remain in the Union consis
tently with their honour and safety.
This was Mr. Seward's great speech on a momen
tous occasion, when every eminent man declared the
country was in danger. I would ask citizens of the
Northern States to seriously reflect, and ask themselves
whether a man who thus sets his face against all legislative
compromise is a fit man to hold the helm of the vessel of
State in this present crisis ? Or do they think tha,t the
same man who has got the vessel Into its difficulties is the
best to get her out ?
It is incredible that such objections should be delibe
rately offered to compromises, since every citizen has to
sacrifice his own opinions, conscience, and judgment, when
ever they come Into conflict with any law of the land ; un
less he has determined to set himself against the law, and
to exercise the right of revolution: this, he may some-

120 Ten Years in the United States.
times be right in doing; but then society Is dissolved.
Mr. Seward here declares the principle of acting upon a
" higher law."
The philosophical British politician will find much that
is worthy of perusal and deep consideration In the bold,
acute, and frequently very original writings of the virtuous
and far-seeing Calhoun, the most loved and honoured
statesman of South Carolina. The United States have
had warning enough of this storm now raging, but they
have been guided by mere flippant plausible writers and
orators, who have persuaded their countrymen that they
were altogether too smart and too great to[suffer any serious
misfortune. But to individuals and nations, wealth, pros
perity, and success, are dangerous blessings.
Mr. Calhoun demanded fresh guarantees for the safety
of the South ; among other things, for the execution of the
law relating to fugitive slaves. Of this law Mr. Seward
said : —
We deem its principle, therefore, unjust, unconstitutional,
and immoral, and thus, whilst patriotism withholds its approba
tion, the consciences of our people condemn it. You wiU say that
these convictions of ours are disloyal. Grant it, for argument's
sake ; they are nevertheless honest. Has any Government ever
succeeded in changing the moral convictions of its subjects by
force ? But these convictions imply no disloyalty. We revere
the constitution although we perceive this defect.
That is to say, every subject or citizen who perceives a
defect In the laws of his country has a right to evade or
defy that law.
The reader is aware that In the Constitution of the
United States a provision was inserted for the recovery of

The Height of NorlJierh Abolitionism. 121
runaway slaves. Right or wrong, such a provision was
unavoidable in forming a common Federal Government
embracing Slave States. The honest course for those who
would not felthfuUy carry out that, or any other article of
the constitutional compact, was to secede, or to request those
wha insisted upon the objectionable articles to secede ; or to
require that the whole compact should be rescinded. But
the North has insisted ou enforcing so much of the Con
stitution as suited Itself, and on repudiating what offended
it — the clause that hurt Its feelings towards the negro.
Mr. Seward states that only two compacts found in
diplomatic history admitted extradition of slaves. One of
these was between the Greek Emperor Comnenus and
Oleg II. of Russia, in the year 902 ; the other. In 1787,
between the States of the American Union.
The law of nations disavows such compacts — the law of
nations written on the hearts and consciences of freemen. Armed
power could not enforce them, because there is no public con
science to sustain them. I know that there are laws of various
sorts that regulate the conduct of men. There are constitutions
and statutes, laws mercantile and codes civil ; but when we are
legislating for States, especially when we are founding States, all
these laws must be brought to the standard of the laws of God,
and must be tried by that standard, and stand or fall by it.
Thus he considers his own conscientious Interpretation
of the laws of God paramount to all laws, codes, and con
stitutions.* On another branch of the subject — emancipation In the
* By these extracts the reader will learn that Mr. Seward, and the then
little party of which he was the mouthpiece, considered the distinguishing
feature of the South to be totally at variance with all that was most sacred:
a wrong with which no terms were to be made or kept; and that he, at

122 Ten Years in the United States.
district of Columbia, In which Washington stands, and
which belongs to the Federal Government — Mr. Seward
said : —
Sir, I shall vote for that measure, and am willing to appro
priate any means to carry it into execution ; and if I shall
be asked what I did to embellish the capital of my country, I will
point to her freedmen and say, " These are the monuments of my
munificence ! "
" Oh, for a forty parson -power to chant thy praise,
hypocrisy ! " Mr. Seward knows that these " embelUsh-
ments " of which he speaks are odious nuisances in the
eyes of his constituents, for whom at that very time there
was but little justice even In the courts of law. He himself
calls them " accidents " and " disturbances."
These opinions were delivered at a crisis when seces
sion was for the fiLrst time looked upon by many as a
fixed fact; and since that crisis aU the causes of dis
union on both sides have gone on accumulating. The
speech will serve, therefore, to show the principles then
held In reference to slavery and to separation, and the
nature of the Federal Union.
With one more extract I wiU dismiss this important
speech of Mr. Seward's : —
The preamble of the Constitution not only asserts the
sovereignty to be, not in the States, but in the people ; but also
promulgates the objects of the Constitution : —
least, maintained for each citizen an individual right to ignore or repudiate
aE laws which were inconsistent with a private conscientious conviction of
the law of God. Was it not time for the South to secede from a Govern
ment of which such a man could become the right hand and the head ?
How long would Scotland, Canada, Australia, or Englishmen anywhere,
submit to such treatment of their laws and constitutional rights ?

Necessity for Great Men. 123
" We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more
perfect Union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquillity, pro
vide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and
secure the blessings of liberty, do ordain and establish this
Constitution." Objects sublime and benevolent ! They exclude the very idea
of conquests, to be either divided among States or even enjoyed
by them, for the purpose of seeming, not the blessings of liberty,
but the evils of slavery.
About this time was the beginning of the end of the
Union. One by one, each close upon the other, the great
men, Calhoun, Clay, Webster, statesmen worthy of a great
country, departed, with others who were less conspicuous,
but who had grown up in better days, aud retained much
of their spirit ; In fact, much of the old British Influence
lasted long after the first years of independence. Strikingly
has the truth been illustrated, that no country can long
fiourish without great men in their proper places. EquaUy
worthy and capable men are still to be found in every
State of America; but they are almost all In private
life. A Washington would now find much difficulty in
getting elected into the House of Representatives at the
city that is named after him, even if he tried; and he
would not try.
But let us return to Mr. Seward — a man well worth
observing ; a leading and typical spirit of the last few years
of the Union ; one of several who rose into importance
when the above great national statesmen departed, and
left the country to the small mercy of little men whom
their great presence had kept in the shade comparatively
harndess. Imbued with the better, purer, at least more

124 Ten Years in the United States.
gentlemanly and honourable spirit of the earlier days of
the republic, those great men, supported by others of
similar character, though less known, raised their country
to a position among the nations of the earth to which
perhaps she was hardly entitled. But an unorganized,
chaotic system of popular suffrage rapidly and unavoidably
fell under the control of the leaders of factions and parties,
who obtained the Influence of numbers by suppleness and
flattery, by studying popular prejudices and whims, and
by skill in the demagogue's game of playing the
variouSj parties and interests of the country against each
other. It is astonishing how little a democracy learns from
experience. One may almost say that it forgets and for
gives everything but individuality and independence. If
it seems otherwise at times, it is because the people are
often superior to the natural tendencies and follies of
mere democracy.
Mr. Seward is no new man ; he has been tried and
proved: proved to be a dangerous and unfit man to wield poli
tical power. More than twenty years ago he was Governor
of his native State. How he governed may be gathered
from the following article of the New York Herald, of
July 27, 1858. It is necessary to comfort oneself with the
reflection that even the worst of liars speaks the truth
more frequently than he utters lies : —
In the month of May, 1837, all of the banks in New York, and
nearly all iu the Union, stopped specie payments. The monetary
crisis of that and the succeeding years has had no subsequent
parallel until last fall. As usual, the entire odium was thrown
upon the then dominant party, which fell to the ground with

The Arch-fiend of United States Politics. 125
a crash ; and on the 1st of January, 1839, William H. Seward
assumed the gubernatorial chair at Albany. He came into power
with flying colours, and amidst the ringing applauses of the
multitude. Notwithstanding the hard times, and almost sus
pended animation in commerce and trade, the finances of the
State proper never were in a more flourishing condition. Mr.
Seward found it indebted, upon his advent to office, 5,000,000
dollars. He at once inaugurated, however, his political system,
which, as was said at the time by one of the first men in the
State, consisted in " purchasing supporters, pensioning depend
ants, and rewarding followers." His administration only lasted
untU the end of 1842, and he left New York, after an administra
tion of only four years, owing 25,000,000 dollars. [It is a very
common error to regard the expenses, debt, &c., of the Wash
ington Government as the whole cost of Government in the
Union, whereas each State has also its taxes and debts.] It
was ascertained,' after he was succeeded by Governor Wright, that
had his iniquitous plans been entirely carried out, they would
have involved an expenditure of nearly sixty millions of dollars !
New York has ever since staggered under the burdens which
Sewardism in finance has fastened upon it.
In the United States Senate William H. Seward has been, for
over fifteen years, the arch-fiend of American politics. The lobby
regard him as their king. The broad mantle of his protecting
influence is thrown alike over Matteson and Greely, Webb and
Wolcott — in fact, over every one, of every party, provided the
assault to be made is upon the Treasury. Not a project, under the
pretext of " internal improvement," to enrich a few speculators,
can be started but he supports it, practically indifierent whether
it is North or South, East or West, for the benefit of abolitionists
or of secessionist fire-eaters.
Should an opposition President [that is, a nominee of a coalition
of all parties opposed to the Democrats, who alone remained,
at least, nominally and formally, still a united federal party]
be elected under the auspices of Mr. Seward, it is impossible

126 Ten Years in the United States.
to resist the conviction that the deliberate system which would
sway the councils of the party in power would be the re-adoption
of that which he acted on while Governor of New York. His
plan then was, and would be again, to combine the local interests
of sections of the country with those of the hordes of contractors
and sharks who besiege the doors of the Treasm-y, and, under the
plea of " developing the resources of the Union," to increase the
national debt indefinitely, and mortgage the next generation for
the benefit of his followers  The immediate pre
paratory policy of the opposition [the anti-Democrats] is "to
divide the South and unite the North." It won't work. It is
the North which will be divided, as it was in 1852 ; but the
South have the advantage that they remain united ; that they
will not fall under the control of fanatics, secessionists, traitors,
and corruptionists ; and that even the biggest half of the stolen
loaf will not buy them into the support of either Mr. Seward or
any one over whom he has the slightest influence.
Yet, step by step, Mr. Seward crept higher and higher
into power, determined at any cost to rule. His success
brought about his country's downfall; and probably the
first sure sign of that country's uprising will be his being
hurled from his bad eminence, amidst the curses loud and
deep of all who once gloried in the now soiled and rent
" star-spangled banner."

127

CHAPTER IX.
The House of Bepresentatives at Washington — ^Lobby Members — Whole
sale Corruption of the Legislature of the young Western State of
Wisconsin — Angry Correspondence between General Scott and Jeif.
Davis.
The members of Congress draw lots for their seats, each
place in the hall having a chair and desk, which are num
bered. Now, Americans have a fondness for trading In
any way : even the Southerners are more apt at It than
Europeans ; but Yankees especially are fond of a " swap,"
always expecting and generally contriving to make a little.
For indulging in this penchant, members of Congress have
been very sharply taken to task. One paper, an unsophis
ticated Providence Journal, mentioned, but could hardly
beUeve, that some members, having drawn eligible seats,
had sold them, and taken others In the outer circle. A
New York journaUst was amazed at the greenness of Its
contemporary, and Informed It that M. C.'s sold the books,
stationery, seaUng-wax, franks — and alscJ some the votes, to
which they were entitled.
At this time corruption in Congress was freely talked
about. One paper denied the astonishing stories, admit
ting that there were some piratical M.C.'s who demanded
tribute from those interested in certain measures, under

128 Ten Years in the United States.
pain of impeding their progress. Woman, too, it was
said, and I believe truly, used her sweet influences in the
lobby. *'The lobby" is a general term for the persons
who by any means make it their business to study the
composition of the house, get acquainted with members,
and contrive to influence their votes ; it also comprises
those who are looking after the progress of some particular
matter — a land scheme, a patent, a railway — In which
they are interested. Fancy a handsome, accomphshed,
fashionable woman using her influence with some poor
briefless lawyer : how could his public virtue fail to sur
render ?
Though there are many men iu Congress and in State
legislatures poor enough, it must not be supposed that a
plain, honest, respectable, industrious man of the poorer
classes, a journeyman mechanic, or a hard-working farmer,
much less a labourer, has any better chance of going to
Washington than similar persons have of being sent to the
House of Commons. Whatever a man Is, he must first
work his way into the class of poUticians ; by doing
which his interests, associations, feelings, and views are
changed for those of the professional politician. There
are exceptions to this rule, of course, as in the case of
General Taylor, who was in no degree a professional
politician ; but the fame and popularity he gained by his
victories over the Mexicans made him the most available
man for the Whig party's National Convention to bring
forward as their candidate.
When allusions have been made to corrupt practices
in Congress, many have been loudly indignant at such

Bribery and Corruption in Congress. 129
charges. But a venerable member rose In his place and
stated that he himself had been approached with the offer
of a bribe of 1,500 dollars on behalf of a pending mea
sure. The House of Representatives appointed a com
mittee to Investigate these allegations of corruption. One
witness said he knew of a case in which a member agreed
to get a bill through the House for a certain sum ; and
that the contract was entered Into in his presence, between
the M.C. and the gentleman who wanted the biU. The
bribe appears to have been 14,500 dollars, which, perhaps,
was shared among several. On being examined, the person
charged with bribery denied having made any improper
offers ; but he said, " I suppose there is nobody who knows
anything of the organization of Congress who expects to
carry anything through It merely from love of justice " —
" that Is the general reputation of Congress."
A bUl for a western navigation and railroad company
being before the House, the President received a commu
nication from "0. B. M.," to the effect that the House
Committee had agreed to report favourably on the proposal
to let the company have 272,000 acres, but that there was
trouble in the way, that outsiders made mischief; and
the writer asked — Was the President willing to have one-
fourth (of the land, as I understand) cut up and used to
carry It through ? Another witness, of the highest cha
racter, stated that " O. B. M. " told him there were some
twenty members of the House pledged to each other not
to vote for any grant of money or land unless they were
paid for It ; and that the president of the company must
have 100,000 dollars In Washington to carry the bill.
The witness advised that the Improvement should be
9

130 Ten Years in the United States.
suffered to sink rather than be accomplished by such
means. One person, it was said, acknowledged having
received seven square miles of land and some stock for
his efforts In getting this bUl passed.
With regard to these exposures of corruption at the
very heart and brain of the Union, it was objected that
only Republicans had been inculpated; aud also that If
the four actually accused were guilty, they were merely
the least adroit among a large number of shrewder cor
ruptionists. The committee ended by recommending the
expulsion of four members from the House. The Inquiry
was prosecuted with very little zeal. The corrupt mem
bers were none of them from the South. They demanded
a trial at the bar of the House, which was refused. Some
thought they were mere scapegoats. The Investigation
caused very little excitement, surprise, or Indignation In
the public mind. People of information knew that what
was proved and exposed was but a small part of what
could have been brought to Ught. And of those best able
to make a stir about the matter — the professional politi
cians — many felt like thosei Jews who had brought before
Christ the woman taken In adultery.
Some time before this investigation took place a New
York journal remarked that the decadence of America
since the retirement of General Jackson had been more
rapid, and should be more startling, than that of any other
State that ever existed.
Consider the single point of expenditure. Under Adams it
was thirteen miUions ; under Pierce it is nearly eighty millions.
Is this natural ? Can it be explained in any other way than by
admitting an unparalleled growth of con-uption ? For the advan-

Northern Journals on Corruption. 131
tage of partisan contractors, and to reward partisan services,
large bodies of troops have been transported considerable dis
tances at a greater cost for each than would be sufficient for the
performance of the same journey by the most opulent and
luxurious private gentlemen. Wood has been bought by the cord
for the use of the army, in the midst of the largest and richest
forests on the continent, for twice as much as it would bring iu
the city of New York.
There was nowhere any authority sufficiently strong,
independent, and interested, to check, to investigate, and
punish the wide-spread corruption. The disease was only
curable by a dissolution of the Union, If by that.
A leading Boston journal thus speaks of the United
States Senate: —
The meanest legislative body on the face of the earth — and
it would be difficult to find a meaner one even under the earth —
is the United States Senate. It has no claim to the commonest
kind of common honesty, so far as the majority of its members
are concerned, and that majority is sufficiently large to give tone
and character to the whole assembly. The Senate once was a
high-minded body  There was occasionaUy a display
of temper in it ; there is not much more violence among senators
now than there used to be. . . . The Senate's changes have
not been in the direction of violence, but have taken the form and
shape of the foulest meanness and the rankest knavery.
I do not Indorse all this ; yet very few journals could
consistently deny or much modify It.
The United States' Supreme Court is sometimes spoken
of as the last refuge and as the yet Impregnable citadel
of justice, which even the right-divine of a majority
assails In vain ; yet so far as the press is evidence, I could
bring forward only too many testimonies that it also obeys
9—2

132 Ten Years in the United States.
the same universal and overwhelming Infiuences that are
demoralizing everything on which the politicians can lay
their hands.* Connecting these facts with the gradual but
* Out of their ovm mouths, or mouth-pieces, I have sho^vn the character
of the Washington Government, for the benefit of the English reader. Was
it desirable that such a Government should realize its dream of controlling
at least the whole of North America as one Federal United States ? Such
a Government was a benefit to no one. It has answered its purpose, and
left its moral. Above aU, it was an injustice to the American people. I see
much reason to hope that in a few years North and South, East and West,
will congratulate each other on having got rid of a system under which they
were all alike misruled and preyed upon by an unscrupulous swanu of poli
ticians and demagogues. As soon as the free labour States begin to think,
they will see that conquering the South and licking England would do them
little good. They will have stiU to control themselves, and to erect legal
and constitutional baixiers strong enough to resist the attacks of the press,
the majority and its leaders, upon individual independence.
All nations have had their struggles — wars, foreign and civil, troubles, of
many kinds. The greatest difliculty with all is to form the domestic
internal institutions fittest for their national development. Of late years,
the United States have been making no progress in that du-ection. How
could they, when one quarter of the motive power in their politics has pro
ceeded from the Irish population — foreign bom, reckless of constitutional
Government, animated more by hatred of England than by love of America,
and obeying the dictates of its Eoman Catholic priests ? Anglo-Saxon
energy and intellect must be, as they have been, baffled by such a system ;
which must be supplanted by a better before any true greatness is possible
for the American people. Let the Celt, and still more the Germans, be
really and truly represented ; which now they are not, any more than the
native Americans, or than the unrecognized dite, the most experienced,
intelligent, and virtuous of the community. The character of the Govern
ments of all the States must bo raised much higher by some means : not by
Buncombe speeches, by big talk, or by mutual flattery.
To show that these corruptions are not exceptional or accidental blotches
on the surface of American politics, but deeply seated and widely spread
throughout the whole system, overwhelming evidence can be produced. I
think it would be under the mark to say that four-fifths of the newspapers
and of the printed speeches of the public men of all parties afford but too
ample evidence of an amount of corruption which can be paralleled in no
country in Christendom : except, perhaps, Russia, if the late Emperor really
made the sad declaration which he has been reported to have made, after
examining matters for himself, that he was the only honest man he knew of

State of things in Wisconsin. 133
great deterioration In the character of the public men of
the United States, Illustrated strikingly by the list of Pre
sidents, we may say of the Federal system that its brain
was softening and Its heart diseased.
But now come to the West, " the beautiful West."
Some fifteen hundred miles west of the city of Wash
ington is Wisconsin, one of the last created of the stars
forming the United States constellation. Many families
from the Old World have sought, amidst its beautiful and
fertile wilds, an honourable peace, plenty, and Independence,
which their own country hardly promised. The virgin
land might have been thought the native abode of purity ;
but a very slight acquaintance with the State dispels that
illusion. The New York Times of May 25, 1858, advert
ing to the state of things In Wisconsin, has these headings: —
EaUroad Management. — ^The Wholesale Bribery of the Entire
Government of Wisconsin : Tariff of Prices — Governors quoted
at 50,000 dollars ; Senators, 10,000 dollars ; Assemblymen,
5,000 dollars. — The Genf ral Plunder, Robbei^, and Miscellaneous
Swindling of the La Crosse and Milwaukee EaUroad. — Report of
the Special Committee of the Wisconsin Legislature.
This committee (I beg the reader to believe that this
is all serious) was appointed by joint resolution to
in all his dominions : I hope he meant among his officials. In the United
States the rot has spread so widely, that a well-informed man would
be not a little puzzled to put his finger on a sound spot. I refer,
of course, only to politics. The sound morals of domestic life, and the
jealously-preserved purity and predominance of the Caucasian race, give
ample ground for the hope that the people of the North will profit by their
severe and mortifying experience, and still raise a political fabric worthy of
their ancestors.

134 Ten Yeai-s in the United States.
Inquire Into alleged bribery and corruption of members
of the Legislature of Wisconsin and others In 1856 ; and
also into the condition of the railroad mentioned, and other
corporations. The committee reported as a tame fact the
discovery that a great majority of the Legislature of 1856
had been bought up ; while the most unique Ingenuity had
been used to veil the transaction. The bribery was
effected by assigning to certain persons bonds or stock in the
La Crosse and Milwaukee Company. A list of Senators'
names was given, with their "pecuniary compliments,"
varying from 10,000 dollars to 20,000 dollars In bonds.
The amounts were placed In the hands of an agent of the
company, to be passed by him to those senators when the bill
should become a law ; the recipients not choosing to trust
the directors. About fifty members of the Assembly, or
Lower House, received 5,C00 dollars each In bonds ; a few
more, 10,000 dollars ; and one — of higher principle than the
rest, perhaps — 20,000 dollars. Of these, none rejected
the " compUment." Four senators, however, voted for the
bill gratuitously.
Several State officers In high places came in for a share
of these " pecuniary compliments : " some getting 10,000,
some 5,000 dollars. About thirty " outsiders " received from
1,000 to 25,000 dollars. In one of the lists of recipients
of the railway company's bounty, there were five dashes
 10. When the clerk who drew the Usts up was
asked to explain these blanks, he said, " He remarked at
the time, these must be for the Governor." His principal
told him he was a pretty good guesser. One would be
curious to read the message to the Legislature of this
Governor of the State of Wisconsin.

Railway Legislation in Congress. 135
The manager of the business had two lists made out, of
which the first contained the names of the recipients of
the bribes, numbered ; while in the second those numbers
stood for the names, with the amounts ; the packages of
bonds were then made up, and the first list was destroyed.
There seems to have been a general understanding not to
be too Inquisitive. The witness just mentioned said: —
" It has been the habit of my life to make and preserve
written memoranda of all events or circumstances that I
desire to remember. I had no desire to remember any
thing about the delivery of those packages."
The president of the company said, in his evidence,
that, as president, he placed In the hands of an agent
200,000 dollars. In bonds of the company, to be used In any
such way as might seem necessary to procure the passage
through Congress of the several Acts granting lands to the
territory of Minnesota, for a virtual extension of the La
Crosse and Milwaukee Railroad.
Only three editors came In for a share of the plunder.
On examining the lists of names of the persons bribed, it
wiU be found that five-sixths are of EngUsh origin, the
rest being foreigners. It was not the despised Irish
or German element of the population that furnished this
body of corruption ; It was not English bom, of course ;
an Englishman stands a most Infinitesimal chance of
getting any office, or of obtaining the people's votes.
In the North especially. Nor did the South contribute
any of Its EngUsh descended population to the list of
bought and sold freemen. I see no reason to doubt that
full half of these persons were genuine Yankees, and more
than a quarter more of them Northerners of Yankee

136 Ten Years in tlie United States.
origin. In England we are in the habit of attributing
American wrong-doings, excitements, and rascalities to " the
mob ; " but in this case It need not be proved the mob had
no hand in the foul business : nor has it generally. These
things are the work of " highly-respectable persons," who,
when at home, are most of them attendants or " members
of the church," as the phrase Is.
The Wisconsin Legislature adjourned without taking
any steps to redeem the character of the State from all
these infamies ; and the public wealth In laud thus, and in
other ways, becomes a public curse.
These are but glaring eruptions, as it were, of the wide
spread, deep-seated corruption of the United States.
Instead of lamenting that a poUtical system, so preco
ciously debased, has been checked in Its growth and
reduced In power and extent, may we not rather wonder
how It has stood and flourished so long ?
To return to the City of Washington. Collateral evi
dence of corruption, and of some other facts, is furnished
by a curious correspondence between two American cele
brities — General Scott and Jefferson Davis ; the latter at
the time Secretary for War. As one Is now the President
of the Confederated States, and the other Is the most dis
tinguished general of the United States (States — States —
nothing but States : I suppose when Canada In the course
of human events secedes she wIU call herself the Separated
States, or States of some kind), though now retired from
active service, and further distinguished as one of the very
few, if any. Southern-born men who have sided with the
North — I think the epistolary duel will be Interesting as

General Scott and Jefferson Davis. 137
well as instructive. The General began the encounter
by Imputing bad motives: and Mr. Davis replied, un
officially : —
You have taken the occasion of an official correspondence to
make unfounded imputations upon my motives, and to use such
language as my idea of the requirements of official courtesy does
not permit me to notice in my official character 
Your present accusation, which charges me with usurpation for
the most unworthy ends, and imputes to me motives inconsistent
with official integrity, is considered basely malevolent, and pro
nounced utterly false. — Your obedient servant, Jeff. Davis.
General Scott had granted leave of absence to a colonel,
which the Department at Washington had ordered him to
countermand. This he refused to do, giving his reason ;
but the President declared the reason unsatisfactory. The
Secretary at War, Jefferson Davis, recommends that
the army head-quarters be removed to Washington ; and
on this recommendation the General thus writes to the
Secretary : —
Sir, — Wifh all the records of the army and every compulsory
assistance at hand, you have, by a toil of more than five weeks
on what to your nature must have been a labour of love, poured
out upon me in twenty-seven compact foolscap pages this full
measure of your spleen and vengeance. Its precursor was savage
and scurrilous, but the slowly concocted venom now vented is no
doubt fondly relied upon to kill at once. The felonious intent
is clear enough. Nevertheless, you may be forced to borrow the
exclamation, " 'Tis not done ; the attempt, and not the deed,
confounds us."
The General's style certainly justifies the epithet of
"Fuss and Feathers." The Secretary at War returns to

138 Ten Years in the United States.
the charge. At the end of the war, the City of Mexico
paid a handsome sum to the United States, a per-centage
on which, instead of sharing It with his companions In arms.
General Scott himself pocketed ; and on this point the
Minister touches : —
The law did not allow you what you paid to yourself. That
payment to yourself, what meanness does it display ? What could
have been less consistent with the generosity and magnanimity
which should have graced the first ia rank among a band of
gallant soldiers ? You awarded to yourself the whole per-centage
of the money paid by the City of Mexico when subjugated by
their victorious arms.
Again, the relentless Secretary finds a new weapon : —
You were not indeed entirely deaf to the claim of your brother
officers  You placed in the hands of a committee of
distinguished officers the sum of 2,000 doUars, to be distributed
among the families of the officers who had fallen in the recent
battles ; while, you, without the intervention of a committee, put
more than thrice that sum into your own pocket.
These cruel and tangible charges the General meets by
more personality, and, growing prosy, he quotes poetry : —
For revenge, the slander respecting the trial of 1810 was dis
interred by your letter of September, which, being refuted in the
same month, is now reproduced with variations : —
" Who shames a scribbler? Break one cobweb through.
He spins the slight self-pleasing thread anew;
Destroy his web of sophistry: in vain —
The creature's at his dirty work again."
The now President of the Confederate States replies
with more truth than poetry : —
Sir, — .... You have persisted in making your letters
official, and I have thus forced upon me the obligation to receive

General Scott and Jefferson Davis. 139
them, and reply, iu such terms as seem to me appropriate, to the
baseless accusations which derive their only importance from the
high standing you occupy.
Another instance of your capacity, in tlie same breath, to beg for
sympathy and utter slander, is your accusation that I have endea
voured to provoke a duel with an old soldier, known to be so
lame in both arms as to write with difficulty and pain.
Those ignorant of the fact that the gi-eat disability of which
you complain was the result of a fall upon the pavement in New
York, would naturally infer from the introduction of the pharse
"old soldier," that you were, by wounds received in battle, dis
qualified for self-defence, and every generous heart that believed
your assertion would visit with indignant censure the unmanly
attempt to involve a wounded veteran in personal combat. But
no such purpose was entertained. You had given notice to the
world that you would not act upon the sentiment which makes a
gentleman responsible to any one whom he assails when in the
vigour of manhood. You pleaded a sense of religion and patriotic
scruples, as reasons for not answering to the personal defiance of an
aggrieved officer. General Jackson, your superior in military rank,
and infinitely above you in every other respect — and it was not to
be supposed that you would, at this time, take different ground.
Bat no disability, no age, no plea of conscientious scruples can
be admitted to shield a slanderer from rebuke ; and when you
gratuitously imputed to me motives injurious and ofiensive to me
as a man, I addressed to you an unofficial note, anijixed on you
the brand of falsehood, which you vainly endeavour to wash away
with your unfailing flood of abusive epithets.
Your obedient servant, Jeffeeson Davis.
To Brevet Lieutenant-General Winfield Scott, U. S. Army.
But the " old soldier," being of British descent, did not
know when he was beaten. He imputes " Caliban malice "
to the Secretary, who compassionates au " enraged im
becile," and thus concludes the wordy tournament : —

140 Ten Years in the United States.
War Department, May 27, 1856.
Sir, — ^I have received your letter of the 20th inst. The delay
for which you make a hypocritical apology has strengthened you to
resume the labour of vituperation, but having already in this cor
respondence stamped you with falsehood, and, whenever you have
presented a tangible point, convicted you by conclusive proof, I
have ceased to regard your abuse ; and as you present nothing in
this letter which requires remark, I am gratified to be relieved
from the necessity of further exposing your malignity and depravity.
Your obedient servant, Jefferson Davis.
Brevet Lieutenant-General Wiufield Scott.
" Wingfield," I believe, it should be ; but the " g " spoils
the appropriateness of the poor old General's first name :
One who knew him weU always called him "Wing-
field." We may see him again in another character —
"stumping" the United States.
I am aware that to the English reader these personalities
are painful and not very Interesting reading; but they
are frequent and characteristic phenomena In the social
and political condition of the United States, where many
things are exposed to the eye of the sovereign people
which elsewhere are confined to the criticism aud know
ledge of a select few.

141

CHAPTER X.
'.New York City — The City Government — Sanitary Condition — The Condi
tion of the Irish — The Poor — Tenement Houses — Needlewomen — The
Potter's Field.
Natuke has afforded no finer site for a great commercial
centre than that upon which the Dutch established their
New Amsterdam, changed by the English, when they took
possession of it. Into New York. A city so favoured
deserved a better name. By people in the neighbourhood
it is sometimes called York ; poetically, Manhattan ; equi
vocally, in print, Gotham ; politically, the Empire City ;
it is at the same time the least and the most thoroughly
characterlstical American of all American cities. I will
only remind the reader that it is built on a tongue of
land about two miles broad, the point ending In a large,
convenient, and beautifid bay, with the noble Hudson on
the west side, an arm of the sea on the. east. The edges
of the city for miles are adorned with a rich, close fringe
of all kinds of vessels, from the ocean steamer downwards,
their bowsprits projecting over the busy piers and water
side streets.
It Is a remarkable place, worth seeing, and well worthy
of study as to Its history, its social and poUtical con
dition. I lived there, on and off, for some years, and

142 Ten Years in the United States.
know It tolerably well. Much of the Information I shal
lay before the reader as to New York and Its affairs wIJ
be of such a character that many will think It exaggerated
I shall, therefore, draw some of my evidence from
weekly journal published In the place, edited by a careft
lawyer, a foreigner, who, though an anti-Southern mai
is not very pro-Northern. This journal was partly mad
up of the pith (fairly extracted, I know) of New York an
other papers ; the reader may thus be tolerably sure as t
the Impartiality of the selections.
I need hardly say that New York Is almost solely
creation of commerce. The State Government meets a
Albany, a considerable city at the head of tide-wate
navigation on the Hudson. The extensive manufacture
of New York principally depend, directly or indirectly
on the shipping. This commerce depended on the Unite(
States tariff and on the United States Union, to an exten
which the owners of New York City lots especially will no
like to calculate at this time (a.d. 1862). One-third o
the population is of foreign birth, chiefly German an(
Irish. The suffrage Is pretty nearly universal, except iha
foreigners are required to live five years In the countn
and to become naturalized before voting.
First, then, as to the city Government. The leadin|
journal, the Herald of New York, thus characterizes som(
members of the corporation of 1856 : —
A few days since we expressed a wish for some sketches of thi
new Corporation, to ascertain if, judging from their antecedents
they were as great scamps as they had been represented. Thii
request has been complied with in part, and we have a large amount
of interesting biographical matter on hand. Some of the sketchei

Corporation of New York. 143
are favourable, but one or two look vei-y black. One of the
aldermen elect is linmed as a man who fled from his country to the
land of the free and the home of the brave, to shelter himself
from the vigilance of the law. He set up business in a small way
as a pugilist, and was engaged as a principal in several fights.
He was also kind enough to act as second in several of these ele
gant exhibitions. From prize-fighting to emigrant-running is a
natural transition, and our conscript father became a runner. But
the emigrant business not being so lucrative as polities, he deter
mined to help save the Union and be elected alderman, in both of
which attempts his efforts were crowned with entire success.
During the election, the exuberance of his supporters showed
itseK in some picturesque knock-downs, black-eyes, and bloody
noses ; but these are only the playful exhibitions of excited
Democracy  Another of the Corporation has figured
in the police reports rather extensively during the past three
months, and has a penchant for getting drunk and kicking
up rows in disreputable houses. These probably are only the
eccentricities of genius too long pent up. Portrait number three
is of a councilman who is said to be tolerably well known among
the " fancy." He recommended himself to the suffrages of the
voters of his district by walking into a station-house and beating
a policeman in his bed. He was dismissed from the police for
misconduct, and is now returned by a grateful community as a
member of the Corporation. A fourth councUman is said to be a
drunken lounger about engiae-houses ; a fifth, a dealer in old
boot-legs ; and an assessor has been indicted as an accessory in a
recent murder. This is a pretty fair beginning for some Hght and
pleasant reading for the holidays. Let it go on. Let us know all
about these fellows, so that we can keep a watch on their official
life. The independent press is the only palladium of the people's
rights. It must be vigilant and untiring. Send along the facts.
Let us know who are to govern us.
About this time the Tribune asserted that in a given
period there were as many murders, save two, committed

144 Ten Years in the United States.
in the city of New York, as in all England. But, in
fact, there are no statistics of New York murders. It
was proved in a trial that leaden weights were manu
factured for the purpose of sinking bodies in the waters
that flow round the city. About this time, 1856, there
were four " mysterious disappearances " from one hotel
within a short period.
Temperance men will not be surprised to learn that
there were at this time 15,000 places In New York city
where intoxicating liquor was sold ; these places — groceries
and groggeries combined — are kept principally by Irish
and Germans. Even of the public-houses very few are
kept by Americans, But the respectable hotels — the esta
blishments used by travellers, some of them In the larger
cities very extensive, making up five hundred beds and
more, requiring no little administrative ability to manage
them so well as they are managed — are usuaUy conducted
by gentlemen native-born, who afford favourable specimens
of the appearance, manners, and character of the United
States-man. At this period crime of all kinds was unusually rampant ;
garotting was practised to an extent which made it common
prudence to carry arms after ten o'clock at night. Re
spectable young men formed self-defence clubs to practise
gymnastics and the use of weapons, and to provide them
selves with proper pistols, knives, &c. I had myself
frequent occasions to be out very late, and always had
a formidable knife up my left sleeve, the handle towards
my hand. A demand arose for a swift and severe adminis
tration of justice, by complying with which one judge
made himself highly popular. In one morning he tried

Crime and Filth in Neiv York. 145
more than sixty cases. Drumhead or Lynch law would
probably have been fairer to the accused. The New
Yorkers are not apt to scrutinize very closely, or look
to precedent or principle, when their Immediate Interests
are in question. They like to see their objects effected
with a strong, high hand.
One of the first surprising facts I met with In New
York was the extensive neighbourhood of excessively
crowded tenement-houses; generally red brick, three or
four stories high, containing from ten to twenty rooms,
badly lighted and ventilated; often a family — ^mostly
foreigners — In each room.
In the streets the air was foul, and. In the hot weather,
sickening, with putrefying garbage. The adult Inhabitants
were generally voters, and zealous ones too. In the
warm summer evenings all were out of doors or at
the windows, men, women, and children, lightly clothed ;
numbers of the females would be sitting on the " stoops,"
their chins In their bauds, their elbows on their knees,
conversing in the brogue of the Emerald Isle; large
numbers were Irish, but with very little Irish fun left
in them ; death, languor, llstlessness, and disease hovering
around and over them.
Why did not these thousands and hundreds of thousands
demand an efficient sanitary law ? They had votes enough
to turn any election ; they had leaders and orators ; and
they were well organized for poUtical purposes. Arch
bishop Hughes could muster them to a man to give their
suffrage as he thought best. Yet here they were, sad,
but used to It, pining away under circumstances more
wantonly injurious than the despotism of Russia. United,
10

146 Ten Years in the United States.
they could easily have obtained a sanitary law to forbid
over-crowding of houses, to ensure a full supply of Ught,
air, and water, and enforcing a thorough cleanliness in
and around every dwelUng : measures which would make
every Uving soul of them healthier, wealthier, wiser,
happier, and better.
With everything In its favour, the sanitary condition
of this the greatest city of America, speaking generally,
is far Inferior to that of London ; while. In the poor
crowded neighbourhoods, it Is, in the summer time, shocking
and disgusting. I draw attention to this matter to hasten
the time when citizens will give their vote and Influence
for those who have studied and felt the vast Importance
of sanitary questions.
I am not speaking simply as a foreigner, Americans
themselves are my witnesses. Here is what the then
leading journal of America says (March, 1857) on the
filth of New York:—
With the exception of a very few thoroughfares, all the streets
are one mass of reeking, disgusting filth, which in some places is
piled to such a height as to render them almost impassable by
vehicles. Only those who live in these localities can have a true
idea of their condition, and they form at least nine-tenths of our
population. The dirt, like an epidemic, prevaUs aU over — ^in the
principal thoroughfares, ia the bye-streets, the alley-ways, the
lanes, in a word, from the most northern limits of the city down
to the Battery, and from the East to the North river. No attempt
has been made by the Street Commissioner or the Commissioner
of Streets and Lamps to have them cleaned, nor has any reports
been made by either of those officers to the Common Council in
regard to the subject.
Ann Street, which is within a few feet of our office, is literally

Filthy state of New York. 147
choked up with filth, which in some places rises to the height of
one or two feet above the sidewalks. Engine Company No. 88,
and Hose Company No. 20, made an onslaught on the mountains
of ice, snow, ashes, and garbage, which rise in front of their
houses, and which has proved a great obstruction in the way of
their engines and hose-carts ; but their labours have proved useless,
as there are no carts to remove the accumulated dirt. Stepping
from Ann into Fulton Street, you find that thoroughfare as much
in need of the labour of the scavenger ; but it may be regarded
as cleanliness itself compared with Centre Street. Here the dirt
lulls rise to the height of three or four feet ; and as no ash-carts
have visited this neighbourhood for several weeks past, and will
not probably for some weeks to come, the prospect of the poor
residents is most deplorable. The Five Points and all the streets
leading to that locality present the same appearance. ... Of
Mott, Mulberry, Elizabeth, and other streets running parallel with
the Bowery, the same story may be told. But the east side of the
city, which is included within a line passing up to the Bowery as
high as the northernmost limit of the city, and down as far as the
end of Broad Street, takes the lead, and is justly entitled to pre
eminence. . . . The west side of the city is hardly less
offensive and disgusting. Greenwich and Washington Streets,
throughout their entire length, are filled with the accumulated filth
of weeks.
Mass meetings were actuaUy held on this subject, with
some little effect. I used to think It a pity that Mrs.
TroUope said anything against the pigs, for a live pig
is much better every way than a heap of decaying matter.
From the pig to the Lish Is a natural transition. The
Celtic Irish form a large part of the poorest and labouring
population of New York city, probably more than a third.
They do very much more than their share of the hard
work, and are by no means overpaid. A New Yorker
10—2

148 Ten Years in the United States.
will immediately compare the wages of the Irish labourer
In Ireland and In America as a matter .of cash ; but the
real question Is the sort of life the labourer leads. The
hewer of wood and drawer of water has a hard, rough
life everywhere ; but still there are degrees : better here,
worse there. On this subject I came to the same con
clusions as the best Irish journal in New York, the
American Celt.
The writer Is answering Mr. T. F. Meagher's objections
against systematic Irish Immigration : — ¦
We have been recently, before and during the famiae, in Irish
towns and cities, and we have no hesitation in saying — since it
must and ought to be said — that there is more thorough Irish
degradation in the single city of New York than in aU of them
put together. As to the peasantry of Ireland, let them be never
mentioned in the same day with this degenerate lodging-house
population ; no amount of physical suffering ought ever be com
pared with the moral degradation of the transplanted city Celt,
which our police reports exhibit every day of the week. The
Irish labourer in the interior of New England, New Jersey, and
New York, is certainly better off than his brother in Boston or in
this city. He has fewer temptations and more moderate expenses.
But he is equally, perhaps more, homeless. He has not even the
comfort of a common misery. Estranged from every kindred tie, if
a farm labom-er; huddled up in an enormous boarding-house "built
by the corporation," for whom he works, if he be an operative : he
has no one to look up to but a cold, distant employer, or overseer,
who has no respect for his feelings, or his person, or his rehgion.
There is often a more intimate sympathy between the Alabama
planter and his African slave than between a Yankee employer and
his Irish help. The Irishman may, by intense iadustry, put
" something to the fore," but he never can in these old States
become a proprietor, or feel that easy sense of equality, without

Tlie Irish in New York. 149
which liberty itself is but the liberty of the Arab — the freedom of
wandering over a social desert, where the barren privilege prevails
uithout any of its real advantages.
As to the children of these homeless multitudes, what can be
expected from them but degeneracy and apostacy ? . . At the
East — there is no use in disguising it — the elevation of the bulk
of the Irish population is impossible. At the West, and in
Canada, if it be not their own fault, they may yet establish a free,
a virtuous, and independent, and a Catholic posterity.
For many years towards the end of the existence of
the Union, no State exercised so great an influence
in Federal politics and elections as the State of New
York ; and the State generally followed the lead of " the
Empire City." Now the best organized and strongest rote in
the City of New York was the Irish. For " voting the
Democratic ticket," for raising and swelling any cry or
urging any measure against England, for doing everything
that became true Irishmen and good Catholics, Archbishop
Hughes could rely on them to a man. Election day was
at the same time their Donnybrook and Fontenoy. Thus
this crowd of exiles, driven (as they maintain) from theb
own loved native Erin by the rapacity of the Saxon, exert
a potent and avenging Influence over the millions of Ame
rican Saxons peopling the United States. Bleak teetotal
Maine, game-cock South Carolina, flowery Florida, gold-
bearing California, each one of the more than thirty States
which contributed a star apiece to the firmament of the
United States flag, felt and acknowledged the weight of
the New York Irish votes. The Whigs envied the Demo
crats their luck in having such a phalanx, as good at voting
as at fighting; and all parties were ever ready to offer
more than reasonable terms for their service. Meanwhile

150 Ten Years in the United States.
these excitable Irishmen, courted, flattered, hated, and
despised, acted most disinterestedly ; doing all the hardest
work, drinking the vilest of stuff in lieu of whisky, and
living miserably in crowded houses and filthy streets ; the
poor people never thinking of using their vote and Interest
to have laws passed for the protection of their own life and
health. Truly, universal suffrage brings about strange,
mortifying, and disappointing combinations and results I '
Those who call themselves the upper classes, those who
have wealth, intelligence, office, influence, in any commu
nity, have much to answer for when they allow such
breeding-places of crime, pauperism, and disease to exist,
as are described by a committee appointed by the New
York State Legislature to investigate the condition of the
poor. The Federal Government, the Washington autho
rities, be It remembered, have no power to interfere In
these matters, — fortunately, or they would have been ten
times worse.
In one building, one hundred and ten families are gathered,
some of them, numbering eight or ten members, occupying one
close apartment, and huddled indiscriminately in damp, foul
cellars, to breathe the air of which is to inhale disease. Here, in
their very worst aspect, are to be seen the horrors of such a mode
of living. Here are to be found drunken and diseased adults, of
both sexes, lying in the midst of their filth ; idiotic and crippled
children, suffering from neglect and ill-treatment ; girls just
springing into womanhood living indiscriminately in the same
apartment with men of all ages and all colours; babes left so
destitute of care and nourishment as to be only fitted for a jail
or hospital in after years, if they escape the blessing of an early
gra'^e, . . .
Probably It was only through some coloured person

Pauperism in Neio York. 151
being traced to this or some such den, by some benevolent
abolitionist, that this phase of life in New York was
exposed. I believe that any one skilled In the algebra of
vice and suffering and human deterioration, would find on
calculation that in one year. In one such house of horrors,
there was endured and perpetrated more avoidable crime
and misery than by all the negroes in the most populous of
the Southern States during the same period.
There was an on dit that a benevolent lady visiting one
of these places entered a rather large room In which there
were five famiUes, more or less numerous. She asked two
neighbourly, chatting Irish how they all agreed — didn't
they quarrel and meddle with each other? "Oh, no,
ma'am, not often," said one; "we get along very well,
all of us, except " (lowering her voice to a whisper) " that
lady In the middle, with three children; she will take
boarders, aud that's against our rules."
The report of the Secretary of the State of New York
showed that In the year 1855, 200,000 paupers were
relieved at the public expense. For the twenty years then
ending the increase of population was 61 per cent. ; the
increase of pauperism, 706 per cent. 142,000 of these
paupers were relieved by the Commissioners of Emigration ;
a fact which goes towards excusing the habit which many
Americans have of calling foreigners " damned foreigners."
The contempt and dislike which the native Americans
entertain for the " mere Irish " and " damned Dutch," and
more or less for all foreigners, are so well known that
sometimes weak individuals deny their birthplaces and
endeavour to pass for Americans ; but always in vain. I
have met with one such recreant Englishman, and more

152 Ten Years in the United States.
than one Irishman of the same sort ; but even an English
man is always distinguishable if he has grown up to man
hood In the old country, and consequently an Englishman
rarely hears the real opinions of Americans, who are too
polite to utter disagreeable truths to strangers. But having
initiated myself into the habits, feelings, prejudices, and
very spirit of native American life, I am able to assure
the reader that American books, speeches, and newspapers
say one thing, and men and women. In their social inter
course, another. There is a total opposition between pri
vate feeling and principle and the " buncombe " addressed
to the public and to the ears of mankind at large, supposed
to be always listening, by the press.
But would not a government administered with the aver
age wisdom and justice of even European governments have
found means to stop such a rapid fungus-like growth of
pauperism ? I have no hesitation In saying that, long ago,
the native-born American citizens would have effectually
checked that mighty and long-increasing stream of Euro
pean emigration westward, which has so greatly added to
the wealth, population, and importance of their country,
and has contributed very materiaUy to breaking It up into
sections less formidable, and more governable; but the
influence of foreign-born citizens was and is too great to
allow them to do so. Thus the will of a large majority
of citizens possessed of the suffrage may be thwarted and
rendered powerless by party spirit and party tactics. It
is a simple matter to understand. Say there are In a
political body 50,000 voters belonging to the A party,
50,000 to the B party, and 5,000 to the Z party. A and
B court and flatter, and hate and dread, and bid for the Z

Increase of Poverty in Neio York. 153
votes ; and the Z party turn the scale, as Its leaders advise,
at every election.
On the whole, three-fourths of the paupers of the State
were of foreign birth; hence the American jumps to the
conclusion that pauperism is In fact, at least three-fourths,
a foreign Importation. But then these foreigners do all
the roughest, dirtiest, hardest manual labour; no Ame
rican, I guess, ever hardened his hands by ramming down
the paving-stones (though the rammers, or whatever they
may be called, are much lighter than those Pat has to lift
in the land he left). His fellow-countrymen would blush
for him if he did, and I know of no reason for believing
that native Americans condemned to like exhausting
drudgery would not soon yield, even in the climate of the
North, as many careless, hand-to-mouth, broken-down, and
pauperised individuals as the poor Irish there now do.
Both In the City and State of New York the proportion
of poverty and pauperism Is yearly Increasing. At times
want presses hard on large numbers of those who are too
proud or too sensitive to let their wants be known. The
Song of the Shirt Is as true there as In London. Occasion
aUy the upper classes open their eyes in miraculous
astonishment at the wages of the seamstress.
Look at the following prices (says the Tribune), then at some
pale, emaciated woman, with three or four children — a widow — or
perhaps worse, encumbered with a drunken husband. For a
miserable shelter in attic or ceUar she must pay four or five dollars
per month. With constant work, early and late, she can earn but
twenty-five cents per day. Five or six mouths to fill, bodies to
clothe, and rent to pay out of 1 dollar 50 cents per week. Calico
shirts, fifty cents a dozen; white muslin shirts, Unen bosoms, with

154 Ten Years in the United States.
fourteen plaits, eighteen cents each ; three-ply linen collars, with
three button-holes, and stitched all round, three cents each.
One of these victims of oppression, who, thank Heaven ! has
no children, makes pantaloons at six cents a pair. By working
from five in the morning to midnight she finishes four pair.
Another of these unfortunate beings remarked to a visitor, who
expressed surprise and regret that her garret had no light but
what was admitted through the scuttle, that perhaps it was best,
for she was not tempted to lose ber time looking out of the
window. And yet I know that while such were the wages, very
many, I may almost say innumerable, openings existed iu
villages and small towns, especiaUy In the South, where a
respectable tolerably clever needlewoman would have been
sure of an easy, comfortable living. Our supply and
demand arrangements surely admit of considerable Im
provement, with our modern facilities.
I fear tbe condition of the factory girls at Lowell is
much Inferior to what it was when first described by
EngUsh travellers; but I cannot speak from my own
observation. Altogether, there Is no doubt that factory
hands are much better off In the States than In England
Yet though want and pauperism have grown to gigantic
proportions in New York, It Is not, I am satisfied, from a
want of liberality and benevolence on the part of the
well-to-do classes. The stream of immigration which
enters at this great sea-port enormously and continually
increases those evils ; but a more powerful cause of their
rapid and alarming growth is the gradual retirement of
the better sort of people of all classes from the direction
of public affairs. Other northern cities, in proportion as

Treatment of Workwomen. 155
they approach New York In size and circumstances, seem
to develop as extensively the same world-wide evils;
proving too undeniably that there is nothing in republican
institutions, absence of state church, freedom from heredi
tary legislation, and possession of universal suffrage. Incon
sistent with the prevalence of poverty with all Its horrors.
Extremes meet. In the States of New Jersey, Ver
mont, and in the very focus of the light of civil and
reUgious Uberty — in the land of Roger Williams, Rhode
Island — and elsewhere too, I rather think, "the poor of
some towns may annually be seen at the auction block to
be struck off to the lowest bidder, who thinks he can
either get some little compensating work out of them, or
feed them on the refuse of his table, and many times on
that which he never thought fit to be brought Into his
house. Would it not be well for some of our New Eng
land orators to take measures for preventing the sale at
auction of some of tbe mothers of New England ? "
In Virginia, not long ago, confirmed white vagabonds
might be sold in much the same manner; but as the
buyer had no right to whip them, and was bound not to
starve them, the troublesome article was usually unsale-
:able. I was sorry to observe that the American was beginning
to lay aside his finest and most indisputable distinction — •
delicacy and considerateness towards women — in his treat
ment of workwomen. The poor creatures often had to
submit to impertinence, harshness, insolence, and famUI-
arity from those of whom they had to seek work and to
receive their miserable pay. In 1856 there were 20,000
women in New York, whose average earnings were not

156 Ten Years in the United States.
more than three dollars per week. A single labouring
man would pay about that amount for his board and
lodging. "The Woman's Rights" party say that if
women had the suffrage, all these and many other wrongs
would be righted. They demand for women the "rights
of man," which they truly Insist are not the rights of
males only. They demand the power of looking after
their own Interests, a vote, a place In the legislatures and
congress. This party is still a very small one. It and the
thorough Abolitionist party were of about equal size and
importance, and consisted extensively of the same persons.
Some ten or twelve years ago, when I first visited the
" Tabernacle," a large chapel then in Broadway, New York,
I heard women and women's-rigbts men advocating their
sacred cause — not lUoglcally, from the premise that all men
are by nature free and equal. I felt inclined to ask the fair
speakers what the better the Irish population was for all
their voting, and whether women were more reflective,
less excitable, less likely to become the tools of demagogues
than Celts ? But this folly will burn Itself Innocently
out; the other, an own sister, will burn itself out, and at
the same time consume the United States, wliich ought not
to have played with the fire.
The Abolitionist party, again, attributed this, with all
other Northern ills, mainly to the peculiar institution,
"the sum of all vlUauies," negro slavery In the South.
At this moment, since the seizure of the Confederate
envoys and the discovery that the South is not to be
conquered, they find that England is the source of all
their woes.
It is curious and sad to see how young and insolent

The Potter's Field. 157
New York follows exactly In the tracks of the old cities
of effete, tyrannized, priest-ridden Europe — to use the
language of young America ; sometimes even going ahead.
The despised pauper, most likely a foreigner, when his
spirit has gone to its final resting-place. Is probably carried
to the Potter's Field. At about the time of which I
have been speaking, an avenue — the streets running the
length of the strip of land on which the city Is built are
so called — was being extended and graded. It cut
through this Potter's Field, pursuing its straight course, and
tlie remains of human beings at various depths, and iu
every stage of decay, were ruthlessly dug out, exposed,
hacked about, and piled up out of the way ; reminding one
of the horrible London churchyard abominations. "It
seems hardly right to treat the bones of the poor paupers
In so careless a manner," said a newspaper, and then con
cluded, giving an opposition journal a dig in the ribs,
" The probability is that the Times people will be deeply
speculating in Potter's Field lots before long."
Adulterated food and drinks, unwholesome meat, milk
from horribly diseased cows, cheap sausages, " suffocated "
pork — all these and other artificial aggravations of the
miseries of poverty are In full operation to send the
unhappy poor to the Potter's Field.
The Germans form a very numerous and influential
part of the population of New York and of the Northern
and Western States generaUy. Among them are found all
classes, trades, professions : pretty fairly representing the
Inhabitants of Germany. They keep up their old national
habits, customs, amusements, associations, as tenaciously

158 Ten Years in the United States.
and more heartily than the Irish adhere to theirs. Their
lager-bier saloons, theatres, winter- gardens, summer-
gardens, " volk-gartens," abound. At some of their rural
resorts near the city they frequently have Immense "gather
ings, of ten, twenty, fifty, even reaching to a hundred
thousand people, at which they make themselves at home,
and fancy themselves again In the Fatherland ; while the few
American and other visitors feel like foreigners. They
regard Sunday, too, with no more respect than they do in
Germany; their saloons, theatres, and gardens, being in
full activity during the latter part of the day, greatly to
the scandal of the American proprieties. Of course they
have a vote In the affairs of the land of their adoption ;
and In their political tendencies there Is a strong tinge of
Red Republicanism and Socialism. They threw themselves
into the Black Republican party at Its formation, and did
much to hasten the separation of the North and South ; so
putting an end, with German vigour, to the degrading
two-facedness, misrepresentations, and Jesuitries with which
politicians had long been endeavouring to keep things
together. The Americans regard the Germans as coarse,
rude. Indelicate, low, and dirty in their habits, and so bent
on money-getting that for its sake they will live sordidly
and follow any calling or occupation, however vUe and
repulsive. The American skilled workmen hate them,
because they will work for any wages rather than lose
time and money; and to save money, or to suit his
smaller income, the German will live In a style much
lower and meaner than the American of the same class
and business will adopt while he can help It.
The negroes form a small but interesting portion of the

Negroes in tlie North. 159
population of the North. They are generally regarded as
nuisances, and by this time would have been pretty well
abated as such, had not their numbers been replenished by
runaways. The better sort of them are barbers, waiters,
porters, nurses, domestic servants ; the worst of them asso
ciate on terms of equality and amalgamation with the
whites in such localities as the Five Points. This last
district Is now pretty weU cleared out. It answered to the
old St. Giles' of London, and was an embryo Mexico. The
white population have nothing to do with the negroes,
except as inferiors. The Irish hate them worse than they
do the British. A respectable washerwoman would be
shunned and scorned by her own class were she to marry
a black miUIonnaire. Were she to Invite her old com
panions to tea in the Fifth Avenue, supposing a negro
could get a house there, they would consider themselves
insulted. In New York city the Rev, J. W, Pennington, a coloured
man, sued the Sixth- Avenue RaUway Company (one of the
several street railways, the carriages being drawn by horses)
for expelUng him from one of their railroad cars. " Were the
defendants, as common carriers of passengers, justified in
acting upon the rule by which they exclude coloured people
from all portions of their cars except the front platform, and
except certain cars in which they and the whites have equal
rights ? " That was the question. In charging the jury.
Judge Glosson stated that a common carrier had a right to
prescribe reasonable rules and regulations for the manage
ment of his business ; so that the first question was, were
the rules and regulations reasonable and proper under the
circumstances? After two hours' deliberation, the jury

160 Ten Years in the United States.
found for the Company. The Herald remarked that the
Northern people were particularly squeamish on this point ;
while all over the South It was a common thing to see
master or mistress and slave sitting in the same stage, with
out any nose being turned up at Pomp or Dinah.
In Boston a State law abolishing separate schools for
coloured persons was said to answer well for all parties.
Yet I have been told that the American and English mis
sionaries in the South Seas would not allow their children
In any way to associate with those of the natives. In some
States the negroes have a vote In Federal and other elec
tions. It was stated that a coloured man belonging to
Massachusetts came all the way home from California,
where he could not vote, to put In his ticket for " Fremont
and Freedom." In a town of slave-holding Louisiana
there was a precinct controlled by free negroes who had a
vote and gave it unanimously for Buchanan against " Fre
mont and Freedom."
When some real coloured minstrels were about to start
for Europe from New York, they applied for passports;
the Secretary of State quoted two or three decisions,
and decided that they were not citizens of the United
States, and so could not have passports as such, but that
the United States Government would give them aU proper
protection while abroad.
In the churches. South, the coloured people usuaUy
occupy one of the galleries ; In the theatres the full-blooded
negroes have generally a part of the gallery, while the
mulatto women, those who are understood to form part of
the social evil, have also a section of the gallery set apart
for them, into which a black would not be allowed to enter.

Feeling of the North towards Negroes. 161
The custom of the North In these matters is less settled
and uniform, but, on the whole, more exclusive than that
of the South. Practically the blacks have to keep clear
of their white fellow-citizens, or put up with whatever
disagreeable consequences may arise from getting Into too
close a proximity. A Northern free negro is more afraid
of a rowdy than a slave Is of his master. In Cincinnati,
I have been told, tbe coloured people have a theatre of
their own, and. In their turn, exclude white people from
all parts of the house except the galleries.
As to the general feeling In the North towards coloured
persons, there can be no mistake about It ; the negro is
regarded as an alien, an outcast, a pariah. For principle's
sake, for consistency's sake, and for buncombe purposes,
varying rights and privileges are conferred on him by
Northern laws and constitutions; but these, when they
conflict with popular feeling, become a dead letter. One
of the worst features at the commencement of the pre
sent struggle was the attempt by the Northern press and
people to make England believe that sympathy with the
negro race was one of the principal causes of the fierce
determination to conquer the South. But we shall pro
bably see a terrific reaction against those who have con
tinued to bring about recent events ; which the people
of New York and the whole masses of the North would,
at the period I am now discussing, have avoided, by
driving negroes and abolitionists together Into the western
deserts or Into the Atlantic, if necessary.
New York has its aristocracy: that Is, a vague, un
acknowledged, undefined number of persons, not yet
classified, but so called. There appear to be two circles
11

162 Ten Years in the United States.
(or, for auglit I know, three), which regard themselves
as the select and elevated few ; but public opinion is quite
unsettled as to the persons constituting the genuine social
cream : and, indeed, is very disrespectfully indifferent on
the subject. Occasionally the question Is treated of In the
newspapers ; and the alleged cream is declared to be mere
scum, or actual dregs, which in the ferment of New York
city life came to the surface, I have been informed that the
famous Fifth Avenue people, of whom travellers write as
the only city aristocracy, are merely a miscellaneous, rich,
vulgar, mushroom set. Some say that a few exclusive quiet
old " Knickerbocker " families, wealthy, cultivated, self-re
specting, form the real ilite. But this I know, that there Is no
recognizable class combining within and attracting to itself
wealth, talent, culture, and honourable success. In the
various walks of life; or, as a class, exercising a beneficial,
moral, and intellectual influence on the whole of the com
munity. There is no class the belonging to which Is a
tolerable guarantee, generally acknowledged by other
classes of the community, of one's being entitled to be called
emphatically a gentleman. In common parlance, all
native Americans regard themselves as gentlemen ; and
any one has almost. If not quite, a legal right to knock
you down for caUing him " no gentleman," however humble
his position.
Not long ago a miUionnaire, who had made his milUonby
the manufacture and sale of one of those patent medicines
of which such large quantities are consumed In America,
sold his business, sent aU his old worthless stock Into the
market, and bought one of the finest, newest, largest,
brown stone front houses in the Fifth Avenue. In fur-

American Working Classes. 163
nishing it, he spared no expense, giving a carte blanche to
the upholsterer, and requiring only that his establishment,
as to show, fashion, and costliness, should excite the envy
of. all his neighbours. When everything was finished
and the house was ready for occupation, he generously
threw It open to the public for three days ; Inviting all to
walk up and behold the splendour amidst which he, the
great successful patent-medicine man, was henceforth to
dwell. The native-born American working-classes — that Is, men
who work under employers In their respective businesses
for wages paid daily, weekly, or otherwise — are few in
number, and uninfluential Iu public affairs, city, State, or
Federal. This i^ the case throughout all the States. Yet
I believe no set of men — whether merchants, shopkeepers,
lawyers, clergy, politicians — will compare so advantageously
for America with the corresponding class In Europe. Were
I to speak of the working men as they deserve, I should be
thought to be exaggerating. The tone of intercourse between
Americans — however far one may be above or below the
other as to wealth, position, or education — enables all men
to maintain an Independent bearing and more self-respect
than Is possible In countries where employers too often speak
and behave to their workmen in a manner which they
know would be outrageous to an acknowledged equal.
Competition again Is somewhat reduced among skilled
artisans and mechanics, by the fact that the native popu
lation have a great preference for genteeler pursuits ; such
as clerkships, or callings affording free scope for enterprise
and speculation.
As to the " mob " in the United States, which we hear
11—2

164 Ten Years in the United States.
so much about in Europe, it exists principally in the
European mind ; our writers, and orators, and public, take
It for granted that there must be In that country a terrible
overwhelming mob, such as In England or France Is kept
down by want of arms and organization on its part, and by
the police and military on the part of the Government.
There is, in fact, nothing In the United States similar to
the repressed masses of Europe, of the large cities espe
cially; the corresponding portion of society, only to be
found in the principal towns and cities, is by no means
numerous or formidable. It has shown Itself now and
then in some strength, as In New York, In the Astor
House, or Forrest and Macready Riot, when it was put
down with a promptness and recklessness of life worthy of
the Russian Government ; a comparison with which Power
seems to be not displeasing to the Northern mind.
The fact is, no native American-born consents to look
upon himself as a poor man, as belonging to a class doomed
to labour and poverty. Every youth, however poor, in
the towns, at least, is quite confident that In a few years
he will be a man of considerable means. If not actually
Independent, The trying times of the panic of 1857 were
well calculated to develop the strength of the genuine mob.
It never became formidable, even in New York city, and
was composed principalfy — indeed almost exclusively — of
foreigners. The tyranny of numbers, almost unresisted
at times, is not exercised by the poor in the United States,
They appear and disappear as they are bidden by the
professional politicians.
In Europe the mob mainly consists of the unskilled
labourers, and of the poorest sort of somewhat skilled

Election-time in Neio York. 165
workmen, such as factory hands — the men whose only
capital is their muscle, and some little skill requiring little
training or education. Others may lead, or at times swell
their numbers, but as a general thing they are the
moneyless working-class as opposed to capitalists of all
grades. But In the United States these lowest kinds of
labour are very extensively left to the Irish, the Germans,
and negroes, and there are consequently not enough poor
labouring Americans to make a formidable mob. And
were the foreigners to get up a dangerous demonstration
the native American population would be united against
them, and the volunteer military companies would easily
preserve law and order; unless the classes higher in the
social and pecuniary scale were willing to see them violated,
as has been frequently the case.
One knows nothing of New York who has not seen It
at election time. One knows nothing of universal suffrage
who has not seen It In operation in New York. As exem
plifying the working of universal suffrage and the ballot in
New York, the following account is noteworthy. It should
be premised that the city Is divided permanently Into
wards. In which polling-places are appointed for the use
of the voters there residing. The election lasts only one
day. At this time there were about 90,000 voters in this
metropolis, of whom, in round numbers, one half were
foreign-born naturalized citizens.
Early in the morning (says the Tribune of November 5th, 1856),
several of the polls in the First Ward were taken possession of by
gangs of men armed with clubs, knives, and pistols, who used
every effort to prevent those of different politics from themselves
depositing their votes. A large number of persons applied to the

166 Ten Years in the United States.
Mayor, Chief of Police, and Eecorder, for a sufficient force of men
to be stationed at the polls to preserve order.
The Eecorder then sent to the Mayor and Chief of Police for
ten men to make the arrest. The Mayor refused giving him any,
but the Chief sent some down, and executed the warrants. By
direction of the Mayor the culprits were brought before him
instead of being taken before the Recorder. He, it is said, dis
charged them without bail. The Eecorder then went to the
Mayor, telling him that it was a misdemeanor to discharge
prisoners without bail. The Eecorder then applied to the Sheriff,
and a posse of men were sent down at noon. In the meantime,
however, fighting had been going on, the police amounting to
nothing, while a few stout Irishmen were flourishing their fists and
clubs, and having it all their own way.
In the Sixth Ward a great deal of confusion prevailed. At the
Fourth Poll District, the anti-Woodites, headed by Councilman
Kerrigan, and the Wood men under Pat Matthews, had a terrible
fight, which resulted in the defeat of the latter. At the Third
Poll District the Fremont ticket-stand was torn down, and the
ballots scattered. The police, it is said, would not interfere,
except to protect the Wood and Buchanan boxes.
The Wood Party at the Fourth Poll District, after being defeated
by the anti-Woodites, rallied, and proceeding to a stable near by,
where they had secreted pistols, axes, clubs, brickbats, &c., armed
themselves and re-attacked the enemy. A terrible conflict ensued,
during which fifteen or more pistol-shots were fired, and several
had their heads cut open with clubs and brickbats. Police Captain
Dowling was notified, and repaired to the place with a posse of
men, who in about half an hour quelled the disturbance.
Before the election each party prepares its own tickets,
printed on which Is a list of those for whom Its adherents
are to vote. Men stand about, with placards and tables,
ready to serve their party with these tickets, which are
to be put Into the ballot-boxes.

The Ballot in New York. 167
In many of the election districts, when the poUs closed, from
fifty to a hundred voters stood in line, waiting for an opportunity
to vote. This was not because they did not go to the polls early
enough, for scores of men stood waiting at those poUs all the day,
from immediately after sunrise tiU the polls closed. In numerous
cases ruffians stood at the polls, and when any one came up with a
ticket of the right stripe, he was by force thrust into the line near
the door, and so enabled to get in his vote. Sometimes the rear
of the line would remain stationary for half an hour, while dozens
of men who had votecl stood stUl in front, and let their friends
pass in. Most of the men thus prevented from voting were
Fremont men.
Considering all things, especially the great number of
Irish voters and the excitability of the native population,
it is surprising that there are not more violence and outrage
at a New York election. There is, however, quite violence
enough to satisfy those who would " Americanize our
institutions." Here is part of the Recorder's charge to
the grand jury : —
Within the present week our city has been the scene of out
rages at the poUs which arc humiliating to us as citizens, and dis
graceful to those having the power to check them. In the First
Ward of this city, and almost within hearing of the office of the
Mayor and Chief of the Police, from the opening to the closing of
the polls, there was one constant scene of riot and bloodshed.
Eespectable citizens, who went peaceably to the polls to deposit
their votes, were knocked down and dragged through the streets
without any interference on the part of the police to prevent the
outrages. Hundreds were driven from the polls by an organized
band of desperadoes, who openly refused to allow the electors to
deposit a vote, unless it contained the name of a certain candidate.
I have made these remarks that you may the better appreciate
the necessity of prompt action on your part in certain cases wliich
will be presented for your consideration. I wiU here add, that a

168 Ten Years in the United States.
large number of tlie police force was withdrawn from the First Ward
by order of the Mayor of our city, and that a large number of the
police force was on furlough on the day of election; and were
engaged in advancing the interests of certain candidates, instead
of being engaged in keeping the peace at the polls.
Since the election I have issued warrants for the arrest of
several policemen who, from the evidence before me, stood idly by
without interfering, and saw citizens brutally assaulted ; and what
is very remarkable, though blood ran freely in many wards in the
city, and though men now lie at the point of death from the
wounds they received on the day of election, scarce one of the
offenders against the law had been arrested by any of the police.
Bribery and Intimidation assume different forms in New
York from what we have had revealed in England. The
following is an extract from a circular Issued by the New
York Police Commissioner : — ¦
To tlie Members of the Police Department of the City of
New York.
It is rumoured that you will receive instructions to aid, on the
4th of November next, in the re-election of Fernando Wood to
the office of Mayor. The unprecedented number of your force
that have been on furlough for the last month, and that are now
on furlough, and the known fact that their time has been employed
in electioneering for Mr. Wood, and that they have been assessed,
irrespective of party, to pay tlie election expenses of Mr. Wood in
this campaign, induces the pubHc to believe that an attempt will
be made to coerce the department into such a course.
" Colonization " Is practised to remove surplus voters to
places M'here they will be more useful. A leading journal
asserted that 1,400 "colonists" were Imported Into one
district of the State to secure the return of the demo
cratic candidate. On one occasion, I believe, the leaders

" Colonizing " Voters. 169
of one of the political parties In New York city thus
assisted their political brethren in Philadelphia with some
spare voters or " colonists."
The " District- Attorney to the Electors, &c. of the City
of New York " Issued a circular which contained this
warning : —
The undersigned has also received information that members of
a regularly organized body of men contemplate voting as many
times as possible at the approaching election in this city, in
Brooklyn and Jersey City. This information, though not as yet
of a legal character sufficient to allow the proper authorities to
proceed against any overt act, is regarded by the District-
Attorney as deserving the m-gent attention of all good citizens in
every party, that they may watch carefuUy the polls, and as espe
cially commanding the regard of aU inspectors in the exercise of
great circumspection towards voters, for it is a positive duty of
inspectors to challenge suspicious voters, without waiting for the
bystanders to interfere.
This city contains 137 polling-places ; a body of 250 men, by
each voting several times among these precincts, can alarmingly
swell the aggregate vote of the city, and the election districts
being large, and some of them six or eight miles distant from
others, and many containing large numbers of tenement-houses,
swarming with population, this process of double voting (or
" travelling," as the slang phrase runs), is as easy at a thronged
poU, surrounded by confusion and bustle, as its detection is diffi
cult, unless extraordinary vigilance be exerted by electors and in
spectors. In many election districts the inspectors (in conse
quence of a dominant party being so strong as to be able to divide
itself into cliques, and run various tickets with various inspectors
upon them) are of the same political affinity. While, therefore, in
some precincts, the inspectors, it is hoped, will scrutinize the
electors, in others it is respectfully submitted that the electors
watch the inspectors.

170 Ten Years in the United States.
An immense Impetus is given to a triumphant majority
by the fact that in New York City and State, and some
other parts of the country, the judges are elected by the
people at these elections. We must not entertain the
common Idea that the people of the United States have
freely, voluntarily, thinklngly, made all their laws, and
formed their Federal constitution and respective State
constitutions. Circumstances have been their master, just
as In Europe. Perhaps of late years a regard for the
common good of a State, or of the Union, has been as
rarely as in Europe the motive power of any public
measure. Even numerical majorities, to whom many
seem to have transferred the right divine, have often
had to submit to minorities which have had more skilful
generals, or "wire-workers," as they are called. The
tendency of a democracy Is, of course, to grasp all
possible power. It argues, that if it can appoint the
highest officers and servants, it can surely appoint all
subordinates. Theoretically fair, open, and simple, elections are really
roundabout, underhanded, complicated affairs, in all very
large constituencies, and in many small ones. Judge
Whiting, one of the candidates for the office of Mayor
at this election, made the following remarks on this
subject : —
It is supposed that no man can present himself to the people
for their suffrages except through an organized and well-regulated
convention. The people meet together in their " primary election,"
as it is termed, and at those elections they make a selection of a
representative to attend the general convention for particular
nominations. And how is the selection made, and by whom is it

Managing an Election. 171
made ? Is it made by you, or is it made by the idle, the vicious,
and the profligate ? Who represents you in the convention ?
Men selected beforehand for the purpose of nominating a parti
cular candidate, and that candidate is selected owing to his pecu
liar qualifications to subserve their interests if elected. These
gentlemen meet in convention, and he who pays most as a candi
date for public suffrages receives the nomination. Why, it is
notorious that years ago Tammany Hall sold herself to make a
Mayor. Six thousand dollars went into the coffers of the party
organization, upon a pledge that a particular gentleman should be
nominated for the office ; so that the office was set up for sale.
Instead of the selection being made on the ground of qualification,
it was made upon the length of the pocket. And how is it now ?
Is there a man here who believes that he, with money, could not
purchase a nomination from a regular organized party, if he
saw fit ?
The " primary " meetings of the people, and the appoint
ment by them of representatives to a convention, which
convention nominates the candidates for the various offices,
are mere party arrangements.
The following are the reflections after the election of an
organ of the party that was beaten : —
With an the inequalities, the corruptions, and the family
influences of the English system, we cannot deny that the method
of choosing their representatives is infinitely preferable to our
own manner of doing the same thing by secret and irresponsible
managers. The people here are informed by an advertisement in
the papers that a man has been nominated to represent them in
Congress, whose name even they never before heard, and of whose
character and principles they are equally ignorant. They know
nothing, even, of the men who nominated him ; their wishes were
never consulted, and they vote for him, by secret ballot, blindly.
The whole process is conducted in the dark, and at last, when the
result is announced, there are whispers, and even open charges,

172 Ten Years in the United States.
and more than suspicions, that the election was carried by some
unscrupulous rascal depositing a handful of ballots in one of the
boxes ; and it is not known but that hundreds of men have put in
votes who had no legal right to exercise the privilege.
However, about this time (October, 1857) a remedy for
ballot-stuffing was discovered: a glass ballot-box was
Invented and approved of, by which purity of election
was to be ensured.
The following anecdote may serve to illustrate the way
in which the merest trifles may determine the grandest
results. Two neighbours, both of the old Federal school of
politics, who had lived in the city of Providence, chanced
to quarrel. One was the owner of a pig that had an irre
sistible inclination to Invade the garden of the next neigh
bour. The pig was surprised iu the act of rooting up
some very valuable bulbous roots ; the owner of the garden
put a pitchfork Into his side, and killed him. At the
coming election, he who killed the pig was a candidate
for a seat in the legislature, and failed by one vote — the
vote of his Incensed neighbour. At the election of a
senator, the Democratic or anti-Federal candidate was
elected by one vote, and when the question of war with
England in 1812 was before the senate, war was declared
by a democratic majority of one — so that, but for this
pig, we should have been probably saved from that war.
New York city Is justly entitled to be called a great
city : not merely because of the number of people who live
in It, for that is a trifling matter, although too frequent a
subject of glorification; and not only on account of Its
enterprise and pre-eminence in commerce, and the liber
ality and even generosity of its institutions, based upon

Glories of New York. 173
and animated by the same qualities in Its citizens ; but also
because it has been the theatre of many great and worthy
efforts and triumphs of the human intellect, the birth
place of beneficent discoveries, and the home of many
noble men. The New Yorkers are justly proud of their
city, and delight to recount its associations with distin
guished men and grand discoveries.
The tower of an old Dutch church — once used as the
post-office — was Benjamin Franklin's first observatory In
making his electrical experiments. An American Tory,
afterwards Count Rumford, pursued In this city his
important experiments on artificial light and heat. A New
York lawyer laid down the laws of the English language
in that famous code, Lindley Murray's grammar : and only
lately the authorities have, with equal bad taste and judg
ment, levelled an eminence on the upper part of the city
called after him (indeed, from having been his country
estate) Murray HIU, The " American Dictionary of the
English Language," now the most complete and the highest
authority, was the gigantic work of a New York editor,
Noah Webster, You are told that, on a pond in this
city, John Fitch tried the first experiment in using steam-
power to turn a paddle-wheel ; and on the Hudson River
a New Yorker, Robert Fulton, made the first successful
voyage by steam ; that the Savannah, the first vessel which
crossed the Atlantic, or any ocean or sea, by the aid of
steam, was built, equipped, officered, manned, and owned
in the city of New York, and made the voyage to Liver
pool in 1819, The electro-magnetic telegraph Is claimed
as the Invention of a New Yorker, S, F. Breeze Morse ;
the first instrument demonstrating the practicability of

174 Ten Years in the United States.
that means of transmitting intelligence having been put
together and worked in the University of the city of New
York. In the same buUding, In 1845, Samuel Colt, the
revolver man, then of this same city, is stated to have
planned the first submarine telegraph, and laid it across
the bottom of the arm of the sea called the East River,
the city bounding on the east. Again, still in the same
University, the professor of chemistry is said to have
taken the first daguerreotype likeness of the human face
and figure. New York claims to be the first city In the
world of which a census was taken; which was done in
1614. And you are told that long before the London
Crystal Palace was erected In Hyde Park, a considerable
edifice of glass and iron stood in the centre of the business
part of New York.
They also boast that the Mayor of New York is
beUeved to have under his jurisdiction more persons
than are under any similar officer In the world; that no
other city has so great a revenue and expenditure, or
so many strangers, travellers, and visitors within Its limits
— partly because It Is the great focus of immigration. It
is the oldest chartered city in the New World they say ; so
long ago as 1650 It was endowed with the privileges of a
free city by the Government of the United States of the
Netherlands; and it Is the oldest settlement made by
Europeans within the original thirteen United States.
St. John's Park, now In the centre of the city, contains,
it is said, a greater variety of trees than Is to be found on
any other spot of ground of equal extent in the known
world, — that extent, I should guess, being about five
acres. As to the truth of these claims to respect I do not

Political Decadence. 175
vouch, I merely repeat the assertions I have seen or
heard. The facts given In this chapter wIU, I think, assist the
reader towards an understanding of the poUtical destruction
which has overtaken the United States. When the politics of
the greatest city In the Union had become so debased and
corrupt, when the control of public affairs had fallen Into
such hands — a similar state of things prevailing every
where generally in proportion to the density of the popu
lation — how could the Government of the Union be a
strong and beneficent Government? What permanent
good could distant States like Virginia, Florida, Louisiana,
derive from being under the Influence of legislative power
wielded by reckless, irresponsible, corrupt politicians, whose
only Interest in the country was to get all they could by
any means out of its taxes and offices ?
It would be difficult to contrive a system better calcu
lated to degrade a country — to keep down worthy, able,
and responsible men. By It any keeper of a rum-hole,
amidst the most degraded parts of the city, had more
influence than any hundred of respectable mechanics, and
more than an extensive merchant or large manufacturer.
How such things grew up, how men of all classes engaged In
honest occupations submitted to It, It Is not easy to explain
to a foreigner, especially with that brevity which is here
necessary. The very prosperity and scope of the country
has had much to do with it; and again great numbers of
respectable men have been always living in hopes of coining
in directly or indirectly for a share of " the spoils : " In the
shape of some employment, contract, or office. In this way
the corruption spread imperceptibly, but deeply and widely ;

176 Ten Years in the United States.
the gambling spirit of human nature was appealed to ; men
put up with the general robbery and wrong, hoping some
day to be repaid by a share or prize In the political lottery.
And yet this system will retain numerous admirers In this
and other countries, because It goes under the name of
" Popular Sovereignty."

177

CHAPTER XI.
United States Anglophohia — Inquiry as to whence it arises — Another
Instance of the Majority being ruled by a Minority iu the American
Democracy.
Englishmen are puzzled to understand the seeming Anglo
phobia which frequently manifests Itself in the United
States. What have we said — what have we done — how
have we wronged them — that the "American," as he is
caUed, should keep himself In a constant ill-humour
towards us, and be always ready to go to war with this
country ?
Before endeavouring to explain this matter, I must beg
the reader to consider the difficulty of the undertaking.
Consider what a strange, contradictory, unreliable, whim
sical being each individual man of us Is ; how Ill-will and
good-will, meanness and generosity, envy and heroism,
love and jealousy, sense and stupidity, genius and Insanity,
by turns contend within or characterize the same mind ;
making rational man a most unreliable and unreasonable
being : one thing to-day, another to-morrow ; making,
under different, and sometimes under similar, circum
stances, the most opposite manifestations.
Just as hard to explain, just as complicated, are the
motives, and actions, and feelings, of a vast number of
12

178 Ten Years in ihe United States.
people, forming one body, one nation. We In England
have for some years been free from any great excite
ment, and have felt no great change in our circumstances,
affecting us personally and at home'; and we forget what
were our own doings In more stormy times. But
the Institutions, habits, and state of civilization of the
United States people keep them constantly in a condition
of greater mental activity of a pecuUar kind — cause the
public mind to be affected in a prevailing way, and to be
interested in any new subject more simultaneously. Their
greater gregariousness, the telegraph, public meetings, and
the teeming universal press, all combine with their more
irritable and nervous temperament, to keep them In a
state of mutually co-operative excitement, so to speak.
Suppose an Englishman of some distinction, after having
paid a brief visit to the United States, writes a book, as is
generally the case ; In that book there Is, say, one solitary
paragraph offensive to the national vanity. The book is
sold at perhaps twenty-five cents; a copy of It is sent
to a great number of the infinity of newspapers ; some
of them find and publish this unfortunate paragraph, and
within a few days It goes the round of the press, is read
by everybody in every village, and produces an amount
of bad feeling, ill-natured talk, and recrimination, which
we In this country can hardly realize. Here such a
paragraph would perhaps take ten times as long to circu
late, it would never be noticed very generally, and would
be forgotten by one person before another met with it.
There its effects are increased a thousandfold by its slmul-
taneousness and universality.
Again, this tendency of any one fact or feeling to take

American Thirst for Neivs. 179
possession for a time of the public mind is Increased by
the United States people having more time on their hands,
and being fonder of talk and gossip, than the English.
" What's going on ? What's the news ? " Everybody must
know as soon as possible. The larger the community, the
more intense and active is this inquiring disposition. In
the country parts the people occupy themselves very much
with neighbourhood concerns ; In the towns they are more
of a political turn; In New York everybody, from the
shoeblack upward, is aware of the last remarkable, myste
rious murder, and of the latest European complications,
of which information has been brought by the Persia,
the Atlantic, or any other ocean steamer. The Interest
the New Yorker took at one time in ocean steamers was
surprising to a Londoner, just as much so as the interest
many Englishmen take In races and race-horses is to one
who don't care about them.
Mr. Russell very correctly compared the Yankee's thirst
for news to dram-drinking. You soon get into the habit
— I know I did myself — the habit, I mean, of taking an
eager Interest in the news. You know the paper Ues
through thick and thin ; you know the telegraph lies ;
you know you can't get the truth ; and yet you want to
hear the news. You must know what Is said, and thought
about, and talked about. To-morrow will bring contra
dictions and more lies: that you and everybody know.
But, we must have something to go upon ; we must join
in the crowd ; we are gregarious animals ; we must take
part in the strange fun and excitement ; and if there are
two sides, we must take one. No time to think, no use
in trying to inquire, to reason impartially, to wait for
12—2

180 Ten Years in the United States.
evidence and certainty. This Is the age of progress ; the
steam's up—" AU aboard ! " — go-ahead— says young New
York, delighting In hurry and excitement.
Nature, Indeed, will Insist upon prudence and reflection,
and here It is that the Southerner has the advantage ; for
the Northern farmer is generally too hard-worked to think
very deeply, apart from his own affairs. But as to the
American ahti-English feeling, again — to understand what
It amounts to and emanates from — we must analyse the
population of the United States ; for each of its elements
— the genuine New Englander, the Western people, the
citizens of the South, the Germans, the Irish, and the
negroes — has a public opinion, an esprit de corps of Its
own, to a great extent Independent of, and in some im
portant matters clashing with, that of the other elements
or portions of the popular mass.
The native-born American is much more sensitive, more
Identified with and Interested In public affairs, more under
the Influence of the national vanity and pride, than au
Englishman. No European, not even a Frenchman,
worries himself so much about his country's fame and
greatness as does a citizen of the United States : It is as
if each individual had sacrificed a large portion of his
own Independence to establish that of his country, and
had never got it back again. Were a foreigner to say to
an Englishman, " I think your British constitution, your
monarchy. Is an astonishing absurdity, " he would be
merely answered with a good-humoured, self-satisfied
smile, and " Do you think so ? " or perhaps further,
" Well, we get along with It as well as our neighbours."
But were a foreigner to say to a lively New Yorker, or

Cause of American Sensitiveness. 181
even to a " solid man of Boston," " Sir, your institutions
ireally seem to me, I must say, ridiculous ; " I know not
what would be the consequences — and I would not advise
any one to try to find out experimentally.
This arises from the fact that the citizen of a democracy,
thinking and talking a great deal about public matters
himself, and constantly among others In the same habit,
feels himself always In public; what he says Is of some
interest and importance, as he is one of a party, bound
to stand by certain men, measures, and principles ; hence
he weighs his words, expresses himself cautiously before
people, and is somewhat more or less of a public man.
Although he never studied a political principle, he is
interested in and sticks to his party; and in the same
manner his Americanism, his nationality, his government,
occupies his mind to an extent of wliich the Englishman
has no notion. The American cannot understand the com
parative coolness and indifference of Englishmen generally
on political and national affairs, and cannot help attaching
an importance to casual expressions which the speaker
never Intended.
For the above reasons, and also because men are held
to a more serious personal responsibility for their remarks,
the American Is much more careful and guarded In his
talk than an Englishman. It Is a common weakness of
our nature that we can never sufficiently bear in mind
and allow for differences of feeling, education, and cha
racter. Each of us makes himself the standard by which
to judge others. How long It often takes for two or three
individuals In daily intercourse to understand each other !
With two nations, both (though in somewhat different

182 Ten Years in the United States.
ways) equally proud, jealous, and opinionated. It is of
course an Infinitely more difficult matter : so very difficult
that one may be excused for sometimes thinking that the
Yankee will never come to an entente cordiale vdth the
Englishman until the Uon lies down in peace with the
lamb. This greater sensitiveness and activity of national and
Individual self-esteem Is pretty common. It may be said, to
the native whites, both North and South : it Is of course
diminished in the Southerner by his more reflective,
leisurely, rural Ufe. And here I may mention one im
portant feature In Southern society arising from their
"pecuUar institution." A man living amidst his own slaves;
his comfort, his wealth, his general welfare depending
entirely on them — they, too, being a careless, lazy, whimsi
cal sort of human being, requiring much indulgence and
humouring — is compelled to think, to control his temper, to
study human nature in general, and that of his " people " In
particular, to an extent of wliich people in what may be
called the free-negro States have no experience. The more
he appeals to severity, the more he uses or orders the
cowhide, the more uncomfortable be makes his o^vn life ;
besides finding that at last It don't pay, and getting himself
a disagreeable reputation among his neighbours. Strange
as it may seem, negro-slavery thus acts on the Southerner
as a mental training analogous to that of military dis
cipline. The source of what anti-British feeling exists in the
South Is their idea that it is the aim of the British
Government, and still more of British abolitionists, to
meddle surreptitiously with their Internal affairs — a notion

Amencan Feelings toicards England. 183
encouraged on some slight grounds by some of the
Southern papers, but, so far as I have been able to learn,
without any valid grounds, although I cannot say without
any reason whatever. The opprobrium almost Invariably
heaped upon their system of slavery, the odious and dis
paraging comparisons made between them and the North
by English travellers, must also have tended to create a
soreness, and an aversion from the nation with whom they
feel they are In every respect most closely connected, and
by their leading characteristics and by self-interest natu
rally alUed. My business at one time obliged me to look
through newspapers and publications, from all parts of
the United States, perhaps twenty or thirty a week, and
I feel justified in saying that the Southern papers very
rarely contained unfair or disparaging remarks about
England. It Is on the Northern people that the writings of their
English critics and visitors have produced the greatest
effect. It Is I fear very generally a part of the New Eng-
lander's earliest teachings at home, even more than at
school (which last would not so much matter), that England
is afraid and jealous of " American " power and pros
perity. It cannot but be that this should be their feel
ing; for the young Yankee especiaUy looks upon the
whole of North America as ultimately to become his and
his country's, by manifest destiny, as soon as the popula
tion of the States reaches a sufficient number. Canada,
Mexico, Cuba, must raise the Stars and Stripes, and
the whole world tremble under the fierce glance of the
mighty American eagle ; they must obey the mandates
and not impede the progress of the empire of the

184 Ten Years in the United States.
United States : as it is written, and quoted thousands of
times — Westward the Star of Empire tabes its way.
And, true enough. It has already evidently taken Its way
considerably west of New York and Boston.
We must remember, too, that many of the sons and
daughters of those who lived and suffered in the war of
independence are stIU living, and many a story is told
of British outrages then Inflicted. Of the war of 1812,
also, many bitter and aggravating stories are told, stirring
youthful patriotism and indignation iu a way which the
Englishman or Scotchman can hardly realize ; It being so
many generations ago since the horrors of war have been
understood by experience in these islands. These tradi
tions, highly coloured, listened to in childhood, taught by
beloved teachers, and seldom examined into, have an
immense and unsuspected influence on the conduct of the
grown man.
I have alluded to the more active self-esteem of the
citizen of the Union. This feeling Is greatly encouraged
by the principle or theory In which every young American
is educated — that men are all by nature equal; that all
have equal rights ; that one man is as good as another ;
that all may, and should, aspire to the highest dignity,
success, and distinction. While in all these views there Is
a certain degree of truth and a wholesome stimulus, they
are also apt to be misunderstood, and to create excessive
and unhealthy ambition. And when, after years of toil
and struggling, the American finds himself still poor, un
important, and condemned to hard labour for the term of
his natural life, whUe others, no better — perhaps, not so

Ambition and Self-esteem of the Yankees. 185
good, so far as their conduct goes, as himself — are enjoying
ease and wealth, and moving In a sphere of life far above
him, it seems to him -wTong and hard; and, though he
don't say much about It, he feels and thinks the more.
Poverty Is much more galling to such a man than it Is to
the European, who Is not brought up with such high
notions. This universal ambition, these great expecta
tions, are, with other influences, at the bottom of that
deficiency of cheerfulness and gaiety, that Incapacity for
occasional careless enjoyment of life which belong to the
genuine Puritan Yankee character.
This exaggerated feeling of self-esteem, and the state
of mind it produces, cannot be vented on friends and
neighbours with impunity, and Is, therefore, apt to be in
dulged more safely In some other direction ; especially in
party and national feeling. The same man whom shame,
pride, prudence, or self-respect, would restrain from dis
playing any uneasy sense of his inferior social position
with regard to his neighbours, will find a sort of con
solation and relief In denouncing bitterly some real or
imaginary interference, or outrage, or insolence on the
part of the British.
The Southern slaveholder, too, comes In for a share
of this lU-feeluig. The anxious, economical, persevering
farmer of New England, still in advanced life anxiously
tolling, and perhaps belonging to a poUtical party opposed
and defeated mainly by the South, regards with no friendly
eye the liberal, careless, high-spirited Southerner, so dif
ferent from himself In disposition, and a sort of aristocrat
born to good luck. With that inconsistency common in our
poor weak human nature, the same dyspeptic, toil-worn

186 Ten Years in the United States.
Yankee who loathes the outcast free black — an "exotic"
and " anomaly," as the present United States' Secretary
of State calls the negro — works himself up into a state of
virtuous indignation against the Southerner ; who at least
tolerates and protects the negro, as a servant, though not
as an equal.
I should be sorry to exaggerate the extent of this
diseased mental condition ; to define It very exactly is, of
course, impossible. Certainly there are very many in
New England, as elsewhere, who have a liberal and intel
ligent appreciation of the practical advantages of British.
institutions, and of the good points of the British character.
Among all people such feelings vary greatly with times,
places, and occurrences; and more so with the earnest,
eager, over-strained and excitable Yankee than with most
people. As to the Germans, who form so large and influential
a portion of the United States population, I need hardly
say that there is very little anti-British prejudice among
them. There Is a strong tinge of red-republicanism among
them : they got up a truly magnificent torch-light pro
cession In honour of the deluded Orslnl, filling the Broad
way with flame, and smoke, and banners, and Teutonic
cheers. They naturally took to black repubUcanIsm ; but
they are a healthy portion of the United States population
— a hard-working, money-making people, fond of social
enjoyment, of healthy amusements, and of lager-beer.
Their historical recollections would rather incline them
to England ; and they perceive (though they trouble
themselves little about such things), that they and the
British are more alike in character than either are to the

American Tact and Considerateness. 187
American : who also finds In both the same faults — rude
ness and excessive bluntness.
In ordinary intercom'se with people, in social life or in
business, the American has more tact and considerateness
In manner, and in expressing himself, than Englishmen
in general. A visitor will be at first Inclined to dispute
this fact ; but the undeniably greater respect paid to
women, and the free and straightforward, unceremonious
manner In which superiors and Inferiors — a mistress and
her housemaid, an overlooker and his labourers, for
Jnstance — address each other, are proofs enough of what
is here said. The various classes know and keep to their
imderstood places as carefuUy as they do here, but none
expect ft-om others such a show of deference as is very
common in. England.
But the reader will ask. What constitues this strong
anti-British feeUng which every now and then we read
about, and have to soothe and appease ? For we have not
come to any very bitter or Irrational animosity, such as
would be sufficient to plunge the two countries Into a
mutual wanton war. I have already, I think, clearly shown
the reader that this United States democracy — as It may
be called, and has come to be m reality ; though wrong
fully, since legally each State is a democratic-constitutional
government, a very different thing — I have shown that
this so-called democracy is not practically governed by
the majority. Mere numbers form a very poor founda
tion for government, which should, be based upon worth
and ability ; still, any large number of Anglo-Saxon men
wiU be able, under most circumstances, to get along with
a government by majority. But the United States have

188 Ten Years in the United States.
been In a very great measure governed by minorities.
I have shown elsewhere how two, three, or more con
tending parties will bid against each other, higher and
higher, for the vote of some small party that keeps Itself
aloof, aiming at some one object, for which it sacrifices all
other considerations. At each election the small party
thus in the market sells Its vote to those who will best
put or most favour its views, and so gradually the vast
majority are drawn into a policy which, at the outset, they
had not the least intention of permitting.
It Is chiefly the Irish that both Great Britain and the .
United States have to thank for the occasional threaten-
ings of war which arise between the two countries. " War
with England," " the destruction of British power," " the
independence of Ireland " — these are the ceaseless cries of
— I was about to say — the American Irish ; but it would,
I beUeve, be unjust and untrue, as to the Irish of Canada :
this shows the impropriety of using the word America for
United States.
To their hatred of England the Irish of the United
States are ever ready to sacrifice all other political con
siderations. The party that has their votes, and the party
that wants their votes, must do nothing to thwart, and
are expected frequently to do a good deal to humour, this
cherished antipathy. Supposing a difficulty were at this
moment to arise with the British Government, the Irish, at
all hazards — without any regard to the merits of the case,
or to the Interests of the United States — would no doubt
shout for war ; and nothing but the most glaring necessity
of self-preservation would give the other parties In the
country courage enough to withstand their influence — to

Irish Hatred of England. 189
resist the temptation of getting their votes by going In
favour of war. Every editor of an organ of the party
having the Irish vote, must constantly bear In mind the
necessity of pleasing and conciliating them; while the party
that has not the Irish vote, hopes to get It, and acts so
as to deserve It at some future time. Hence, whatever
bad feeling or jealousy exists in the native American mind,
and which ought to have died out by this time, is con
stantly kept alive. Very Uttle is written or said in public
that can go towards producing more amiable and pleasant
feelings ; and every cause of offence, real or Imaginary,
is kept In mind and made the most of. Thus the expa
triated sons of Erin avenge across the Atlantic their
country's wrongs, past and present, actual or supposed,
upon the Saxon: upon the English Saxon, and also upon
him of the United States. All this Is clearly enough
understood by the citizens in general of the Union. It
was really or ostensibly to counteract this foreign in
fluence (as It really Is) that the Know-Nothing secret
party was organized ; but it was infected with the pre
vailing political corruption, and soon died. It may be
asked, how is It possible that a high-spirited people like
the Americans, and a people so shrewd, united, and deter
mined as the Germans (for we must regard the United
States, for many purposes, as consisting of several distinct
peoples, of which sometimes one, sometimes another,
directs national movements) — It may be asked, how two
such races can submit to a state of things so 'humiliating ?
That, again, is a question not very easy to answer satis
factorily and briefly.
The Irish have done a good deal of hard work for the

190 Ten Years in the United States.
country; they have very materially aided Its extraordi
nary development, and they please to pay themselves In
this way: they, or their leaders. That those leaders
should hate England Is, perhaps, natural ; but how they —
able, educated, and InteUigent as some of them are— can
reconcile It to their consciences not to exert their power
over their countrymen and co-religionists to secure for
them, and to Induce them to adopt, a better mode of living,
and better places and circumstances to live in, than they
enjoy in their squalid and crowded neighbourhoods in the
cities of America, I am at a loss to guess.
As to altering this state of things, it must be understood
that the actual Government of the United States, whether
In the hands of a majority or minority, whether controlled
by abolitionists or by slave- owners — by speculators (of
whom we must find room to say something), or by
foreigners, or what not — Is at least as powerful as that
of Britain or Russia. The system of things, the circum
stances of the country, take their own course, and are not
easily altered ; especially by the thinking, the moral, the
responsible portion of the community : they who. If not the
least numerous, are the least powerful, because totally unor
ganized, aud taking a very secondary part in the existing
political organizations. The professional politicians, the
leaders of each party or faction, are well organized ; and
this nation within the nation, that we have been just
considering, Is weU drilled and disciplined, obeys Its leaders
without quesllon, and, surrounded by a race that has Uttle
liking for them, is united by the ties of kindred, party,
country, and religion.
Truly, the well-disposed portion of the people of the

Perils of the United States. 191
United States are entitled to the sympathy of all humane
people ; and unless that portion find some means of uniting
against the foolish, reckless, and rascally portion. It Is
hard to say what Is to become of them. It Is, perhaps,
possible that shame and wretchedness, divisions and wars,
and ruin of every kind, may so degrade and barbarize the
country, that negroes, Indians, and whites, may at last
amalgamate, and New York become another Mexico. If
one knew how to assist a race as yet so self-confident and
proud, they would be entitled to assistance. One benefit
at least we can do them, and ourselves, and the world at
large; In doing which, too, an end would most speedily
be put to the animosity of which we have been tracing the
origin In this chapter : and that is to tell them the truth —
the rough, unsophisticated trutL

192 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER XIL
North and South — The national Foible — Distinctions between the Slave
holder and Yankee — Their Types — Public Life — Publicity — ^Display —
Modes of Life — " Grass Widow's " Eevenge — Failure of Democracy —
" Mason and Dixon's Line."
The great weakness of the native-born people of the
United States Is self-glorification — a very dangerous weak
ness. A Uttle — even a good deal — of partiality and pre
judice for one's own country is excusable, is even amiable ;
just as one respects a mother all the more for thinking her
poor Uttle commonplace darling the sweetest, most inter
esting Uttle creature that ever was. But there's reason
in all things. Many in the Northern States were very
fond of drawing comparisons between the condition and
progress of the North and South ; and It will, perhaps.
Interest the reader to compare the leading features of the
two sections now at war.
The greatest distinction between the Northern and South
ern States of the Union was the tendency of the popula
tion of the former to the towns and cities, from the meagre-
ness and unattractlveness of life In the country. And vet
it is a beautiful country In many parts — in most parts of
New England. GeneraUy speaking, the North, as to
healthiness and scenery, has considerably the advantage ;
and yet the natives don't seem to enjoy rural life : they

The Young Men of the North. 193
neither talk nor look as if they did ; and those are con
sidered, and consider themselves, fortunate, who abandon
it to go and push their fortunes In town. The training of
the young, and the notions instilled into them, partly account
for this. The quietness and slow profits of farming are
not very tempting to a youth who has been brought up to
beUeve that he Is as good as anybody else, and that there
is no reason why he should not be a miUionnaire or a
President, if he only struggles hard enough : a very un
healthy and irrational, though very popular mode of
exciting youth to Improve themselves — seeing that there is
only room for a very few at the top of the tree.
Arrived in town, the young American looks out for
something light and genteel, abandoning hard and dirty
work to foreigners. While the West has been calling
for labourers, workmen, and agriculturists of all grades,
there have been large numbers of superfluous young men
hanging about in the large eastern cities, competing for
poorly paid employment, principally as " clerks," as shop
men are called.
The universality of education — of ability to read, and
write, and figure a Uttle — accounts partly for this tendency.
A youth who has been to school, and who has read of the
successful struggles of genius with poverty, feels that he
is lowering himself, and throwing away his chances of
rising In society, by submitting to hard, long-continued
physical labour; especially In a cUmate like that of the
Northern States, where the summer heat and winter cold
are so exhausting to the system, that after the ordinary
ten hours' work, and the time spent in rest and meals,
and getting to and from the place of business, the work-
13

194 Ten Years in the United States.
man has neither leisure nor inclination for Intellectual
culture by study of any kind. CUmate has not yet had
time to teU on the population of the United States In
general, recruited as it has incessantly been by immigrants
from Europe; but by analyzing the population, and ob
serving that portion of It which has been longest and
most exposed to the dry land-air, the hot summers, and
long, cold winters, and great and sudden meteorological
changes of the North, we may see some of the combined
effects of the climate and his mode of life and general
circumstances on the man of the United States. That
portion Is the farming population, of Yankee descent.
The type of this class Is a rather tall, bony, sinewy,
strong man, with very little fat ; with none of the EngUsh
ruddiness of complexion ; with a good, full, well-formed
head, and a brain above the English average ; active, perse
vering, and full of energy — not a lazy bone m his body;
well marked. Intelligent, decided features, highly expres
sive of a cautious, secretive, determined character; by
no means a handsome man, but frequently fine-looking
in youth. There Is too often about him a look of being
overworked both In mind and body, and a want of ease,
content, and cheerfulness. His mind is always at work,
engaged seriously on something useful or profitable ; and
he wears himself out with unceasing anxious thought
about gaining and saving : not avariciously, but to provide
for the future, and to raise himself and his family in the
social scale. The most serious faults in his character are
too much thought of his own personal independence and
dignity, too much jealousy of any superiority, and an
unduly excited pride and ambition ; to which he sacrifices

Men of the North and the South. 195
that little occasional indulgence in careless, hearty, social
enjoyment, which Is necessary to health of mind and
body. This is, I think, a fair description of the predominant
race In the eastern and northern States, and In many
parts of the west. The Irish, indeed, interfere seriously
with its supremacy, and lately, to a still greater extent,
the Germans; but till within the last ten years, this Yankee
race gave the tone and character to the legislation of the
free-labour States.
The typical Southern man is In many respects, though
it will hardly be expected, more British and European In
habits, appearance, and character. He has plenty on his
mind, but he, Is not so uneasy about his social position,
and aUows himself more pleasure and social enjoyment —
often too much; hence, at forty and fifty, he is well
enough off for flesh and fat, but not to excess. What In
Europe would be called a fat person is a great rarity in
America, and Is seldom to be met with, except among the
Germans, Englishmen, negroes, and negresses : these last
especially; for while among the native-born whites there
is a strong tendency to dyspepsia, the blacks seem con-
stitutlonaUy Inclined to hyperpepsia.
The preference for rural life, and the love of quiet
social intercourse and enjoyment, mainly distinguish the
South from the North: in the latter section the want
of domestic unostentatious sociableness has been much
dwelt upon at times by the press; but excessive devotion
to money-making and getting on in the world seems to
have become an incurable habit. There are four national
holidays — ^New Year's Day, 4th of July, Thanksgiving
13—2

196 Ten Years in the United States.
Day, and Christmas Day, — though, in fact, Christmas is
little noticed In the North, while New Year's Day is not
much kept at the South. In an article on this subject,
headed, " Are we a happy people ? " in a widely-read
periodical, it was asked, " How can we get rid of the
Fourth Holiday ? " It being regarded as au inconvenient
interruption : in towns, at least. And one-third of the
people of the United States live In towns and cities : in
the North, it must be nearly one-half; and in the South a
large portion of the few town people live nearly half the
year on their property in the country.
I am only repeating what has been said by Northern
writers over and over again, that town life in the North
has become, in comparison with European habits, unsocial
and anti-domestic ; and It Is yearly getting worse and worse,
especiaUy among the moneyed classes. The tendency is to
live In boarding-houses and hotels ; and It is the women
who seem most Inclined to that sort of life, by which they
are very much released from household cares and duties,
and enabled to devote themselves to fashionable visits and
amusements. The great majority, probably three-fourths
of the Northern people, other than the agriculturists, board
out, taking their meals at the general table at set times :
well enough for single men and strangers, but destructive
of the home-feeling In families. The wealthy, I mean;
and those, especially, who have most recently sprung from
nothing, as the saying is : implying (even with us) that
those living quietly, economically, and Industriously, are
mere nobodies. Ostentation is a weakness of the North.
I have before me a newspaper paragraph, describing
the wife of an English lord, who was staying at one

Hotel Habits and Gossip. 197
of the hotels. Fashionable American ladles, elaborately
aud expensively dressed, called upon her, and were
astonished to find her plainly dressed, not displaying
even a bit of jewellery. I have seen a description, in
a Northern newspaper, of the persons, dress, and daily
habits of a titled family In England, written by an
American visitor, holding them up as models ; quite
unconscious of any indelicacy In describing a private
family, daughters and all, In a public print, Americans
have a strong curiosity as to private personal affairs and
peculiarities, and one accustomed to London Is sure to
think them too fond of gossip, bordering on scandal, A
newspaper correspondent writes from one of the " springs "
— ^places of summer resort — In this style : " To-day I am
invited to dine with Dr, J, R. Kent at his residence.
Among the visitors here Is the Hon, E, W, liubbard, full
of life and anecdote. The dancing folks met yesterday
to practise the ' Lancers,' and at night went through it
without mistake. Miss C, of Chesterfield, and Miss W,,
of Richmond, are here, both of them pleasant and hand
some ; the former a graceful dancer, the latter a member
of the Church. Miss S,, of Tennessee, attracts attention,
and Miss T,, of North Carolina, was unanimously voted
the star of the [room ; which was the more surprising,
because, If there Is one State In the Union not remark
able above all others for beautiful women, it is North
Carolina — famous, however, for tar, turpentine, and red
herrings. There is a sweet little Miss H. here from
New York, Uttle more than a child, who performs
delightfully on the piano. To-morrow night we are to
have a fancy dress ball. I will give you all the points."

198 Ten. Years in the United States.
These Initials are aU genu.Ine, aud some of the persons
would be known to many of the readers of the paper.
And the young ladies would be as proud of the notice
as any debutante.
In the immense city of New York every Americanism
is exaggerated ; and there the love of show, splendour,
and extravagance is indulged In to excess. The number
of palace-like hotels — palace-like, that is, as to size and
upholstery — is yearly added to : works of taste and fine
art productions being little understood or cared for. It
has become fashionable to live in these great hotels, and
their splendidly-furnished apartments become the models,
as to style, appearance, and expensiveness which young
married couples, according to their means — and generally
beyond their means — endeavour to imitate.
It cannot but be — it needs no proof — that this mode of life
undermines the domestic virtues ; and It Is rather surprising
that the high standard of the Anglo-Saxon as to essentials
has not been lowered very decidedly. Troubles, occasion
ally arise In these family communities, as the women will
notice things, and think and talk about one ataother. At
one of the private fashionable boarding-houses, on one
occasion I recollect, quite a pretty public excitement was
got up by a "grass widow" — a lady whose husband
being absent for a period in the country, is therefore
said to be " at grass," This lady being young, handsome,
and. In one sense, unencumbered, attracted a deal of atten
tion from some of the gentlemen, and, consequently, was
subjected to the sharp criticism of some of the ladles.
Reports, rather derogatory to her character were circulated
in and outside the house — such as were not to be men-

A Slanderer Punished. 199
tioned for the world. They reached the ears of the
person most interested ; but she took no notice of them.
At last a story was circulated which necessitated expla
nation or contradiction, and the lady, having ascertained
the original scandal-monger, soon made up her mind how
to act. She communicated her plans to a few friends,
and determined to have a public apology, or to cow-
liide the offender. On the day appointed, dinner hap
pened to be late, so there was a full gathering ; about
fifty persons had taken their seats immediately on being
summoned by the customary bell, aniong them the
slanderer, a respectable merchant. Hardly had he settled
himself In his chair when the Injured lady entered the
room, and, walking straight up to him, demanded that he
should then and there retract and apologize. On his re
fusing to do so, she drew from the folds of her dress a
good cowhide, and gave it him over the face, head, and
shoulders. In earnest. Ladles screamed, gentlemen re
monstrated, but she kept on deliberately cowhiding the
offender, till at last some one wrested the weapon from
her fierce little hand ; and her victim was hurried off to
his room, where he stayed for a considerable time. It Is
characteristic that the merchant, having an inkling of
what was in store for him, had a police officer ready,
who was called in immediately the punishment began ; but
he didn't like to Interfere In a lady's private affairs, and
retired. It was stated in one of the respectable city
papers that. In consequence of the many intrigues going
on among the boarders In the house, it was tacitly agreed
to hush up the matter; which, however, got into the
papers.

200 Ten Years in the United States.
The great liberality of the laws of some of the States as
to marriage and divorce, and the nomadic character of a
large portion of the town populations continually Increase
the number of "grass widows." Thus, iu the western
States of Indiana and Illinois, the marriage tie Is very
easily severed ; married women come from other States,
and after being there about ten days become citizens
and residents ; by means of false swearing, they are
proved to be natives, and so entitled to the benefit of
the laws of divorce. A suit Is then commenced, and
granted for, say. Incompatibility of temper, which is good
legal ground. It was asserted in the papers that In one
case a millionnalre's widow came thus from Brazil, and
obtained a divorce and 100,000 dollars alimony. In fact,
women carry things with rather a high hand. In the new
free-labour States especially.
Out of fashionable city Ufe, custom ties the married
woman, both In the North and South, closely enough to
her home. The young women, however, have greater
liberty than they have even In England : a liberty, how
ever, very seldom attended with 111 consequences ; as,
among Americans, any wrong or serious Insult Is avenged,
perhaps, by the death of the offender. But as the popu
lation increases and becomes more miscellaneous, this
liberty will have to be restricted, or morals must suffer.
In the South, in these matters, the law may be said
to recognize the right of those aggrieved to take the
law into their own bauds. Not long ago. In Virginia,
a prominent, highly-respected citizen coolly walked Into
one of the banks and shot its president three times
with a revolver, of which he died next day. The

Revenge for Private Wrongs. 201
gentleman who committed this deed then walked out,
crossed the street, and surrendered himself to a police
officer; who permitted him to go to his own home (in
the keeping of some official gentleman, I believe), giving
his promise that he would appear when called for. The
president of the bank. It appeared, had seduced a weak-
minded daughter of the gentleman, who, on discovering
the fact, placed his unfortunate child in a lunatic asylum,
and took Immediate revenge on the villain : this was
expected and approved of by the community. The
trial would be a mere formaUty. In a settled popula
tion like that of the now Confederated States, this state
of public opinion very seldom leads to mistaken or unjusti
fiable assaults. The character and conduct .of every one
are known or ascertainable by bis neighbours better than
they can be by even a jury In a large city ; and all know
that the law would take its course on them, unless they
had ample justification in public opinion.
Residing generally on his isolated farm or plantation,
leading a domestic social life, rarely without a perma
nent visitor or two; living, perhaps, too liberally, but
without display — he and his wife considerably occupied
usually by the whims and troubles or ailments of their
servants, and also, to some extent, by having to look
after matters connected with an estate of perhaps 500 to
1,000 or more acres — the Southerner can hardly fail to
acquire a more reflective habit of mind and more adminis
trative ability than the Northerner; who, as has been
shown, Is either au anxious overworked man, or, in the
cities, leads an unsocial life, his whole soul devoted to
business and pecuniary speculations. Perhaps he takes to

202 Ten Years in the United States.
poUtlcs, not for the sake of change, but with an eye to
eternal business and the almighty dollar ; his only amuse
ment being some sort of excitement — a large party — the
theatre — at all events, amidst a crowd. In short, the
mass of the Northern people, those who lead or drive the
country along, may be said to live In a perpetual state
of public meeting.
The reader wIU not at first realize what this amounts
to. Public meeting is very weU in Its place, but when It
comes to be chronic, and a man Is always before the pubHc,
or thinking of the public. It is demoralizing. A man, for
instance, addressing a public meeting, is in an inferior
position ; he ^s like a poor man waiting on a rich one —
a courtier in presence of his sovereign : he is anxious to
be noticed favourably; his great object is to talk plea
santly and plausibly, and to produce a good impression on
his audience : for whom, individually, he may have a
private contempt. He Is no longer an independent man,
giving his honest opinion among equals. This Is the de
cided tendency of pubUc life, poUtical or fashionable, with
man and woman alike ; for the woman, devoted to display
and fashion (and, of course, publicity), loses true self-
respect, sincerity, and truthfulness 6f character, and, in
word, thought, and action, studies only effect. The in
fluence of this sort of life on the individual, on the
community, on public opinion, and on the Government,
is of course very great and injurious ; lowering the tone
of the pubUc mind, above all, as to truthfulness and
stability. Europe has been unable to imderstand how the Con
federated States — shut out from the rest of the world.

Failure of NoHhern Democracy. 203
without aid or sympathy, trade or Intercourse, left appa
rently to the mercy of the North, with Its overwhelming
superiority in wealth, numbers, and all the necessaries of
war — ^have proved themselves In every way, morally and
physically, with both pen and sword, so superior to their
insolent gigantic foe. There is as much brain In Northern
men; there are more books, colleges, and education iu
the North ; yet never were such immense resources so
miserably, shamefuUy squandered. The different states
of society of the tw^o peoples will sufficiently account for aU
this. The North, worked up and kept to a state of un
reasoning excitement, led by professional politicians, long
habitually accustomed to trust In appearances, plausiblUtles,
" buncombe " talk, and shams of all kinds, has necessarUy
fallen into mean, dishonest hands. Honest ability has had no
chance — has long given up the contest — with unscrupulous,
clever, oratorical public plunderers. Wonderful and rapid
has been the degeneracy of public life in the United States.
Seldom In the world's history have a more able and honour
able body of men assembled for a public purpose than those
who, not a century ago, solemnly and sadly signed the
United States Declaration of Independence; but from that
day to this the character of the leading men, as a whole, as
to moral worth, capacity, and experience, has steadily faUeu
lower and lower : proving the total failure of miscellaneous
democracy as a means of promoting the well-being of
society. It is the natural, unavoidable result of the past history
of the United States, that the men Into whose hands the
Government has fallen, watch with jealous fear the uprising
of some able man who should perchance obtain the confi-

204 Ten Years in the United States.
dence of the bewildered people ; who must soon have time
to reflect and determine upon a change in their present
mad and degrading career. Especially does the present
Government — whose measures are so opposed to the wishes,
feelings, interests, and prejudices of the people at large —
dread to see a military genius at the head of their now
doomed hordes. They — Lincoln, Seward, and their abet
tors — will be at his mercy on his first victory ; for the
Northern people and soldiery would call upon him at once
to clear out Washington. An able general could not be
foolish enough to ally himself with a set of unprincipled,
feeble, falUng men, a moment longer than necessary.
Genius and incompetency are natural enemies ; and the
North would cheerfuUy see at Its head a capable military
dictator, instead of the well-meaning one, elected with such
triumph and glorification, who would, no doubt, be glad to
pack up and depart In peace. It shows how completely the
North is controlled by the mere professional poUticians,
that even war, on such a grand scale, has failed to bring
out any considerable talent. Much less need than a natural
life and death struggle, has always among European races
sufficed to bring out some great men, both civil and
military. It Is remarkable that the quarrel between the North and
the South began even long before any Union was formed ;
and a line was drawn between the Puritanical province of
Pennsylvania and the Roman Catholic Marylanders, which
since grew into the proverbial " Mason and Dixon's Line "
— an expression often met with In United States papers,
speeches, &c. Its origin Is as follows :— Before the com
mencement of the rebellion which ended, as to its Imme-

"Mason and Dixon's Line." 205
effects. In the final secession of the thirteen colonies
Britain, and their recognition by the world as the
d States, Lord Baltimore and William Penn had
:ting claims about the boundary line between the
u'ovlnces of Maryland and Pennsylvania. For nearly
r years (from 1683) border wars had been carried
tween the Catholics of the former and the Puritans
3 latter. The Colonel Cresap, "who slew Logan, the
ent Indian, took an active part in this warfare. At
he principals on each side named commissioners to
out the 'decree of James IL, by which the cou-
vas to be settled. Surveyors were engaged, who
to begin at Cape Henlopen, or Delaware Bay, and
e run a line due west to a point midway between
cape and the shore of Chesapeake Bay ; from that
Idle point" they were to run a line In a northerly
tion, concerning which my authority is not very
; finally, they were to run a line due west till the
irn limits of the two provinces should be reached.
work was proceeded with, but the authorities were
latisfied with it, and engaged In England Charles
n and Jeremiah Dixon (the latter born in a coal-
), mathematicians and surveyors, to take charge of
rork ; and, after three years' labour, they completed
1767. They took the first astronomical calculation,
in the first observatory in America; and found
vork of their predecessors correct. Their line ran
,gh the former territory of the Lennl-Lenape, whom
eaders of the Last of the Mohicans may remember.
¦ became alarmed at the conduct of the Indians, who
i not understand — or, perhaps, understood too well —

206 Ten Years in the United States.
the meaning of the surveyors' star-gazings and land-
measuring ; and when, at length, the line reached a war
path through the primeval forest, their escort of red men
told them It was the will of the Six Nations that the
surveys should cease ; so the surveyors returned to Phila
delphia, and were honourably discharged.
For part of the distance, at the end of every fifth mUe,
a stone was placed, graven with the arms of Lord Balti
more on one side, and those of the Penn famUy on the
other ; also a smaller stone at every mUe, with only the
initials M. and P. : aU sent from England. The rest of
the distance, whatever it was, was shown by a vista, eight
yards wide, and piles of stone.
The twelve-mile circle round Newcastle, at which the
due west line commenced, was regarded as In some way a
charmed neighbourhood by the ignorant and superstitious
of the vicinity. The armorial bearings on the five-mile
stones had a mysterious look ; and a large stone near the
commencement of the line, where many observations were
taken, Is to this day called " The Star-gazers' Stone."
The stone at the " middle point " was taken up, in hopes
of finding there the treasures of Captain Kid; and a
famous pretended " Spirit," whose master was tried for
swindling in 1797, dated his oracles "thirteen mUes from
Newcastle, Delaware : " on such slight grounds Is our
love of the mysterious and supernatural ready to seize and
take root.
This was the oft-mentioned " Mason and Dixon's line,"
intended as a " line of peace," and which, to avoid dis
cussion, may be accepted as the ready-drawn line of sepa
ration between Federals and Confederates. In time, the

Line dividing Free and Slave States. 207
Germans and Quakers of Pennsylvania sold their slaves to
their Southern neighbours, and abolished slavery. Mary
land has retained the Institution up to the present day;
probably, for very similar reasons, at bottom, to those for
which their Northern neighbours abolished it. And so
this faint line, a mere vista through the vast forest, became
the line of demarcation between the domains in which
the negro is retained as an humble but valuable member
of the social system and that in which he is an alien and
an outcast.

208 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER XIII.
Some amusing Statistics. — Inferiority of the South demonstrated by Aboli
tionist Figures. — As to Christian Benevolence. — Area and Population. —
Value of Churches. — The Press. — Education. — Libraries. — Colleges. —
Southern Ignorance. — Agriculture. — Cotton. — Manufactures. — Com
merce. — Explanations. — Eeflection. — Miseducation. — New England
Education. — Quotation from Bishop Potter.
If I have inflicted some heavy 'matter of my own on the
reader, I will now show him some figures which will, I
think, make him smile.
In the arts aiid sciences, literature, trade, commerce,
shipping, manufactures ; in amusements, such as music
and the theatre afford; In luxuries, display and fashion;
In the number and extent of schools, colleges, libraries ;
in education in its popular sense — in all these means of
civilization and progress and refinement, these grand arenas
of human competition. It must be confessed, the free negro
or white labour States have long been superior to those
relying on negro-slave labour. Nay, even In matters of
religion and benevolence the Slave States are declared to
be sadly behindhand.
I will give a few statistics on these points, published on
good abolitionist authority about 1857, therefore before the
recent great territorial and political changes; and while

Benevolence of North and South.

209

there was more chance of Impartiality. Thus In 1855,
there was contributed for purposes of Christian bene
volence : — By the South. By the North.

For the Bible cause
For Missionary purposes
For the Tract cause

^68,000 101,000 24,000

^319,000 502,000 131,000

^193,000 p52,000
ft To feel the full force of these statements, it is neces
sary to notice the Akea and Population of these States.
According to the census of 1850, using round numbers,
tlie area in square miles of tlie whole thirty-one United States
was as follows : —

States containing Negro

Slaves.

Free Negro States.

Square Miles.

Square Miles.

Delaware . .

2,100

Rhode Island .

1,300

Maryland .

11,100

Connecticut .

4,700

South Carolina.

30,000

Massachusetts .

7,800

Kentucky

37,600

New Jersey .

8,300

Louisiana

41,300

New Hampshire

9,300

Tennessee .

45,600

Vermont

10,200

Mississippi

47,200

Maine ....

31,800

North Carolina .

50,700

Indiana

33,800

Alabama

50,700

Ohio

40,000

Arkansas

52,200

Pennsylvania

46,000

Georgia .

. 58,000

New York

47,000

Florida

59,300

Iowa ....

51,000

"Virginia.

. 61,300

Wisconsin

53,900

Missouri

67,400

Illinois

55,400

Texas . . abou

b 300,000

Michigan

56,200

(\n 1 1 TiTrn 1 n

156,000

Southern Total, say (=

Total ai-ea of Northern
500,000,000 of acres)
914,500
States, say .
012,700
The density of this Southern popu
lation varied from, say, 1 person per
square mile in Texas to 52 persons
per square mile in Maryland; the
average being 11.
In the Northern States the scan
tiest population was that of Cali
fornia, half a soul to the square mile;
the densest Massachusetts, 127; the
average of the Northern States being
say, per square mile, 22 persons.
14
210 Ten Years in the United States.
If to this vast area of land, very little of which Is not
highly fertile, be added the Territories — domain not
formed into States, for want of the small population
required by the law of the United States — the whole
would be nearly twenty times as extensive as France or
the Spanish Peninsula.
In 1850 the Value of Churches w^as : —
In the South, ^22,000,000 ; ^68,000,000 in the North.
As to The Press, freedom of which and of speech are,
or at this time were, among the understood Inalienable
birthrights of the United States citizen, the comparison is
almost ridiculous.
At the time of the secession of the American colonies from
Great Britain, when the white population was nearly equal
In the two sections, when the good George Washington, and
others worthy of him, such as the signers of the declara
tion of independence. Were the leading soldiers and poli
ticians of the country, men whom England and the world
at large admired and respected, there were onlv thirty-
seven little newspapers In the whole country (and schools
and colleges In proportion).
In 1850 there were 249 daily papers, in the United States.
,, say 100 tri- weekly ,,
,, )> SO semi- weekly ,,
,, nearly 2000 weekly ,,
To enter Into further details, the millions, tens of mU-
Uons, and hundreds of mUUons of copies would only be
bewildering; the kernel of the whole lies in this, that

Education in the North and South. 211
not one-fourth of the enlightening sheets circulated iu the
South. The New York Daily Herald had a circulation
about equal to half that of all the Southern dailies: enough
to ruin the finest constitution in the world !
Now, as to Education : the disparity is enormous. Thus
the number of Ministers of the Gospel educated (1855, I
believe). In the South was 747, to 10,702 in the North !
It would be Interesting to learn In what section those
acute ministers of the Gospel were educated who joined
in the advice to set the negroes upon the people of the
South. New England began a system of public education very
early — more than two hundred years ago. In the colonial
laws It was enacted " That every township, after the Lord
had increased them to the number of fifty householders,
shall appoint one to teach aU children to write and read ; "
and on reaching a hmidred families, the township was to
set up a grammar-school, where youth might be prepared
for the university.
Again the Income of Public Schools about this time.
Was, in the South, ^3,000,000; and 7,000,000 in the North.
The number of Scholars in colleges, academies, and
public schools was : —
In the South, 700,000 ; 3,000,000 in the North.
In Libraries of various kinds the North is very rich.
About 1855 the total number of volumes in libraries other
than private was :—
700,000 volumes in the South ; in the North, 4,000,000 !
14—2

212 Ten Years in the United States.
Little Massachusetts alone (the State whose hay crop
Is of more importance than all the cotton of the South)
has more volumes In her libraries than all the fifteen slave
States together.
In Ignorance, however, the South has the advantage
greatly. Of the white adult population there are, unable
to read and write : —
In South Carolina 1 in 7; in Massachusetts 1 in 517.
The other States afforded similar contrasts.
As to Agriculture the case Is almost as bad for the
South.
The value of farms was 1,100,000,000 in the slave-labour States,
and 2,100,000,000 in the white-labour States.
Of improved land there were 55,000,000 of acres in the South,
and 58,000,000 of acres in the North.
This Is correct, the South being more exclusively agri
cultural than the North.
, It Is admitted that In one or two articles the South did
excel, for instance, of Cotton the South raised, say
^100,000,000 worth: 2,500,000 bales of 400 lbs. each,
worth ^40 per bale ; one acre yielding one bale.
As to Manufactures, at the time of secession the South
could boast of rather more than a tithe of the manufac
turing power and capital of the North : and the total share
of the latter in the foreign and domestic commerce of the
United States was about four times as great as that of the
South.

Resources of North and South. 213
The preceding statements are, I have reason to believe,
in the main correct, being memoranda taken from au
aboUtlonist view of " The North and the South," published
in Boston, 1856. I have preferred giving the state of
tilings at these periods, 1850 and 1855, because the enor
mous additions of late to the United States domain have
made such comparative calculations less satisfactory as
bases to reason upon. Now, how damaging and un
answerable are these facts against the cause of the North !
How they add proof upon proof to the rest of the world
of the superiority of the South In patriotism, unity, loyalty,
truthfulness. Integrity, and statesmanship, and also in man
hood : to rise against, to defy, to drive away and defeat,
time after time, a power so overwhelming, superior In
dollars and in swarms of men, as well as in education,
religious zeal, and benevolence !
The above statistics have been quoted everywhere to
show the degrading effects of slavery: whereas, they
merely tend to show that negro labour is attended with
some disadvantages compared with a white labouring popu
lation, and that the black man in the Southern States,
however much improved compared with his African con
dition, is still less civilized than the white man of the
Northern States.
Probably a careful examination of the Northern "educa
tion " would satisfy thinking men that it is a very mixed
blessing, and that the South had quite enough of It: for
I may mention, just to show how facts must be received
when offered carelessly, or ignorantly, or dishonestly, that
very many of those who could afford it In the South
preferred sending their chUdren to the North to be

214 Ten Years in the United States.
educated ; partly for the benefit of the more Invigorating
cUmate: while a denser population enabled the North to
afford advantages unattainable in the South, especiaUy
for medical education. Not having had the advantage
of much education myself, I have abstained from entering
into this matter more fully ; but I know enough to be able
to say that, from the common schools to the chief colleges,
Yankee education, compared with that imparted in corre
sponding Institutions in Europe, is far less thorough, and,
so to speak, less honest : comparing attainments with pro
mise and pretension.
I have been present at a sort of exhibition of common
school pupils, where youths of about fourteen deUvered
essays and orations on various important subjects — one,
I recollect, on the approaching downfall of England, the
magnificent future of America, the regeneration of the Old
World by the New, and so on, before an Immense audience,
probably of four thousand people, at the Italian Opera
House. I thought it a melancholy display, well calculated
to pervert a fine mind, to engender in the pupils and
parents a mistaken ambition, and stimulate that over ex
citability of vanity and self-esteem which has at times
deprived, the people at large of the ordinary use of their
reasoning powers : which are but feeble powers in human
affairs, even at the best of times, and among the most
enlightened nations, rational beings though we be.
It will help towards understanding the character of this
boasted public system of education, to state that a gentle
man, for some time superintendent of the City of New York
common schools, could not (or, at least, did not) put his

Readers at the Astor Library. 215
public reports In even tolerably good English, such as
would be necessary for a story or essay to be clothed in to
appear in the poorest penny sheet.
Then, again, as to the libraries : In New York city is
a very fine coUection of books, now amounting probably to
100,000 volumes. In an excellent new building, and having
a very handsome reading-room — the Astor library — Into
which any one at any time (from ten to four, I believe,)
could walk, and call for any book, and sit down and read.
I read or looked over a few volumes there at different
times, and the average number of persons sitting down and
realding seemed to be about five; one-half of them foreigners.
That there is less useful and improving reading in the
States generally than In any country In Europe, I make
no doubt, having considered the matter and made use of
very many opportunities In the United States of comparing
the people of various countries In this and other respects.
Certainly, If the few serious and thinking readers were
put together or viewed as a class, it would be seen that
they have far less to do with the public affairs of their
country, have much less immediate weight, and a much
smaller share of the " spoils," than a Uke number of their
neighbours and new-made fellow-citizens who have not
Uved ten years In America.
Here let me draw a moral from the effects of United
States education. I would disparage no man's hobby, but
there is a not very vast but most fertile field, as yet
almost entirely unworked, upon which a wealthy philan
thropist might at once commence : the organization of as
many as were able and willing to go through the necessary
reading and examinations Into a recognizable class entitled

216 Ten Years in the United States.
to be called "well-informed men." Great things have
been done with the refuse, the weakest, and most worthless
of the social materials ; it Is time now to try what can be
done with the best. The very spread of popular education
In the United States, and in England and elsewhere,
necessarily at present to a great extent superficial and
partial, creates an aversion to the lower kinds of labour,
an Impatience of that inferiority and insignificance to
which the mass of society is unavoidably condemned, and
an over-estimate of their own abUIty in the less fortunate
classes of society. This makes it more desirable to bring
forward the best minds of every class, to give them sound
moral and rational training, so tested, acknowledged,
and certified that they will form a sort of order or
interest in the country, and be selected to fill to a great
extent responsible and influential posts throughout the
social and industrial system. Then, instead of favouring
amalgamation of the highly developed with inferior races —
Instead of putting the cultivated and best bred men,
produced by ages of civilization, on a level with negroes
and sepoys — philanthropists wiU see that the mission of the
most civilized and most highly organized people is to help
the lower races forward by becoming their teachers,
preachers, officers, overseers, foremen, guides, and legis
lators. Under such a policy, India, for Instance — in pro
portion to her soil and population — might be made as
wealth-producing to the British empire and the rest of
the world as the Southern States of North America had
become; not by imitating the system of those States,
but adopting the system which should be found most
advantageous for all parties — forming their own " pecuUar

Degeneration of the United States. 217
Institution." Unless the dark-coloured races are to be
destroyed, It seems to me this Is the clear mission of the
most highly trained men, and women, too, of the civilized
Avorld; opening to them a new and grand arena, and
abundant and congenial employment, and cutting up by the
roots red republicanism, abolitionism, and other diseases
of bodies politic.
These, I think, are some of the Important lessons taught
by the history of the United States. But however all this
may be, the great, glaring, and somewhat alarming fact,
that general moral and political degeneration has proceeded
In the United States almost exactly pari passu with its
wide-spread and costly popular education, demands serious
consideration until the fact is really understood. To me It
seems that the radical error has been (to speak with a little
exaggeration) in teaching youth, by precept and example,
at school and at home, to think too highly of themselves
and their destinies. The boy is told and reads about
Benjamin Franklin's walking along the streets of Phila
delphia looking for employment, with his dinner, a twopenny
loaf, under his arm ; about Lewis Cass, John Jacob Astor,
Horace Greely, and others, who " rose from nothing," as the
saying Is, to distinction and wealth. " Mind your looks,
learn all you can, behave yourself, look sharp, persevere,
and go ahead: we're all on an equality in this country;
so you stand as good a chance as any one of getting to
the top of the tree, my son." Thus the citizen of the
United States talks to his child, and it sounds pleasantly
to a poor man with a large family ; but it will not bear
examination. Is It good for a community to have everybody
striving with all his mental and physical strength against

218 Ten Years in the United States.
his fellows for a few great glittering prizes, which only
one In hundreds of thousands can possibly attain ? No ;
it becomes a fearfully demoralizing competition. Do what
we will, civilized society must take the form of the
pyramid. It does so even when a "liberty, fraternity,
equality" Robespierre Is managing affairs. The masses,
the vast majority, must be near the base ; even though
every living block of which the edifice Is composed be
equally fit, able, willing, and determined to stand at the
very apex.
It is altogether a mistake ; of which the North has
already felt the consequences. The few who are really
fit for the highest positions are always the least eager for
theni. Those most anxious to have the eyes of the world
fixed on them, and to wield power, are among the least
conscientious and the most conceited of mankind. The
greater the number of competitors for high and respon
sible offices, the smaller the chance of their being fiUed
by the right men, and the fewer the men of the necessary
talent, experience, and integrity who will take part iu the
competition. Hence foUows that political deterioration
which the list of United States Presidents lUustrates.
In the "Annual Report of the City Superintendent of
Schools of the City of New York "(1850), It is said (giving
the sense, and the words as near as may be), the immates
of the almshouses and pauper asylums, who cost nearly as
much as the entire educational system, are, with rare excep
tions, destitute of even an ordinary common-school educa
tion, by far the greater portion being unable to read or
write ; the records of crime in the city and state show the
names of very few who in early youth enjoyed what may

New England School System. 219
be denominated a good education ; the ranks of crime and
vice are almost exclusively recruited from the Ignorant
classes. In 1848 a circular was sent by the Massachusetts Board
of Education to the most experienced and distinguished
teachers In the union, to ascertain their opinions as to the
efl[iclency of the New England common-school system and
principles of education in the formation of upright and
moral character — in the production of useful men, honest
dealers, conscientious jurors, true witnesses, incorruptible
voters and magistrates, good parents, good nelgbbours.
The replies to this circular were very sanguine. One
believed that ninety-five per cent, would be supporters of
the moral welfare of the community. David P. Page, then
principal of the New York State Normal School, after an
experience of twenty years, said — " Could I be connected
with a school furnished with all the appliances you name
... I should scarcely expect, after the first generation of
children submitted to the experiment, to fail in a single case
to secure the residt you have named : that is, all the pupils
should be temperate, industrious, frugal, conscientious in
all their dealings, prompt to pity and instruct ignorance
. . . public-spirited, philanthropic, and observers of all
things sacred." (It Is curious that among the good quali
ties aimed at, truthfulness, self-control, and the right use
of reason, are not Included.) Solomon Adams, Esq., of
Boston, expected that ninety-five in a hundred, or more,
would become supporters of law, order, truth, aud all
righteousness. Another, Miss Catherine A. Beecher, after
fifteen years' experience, believed that If all the children
<)f any given place, at the age of four years, were for six

220 Ten Years in the United States.
hours a day for twelve years put under the care of teachers
(holding her views and trained as she would have them),
and to spend their lives In this same given place, then
not a single one would fail to turn out a prosperous aud
respectable member of society, and obtain admission into
the world of endless peace and love !
With such solemn nonsense as this did the leaders In
public education, so-called, deceive themselves and the
public. Not one of the eight or ten quoted thinks of even
defining what sort of children they meant — whether Yankee,
German, Irish, Negro, or Red Indian : was It of no conse
quence ? — are all equally plastic in their mighty and skilful
hands ? Could they ensure righteousness and respecta
bility to a hundred young cannibals or Dahomeyans as
surely as to so many precocious Yankee juveniles, whose
great great grandfathers had come over in the Mayfloioer ?
What a pity that thousands of years ago the New England
system of public education. Including Normal schools, was
not revealed to the world, and mankind reformed " right
away," instead of going through the slow process appointed
by Moses and Jesus Christ ! They overlook, too, the
momentous fact that it is not the criminals and paupers who
cause human misery and degrade nations, so much as it Is
corrupt politicians, weak rulers, recklessly ambitious men,
and false and foolish teachers of every kind. As I have
said before, it is not the mob that has ruined the United
States; but the highly respectable men : not the ignorant
and the poor, but the arrogant, selfish, and prosperous.
The subject of education has been made so conspicuous
a feature of the Northern States that I will let Its directors
still further describe It.

Public Schools of New York. 221
The public schools of the city of New York are under the
supervision of a Board of Education elected by the citizens.
The schools of each ward are under control of a local board,
also elected by the people ; as are also two school Inspec
tors for each ward of the city. A superintendent, with
three assistants similarly elected, supervises the whole, and
examines and licenses teachers. As to the efficiency,
extent, and completeness of the Instruction given, the
superintendent declares It highly satisfactory. He also
says there Is scarcely a class which Is not burdened with
too many branches of study, and required to do more than
Is consistent with mental and physical vigour. In the
schools for the more advanced pupils, many pursue eight
and ten distinct branches of study at the same time,
requiring from eight to ten hours of daily application.
With a few exceptions, each day Is commenced by the
reading of selections from the Bible, the repetition in
concert of the Lord's Prayer, and the singing of a hymn
or two. This Introduction of religion has several times
caused difficulties and discussions, especially with Roman
Catholics. The law is that the doctrines or tenets of any
particular religious sect are not to be taught, but the Holy
Scriptures are not to be excluded ; but what version shall
be used the controUing board must not determine — a very
puzzling law.
Money is liberally appropriated for school libraries, and
the superintendent recommends that they should be sub
jected to the most rigid censorship, in order to exclude
every work, however exalted the author, conflicting with
the principles on which public or private morals are
founded. An assistant superintendent condemns the ten-

222 Ten Years in the United States.
dency of teachers to display their pupils on the pubUc
occasions, to enhance their own reputation. The children,
especially the most precocious, are constantly drUled and
prepared for monthly " receptions " before numerous
spectators. WUl there not on aU such occasions brood
over the teacher's mind the appaUing fear that the future
welfare of these exhibited children may have been sacrificed
to his own purposes ?
I do not think It can be proved that up to the present
time the sort of education given In the public schools of
the various States has perceptibly contributed to make
the people more reflective, more moral, either socially or
politically, or more regardful of truthfulness in all things,
than they would have been if the State had left education
alone. The spirit of the system has been wrong, and the
people have spent their money on half-education.
To support my facts and deductions I have quoted
editors and orators ; I will now for the same purpose quote
the learned, distinguished, and highly respected Bishop of
New York, Horatio Potter.
" What," he says, addressing, bis charge, " is to be the
future of this rapidly expanding world in which we live,
now so characterized by feverish activity, by change, by
strange developments In the way of physical growth and
advancement? Consider the Increase of luxury and
extravagance; consider the general state of morality, as
indicated by what takes place in the walks of business,
in private life, and in the halls of legislation. Examine
the records of crime and violence — If you dare to trust
yourselves to such a study. Look at the daily life of our
great cities, as reported to you through the public press.

Bishop Potter's Address. 223
Consider with yourselves by what scenes, visible and
invisible, your sons and your daughters are to be sur
rounded as they grow up, and what, twenty-five years
hence, is likely to be the moral atmosphere which your
children and grandchildren will be breathing.
" I have no motive for wishing to exaggerate the pre
valent corruption of morals, or for seeking to darken
unnecessarily the prospect of the future. But If you will
take the advice of one who has been a somewhat attentive
observer of the comitry for the last ten years, you will do
almost anything else In the world sooner than allow the
ministers of the Church of God to be crippled or dis
couraged at such a time as this through your apathy aud
neglect. We need men of steadfast principle, of heroic
courage, of thorough education ; men who will stand up In
the face of power, and in all the places of concourse, and
reason of righteousness, temperance, and a judgment to
come. . . . We need such men, not merely In a few
powerful congregations in cities, but scattered through
every part of the cities and through all the coimtry.
Leave this country, with its present tendencies, without an
adequate supply of competent and faithful pastors, and you
wiU soon have a people prepared and ready for destruc
tion."

224 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER XIV.
"STEIKE, BUT HEAR ME."
The Dangers of Philanthropy — The Question : Negro Slavery in the
Confederated States — Under whom is the Negro likely to fare best:
Northerners or Southerners? — The Tree to be judged by its Fruits —
Condition of the Afiican in Africa and elsewhere — In the Southern
States — Negi'o Progress — Effect of Slavery on the Slave-owner— Effects
of Demagogue Rule on Free-men — Abstract Injustice — Men not Equal
— Origin of Slaveiy — Good to one Man may be Evil to another —
Negro's cerebral Inferiority — Fate of the Negro should the North
triumph — To distinguish and classify Men the gi'eat Problem.
I WOULD that I could Induce the British public im
mediately to read and consider the life of Las Casas —
that good heroic man, who, excited to Indignation by the
wrongs Inflicted by his fellow-countrymen, the Spaniards,
on the Indians of the then newly-discovered New World,
devoted bis great ability to their service ; and in his zeal
did them more harm, caused more suffering and destruc
tion among them, than PIzarro and all his fellow-ravagers ;
becoming the founder of negro slavery in America, and,
with the most philanthropic intentions, establishing the
terrible negro slave-trade between Africa and the continent
which Columbus gave to Spanish Christianity.
And so again, in this day and In this country, there are
stUl not a few who, refusing to be enlightened by late events.

Tlie Negro Slavery Question. 225
would blindly rejoice at a great crime : at almost any means
which, in the name of freedom, should place millions of
the black race iu the way and at the mercy of its most
unrelenting enemies, the people of the present United
States : — for that they have been and are its bitter enemies
— that they will find means to root out the negro, now
doubly odious, from their midst — no man can pretend to
doubt. The time has now arrived, therefore, when It is possible,
desirable, and necessary, to consider calmly, upon Its own
merits — not confusing It with other somewhat connected
matters — the question of negro slavery In the Confede
rated States of North America.
Can a just, humane, and enlightened man approve of the
" peculiar Institution " at present existing in the Confede
rated States, and as it has existed In that part of the world
for many years ? That, I think. Is the fair, definite, prac
tical question.
The question is not whether human slavery is ab
stractly right or wrong; nor whether it originated In
Injustice ; whether a better system Is Imaginable and de
sirable ; nor whether It Is destined to disappear as the world
improves. These, I say, are not the questions; because
no country, no statesman, is mainly guided by such
considerations : they are proper matter, for philosophical
discussion, but are necessarily set aside In the actual
business of human government; which Is most wise and
most beneficent when It confines itself. In the first place,
to maldng the best of existing circumstances, and In the
next place, to cautiously and gradually Improving circum
stances themselves. 15

:226 Ten Years in the United Slates.
The question is a practical one. Under now existing
circumstances. Is It not better for the negro himself, and
for mankind at large, that he should remain under the rule
of his old master in the Confederated States, than that he
should fall into the hands of the white men of the North ?
Here, then, are the main facts of the case we have to
consider : —
1. The United States, with a white population of, say
twenty miUions, and a territory enough for five or ten
full-sized nations, desire to regain power over the ' people,
the commerce, and land of the Confederated States.
2. The Confederated States consisting of some twelve
milUons of human beings, possessed of ample ten-rtoryj
contributing far more to the wealth of the rest of the
world than the United States do or have done; justly
boasting of a peaceful, industrious prosperity, of an almost
total immunity from the evils of want and famine, and
from domestic or political commotions to the extent of
bloodshed; demand only to be left alone to develop their
own resources, and to be admitted to a place among inde
pendent national powers.
3. A portion of these populations are negroes : a race
of people regarded as Inferior, and unentitled to political
or social equality, by all the whites, it may be said-^the
exceptions being so Inconsiderable. The President of the
United States has told them (those of them, that is, within
his domain,) that he and the whites over whom he rules
wish that they would leave their common country — which
they, the whites, regard as a white man's country — rin which,
amidst aU its miUions of square miles of idle fertile land,
they can find no room for their half-million of free negroes.

Leading Facts of the Case. 227
but will pay their passage to a foreign country. Some of
the States have even passed a virtual sentence of slow ex-
tarminatlon against the whole race, forbidding them to
enter within their boundaries; a sentence which the people,
so little scrupulous in most matters, will carry out to its
evident Intention, by making the life of the free negro so
Intolerable that he will finally disappear.
4. But the mass of the negro population of North
America live in the Confederated States, in a state of
slavery, under circumstances and laws which make their
masters interested In their physical well-being ; so that they
are a strong, healthy, well-fed, and on the whole well con
tented labouring population, increasing in numbers, and
sharing in the prosperity of the country : their condition
being best in the oldest and most cultivated parts, and worst
in the new wild regions, just as Is the case with the
whites. In short : In the North, the negro Is regarded by
the white sovereign people — ^whose will is law, and whose
prejudices, therefore, are law; expressed usually by statute
law, but. If necessary, by lynch law — as an exotic, an
anomaly, an alien, a nuisance. In the South, he is ac
knowledged to be necessary to the independence, the
welfare, industry, and progress of the country; he is valued,
the adult, at about one thousand dollars a head, twice as
much as a fine high-bred horse is worth, and is under the
most watchful and powerful of all protectors — individual
self-interest. Now, under which power would any humane
and rational man place these negroes? The answer is
self-evident. And these are the only alternatives, how
ever disagreeable both may be.
It Is not an abstract question, nor a very abstruse one.
15—2

228 Ten Years in the United States.
Terrible evils arising from slavery at once strike the
stranger. There Is possibly not an alleged fact in Uncle
Tom's Cabin which could not be proved : yet It is, I may
say, wholly untrue as a picture of negro slavery as It
then existed. Imagine a person similarly gifted with the
writer of that book, to collect a number of shocking
instances of ignorance, wretchedness, crime, cruelty to
animals, wives, and children — of meanness, snobbishness,
servility, rascality in tradesmen, dishonesty in officials,
stupidity in magistrates, and so on — occurring In England,
and to make a book out of It, just putting in here and there
some few redeeming traits of manliness and goodness, to
make it seem impartial, and then circulate a translation of
it in Central Africa. Why, the King of Dahomey would
thank bis Mumbo-Jumbo that he was not an Englishman !
To judge fairly of the effect of slavery on the negro, his
condition In his native country should be compared with
his present state. Without ignoring the evils of slavery,
which is probably for the negro a transition state, I contend
that for him bondage in the Slave States of North America
Is better than his life In his native Africa, where slavery
Is one of the least of his miseries. And what is his
condition in the Northern States, where he Is nominally
free? The State of which President Lincoln Is a citizen
will not let this free negro enter within its borders !
TIcket-of -leave men can go there. If white, but not even
Uncle Tom himself. And though this law does not pre
vail In all the free negro States, yet the feeUng on which
it Is founded is universal. The free negro is disappearing
from the North, as a matter of course. Those In the South
prefer staying there, though they would be more welcome

The Slave and Free Negro. 229
to go than to stay. Hard as it seems to convince people
of the fact, it is a very simple matter: the negro has
not so much mind or so much brain as the white, and
cannot keep pace with him in the life-struggle of competi
tion. Were ten thousand negroes to find their way to
England they would be still more rapidly crushed out ;
disappearing through the workhouses and prisons, and
perishing amidst the dregs of our towns. Such Is the fate
of large numbers — the morally and intellectually weakest
— of our own people ; who, however, are naturally superior
to the average of any negro population.
But It is urged that more might have been done for
the negro ; he might have been raised higher in the
human scale. Probably. And a good deal more might
have been done for the white man than has been done.
But our coloured friends have not much reason to com
plain, as the world goes.
What are the fruits of the " peculiar institution ? " How
has it worked for the black, the white, and the world in
general ? Compare the condition of the negro in the
Southern States with his condition elsewhere. Compare
his history in those States, since his first Introduction,
with his history in other parts of the world for a like
time : look, in fact, at both sides of the question.
Turn to Africa. Is there any reason to beUeve that the
natives have in the least Improved for the last thousand
years, or that their condition Is better than It was? War,
want, slavery, wretchedness, brutality, are natural to the
race. About this very time the horrible King of Dahomey
is celebrating the '' grand custom " of his kingdom, and
slaughtering thousands of his " subjects."

230- Ten Years in ihe United States.
In the Slave States of North America the negro is,
in the main, cheerful, healthy, well-fed, and rapidly in
creasing in numbers. He has made much progress in
the appearances and decencies of life : wearing coat and
trousers after our cut ; going to church very generally.
Instead of worshipping fetiches ; and abstaining from can
nibalism. Instead of slaughtering and selling his neigh
bours, he seldom goes beyond stealing white men's chickens
and young pigs. We imagine him to be groaning under a
horrible system of slavery, while he is Uving a life of
peace, plenty, and progress. Yes, I malce bold to sa}',
progress. From the lazy, murdering, thieving, fetich-
worshipping native African, he has been converted into
one of the most usefid and productive of the world's
labourers, supplying millions of Europeans with the raw
material on which to employ their skill and Industry.
Let the tree be judged by Its fruits. The state of things
that does most good for a man or a number of men, — that
I will give my vote for, whatever Its name. By slavery
the African Is trained to habits of industry ; his good
qualities have more scope; he is relieved from incessant
want, fear, and warfare ; his vices are greatly restrained,
and his deficient capacity Is supplied by the care of his
master. On the other hand, how has this institution of slavery
affected the wliite man — the master ? Let his conduct in
the present trying circumstances speak for him. Never
did a people deliberately enter upon a more unequal con
test than the Secessionists. The North at first could not
believe the South to be serious; and now, month after
month, with their millions of men and hundreds of mUlions

Effects of Slavery on the Master. 231
of dollars, they have assailed in vain the States through
which they expected to march unresisted, and triumphantly.
The final appeal to arms, the stern trial by battle, is the
grand test of a nation's manhood; and judged by that test
the South seems in no degree enfeebled or corrupted by
the system of slavery which has grown with her growth,
and has In truth mainly contributed to her power and
prosperity. Judged by that test, the Slaveocracy of the South
are far superior to the Demagogocracy of the Nortli.
The people of all parts of the Union have ever liked and
respected the Southern character. Any Yankee would feel
highly complimented by being mistaken for a Southerner,
unless he guessed you were soft-sawdering him. The
negroes themselves — and they ought to be good judges —
have a decided aversion to all foreigners and Northerners
as masters; greatly preferring to serve those who have
been born In their midst, and \vho, understanding them,
do not expect too much of them, but make a very liberal
allowance for their vices and weaknesses.
It were very easy to give a variety of facts tending to
show that the negro population of the South is in a very
prosperous and improving condition : viewing them physi-
caUy, mentally, and socially, and, lastly, comparatively
with other negroes. From amidst several millions, spread
over a vast territory, it is a simple matter to collect facts
enough, of any kind desired, to prove almost anything that
prejudice on either side can believe or assert. It will
be sufficient, however, on this subject to present the reader
with what no one will deny, and what Is now universally
seen to be the truth, by all who have paid ordinary
attention to the newspaper records of the present war.

232 Ten Years in the United States.
I will use nearly the words and keep to the spirit of the
press, giving nothing but what I have good reason for
believing to be quite true.
As to the free negroes. North and South, the general
{feeling of all North America, Canada Included, is thus ex
pressed by an editor, speaking of those in his own neigh
bourhood, where they w-ere universally numerous. What
has been added to our strength as a producing community.
It is asked, by the Influx of negroes ? We find, upon
examination, that some two or three hundred of them are
idle loafers, either living off the fruits of gambling, or
whose masters have, with their freedom, given them pro
perty or money. While a few may be found, Uke men,
engaged in agricultural employment, the majority prefer
to live about the town, and earn a precarious subsistence
from day to day. When they get money it goes Uke
water. The darkey loves his good dinners, bis good
clothes, and the other etceteras of life too well to resist
gratifying his taste as long as there is a shot in the
locker. Nor are they thrifty, when supplied with means
to start in the world with. A gentleman from the South,
who has quartered upon an extensive farm some of his
emancipated slaves, during a late visit detailed the fol
lowing facts: — he found everything going to ruin about
the place, and work thriftlessly done ; the negroes living
like nabobs, supporting numbers of their friends whose
purses were empty; and, In a few years, if things went
on as they were going, they must come to poverty. What
good will such a class of persons do the community ?
In fact, the free negro generally, north and south,
east and west, is the gipsy of America: except that he

Free Negroes the Gipsies of America. 233
sticks to one spot, he has a somewhat similar reputation.
And It happens, too, that the fortune-tellers, of whom
fiiere seems to be one more or less recognized as a pro
fessional In every considerable town, and In many country
neighbourhoods, belong to this class. At least, the five or
six I have known of, in various places, have been free
black or yellow people ; 'who are consulted principally by
girls : for fun, of course, they will tell you ; but not with
out a mixture of that love of the strange and unaccountable,
that superstition which belongs to most of us in some
form, irrespective of education.
No doubt there are some few full-blooded negroes equal
mentally to the average Englishman; just as there are
some few people, evidently of English pedigree, unmin-
gled with any Inferior race, who yet are below the average
negro in moral and intellectual power. Perhaps In no
respect is the difference between the African and the
Anglo-Saxon more visible than in the very Important point
of disposition for work. There are, it is true, some true-
born Britons who may justly be accused of laziness ; but,
generally, it arises In them from their not having found
their mission, from discontent, or from liver disease.
Whether It Is a gift of nature, or a habit acquired by
ages of training, I know not ; but in inclination for labour,
physical labour, one Englishman is equal, I should say,
to two negroes ; and an English ploughman, working
in England, does as much work as two or three Negro
field-bauds, taking into consideration quality as well as
quantity. But it is when left to themselves that tho
difference is most striking: the one sets up some amuse
ment equal to the hardest kind of" work — skittles, wrest-

234 Ten Years in the United States.
Ijng, foxhunting — If mixed with a little danger all the
better ; the other, if he could have his grossest animal
wants satisfied, would indulge himself to death. This Is
not the case, I need not say, Avith the black man alone : It
is more remarkable in him, however, on account of his
fine, full, muscular development, especially as tcf the upper
parts of his body, his weak point seeming to be about the
shins. Those who have to pay for work done in different
parts of the world consider that a labourer in England
does from three to five times as much as a sepoy. China
man or other more or less coloured person. The moral
difference here operates, it must be remembered ; the
Englishman being less of an eye-servant than the others.
It seemed to me that the black man is a more nocturnal
animal than the white ; he likes to bask In the hot sun,
but he seems to wake up at night, and then. If ever, to
enjoy a little exercise. Socially gathered round a bit of
fire, with something to eat, and a little whisky, and the
society of the fair sex, and a good deal of singing and
laughter — such laughter as would cure a dyspeptic, if he
could but do the like a few times — then the negro shines,
and will get up a " break-down," about which there is
an amusing clumsy cleverness, such as you might expect
from a frolicsome, nimble young elephant. Few things
are more comical and characteristic than a fight between
two negro lads (though, perhaps,. I ought to be ashamed
to say so) : they butt, and kick, and swing then' fists
wildly about, yet apparently at random, and without
seeming to hurt each other. But they are much fonder
of fun and sleep than of fighting.
I think there can be no doubt that, the regular and

A Free Negro in Virginia. 235
moderate labour and diet to which the negro slave is
being accustomed by his master. Is the best practicable
system of education for this careless, lazy, sensual race ;
destined yet, we may hope, to do a fair share of work
for himself and the rest of the world, and by means of
honest labour to be reclaimed himself from black, dis
gusting African savageism, and also to subdue to the use
of mankind that, to us, malarious land on which he has
Idly squatted from time Immemorial.
Let us now return to the free negro. To the general
character above given of the class there are, of course,
many exceptions. I have known the case of a free
negro, in Virginia, owning houses, employing white and
black workmen, living in a pretty dweUing of his own,
and generaUy respected. One of the most noteworthy free
negroes was perhaps Pierre Chastang, of Mobile, where be
was born in 1779. He was the slave of Jean Chastang,
till in 1810 he became the property of another master.
During the Indian war, Pierre, then known to the citizens
as a brave, honest, trustworthy man, was appointed by
Jackson patroon or captain of a Government transport,
to carry provisions to the troops. The undertaking was
perilous, as at that time the whole country was infested
with hostile Indians, and but few persons could be found
to take charge In an expedition attended with so great
a risk of life. Pierre was, however, successful, and reached
the troops in safety with a supply of provisions. In 1819,
during the ravages of the yellow fever, Pierre rendered
essential service to the city, by taking care of the sick and
protecting the property of the citizens. He, and one or
two other persons, were compelled to act as nurses and

236 Ten Years in the United States.
sexton; but the sickness and mortality were so great, that it
Avas difficult to have the patients properly cared for : three,
four, and five bodies were taken at a time in a cart, and
deposited in a pit. As a matter of course, all who could
get away fled from the pestilence, leaving their property
in charge of Pierre. On the return of the merchants
in the fall they found everything safe, and as some appre
ciation of his services and honesty, a subscription was at
once taken up for his emancipation and to purchase him a
horse and dray. Since that period, his avocation as a
drayman has enabled him to support his family quite
handsomely, and at the. same time amass a snug little pro
perty. No person iu this community (says a Mobile
journal), white or black, was ever more highly esteemed
and respected, and no one In his sphere has been a more
conspicuously honest, benevolent, and upright man than
Pierre Chastang. He always acted on the golden rule of
doing unto others as he would be done by.
Now, as to the slaves. Let me give a short biography
of one, a servant of General Washington, still residing
on the farm of a Mr. Smoot, of Alabama. He was born
on the property of Colonel Fauntleroy, of Rappahannock,
Virginia, in 1751, and while Washington was in Philadel
phia, attending the Continental Congress, he purchased
him, giving thirty pounds for him. Soon after. General
Washington took command of the army, taking Jerry
with him as his body servant; which position he occupied
until the close of the great struggle for American Inde
pendence, taking au active part in all the battles in which
Washington was engaged. Jerry recounts with great
accuracy many prominent incidents, and shed tears while

Washington's Negro Slave. 237
relating the hardships experienced by the soldiers of the
American forces.
After the close of the Avar, Jerry was taken to Mount
Vernon ; Avhere he remained till, becoming discontented in
consequence of his wife moving to a distant neighbourhood,
he Avas sold to the owner of his wife. A few years after,
Jerry's wife died. Becoming dissatisfied Avith his master,
he Avas again sold, and finally was carried to Richmond,
Avhere he was purchased by the father of Colonel Hugh P.
Watson, now of Montgomery, Alabama. Mr. W. kept
Jerry until his death, when he fell into the hands of his
young master. Colonel Hugh P. Watson.
When the Avar with Mexico took place, Colonel Watson
volunteered, and as soon as Jerry heard that, he said his
young master should not go unless he, too, went with
him ; so he went AvIth the Talladega boys. Jerry Avould
not only take every opportunity to kill a " Greaser," but,
when he could not shoot one, would Avin their money
from the "yallar devils" (a phrase of his when speak
ing of the Mexicans). Jerry declares that he and one
more of the Talladega A'olunteers (whose name he uses
freely) were the only Americans that could beat the
Mexicans at " monte," and, as a proof of it, he brought
home quite a number of lumps of gold, which he took
great delight in showing. When the Talladega A'olun
teers came home, he returned with his young master.
Major Smoot finally purchased Jerry's wife, and Colonel
Watson gave him permission to go where and Avhen
he pleased. He now labours most of his time in feeding
, pigs, gardening, and doing such work as he likes.
I merely relate these things to show that negro worth

238 Ten Years in the United States.
and ability are sometimes recognized; though not so
Invariably, it must be confessed, as is desirable ; also, to
Illustrate the fact, that there is a considerable scope for
ambition open to the slave ; that he Is not confined to one
dead level, but is in the best, though not in the fullest
sense, a member of society : that he can rise, though not to
be President. He is condemned to " keep his place," but
that place is not very narrow: not so narrow, I think, con
sidering his average abUity, as many races and classes are
practically confined to. And when Ave remember that
Northern party abolitionism has of late years kept the South
as it were In a state of siege, it will hardly be denied that
this system of slavery allows the negro the great essential
of civilization — means and opportunity of improvement
and development — at least as liberally as is practically
enjoyed under many other forms of government' by men
considerably above the African race in mental develop
ment. It Is clear from these facts tliat the negro has the aid and
benefit of the prudence, intelligence, and morality of the
dominant white race ; which. In return, has the benefit of
his labour. Substantially, though somewhat in the rough
at present, it is a just, wise, and mutually beneficial
exchange. As a labourer, in the South, the AA^hite man
would have lost the high qualities by means of which he
plays so important a part in the Avorld as a capitalist and
producer ; and now — when driven to it, though the most
peaceable of men, and bound to be so by the delicate
n.ature of his "peculiar Institution," — also as a soldier:
but as a manager of labour, and as a provider and ruler
of the labourer, he has done wonders. White and black

The Negro's Condition in the Slave States. 239
were both necessary to each otlier, and, generally speaking,
as the world goes, have done their duty by each other ;
and surely it should be denounced as au execrable crime
against society, to put the torch and the knife into the
hands of these, still savages at heart. In order that the
political abolitionists of the North may have the benefit
of " the sympathy of Europe," and then, their objects
gained, rid themselves altogether at their leisure of the
blacks, and perhaps have the land of the South to specu
late with — to seU to European free emigrant labourers,
who. In a few years, would be treated by the North as a
degraded and inferior race.
There are certain general facts, however, Avhich may
be now considered and admitted as settled, on which the
reader will feel that he can rely In endeavouring to
arrive at an understanding of the real condition of the
negro slaA-e.
And first of these is the generally strong and healthy
condition of the slave population. No traveller has, I
believe, asserted that he saw among them the signs of a
lack of sufficient, wholesome food. If I were to enter into
a comparison of their actual average dietary, to the best of
my judgment, and after considerable inquiry, AvIth that of
our labouring population, the statements would seem exag
gerated In favour of the slaves ; but no doubt the superior
healthiness of the climate of these islands, the better, more
nourishing air (as from my own experience I may describe
it) makes less food necessary here than in America for white
men. And as to the amount of labour got out of the slave,
I believe that the testimony of all travellers is to the effect
that even the adult males seemed to be bA' no means over-

240 Ten Years in the United States.
Avorked ; with the exception, made by some few observers,
that, at the time of getting In the cotton, and, according
to others, the sugar-ciine, they were sometimes Avorked to
excess. On many cotton plantations, however, the labour
Is easily got through by a system of tasking the hands ;
giving to each a fair day's work (a negro's day's work),
and then letting him Avork for himself, for pay, if he
pleases ; which most of them do cheerfuUy.
Very satisfactory evidence as to this matter is afforded
by the census of the United States, taken every ten years.
Take a half-century : In 1800 the slave population in the
present slave-holding States Avas 853,851 ; in 1850 it Avas
3,200,304. A strong and healthy population, increasing
at this rate, must be physically better off than the great
bulk of the people of the civilized Avorld.
As to the moral and religious progress of the slaves.
It Is quite useless to say a little on a question so exten
sive. One thing is, however, almost self-evident, that the
peaceful, orderly. Industrious, aud prosperous condition
of the slave population In the Slave States — comparing
negro with negro, comparing this population with even
the other inferior or savage races of the world — implies
the absence, at least, of the want, rapine, war and murder,
that keep down the numbers of the human race over vast
regions of the earth ; and, so far, is proof of a more moral
condition. But there is a sentimental point of view of negro slavery
Avhich demands some attention. Many feel interested iu
the quadroons and octoroons (to use a word familiar to the
London public in connection with a sensation drama), of
Avliom they have read in stories.

Mulattoes. — Quadroons. 241
These people of mixed blood — truly "anomalies," to
use Mr. Seward's term for his negro friends — one can
hardly help pitying on first acquaintance ; some because
of their repulsiveness, having a sort of unnatural look ;
others, because they evidently have feeling, capacity, and
appearance above their destiny. From the fortunate few
ness of their numbers, they seem to a stranger to be neces
sarily isolated, and constantly reminded of their anomalous
origin and position ; which are somewhat analogous to
those of a prepossessing, well-educated person in England,
of illegitimate birth, suffering, for no fault of his own,
under the hard law, which sentimentalists would unani
mously repeal, that visits the sins of the parent upon
the child.
Among them are occasionally fine men and women ;
the latter having frequently good features, Avith what a
romancist might call a voluptuous look, compared with
the more intellectual expression and less active animalism
of an American countenance, or of that of a cultivated
European : for the rude, hearty, coarse, healthy look of
well-fed, hard-working, and fresh-air-breathing people in
England is very rarely met with in North America.
They are generally considered to be Inferior In physical
stamina to either pure race ; and it is said that they die
out in a year or tAvo, on repeated Intermarrying — be
coming consumptive, I believe : an assertion which seems
to be founded on fact, seeing how fcAv they still are in
number. I have heard good-hearted, sensible persons, who felt
no scruples about black negro slavery, contend that these
yellow people ought to have their freedom, on account
16

242 I'en Years in the United States.
of their superior Intelligence, compared with the genuine
negro— not reflecting that such a poUcy would be offering
a high reward to vice among the coloured population.
Undoubtedly, a man of this origin, of good capacity and
Avith a good share of pride, is in a very unfortunate posi
tion. He has to pay to a superior race the same deference
which In some parts of the world poverty pays to wealth.
It Is said. Indeed, that the poor free man lives in the
enjoyment of a hope to escape from his lot: I think,
however, this is a source of consolation more frequently
read of than met Avitli. The hour or two's Indulgence on
Saturday night, the Sunday relaxation, the occasional
holiday — these are what the mass of, at least British poor
working men and women look forward to, and keep their
spirits up and their discontent down with ; hope to escape
from their hard lot as hewers of Avood and drawers of
water for the more fortunate, animates very fcAv of them
after the first few years of manhood : just so the negroes,
bond and free, black and yelloAv, seem to get used to
their condition, and to make the best of it. The free.
Intelligent mulatto, whose position one would think most
irksome, very seldom leaves his native place : though the
lightest coloured slaves, hardly distinguishable from white
men (but these are very rare — probably not five, certainly
not ten, such being found in Richmond), are rather dan
gerous property, as, in case they get discontented, they
can travel more readily by the " underground railway "
than their darker brethren. The famous Frederick
Douglas is one of these mulattoes. Generally speaking, it
seems that the coloured people who have been most re
markable for their virtues or intelligence have been of

The Negro Race in tlie South. 243
the pure black race ; of AA'hom there are perhaps as many
grades and sub-varieties as among Europeans.
The reader will by this time have seen that the negro
race In the Southern States forms a community, or rather
a class of its own, intimately connected at many points
with, the rest of the society to Avhich it belongs; having
advantages sufficient to keep Its mind from stagnating,
but not all the hopes and fears Avhich act upon men
enjoying more freedom than It has yet earned. It has
social distinctions aud a public opinion, too, of Its own;
the former based partly upon occupation and duties, but
still more upon the standing of the family the slave belongs
to. The housekeeper who has charge of the keys, and
sees to everything, of course looks down on the field
hand, and if offended by one would perhaps call him
" a dirty black field nigger."
The private opinion of these people, as to their con
dition and the " peculiar institution," It Is not very easy
to learn. They would no doubt be A'ery willing to change
places AvIth their masters ; but they are certainly not
such Impatient abolitionists as their Northern friends
would have them to be. The better class of servants,
those most trusted, take no little pride In themselves, their
station in life, and their family; they have very little
respect for poor people, and It Is they who use the terms
" poor whites," and " poor white trash," among them
selves ; alluding to poor, idle and thriftless whites of the
lowest class.
The negroes look upon the Southerner as superior to
foreigners in general, especially to Dutchmen ; they have
very little liking for Yaukees, who have decidedly a bad
16—2

? 244 Ten Years in the United States.
name for having very Uttle sympathy Avith them, not
understanding how to get along smoothly, and especially
as being hard masters and overseers. Nor will it be easy
for the Northerners to remove this AA'ell-founded opinion
of the negro population ; who Avill strongly suspect their
kind intentions, unless a safe opportunity can be glA'en
to the negro to commence plundering and gratifying his
passions, when fear and fury on both sides Avould oblige
him to go on and run amuck. This could only be attempted
Avhen the able-bodied men were absent In great numbers, as
on military duty ; and should they, betAveen two enemies,
fail to Avreak ample revenge, the Northerners would gladly
aid them. The CaAvnpore and Dahomey savageries into
which the negroes would rush, AA'ould give their Northern
allies justification and opportunity to Avipe them out. The
calculation of the Lincoln and SeAvard Government is : —
" The niggers will kill the Avhites, and the Avhites will
kill the niggers, and thus end for the present the eternal
nigger question."
I have found myself gradually, though rather uuAvil-
lingly, led to give too many pages to matters relating to
this much misunderstood, and just now very important
portion of the inhabitants of the North American States ;
all the more interesting, since It has been resolved to set
them loose upon the unconquerable Southerners — " In
order to secure the sympathies of Europe ! " — and at least
to get back the territory. If not the citizens, of the South.
Great calculations have been made on British anti-slaA'ery
feeling ; as if there were anything in common between
British West India Emancipation and the grasping poli
tical Abolitionism of the Northern States, except that

The Basis of Human Eights. 245
they use the name of emancipation. As practical men,
obliged to choose betAveen tAvo evils. Englishmen must
reconsider this question, Avithout regard to their former
opinions under other circumstances. Slavery may be
denounced as abstractly unjust ; but there is A'ery little
in this AA'orld that coincides with our Ideas of ab.stract
justice. It is urged that it originated in wrong, in
cruelty. Admitted. Hoav many Governments and nations
had their origin In violence and Avar ? Shall we overturn
that Avhich answers well, because it began ill ?
Every human being Is entitled to the treatment, the
circumstances, the institutions, the liberty, the control,
and whatever else is best for him. It is not the colour
of his skin, nor his religious belief, age, place of birth,
quantity of money, that gives him his rights; it is his
capacity, moral, physical, and intellectual. The lunatic,
the idiot, the criminal, the helpless, are all men and
brethren, and are entitled to be treated by their more
capable brethren as is best for those unfortunates and
the general Aveal.
But it is said, you have no right to Impose a condition
on another Avhich you would not allow him to impose
upon you : you are morally bound to do as you Avould
be done by. Now here is a fallacy, arising from a literal,
narrow Interpretation of the command, " Do unto others
as you Avould they should do unto you," Avhicli, like some
other precepts, cannot be taken literally. A parent compels
a child's obedience, but does not obey in return. Women
everywhere are in an inferior political condition ; and
human beings do in various Avays rightfully assume and
exercise poAver over others, their fellows, without con-

246 Ten Years in the United States.
suiting them, without discussion, and without regard to
numbers or majorities.
Negro slavery, as it exists In the Confederated States,
Is a beneficent Institution, because the tAvo' great classes
are in their natural places — the negro at work in the field,
the Anglo-Saxon controlling and managing. The child of
an English lord or mUlIonnaire and that of an English
ploughman, transposed in their cradles by accident, and
growing up, each unconsciously, in his altered sphere,
might probably fit the places they had got shifted Into, the
one as well as the other ; both being of the same, or very
nearly allied, races. Of course this could not happen with
a negro child and his young master, for even if nature
had not made the black distinguishable by his colour, his
features would betray him ; and If these did not, his mind,
manner, character, would ; these being all alike negro :
his features, brain, complexion, capacity, all being In har
mony with each other. In a household or on a plantation
in a country cursed, as we say, Avith negro slaA'ery, the
visitor, the servant himself, and the master, all feel that
people are in their right places ; and there, consequently,
is a satisfaction, a content, a mutual familiarity, and good
understanding, rarely witnessed in free society. Neither
race by itself could have produced so advanced a civiUza-
tlon as noAv exists In the South. I know of no other races
¦ — I can Imagine no other social system — which could have
so speedily subjected those regions to the service and sus
tenance of man. Had the wishes of Washington and
Jefferson been carried out — that is, had they and the men
of their day ventured to abolish domestic negro slavery,
from Virginia to Texas, the whole Southern country would

Men not horn Free and Equal. 247
at this time be an Indian hunting ground, or have beco.me
as wretched, degraded, and useless as Mexico ; which has
a liberal, philosophical, free and equal Constitution— on
paper. Families and races of men differ in natural character.
As no two leaves of a tree are exactly alike, so every
individual human being differs from birth from all others.
In everyday life we all acknowledge this truth; none but
here and there a philosopher imagines that the men, women,
and children around him would all have been alike iu con
duct, disposition, talent, had they groAvn up in like circum
stances. Mankind are not born free, are not born equal ;
they have no Inalienable rights, except to be treated as
is most for their own and society's good. Some men are
fit for one thing, some for another ; some men are better
than others : none excel In everything ; each has his
specialty. The customs, laws, pursuits, circumstances,
institutions, under which one race will thrive and improve,
Avould degrade, disorganize, ruin another.
But to the English mind the institution of slavery is so
shocking, so cruel, that It refuses to believe in Its advan
tage or necessity even for negro savages. The very name
Is hateful : the complex idea which that name represents
— Including the atrocious slave-trade and the horrors of
the middle passage — is abominable and altogether Intoler
able. But the meaning of the words " negro slavery " is
very different now to the English people, and is every
day changing. Could Englishmen, sitting In comfort and
safety, keep in mind an approximate Idea of tbe brutality,
the ferocity, and repulsiveness of the average negro when
left to himself, they Avould not be so intolerant of a system

248 Ten Years in the United States.
wliich has made him one of the most useful of all labourers
in the work of clA-Ilizatlon, and also, some may think
it worth mentioning, one of the best paid. When the
working men and A^'omen of the North were crowding
to the soup-kitchens at the time of the last money panic,
and others were enduring cold and hunger In silence and
secrecy, no slave had a meal stinted ; and hoav, when war
is ravaging their country, only those servants will suffer
who are foolish enough to be deceived by the temptations
held out to them by the invaders. Now the negro prefers
victuals to liberty; and certainly It does him more good.
In the simplest form of society, such as that in which
the native American Avas discovered, we find each savage
tribe claiming certain districts of country, llA'Ing by tbe
chase, in scanty numbers, unceasingly at Avar with other
tribes, and as a general rule, torturing and killing pri
soners. Tribes, hoAvever rude, which live more or less
by agriculture, are also almost continually at war ; want
and revenge making: this the normal condition of savage
life. The conqueror regards it as his natural right to
kill his captive, and in many parts of the world to eat
him too. The most promising of savages, the Ncav Zea-
lander, Avas a confirmed cannibal, animal food being
almost unattainable by other means ; while the Red Indian
looked upon cannibalism with disgust, having abundance
of game. But the savage who practices agriculture to
any extent can often make use of his prisoner ; so he Is
not obliged, In self-defence, to kill him, nor so sorely
tempted to eat him. Were a chief of such a tribe to
forbid the making of slaves, the warriors Avould of course

Tlie Slave's Dilemma. 249
give no quarter to their enemies : for savages want no
neighbours. The African is thus born and bred amidst
slavery, of a worse type than that In which they live in
the Southern States of America.
I am defending negro slavery as It exists in the Con
federated States, not slavery abstractedly or generally.
I am not for slavery, any more than you, reader, are for
Avar, because you think It necessary at times, and justi
fiable Avhen necessary. Time, place, and circumstance
modify all laws, rules, and principles; so that what is wise
in one place or time would be foolish In another. Slavery
is an evil; still in human affairs Ave have often but a choice
of evils allowed us : and not always even a choice. To
the poor Red Indian — Ave always give our sympathy to
the utterly vanquished — to the poor vanishing Red Indian,
the original lord of the soil, negro slavery has proved a
fatal evil; for without It the white man would ncA'er have
subdued the Southern wilderness, nor have exterminated
the labour-hating native American. The choice of evils
for the slave in the Confederated States Is, at present,
between his present servile condition under his Avhite
master on one hand, and such freedom as the North
offers him on the other.
Scarcely a njan of any attainments in anatomy, medi
cine, or physiology, avIU deny that the form and propor
tions of the average negro brain indicate a much lower
degree of moral and intellectual power than that with
which nature has endowed the average white man. In
civilized countries those whose heads or brains approach
most nearly to the African type fall Into the lowest classes ;
sink down into the dregs of the community. A person

250 Ten Years in the United States.
in England whose cerebral organization is nearly as low
as that of the average negro will rarely conduct himself
so as to be recognized by any self-respecting class of
the people, from the labourer upwards, as a respectable
man. The children, the boys and girls, the legal infants
of any white race, are more capable of self-government
than the adult negro population of any part of the world
— bond or free.
It Is not merely the colour of the skin that distinguishes
the negro from the white ; his whole character is different :
lower, more sensual. In England this Is not understood.
An Importation of 10,000 real negroes Into this country
would very soon alter the national feelings regarding them.
Our countrymen In Australia find the filthy, mean,
coAvardly, miserably-living, and clieaply-labouring Chinese
intolerable. In the Northern States the negro Is felt to be
an alien, an outcast, a nuisance ; the people envy him the
land he occupies, and would gladly have an excuse to drive
liim into the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico. Does
not President Lincoln invite them — those under his rule,
Avho are mocked by being called free — to leave their own
native country, the United States, and go, at their generous
fellow-countrymen's expense, to a distant, barbarous land ?
That, O British friends of the negro ! is the freedom the
North has in store for him.
Perhaps the worst feature In the war now waged to
bring the seceded States back Into the Union was the
hypocrisy on this subject. Attempts were made to enlist
the anti-slaA'ery sympathies of England with tbe North, on
the ground that the North aimed at befriending the negro,
and abolishing slavery. But were the South to say, " We

Negro Freedom in ihe North. 251
will surrender all our slaA^es If you Avill receive them,
free, into your midst," Mr. Seward and Mr. Lincoln would
not dare to accept the proposition. The myriads of men
in arms hovering around the South would be only too
delighted to have some exciise — such as an insurrection
among the slaves — to shoot the niggers down like wolves
or Indians ; and thus kill the poor goose that has laid the
golden eggs for the whole Union.
What American abolitionist would not rather see his
daughter dead than married to a " genuine nigger," how
ever Avell dressed and well educated? Slavery, as it
exists now in the Confederated States, gives the black
man the best chance of gradual improA'ement he has ever
had. This we may be sure of: the Northern mind is already
made up, that when the South is conquered, the negroes
must go to some regions better fitted by Providence for
their civilization and free self-development. Some such
cant as that will be employed. A passage somewhere,
anywhere, will be offered them ; they will be free to go or
stay ; but the United States will be too hot for them :
they will find there no encouragement, no protection, no
justice ; and they wiU disappear.
There are. Indeed, some who, viewing the matter ethno-
logically, believe that — by a stern yet beneficent law of
nature, ever operating to produce and multiply, and fill
the earth with higher and higher developments of all kinds
of animal Ufe, including man — the Inferior human races,
such as the red man, the negro, the Australian, are
doomed to extinction by the spread of races superior to
themselves in mental power. But such a universal law

252 Ten Years in the United States.
as that — and that there is such a law, seems clearly settled
— admits of many exceptions aud counteractions ; and,
such law being admitted. It by no means follows that the
time has come for the negro, or any other variety of our
family, to vanish from the scene in which they are, no
doubt, destined to perform a useful part. It seems to
me that there is still plenty of Avork for the negro — work
Avhicli he can do better than anybody else — work Avliich
no superior race can long stick to and remain a superior
race. Any one with a little verbal ingenuity may easily
collect a number of isolated facts, and argue long and
plausibly to the contrary. The abolitionists have plenty
of proof that Avhite men can perform better than the
negro the agricultural labour of the South, frequently
quoting some German settlements In Texas. But analogy
and history glA-e very strong proofs, supported rather than
rebutted by recent experience, that a climate like that of
the South — the Gulf States especially, Avhich the Northern
generals found in more than one sense too hot for them
selves and their men to fight in during the summer heat —
would very soon exhaust and degrade agricultural labourers
of British or Northern origin. But to return. —
To treat all men, all human beings, alike, Avere it pos
sible, would be the height of folly and injustice. The
French political theory, based on an imaginary natural
equality, has collapsed : It was impracticable, impossible.
To discriminate among men, to put each in his proper place,
to place more influence in the hands of the most moral,
intelligent, and cultivated members of society — that must
he the task for future reformers.
A twelvemonth ago I would not have attempted to de-

United States Declaration of Independence. 253
fend an institution long since tried and condemned, though
Avithout a fair hearing. But circumstances have changed ;
new and Important facts have been brought to light ; sur
prising, unwelcome, and almost Incredible events liaA'e
unsettled and greatly modified the opinions of every man
iu this country, and in Europe, who is not more stubborn
than facts themselves. A vaunted and admired, and to
outward View, mighty political system, has been Aveighed
In the balance and found Avantlng. Few are as yet aAvare
of the silent effect on men's minds of the "American
news " that bas come week after week for the last twelve
months. Not that society Avill go backAvards, but it will
go no farther on the road travelled by the United States ;
not even though urged or Invited forAvard by the purest
patriot breathing. The task of the good citizens of that
country is a difficult one ; being, among other things, to
purify and organize its suffrage, and to erase from its
Declaration of Independence that great French fallacy,
which has been to Columbia the direful spring of woes
unnumbered, the text of Yankee abolitionism — the alleged
truth, the palpable untruth, "that all men are created
enual."

254 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER XV.
Early Settlers of the now Northern States — The Mayflower and the
Pm"itans — Colonization of Virginia and the now Confederated States —
Handsome young EngKshwomen sold in Virginia — Cavalier Emigrants
— Rebels sold — Huguenot Immigrants — The Puritans and Roger
Williams — The Yankee Character — Respect shown to Women — On
the Stump — Enow-nothings — Popular Sovereignty insulted — Insanity on
the subject of Natural Grandeur.
The persecuted and persecuting Puritans were the first
emigrants, and gained- the upper hand In those rigorous
regions lying farthest north of the American territory
claimed by the British Crown ; and have given their
peculiar tone of life, manners, and habits ta New Eng
land, or the Eastern States, and since to the North- West
in a considerable degree. Of these men, and their pioneer
bark, the Mayflower, a great deal has been said which I
think the future will unsay; to me they seem to have
been merely unco' guid and rigidly righteous Englishmen,
rather narrow-minded and fanatical, brooding long and
bitterly over their oavu wrongs, and thinking no more
than most men (not so much as some In those times) of
others' rights : a thrifty, close, tenacious, brave, persevering
people, somcAvhat illiberal and unsocial. It maj"- be said, in
their mode of life, although well educated and of the
higher classes ; exclusive and strictly sectarian ; with all

Puritan and Cavalier Settlers in Virginia. 2J5
the faults and virtues. In short, of persecuted, defeated,
proud, unsuccessful but unconquered Englishmen, em
bittered by theological controversy.
It would be interesting to ascertain Avliat element of
the population the Puritans mainly belonged to ; for there
are, no doubt, portions of the English people having
hereditary tendencies and peculiarities almost as marked
as those which distinguish the Irish from the Saxon race.
It is common and easy enough to refuse to acknoAvledge
such facts; but It Is useless to attempt to study the
capacity, the destinj', and character of a nation, unless
we admit these hereditary distinctions of race.
Opposing influences and different classes prevailed in
the English settlements formed in the territory which
has since been called the South. Sir Walter Raleigh
promoted Its exploration, and the first attem.pts to colonize
the country to which was given the name of Virginia. Of
the first hundred and five adventurers more than fifty
were " gentlemen," having among the objects of their
expedition the propagation of Christianity. Subsequently
emigrants of various classes, including the more useful and
laborious, went out ; but altogether they were a bad lot
(according to a recent Virginian historian, Howlson), with
some exceptions, and at times they suffered terribly.
At first the settlers were entitled to a hundred acres per
man, which was found too much, and reduced to fifty — a
surprising fact, till we remember that the landholder was
his own labourer. ' Soon a " General Assembly " met, com
posed of burgesses, probably elected by a suffrage nearly
universal. It was the natural course of things. A
thousand reputable settlers went from the mother country.

256 Ten Years in the United States.
and King James commanded a hundred convicts of the
worst kind to be sent to help them.
Women being scarce in Virginia, the managers of the
colony, residing in England, obtained ninety young
females, Avho were voluntarily shipped off. To defray
expenses, they were sold, the price apiece being 120 lbs. of
tobacco (worth 3s. per lb.) ; and they were bought readily.
Sixty more Avere sent, said to be young, handsome, and
chaste. These importations were repeated, with proper care,
it Is stated. Certainly, the personal appearance of the
population at the present day confirms Avhat Is said as to
the good looks of these women.
To the north of Virginia, Lord Baltimore founded a
colony with two hundred persons of good family — Roman
Catholics. The Virginians remained true to Charles after he was
defeated by Cromwell. The founders of the colony had left
England before the civil and religious dissensions began,
and retained their affection for Church and King and the
mother country, all together, as they recollected things.
These feelings and prejudices they long cherished; and
Avhen afterwards In England the royalists Avere defeated by
CroniAvell, It was natural that any cavaliers wishing to
emigrate, should turn to the South, which still merely
remained in statu quo, rather than to the Puritaiiized North.
Thus, North and South are really descended, in all pro
bability, from similar classes of the British population ;
though Puritanism developed Itself powerfully in New
England, Avliile the planters of the South took a pride In
preserving the social habits, and, as far as convenient, the
political and religious Institutions of Old England.

Early Population of Virginia. 257
Some portion of the population of Virginia Is descended
from a number of the routed followers of the illegitimate
Earl of Monmouth : a portion of whom, Bancroft, I think,
says, were sold for ten or fifteen pounds a piece to be
slaves in the colony. Of the number of these unfortunates,
aud the nature of the slavery, I am not aware ; but they
seem to have had no great reason to complain of their
punishment, as they soon acquired Independence and tran
quillity in hospitable Virginia.
A foAv, probably 2,000 In all, of the crowds of
Huguenots, Avho were driven from France towards the end
of the seventeenth century, found a home in Virginia, and
became a portion of its regular population. From these
French Calvinlsts, I believe. Lieutenant Maury is de
scended — one of the few really scientific men whom
America has produced.
The fertile and beautiful central region — the valley of
Virginia — attracted a number of Scotch-Irish from Penn
sylvania, who shared It with German emigrants ; and,
both together, are acknowledged to be among the best
farmers of the State.
Meantime, the negro had been Imported. In August,
1620, a Dutch man-of-war sailed up the James, and landed
and sold to the planters twenty negroes from Africa. The
black slave flourished, but the free Indian continued to dis
appear. Soon after the American revolution the renowned
orator, Patrick Henry, Introduced a bill into the Legis
lature of the State, providing that any free, white, male
citizen marrying an Indian lady should receive a bounty
of ten pounds sterling, and five pounds on the birth of
each child, and be exempt from all taxes on person or
17

258 Ten Years in the United States.
property; aud giving similar encouragement to white
female citizens marrying Indians. This bill passed Its
first and second reading, and was likely to become law,
when Patrick Henry was elected Governor of the State,
and his bill, wanting bis support, was rejected on the third
reading. Virginia peopled large tracts In the south and south
west, outside her own domain. Conducting agriculture
in the exhausting and Avasteful mode common to all the
States while good land Avas to be had in them, her sons
preferred to migrate and locate themselves on the rich
virgin lands of Kentucky, Alabama, and other more
distant regions. Kentucky, especially, is a young and
heartier Virginia.
South Carolina Is said to claim an aristocratic descent
from Old Scotch families for many of her people.
Louisiana has much French blood In portions of her popu
lation ; and her Creoles are stIU as French, as the Eastern
Virginians are English. It may be worth observing, that
the various sources of population have not "amalgamated
as yet so extensively as might be supposed CA'en from the
remarks of American Avrlters. Thus, In Pennsylvania,
there are extensive and beautiful portions, which haA'e
from the first settlement of the country been peopled by
Germans; and several generations have passed away,
leaving a pure German-speaking population, ignorant of
English, thinking themselves quite as good as the native
Americans, and a good deal better.
Thus, it wUl be understood how all smaller matters were
swallowed up In two great features. The Puritanical
spirit distinguishing the North, negro slavery the South.

Tlie Puritans. 259
The New England tendencies fully developed themselves
in the famous Blue Laws. It Is, perhaps, not too much to
say, that no white men were ever subjected to a system at
once so petty, contemptible, and tyrannical. This system
has sunk deeply into the character of the numerous and
Influential descendants of the Puritans : a rigid, self-
righteous, intolerant, brooding disposition ; an excessive
regard for proprieties and appearances ; restraints on social
gaiety, enjoyments, and amusements ; a tendency to go to
extremes, to magnify one idea, and to dwell upon It, are
its predominant characteristics. It is one of the curio
sities of Yankee rhetoric and literature, that an Impression
has been created In England that the Puritans were the
friends of liberty. If any one thinks so, let him read the
Life of Roger Williams, by Romeo Elton, published by
A. Cockshaw, Ludgate Hill.
The Mayflower folks were highly respectable, moral,
conscientious, and possibly enlightened people for their
times. Smarting under persecution, they had a keen sense
of their own rights and their oavu wrongs, and Avent Into
the wilderness to secure liberty — for themselves and those
of their own way of thinking. It is undeniable that, Avith
the whole body of English Presbyterian clergy, protesting
against the views of CromAvell and his party, "they
detested and abhorred toleration," and believed, with
Edwards, of that time, that toleration would make the
kingdom a second Babel.
When Roger Williams came among them, and took the
liberty of worshipping God according to his own Noncon
formist conscience, he had to fly from their midst In the
month of January, through unknoAvn forests, to strange
17—2

260 Ten Years in the United States.
Indians, and, on the banks of the Mooshausick, commence
the establishment of
" A State where none shall persecution fear."
Of the many genuine first-rate men who went to America
with a view of developing themselves and their Ideas, this
Roger Williams was one of the best and foremost, although
he was only a Welshman, bom in 1606, in Carmarthen,
at a place called Maestroiddyn-faAvr. Sir Edward Cope,
seeing something in him, kindly sent him to be educated
at the now Charter-house School. He became a noncon
forming Puritan, and to escape from the tyranny of Laud,
he went to transatlantic Boston, where he was received
with great joy by his Puritan brethren. But on account
of some nonconforming niceties, and because he had ex
pressed an opinion that the magistrate had no right to
punish a breach of the Sabbath, nor any other " breach of
the first table," the authorities Avould not allow him to
settle as teacher at one of their churches, Avhen an opportu
nity of doing so offered Itself. From time to time he gave
his brethren a good deal of trouble ; he Avas as near a
thorough radical as could live in " the Augustan age of
Christianity." Cotton Mather, no small authority, declared
that " he had a windmill In his head." He contended
that unregenerate men ought not to have oaths adminis
tered to them; he was too much of an Englishman to
take a sort of oath of allegiance to the Government of
Massachusetts ; he denounced a law requiring every man
to attend public worship, and maintained that the magis
trate could not rightfuUy interfere to stop heresy In a
church. The upshot Avas that ministers and magistrates

Persecution of Roger Williams. 261
agreed that Roger Williams should suffer banishment —
a heavy punishment, under then existing circumstances.
So this time, to escape from the tyranny of Puritanism,
he went Into the red-man's wilderness. On reaching
Plymouth, the governor begged of him to go away, not
wishing to offend the bitter Massachusetts ministers and
magistrates ; so he departed also from these brethren, and
finally settled In the spot where now stands Providence,
which he founded and named In remembrance of " God's
merciful Providence to him In his distress."
These facts Illustrate the Puritan character ; they show
that the Mayflower's passengers did not tolerate toleration ;
that the original Puritan Fathers had not the slightest
tinge of what In the present day Is called liberality. In
matters of either Church or State. Providence grew, and
was for some years a pure, direct democracy. Those
who joined the community had merely to subscribe to a
covenant, 'or promise to submit themselves to all orders
for the public good made by the major consent of the
present Inhabitants, masters of families, "only in civil
things." This, It Is said, is the first instance of a Government
recognizing perfect freedom of conscience ; and Rhode
Island has, I believe, remained true to the principle.
Massachusetts, too, long remained true to her principles
and spirit, the A-ery same as that AA'hich Burns drew and
fixed for the information of the future in " Holy Willie's
Prayer," and some other pieces.
These Puritans, men of substance and education, scorned
the Ignorant and godless rabble, and abandoned their homes
in order to govern themselA'cs and worship in their own

262 Ten Years in tlie United States.
way ; admitting to the same prIvUeges others of their OAvn
way of thinking, perhaps. But no king or priest would
have reprobated more than they the universal-republican
theorists of this day. Quite inappUcable are the lines
often quoted with regard to them : —
" Oh! call it holy ground.
The soil where &st they trod !
They left unstain'd what there they found —
Freedom to worship God." ,
Bold, Intelligent, formidable, even conscientious, men
they were : very much of what Is most admirable in the
United States Is their work. But-" liberal," In the modern,
moral, political, or religious sense of the word, they were
not ; nor are their descendants.
The Yankee is, strickly speaking, the New Englander ;
New England, which has noAv no legally recognized exist
ence, consisting of the five North-Eastern or down-east
States, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maine, Rhode Island,
NcAv Hampshire. The Yankees on the one hand, and the
Virginians on the other, took the lead in the population
and development of the United States. I have, therefore,
selected them In endeavouring to give the British reader
an Insight into the character of the United States popu
lation. Louisiana, Texas, South Carolina, New York, and,
in fact, most of the States, have interesting, instructive,
and reliable unwritten histories; but the limits of this
volume compel me to pass them over.
Let me add a hope that before long the British states
man and politician, having to deal with, and. In some
fashion, govern, people of so many different races, or
varieties, or species, or families (Avhichever name it may

Characteristics of the Yankee. 263
be finally determined to adopt), each having their peculiar
hereditary tendencies, peculiarities, and capacities, will
study nations and communities scientifically, ethnologi-
caUy. For it is among the grossest of cruelties and
absurdities to endeavour to compel all peoples to suit them
selves to the same mode of government. Yet, there Is
a constant, strong, and very natural desire on the part
of Englishmen to consider the \a.-ws and institutions of
Britain the best possible for the rest of the world ; as great
a mistake as It would be to treat the groAvn man and the
mere child alike, on the ground that they are both human
beings. Among the developments of his mental character which
most clearly distinguish the genuine United States man
from his European ancestors, his more active and highly-
cultivated secretiveness is prominent. In ordinary life,
he has a control over his feelings, features, and words,
to AvhIch the Englishman or German is a stranger, and in
which only old world TaUeyrands and Metternlchs rival
him. I knoAV not why travellers have seldom noticed this
important fact, unless it Is that they have been very much
In the habit of taking Americans at their own estimate of
themselves ; and I daresay my transatlantic friends gene
rally will repel, with some surprise and Indignation, such
a charge upon their national idiosyncrasy.
The United States Ambassador said, in a recent speech
at the Mansion House, for which he was complimented by
Mr. Seward, that his countrymen were "too open, too
candid, too careless, in the expression of their opinions."
Of course, there is a true side to this remarkable assertion.
When talking with a majority, or In the midst of his party.

264 Ten Years in the United States.
even the Bostonlan is seemingly careless, free, andreckless of
speech. But what an Englishman means by candour and
freedom of speech is a rare luxury In any part of the United
States, and only enjoyed in the family circle, or between tried
friends—" between you and I and the gate post," as the^
say In Virginia. In Europe, the statesman, the pollticiari,
the courtier, the public man who lives and talks with am
eye to votes, the man or woman bent on fashionable
distinction and popularity, these and such like, possess,
and, to the trained eye, display, a quick, constantly ready,
self-concealing, and self-controlling power. In a far greater
degree than the average of the respective peoples to which
they belong. We have only to remember how much the
Northern man lives In public, generally belonging to some
political party ; so that while he has, as I said before, a
small fraction of sovereignty, he Is almost perpetually and
wholly a courtier, CA'er in the presence too of a most
watchful, jealous sovereign ; and we can then understand
how the tongue, the face, the manners of the republican
American become ready, pliant, appropriate — how he
learns to have himself well in hand : Avhich self-command
can never be acquired without the constant aid, as phre
nologists would say, of an ample secretiveness.
All this may seem inconsistent with the more manly,
mutually considerate, and gentlemanly bearing of Ameri
cans towards each other, regardless of class or station.
But It is not. We must remember that human nature Is
made up of contraries. The English agricultural labourer
has less of this self-controlling power, of which we haA'e
been speaking, than the gentleman, the doctor, or parson,
to whom he awkAvardly touches his hat when they meet.

American Respect foi^ Women. 265
And let not the reader sneer at the word gentlemanly, as
applied to the manners of Americans. They are some
thing better than mere tobacco chewers and spitters. Those
habits form a monstrous feature In the English caricature
of the United States people and their peculiarities ; but
after all the praise which has been fulsomely bestowed on
Americans, their best national qualities and distinctions
are by no means sufficiently dwelt upon and understood.
A pretty work-girl may, during the proper hours, walk up
Broadway or doAvn the Bowery, and neither " Mose," with
his red shirt, his trousers tucked Into his boots, and his
hands In his pockets, his strong cigar cocked up at an
angle of forty-five degrees, loafing near his loved " ma
chine," ready for a fire or a " muss ; " nor the well-
dressed loungers about the hotels and restaurants aud
comers, are likely in any way to annoy or molest her.
The fighting man, the gambler, the Irish labourer, the
tobacco-spitting defiant-looking roAvdy, all make way for
her, habitually, without thinking of It. Or If a poorly-
dressed Avoman enter a crowded street-railway car, such
as has lately been introduced Into London, the young
workman or well-dressed clerk nearest her, rises and
offers her his seat. You may walk months, ay, years,
I might say, in the crowded thoroughfares of American
cities and never see a woman step off the pavement into
the road to pass a man, or any number of men, coming
from an opposite direction. And the not uncommon
London diversion of male Idlers, following and accosting
respectable girls and women in the streets, is very rarely
indulged in In any American city or town. For these
good traits, I think Englishmen may pardon speaking

266 Ten Years in the United States.
through the nose (In reality, the defect alluded to is, not
speaking sufficiently through the nose), chewing tobacco,
and even greater small vices.
A public man must talk smoothly, pleasantly, and flat
teringly to the sovereign people, just as much as his
courtiers and employ^ must to Louis Napoleon. In some
respects — in courtesy, gregariousness, disregard of moral
obstacles, and in excltableness — the United States people
have inclined to the French national character. Now
and then, it Is true, a candidate for office will get a
majority by treating the people with audacious frankness
and honesty. The novelty of the thing tickles their
majesty : the experiment woidd become more dangerous
every time it was repeated ; but it seldom fails, being
seldom tried. A Mr. Russell, candidate for the auditor-
ship of Mississippi, tried this method of political strategy,
and succeeded. His style Avas thoroughly yet uncommonly
American. Being called on for a speech, he rose and
said : —
FeUovr-eitizens, you have called on me for a few remarks. I
haA'e none to make. I have no prepared speech. Indeed, I am
no speaker. I do not desire to he a speaker. I only want to he
an auditor.
There is a boldness, carelessness, bonhommie, almost
abandon, in the following, Avhich will give the reader a
fair Idea of perhaps the best sort of stump-speaking one
sometimes hears In America, and can hear nowhere
else : —
Ladies and Gentlemen, — I rise — ^hnt there's no use of telling
you that, you know I am up as Avell as I do. I am a modest
man — very — ^but I have never lost a picayune by it in my life ;

A Stump Speech. 267
because a scarce commodity among candidates, I thought I would
mention it, for fear if I didn't you never would hear of it.
Candidates are generally considered as nuisances, but they are
not. They are the politest men in the world — shake yon by the
hand, ask how's your family, what's the prospect for crops, &c.,
and I am the politest man there is in the State. Davy Crockett
says, the politest man he ever saAv, when he asked a man to drink,
turned his back, so that he might drink as much as he pleased.
I beat that aU hollow, I give a man a chance to drink twice if he
wishes, for I not only turn around, hut shut my eyes.
Fellow-citizens, I was bom — if I hadn't been I wouldn't have
been a candidate; but I am agoing to tell you where. 'Twas not
in Mississippi, but 'twas on the right side of the negro line ; yet,
that's no compliment, as the negroes are mostly born on the same
side. I started in the world as poor as a church mouse, yet I
eame honestly by my poverty, for I inherited it ; and if I did start
poor, no man can say but that I have held my own remarkably
well. Candidates generally ask you, if you think they are qualified,
&c. Now, I don't ask your thoughts, I ask your votes. Why,
there's nothing to think of except to watch and see that Swan's
name is not on your ticket, if so, think to scratch it off and put
mine on. I am certain that I am competent ; for who ought to
know better than I do ? — nobody. I Avill aUoAV that Swan is the
best auditor in the State ;, that is, tUl I am elected — then, per
haps, it's not proper for me to say anything more ; yet, as an
honest man, I am bound to say that I believe it's a grievous sin
to hide anything from my feUow- citizens, therefore say that it's
my private opinion, publicly expressed, that I'll make the best
auditor ever in the United States.
'Tis not for honour I Avish to be auditor, for in my OAvn county
I was offered an office that was all honour — coroner, which I
respectfully declined. The auditor's office is worth some 5,000
doUars a year, and I am in for it like a thousand of brick. To
show my goodness of heart, I'll make this offer to my competitor.
I am sure of being elected, and he will lose something by the

268 Ten Years in ihe United States.
canvass, therefore, I am vrUling to divide equally with him, and
make these two offers : I'll take the salary, and he may have the
honour ; or he may have the honour, and I'll take the salary.
In the way of honours I have received enough to satisfy me for
life. I went out to Mexico, eat pork and beans, slept in the rain
and mud, and swallowed everything except live Mexicans. When
I was ordered to "go" I went. "Charge," I charged. "And
break for the chaperell," you had better believe I beat a quarter
nag in doing my duty.
My competitor, Swan, is a bird of golden plumage, who has
been SArimming for the last four years in the auditor's pond, at
5,000 dollars a year. I am for rotation. I want to rotate him
out, and to rotate myself in. There's plenty of room for him to
swim outside of that pond, therefore, pop in your votes for me —
I'U pop him out, and pop myself in.
I am for a division of labour. Swan says he has to work
all the time with his nose down upon the public grindstone.
Four years must have ground it to a pint. Poor fellow ! the
pubhc ought not to insist on having the handle of his mug ground
clean off. I have a large, full-grown nose, and tough as sole-
leather. I rush to the post of duty. I offer it up as a sacrifice. I
clap it on the grindstone. Fellow-citizens, grind away — grind
till I holler enuff, and that'll be some time first.
Time's most out. Well, I like to forgot to tell you my name.
It's Daniel (for short, Dan. Not a handsome name ; for my
parents were poor people, who lived where the quality appropriated
all the nice names, therefore they had to take what was left and
divide around among us ; but it's as handsome as I am) E.
Enssell. Eemember every one of you that it's not Swan.
I am sure to be elected, so, one and all, great and small, short
and tall, when you come doAvn to Jackson, after the election, stop
at the auditor's office — ^the latch string always hangs out. Enter
without knocking : take off your things, and make yourself at home.
This is broadly, characteristically American — Southern
and Western especially ; for the Yankee, the^^Down-easter,

" Ned Buntline " and tlie " Know-Nothings." 269
can rarely even assume such a good-humoured reck
lessness. One of the influential and remarkable men in the
United States, for a time, was Ned Buntline, generally
looked upon as the originator and chief of the Know-
Nothings — a secret, anti-foreign, native-American party^
which was near sweeping everything before it. I should
like to give some details of the life of this political leader,
but I fear they would throw suspicion on the credibility
of all the contents of this volume; for his career is an
impossible one — out of the United States. It illustrates
strikingly some of the ugliest features In American
politics, especially the total disregard as to the means by
AA'hich success may be achieved. This Ned, chief of
the native Americans, was cowhided In BroadAvay, In mid
day, by one of the chiefs of the social evil for insulting
and calumniating her ; yet he could at any time command
the support of large numbers of highly respectable men ;
and any candidate for the Presidency would have paid
high for his support. In Ned^s Own, he says : —
Talking of Englishmen puts me in mind of the cruise of the
yacht [his oavu] last Friday. At sunrise on that day, the star-
spangled banner was run up to her mast-head ; immediately under
it. Union down, was seen the flag of that nation which proudly
boasts that the sun never sets on its Avide domains — the flag
which is red Avith Ireland's blood [yet the Know-Nothings were
especially opposed to the Irish], the blood of the wronged and
starving poor. Having sailed about for a time, she heaved to
under the stem of the English steamer to fire a salute ....
and having fired a gun for every State in the Union, I fired the
English flag from my gun, as a finale, according to my previous
promise.

270 Ten Years in the United States.
I can hardly expect the English reader to believe that
the man Avho could thus act, and then publish, and glory in
such silliness, Avas at the time, and afterwards, acknow
ledged leader of the new and powerful Native- American
party. I have alluded to the career of this politician to illustrate
the strength of what is called Native- Americanism — a sen
timent of which the visitor and traveller hears and sees
A'ery little, of Avhicli the press gh'es but a faint idea, and
which Is cherished, as It were, in private, and strengthened
by secret associations of native Americans. I believe, that
could the native-born white population of the eastern
cities carry out their wishes, the majority would at once
stop immigration from Europe ; still more from China
or elsewhere. And they could, I assure the reader,
give very good, if not quite sufficient reasons, for so
doing. Now and then the sovereign people are treated to a dose
of rough truth; but It has no effect, being so seldom
administered. For Instance, John W. Boyd, formerly
editor of a Pennsylvania paper, was recommended for the
mayoralty of Hagerstown, but declined the honour, pub
lishing his reasons at length. In the first place, he thought
the position wouldn't suit him ; in the second, he considered
it would bring him neither honour nor profit; thirdly,
in his own words, —
I have not the courage to place myself under obligations to
every Tom, Dick, and Harry, or to shake hands Avith ever scaly
blackguard, at the imminent risk of catching more than I
bargained for. Fourth, I have not the patience to inquire into
the state of every man's health.

Illustration of Northern Epidemic Insanity. 271
He would Avilllngly serve his fellow-citizens, but, he
adds —
To put myself in a position in which every wretch entitled to a
vote would feel himself privileged to hold me under special
obligations, would be giving rather too mnch pork for a shilling,
[A common expression.] I, therefore, most emphatically decline
the intended dishonour.
Of a different style, and from another sort of journal,
is the foUowing extravaganza, with more pretentious
variations. These effusions of morbid egotism, thousands
read In the belief that they are imbibing something true
and elevating : —
The editor showed how much more rapidly we had progressed
than England, and assigned, as the reason, that Avhile the Crown
and aristocracy of England consumed most of the eandngs of
the masses, Eepublicanism gave her sons most that they earned,
thus stimulating enterprise, &c. On this principle, he prophesied,
that if we were true to the genius of liberty, we should he the
arbiters of the whole world, in a commercial, agricultural, moral,
intellectual — in eveey point of vieiv ; that, besides bringing the
icorld at our feet, Eepublicanism would free Canada in twenty
years [vrritten 1848] ; and in fifty, render even the British
throne a sounding brass, or batter it to pieces, and scatter its dust
to the Avinds.
Similar predictions were made of all Europe, and of Turkey,
India, China. How completely do the recent revolutions [1848]
in Europe accord vrith these predictions, except that they have
occurred much sooner than the editor anticipated !
Our readers will remember the importance we attached to
Eepnbhcanism. We have called it " the great salvation '' of our
race. We rate the Declaration of our Independence as the second
great era of human destiny. The French Eevolution is only one
of milHons of effects produced by ours; only an amplification

272 Ten Years in the United States.
of that principle of self-government conceived and executed by
our Puritan forefathers. In truth, they regenerated the whole
world ; deposited the powder, laid the train, and set it on fire.
We have given liberty to France, and signed the Declaration of
Independence for Ireland, for Scotland, for even England. The
decree has gone forth — Henceforward the world is free ! Eepubli
canism has undermined not their thrones merely, but their Church
and State monster, their horse-leech taxation system, all the pre
rogatives of the privileged orders. All that now remains is the
mere execution of these mandates.
Nothing can now arrest that complete revolution, which is now
regenerating our race, and ushering in the Millennium. Woe to
all who attempt such arrest. England will doubtless try her best,
but the trial Avill be her overthrow. That old throne has per
petuated her tyranny by an amount of sagacity employed by no
other nation. But her death-warrant has been signed, sealed,
and delivered, and now only awaits the erection of the
guillotine. If, as I pray she will, she pursues that proud, people-scorning,
murderous policy, which her recent demonstrations indicate as her
policy, her imperial queen Avill be a orownless subject within two
years. Let her concede to her subjects Avhatever they demand, let
her consent to become the subject of her sovereign people, and
she may hold on for a few years to many regal prerogatives ; but,
as sure as she fires on the people, they Avill rise in their might
and put down her and her throne : and everything savoring of
hereditary aristocracy Avill be hunted up and shot doAvn. Most
of us wiU hear the mighty crash of that stupendous stracture of
tyranny and blood, and when she faUs, our race is indeed re
deemed. England's lords, do your worst, and you will do your
best. The foregoing is not from a hot-headed daily or Aveekly
political paper, but from a self-styled moral, social, philo
sophical, and scientific monthly journal, having a large
circulation among an extensive, and intelligent, and liberal-

American Boastfulness. 273
minded class in the Northern States. The extract Is a
fair specimen of the presumption, arrogance, and over
weening egotism, characterizing very much of what has
been for years swallowed by the people of the United
States as Intellectual food.
Most worthy of remark and serious consideration is the
total point-blank contradiction which recent events have
given to the AA'ild, boastful predictions In AvhIch the North
has so freely indulged, with regard both to Its own Imagined
splendid future and the ruin supposed to be hanging over
the pitied and despised Old World. There is danger In
prosperity ; but self-glorification is sure to bring down its
own punishment. " Of much speaking cometh repentance ;
but In silence Is safety."
These illustrations of the wild, unreasoning extravagance
of Young America when talking about his country, must
not be regarded as mere occasional temporary effervescence
of animal spirits. With a large portion of the present
generation the state of mind which gives rise to such
language and thought has become habitual Avhen descanting
upon American affairs. ,To men so excited, the dictates
of prudence and experience, a regard for common sense,
justice, or truthfulness, are mere old-fogylsm. Principles,
talent, education, knowledge, are of no avail, unless they
joined in with the movement of the hour.
Yet it seems natural to form great expectations of the
destiny of America — of Anglo-Saxon America. Thus
Alison — generaUy, perhaps, more careful in making or
acknowledging sweeping assertions and grand theories than
in smaller matters — says : " But If the sun of British
greatness is setting in the Old, it is from the same cause
18

274 Ten Years in the United States.
rising in renovated lustre in the New World. ... In
two centuries the name of England may be extinct, or
may survive only under the shadow of ancient renown;
but a hundred and fifty millions of men In North America
will be speaking its language, reading Its authors, glorying
in its descent."
There was a time Avhen the progress of the white
races in Mexico and in South America seemed equally
sure. No doubt Spanish writers beheld as great a future
for their countrymen in the valleys of the Amazon and
the La Plata, and over the vast regions of the southern
half of the New World. And It is worth the considera
tion of the young and ardent democrat of Europe, that
the strongest and healthiest and wealthiest communities
in the Western World (leaving the United States out
of the question) are Brazil, Cuba, the Confederated States,
and Canada: the first a monarchy with negro slavery;
the second, with negro slavery also, and a dependancy
of a monarchy; the third a republic with negro slavery;
the last, a voluntary member of the British empire — from
Avhich it would at once secede rather than admit upon Its
immense territory the negroes whom Mr. Lincoln so
modestly Invites to leave their country for their country's
good: — While those republics In the same hemisphere
which have enforced abolitionism, practised amalgamation,
and carried out the theory of political equality, without
regard to race or colour, are every year becoming more
aboriginal.

275

CHAPTER XVI.
The Catholic Irish-Americans — The " Democrats " — First Suggestion of
the Atlantic Cable — Irish Press — On England — On United States Poli
tics — Irish Influence.
TowAMis understanding the affairs of the North American
States, It is necessary to consider the great, and often
commanding influence of the Irish population, and the
principles, tendencies, and spirit of that important element
In the public affairs of those States. The Irish emigrants,
to a great extent, settle In the most accessible cities and
tOAvns, instead of going and making a clearing for their
own individual selves in the forests and prairies. This
arises from various causes, but mainly, I think, from
Celtic carelessness and sociability; and for this habit,
which Increases the poverty and misery of the cities, they
are often reproached by their native-born American
fellow-citizens. However, It Increases the Irish political
influence, on account of their unanimous subordination
to their leaders. They almost always adhered to the
Democratic party, Ashen there Avere but two great national
political parties. The other Avas the Whig, to AvhIch the
English usually belonged, partly because it was the pro
tective, or high-tariff party ; and the English In the States
being generally, whether workmen or capitalists. Interested
18—2

276 Ten Years in the United States.
in some skilled labour or business, are unwilling to compete
on equal terms with the cheap labour of Europe.
The word " Democratic," In this party connection, must
not be supposed- to have the English or European sense
of the Avord. Without entering Into the origin of the
term. It may be sufficient to say that the Democrats
were the advocates of State Rights : that Is, as against the
encroaching tendency of the United States Government.
They also caUed themselves, especiaUy In the South,
Strlct-Constructlonists : confining the United States to the
exact powers and limits laid down in the Constitution,
which, indeed, made Congress a mere managing committee
in inter-state and foreign affairs ; as the reader will better
understand on turning to the New York Constitution in
this volume. In fact, a great part of the political history
of the Union consists of the struggles for maintaining the
constitutional Integrity of the several States against the
tendency to give the widest possible, or, rather, the most
popular. Interpretation to the powers conferred on the
United States by the Constitution.
How it happened that the Irish were thus on the side of
Constitutionalism, and allied with the South, it would take
too long to explain, and It may be passed by as one of the
many things In that country which no one Avould have ex
pected : I Avould only observe that it Avas very much owing
to early exhibitions of the native- American or anti-foreign
spirit ; which has always been very strong, but kept down
by the extensiveness of the suffrage and the frequency of
elections. These unnatural combinations greatly increased
political insincerity and demoralization. The manu
facturing interest infused its natural jealousy of British

The Catholic Irish- Americans. 277
power and industry into the Whig party ; while the
Southern Interest had to humour the paramount feeling
of their important Irish allies in the North — hatred of
everything British. In fact, the system was every year
becoming more and more self-stultifying, and the legitimate
powers and objects of the political machine were diminish
ing amidst its increasing vastness and complications ; till
at length the friction became too great, and the huge thing
would work no longer.
However, that the Celtic Irish emigrants — an utterly
foreign and distinct, and very hostile population, in fact —
have greatly controUed the destinies and changed the
history of the United States, there can be no doubt: they
have played a more Important and, for a long time, win
ning part in the political game than twice their number
of the Yankee population, owing to their co-operating,
national, and religious ties, their active political organization,
and their concentration at the Northern centres of popula
tion. Perhaps the United States contained the most dis
cordant population that ever possessed equal legal rights
under one flag : the consequence being a dangerous want
of stability and self-confidence In the Government.
But let us see Avhat the Irish have to say for them
selves. I have before me several papers, published, with
one exception. In New York City, on the same day, just
after the laying of the Atlantic cable. The first Is called
the Irish Vindicator ; It contains an article headed " Who
first suggested an Atlantic cable ? — an Irish bishop
admitted to be the man." The reader probably recollects
that the Atlantic cable was honoured with one of the
grandest celebrations ever got up on any occasion in the

278 Ten Years in the United States.
United States. Wherever possible, the bells were rung,
the red-shirted firemen paraded with their machines and
bands of music, the military companies turned out, cannon
Avere fired, the British and American flags floated together
from churches, shipping, hotels, everywhere, over the
streams of excited people ; an old revolutionary A-^eteran,
ninety-nine years old, who had fought for separation,
rang a glad peal for the eternal reunion of the two
nations ; countless speeches were made, enthusiasm ran
over; at night, there were bonfires. Illuminations, trans
parencies, crowds cheering, more speeches, and fireworks
enough for five ordinary Fourths of July.
Next day, the papers were full of congratulations
about the celebration, the universal opinion was that the
millennium Avas at last close at hand, at least for Anglo-
Saxondom. The Irish Vindicator thus improved the truly
joyous occasion : —
An event has lately happened which renders the Eepeal move
ment in Ii'eland an American object. The la3'ing of the Atlantic
cable renders it inexpedient that Ireland should any longer be the
vassal of England ; and it is on these grounds that we consider
the agitation which has recommenced on the other side of the
Atlantic as one eminently deserving the attention and the encou
ragement of every American, as well as of every Mshman. It may,
indeed, now be called an Irish-American question. Even this
was dimly hinted at in the President's message, when he said, —
" In this view will not all nations of Christendom spontaneously
unite in the declaration that it shall be for ever neutral, and that
its communications shall be held, sacred in their passage to their
places of destination, even in the midst of hostilities ? "
It was impossible for a statesman not to see that this great
triumph of peace, as it has been called, might become, iu the
hands of a power like England, an engine of destruction ; for

The Irish Press — on England. 279
; while it brings the colonies and fleets of that nation within a
¦ whisper's length, we are as far off as ever.
The neutrality of Ireland thus becomes the only chance to
obviate the evil influence this wonderful achievement would have
upon America in the event of hostilities.
Another paper, the Irish American, ornamented AvIth
a small cut In Its head of a spread eagle Avith a sham
rock In its bealc and a harp on Its breast, has an
editorial ou " The Cable," from an American-Irish
point of view, sneering at those who " panted to be
foremost in the jubilee of extraA'agance and folly with
which the success of this great British project is to be
commemorated. "
The cable, the spinning-jenny, the reaping-machine, the sewing-
machine, the printing-press, all these, and such like, are the
triumph of materiality over humanity. They all tend to make
the rich richer, and the poor poorer. They nibble from the
working man's loaf, already scant and hard, a little and a little to
feed the rich man's swine. Will the cable cheer the artizan ?
WiU it moisten his food, or sweeten his drink, or purify the air of
his garret ?
It will be guessed that the mechanical Yankee, who
every year takes out more patents than all tlie rest of the
world, or thereabouts, can have little liking for those who
thus revile all sorts of machines.
It is as AveU sometimes to know how our neighbours
talk about us. A well-conducted periodical, the Irish
Miscellany, thus describes the effect of Cherbourg on the
English mind : —
The English press and the English people are in a panic.
They believe that Napoleon the Third, no matter what his lan
guage to the contrary may be, is preparing for their destruction.

280 Ten Years in the United States.
In vain he tells them that they need not fear him. In vain the
French press declares that Cherbourg, although strong, vsdll prove
a harmless thing. The English see more than harm in it. They
behold in Cherbourg, after eight centuries of enmity between
themselves and the French, a real, living menace of a French
invasion — a starting-point from which may issue in a year, or in
sis months, the power which shall make them the vassals of
Gaul. And at the very idea of such things, they shriek and
howl, as if they saw the day of doom, and had no hope of
escaping. Well, let them enjoy their terror and dismay. They
are invaders themselves. They have felt no pity for the nations
they have outraged and scourged. They are torturers and
enslavers, and they never felt a pang of remorse for all their
butcheries. As to the cable, the same Celtic weekly, says : — •
Who will gain the profits which most people think must be
derived by Ireland from the fact that the Atlantic cable is fastened
to her shore ? Will the fortunate men be Irish, or moneyed
English, or canny Scotch, or keen Americans ?
What good will the cable do to Ireland as a nation ? Will it
be a new chain wherewith England Avill bind the sister kingdom
to the wheels of her chariot ? Let us wait a little while, and
think, before we indulge in any exuberant demonstrations of joy.
It is very easy for the English mind, with Its well-
developed self-esteem, to treat all this with contempt. But
this spirit has been perseveringly Infused, to a great extent,
into American politics ; and the American press found
itself compelled, with about equal sincerity, to flatter the
Irish and bespatter with abuse everything English. Uni
versal suffrage and the ballot, it Is amply proved by
American experience, result In the predominance of one
or more factions — a minority of the people played off
against the majority by professional politicians.

United States Politics. 281
The following extract will give some idea of the sort of
game that politics had become ; of the Intricacy of political
combinations, aud of the part played by the Irish. It Is
intimated that some wire-pulling is going on between
certain party managers, wliich may end in selling the Irish
to the Know-Nothings : —
The Whigs got hack to power in 1853, but had a short lease
of it, the Know-Nothings having stepped in under Governor
Gardner, and held possession for three years ; at the expiration of
which they had to disappear before that interesting and consistent
combination, the Black-Eepublicans, whose party creed embraced
the abolition of slavery, the endoAvment of the negroes Avith
all the rights and privileges of citizenship, and the disfranchise
ment of all white men not bom upon the soil, or who professed
the Catholic faith. This party, Avith Governor Banks, formerly
a Democrat, and a warm lover of the " exile from Erin," is now
in power. It is the strongest political organization in the State,
but probably not strong enough to stand up against a thorough
union and co-operation between the Democrats, the defeated and
disappointed Gardner Know-Nothings, and the sixteen or twenty
thousand Old Line Whigs, who are not now, whatever they may
have been in 1844, much exercised in spirit in regard to the
foreign vote.
The reader will see from this that a politician needed to
have the head-piece of a Morpliy or Paulsen to watch all
the moves o^ the political game played on the vast board
of the United States.
We do not consider the Old Line Whigs as being in the
market. The great bulk of the ex-Whig party were Know-
Nothings and Abolitionists to the heart's core  For
fifteen years they stood upon the principle of "no more Slave
States " — a principle which carried in its train the ultimate sub
ordination of the Slave States to the Free States ; — a principle

282 Ten Years in the United States.
now put forth Avith distinct prominence by the Black Eepublicans,
who, in this particular at least, are entitled to the credit of
calling things by their right names. The Black Eepublican party,
or Banks party, is the largest in number, but does not embrace
a majority of the voters. The Democratic party is now the next
in point of number. The Gardner Know-Nothings, or anti-Banks
men, are not, as an organization, a national party ; and the
national Know-Nothings and the national Whigs united would by
no means be strong enough to overcome the Banksites. By
uniting Avith the Democratic party, the Eepublicans may be
ousted. But how is that union to be effected ? The old Whigs
can unite Avith the Democrats, as there is now no controUing
practical question in the way, if they are sincere ; but how is
it with the Know-Nothings ?
It is notcAvorthy that the publications from which I have
taken the preceding extracts, to illustrate, especially, the
anti-English spirit of the American Irish, display in their
stories and matter generally less of the sensation style of
literature than similar publications addressed to English and
American readers. This Is not what one would expect.
It has been said that the descendants of the Irish are
absorbed Into, and become assimilated to, the rest of
the American native-born population. After many obser
vations as to the actual fact, and also relying upon
the doctrine that different races have different innate
peculiarities, I am satisfied that the descendants of Celts
remain Celts and produce Celtic tendencies. They may
not remain Roman Catholics, nor out-door labourers ; but
in views, principles, and tendencies, they do not become
the same as the Anglo-Saxon. I believe It wUl even be
found that no very extensive amalgamation of the races
has as yet taken place in Anglo-Saxon America.

Irish Influence. 283
This much, hoAvever, is certain, that the welfare of the
Northern States Imperatively demands that the undue
influence of the Irish in American politics should cease.
No country can fiourish under a system which diverts so
large a portion of its political energies Into anti-national
designs and interests. The Irish in the Northern States
are more sincerely the enemies of England than they are
the friends of their adopted country. I suppose no re
spectable Irishman will assert that the honour, interest,
and safety of their new domicile would be weighed for
a moment by his fellow-countrymen and their leaders, if an
opportunity occurred for plunging the States into a war
with hated England. This is a difficulty demanding the
earnest consideration of the native Americans of the
North; if they caimot overcome It, they wIU live in a
house divided against 'itself.
I know the sophistry that is used on this subject. We
IIa'o In days when there are thousands of speakers who can
argue in any direction on any subject, and put things in
a way to suit their hearers, Avhoever they may be. It is
often said by Americans that their population, by con
tinuous immigration from the earliest times, now combines
within Itself all the best quaUties of all nations. What
becomes of the various bad qualities of those nations?
By Avhat filtering process are they left behind ? Or why
reject the good qualities of the Chinaman, the negro, the
Indian, by refusing to amalgamate with them ? The fact
is, there is no shadow of reason for believing that a superior
race is improved by mingling with an inferior ; and we have
no proof iliat two distinct races have ever been benefited
hy amalgamation. It has been shoAvn by Dr. Knox that

284 Ten Years in the United States.
hybrid breeds of men either die out, or return to one of
the parent stocks.
The original Red -man is almost exterminated from North
America ; he is about apparently to " disappear " — how
much there Is in the choice of terms ! — without having
excited much sympathy or virtuous Indignation. He once
seemed to be in a fair way to disappear also from South
America, before the Spanish Immigration ; but the
Spaniard amalgamated, and now is likely to be lost In
the returning and increasing numbers of the native popu
lation. With the principal exception of Brazil, South
America is undoubtedly returning to its aboriginal condi
tion. Is It possible that long-continued civil Avars, mutual
devastations, the supremacy of mobs, the removal and
destruction of capital, the stoppage of commerce and immi
gration, the oppression of moral and intellectual superiority,
epidemic monomanias, and other causes co-operating,
might. In time, degrade some, or all, of the late United
States to the condition of Mexico, of Central and most of
South America ? It is only a few years since these latter
talked, and boasted, and prophesied of themselves — our
statesmen and philosophers joining with them — just as
grandly and confidently as the people of the United
States did after their Mexican conquests.*
* When Canning, who " was looked up to as the head of the liheral party
throughout the globe," in the year 1822, procured the recognition by
Britain of tbe independence of the South American Kepublics, claimed by
Spain as part of her dominions, he said he had " called a new world into
existence to redress the balance of the old; " meaning that though the Holy
Alliance was triumphant in Em-ope, he had secured the cause of liberty by
the establishment of those young republics. What has become of them?
What have they done — what are they likely to do for human progress 2
Statesmen aud politicians must study ethnology ; and then they will cease
to commit such follies as the late French-Spanish-English expedition to
Mexico.

Tlie Irish Roman Catholics. 285
However, in this land of sudden and unexpected
changes, it is not Impossible that the Irish may come
to see the folly and injustice of their unceasing hostility
to England. Nothing would tend so certainly to produce
this desirable reaction as a serious determination to Im
prove their oavu condition in their adopted country.
Yet, with all their weight and Influence iu the Northern
States, the Irish Catholics are not satisfied — nor have they
any reason to be. With their much-talked-of vote I fear
they have done little for themselves, and less for their
UOAV country ; while It has brought upon them the dislike
and jealousy of the native-born American : witness the
Know-Nothing party. An organ of the Roman Catholics,
the Tablet, said : —
Under a Liberal Government a numerous class, defined by
religious ideas or peculiar customs, should be represented accord
ing to their numbers. This is said to be a Liberal Government ;
the Catholics of the United States are upward of tluee millions
strong. Where are their representatives ?
A curious result of miscellaneous voting. For my part,
I acknowledge no expediency, no sense, no justice In the
principle of representing mere numbers ; except under
peculiar circumstances, as a rude temporary arrangement.
Whether the three milUons of Roman Catholics should,
as such, be otherwise represented than they now are
under the heterogeneous numbers system of voting, is
another affair, and an important question. I would call
the reader's attention to the next sentence, as uninten
tional evidence of the degrading nature of the " initia
tion process " through which the political aspirant has to
pass: —

286 Ten Years in the United States.
Catholics of a certain intellectual stature will not stoop to
undergo the initiation process which is the " open Sesame " to a
political career, and those who do can seldom be trusted to the
extent of their ability, which is small indeed. If we wish to have 
a fair share in the political, as in the social life of this great
nation, if we hope to have ourselves felt or respected beyond the
rims of city ballot-boxes, if we would do ever so little to show how
right principles might remove gnarls in our Federal pofitics and
give a Christian tone to our Legislation, we Avill not rest satisfied
tmtil we have at least one man whom we can point to emphatically
as the contingent of the Catholic body to the representative intel
lect of the country.
This testimony by Irish witnesses will help the British
reader to believe and to understand that, notAvithstanding
all their voting and their patent ballot-boxes and their
universal suffrage, so called, the best portion of the American
people, the settled, working, and producing classes, are vir
tually unrepresented.
The excellent men who organized the political system of
the United States, expected things to turn out quite other
wise than this. They thought that the citizens generally
¦ might be relied upon to use prudently and intelligently
their political power, out of a regard to their oavu interests,
as well as from better motives. They expected that at
least a sufficient majority of the sovereign people would
make it their business to watch and understand public
affairs and public men, and that thus the government of 
the country would be the result of the common sense and
common interests of all classes, and be administered by
the wisest and best men of the community. No thin w was
more reasonable : the theory satisfied most of the Avisest
and best men then living. But as so often happens, tlie

Politics abandoned to Politicians. 287
theory broke down when It came to be put Into practice.
One old-established well-known truth," familiar to every
one, and having very much to do with the question, had
been entirely overlooked : namely, the truth expressed In
the popular saying. What Is everybody's business, is
nobody's business.
Industrious men had little time or inclination to study
poUtics in the proper sense of the word. The wise govern
ment of a country certainly demands as much care and
serious thought and steady application of mind as almost
any other business; and those who were bent on their
own concerns, in fighting their way up in society, and
studying the Immediate welfare of their own families, had no
time to study the conduct of statesmen, or to think to any
useful purpose upon such dry matters as are embraced in
the " dismal science " of political economy. So the bulk
of the community only took part in affairs of state under
the influence of some personal consideration, or for the
sake of mental diversion and excitement, without studying
the public welfare, almost totally uninstructed Indeed In
the first principles, or secondary either, of political and
social science.
Still, an orderly and industrious community, with Anglo-
Saxon heads on their shoulders, would be able to get
along with very little government, making mistakes now
and then as to men and measures, then discovering them,
taught by experience, and setting them right. But things
gradually changed for the worse. The highly important
business of politics, A'ltally concerning everybody, but
really honestly and thoroughly attended to by almost
nobody, gradually feU more and more Into the hands of a

288 Ten Years in the United States.
set of men who found that the management of the business
could be made to pay. Numbers of men found political
life much more pleasant and Interesting than the ordinary
modes of making a living. It called Into exercise the
gambling and sporting propensities, the loA'e of opposition
and excitement, which are often strongest in those most
averse to steady Industry and to that drudgery which
every honest working man — whether he labours with his
brain or his hands, or Avith both together — must go through.
An Indefinite, but real, class of politicians arose; the
institutions of the country, the constant changes and
elections, made a great deal of poUtical work ; politics
became an actual profession — a very liberal one, since
anybody could enter it who could make a speech, talk
plausibly, and go among the people, drinliing with one,
arguing with another, and generally serve his party,
without being over particular. The word politics entirely
lost its original meaning, and signified party tactics. A
man might be an active and leading politician, without
having studied for one hour any of the subjects Involved
In all good government.
Thus, although the United States had at starting,
perhaps, as fine a population, as to their origin, their
bravery, their habits, and general circumstances, as any
country in the world could boast of, great corruptions and
most dangerous dissensions soon threatened the welfare
and existence of the Union ; which was, indeed, founded
mainly for self-defence, and was kept together more by
fear than by the strength or wisdom of Its constitution.
As foreigners of aU sorts from Europe, some of a very
bad sort, came over In constantly increasing numbers.

Heterogeneous Population. 289
bringing with them a larger than average share of
inteUect and energy, but, if anything, a smaller amount
of morality than belonged to the general character of the
countries they left, and to that of the people amidst whom
they sought life and liberty, both of which In many cases
they had forfeited ; — as this foreign population increased,
and cities grew in size and Influence, good government
became more impracticable, and yet more needed.
And when one considers the heterogeneous composition
of the people, the sovereign people. In the Nor ther]|f States,
It is surprising that the governments pf the several States
are so Avell carried on as their great increase In wealth and
population prove them to be ; Avhile the fact of the exist
ence of the Federal Government, extending over such
vast regions, can only be understood by consultlno- the
attractive poAver of the public treasury, the charms and
advantages of a seat In Congress, the innumerable offices
In the gift of the President, all centred at Washington,
making It a sort of Mecca to any one who had serA'ed the
party in power.
Native-born Americans, cherishing a half-concealed
contempt and dislike for the foreigner ; Germans, a
powerful, distinct people of themselves — liking the Yankee
as little as he likes them — having their own leaders, press,
and political organizations ; Irishmen, forming a still more
independent sub-nationality ; Danes, Norwegians, Swedes,
Frenchmen, ItaUans, Scotchmen ; last and least, English-
men ; besides various crude " isms," Avhose advocates are
ready to sacrifice all their party vIcavs for the sake cf
pushing along their respective favourite hobbles : the
greater portion of this body also kept in a state of chronic
19

290 Ten Years in the United States.
excitement and Irritation; the vast political machinery,
or competing machines rather, always at work, conduct
ing or preparing for elections, employing a considerable
number of hands, many of them educated or preparing for
the law, but practising politics. Such has the population
of the Northern States now become — an aggregation of
people, not a nation.
It is easy to be seen that in such a state of things, able,
thoughtful, honest, and experienced men, Avho have the
moral |nd Intellectual qualifications for statesmanship, wIU
be kept more and more In the background, and mere
spouters will be most applauded, and occupy the front
of the political platform. Every election Is entirely
managed by the party leaders, their staffs and subordinates
of all grades ; and no citizen can succeed in, or even enter
upon, public life, without becoming a member of the political
profession, and conforming to all its usages. Public meet
ings, committees, conventions, canvasses, speechlfylngs,
newspaper influences — all these form part of the process
through which he has to go, and In AvhIch, indeed, consists
his education for his calling. Above all, he must stick to
his party — whatever it does, whatever any of its members
may do. Such Is the system which has resulted in the
mournful fact that at this moment the people despise and
detest the rulers they beve elected, and, among all their
public men, have not one In whose ability and integrity
any considerable number of them place any confidence.

291

CHAPTER XVIL
United States AboHtionists — Clashing Theory aud Practice — Abolitionist
Meeting — Desire for Disunion — Equality — Woman's Eights — "Free
Love " — ^Daniel Webster — WendeU PhilUps — Majority ruled by a small
Minority.
When, In the year 1776, the American colonies of Great
Britain seceded from the mother-country, the colonists. It
may be fairly said, were all Abolitionists — from Washing
ton downwards — slaA-e-holding Abolitionists: that Is, all
looked upon slavery, then existing in almost every State,
as Inconsistent with the unfortunate assertion in the De
claration of Independence, that all human beings were
born free and equal, and with an Inalienable right to life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I say unfortu
nate, because the assertion is so glaringly and vitally
untrue. But though Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, and
Americans generally, who fought for and established the
United States, were In those days, strictly speaking.
Abolitionists, It must not be supposed that they had much
in common with the Abolitionists of later days, who have
zealously and bitterly reviled and denounced, and finally
dissolved, the Union.
The history of AboUtlonism is very interesting and
instructive, though by no means pleasing; for it shows
19—2

292 Ten Years in the United States.
how cant and monomania may for a time triumph, and
how a persevering one-idea few may. In a demo
cracy, coerce an opposing majority of vastly superior
numbers. In 1848, and for some years after. Abolitionism, as an
aggressive faction, was quite an Insignificant and con
temptible little party — much to my surprise ; for what I
had read In England had led me to expect that it was, as
to numbers, a formidable, popular movement : just as in
the United States many sincerely believe that the British
and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society has aided aud encouraged
American Abolitionism to bring about the present conflict,
and that in so doing, it, the British Antl-SlaA'ery organiza
tion, has been supported by the British aristocracy and
Government, with a view to destroy the great American
Republic. Nor has genuine Abolitionism — that is, an acknowledg
ment of negro equality — ever made any progress In the
United States. The only change it has produced is a
strong desire to get rid of the negro altogether, as an
anomaly and a nuisance — to send him to Central America,
to Africa, or after the Red Indian — anywhere, out of the
Avhite man's way. The only sense in which the Northern
people are Abolitionists, Is that they Avould willingly abolish
negro slavery by abolishing the negro — at least, from their
part of the world.
Yet the Abolitionists, by sticking to each other and to
their one idea, by sacrificing to It all other State and
Federal considerations, and being always ready to give
their vote and Influence to the party that Avould go farthest
with them, have succeeded in producing effects mon-

Abolition Meeting. 295
strously disproportionate to their numbers ; giving to the
world a terrible lesson as to one of tlie great Aveaknesses
of a nominal democracy. Imagine the Peace Party In
England to succeed in controlling the Government of the
British Empire by a series of manoeuvres and intrigues :
such a triumph is that which the heterogeneous Aboli
tionist party has actually achieved over the Government
and people of the United States.
I attended one of their meetings In the Tabernacle — a
large chapel In Broadway, New York — in May, 1857.
The audience consisted principally of women and children,
with a few AvhIte men, some Quakers and Quakeresses, and
here and there a coloured person ; all. It seemed, native-
born Americans, or United States people, to speak more
definitely. Mr. Garrison was President — an honest man, I
believe, but mifortunate in that his mind seems to have stuck
at the assertion in the Declaration of Independence that all
men are born free and equal. To question that assertion
has never occurred to him ; to do so would be to upset all
his notions of right and Avrontj.
A Mr. Foss rose and said that he thought their fathers.
In forming the Government, had done wickedly, and their
children Avere now reaping the fruits of their Avickedness.
They entered into a compact with the slave power. George
Washington, Jefferson, and the other leading men, acted
Jesultlcally. He prayed for the hour when the Govern
ment should be dashed to pieces. Then the slaves Avould
twist their masters' necks.
Mrs. Abby Kelly Foster was glad that the slave power
had succeeded In Kansas (the Macchiavellienne) — meaning
that such success would exasperate the North, and, by

294 Ten Years in the United States.
embittering sectional hatred, promote her very philan
thropic designs.
The Union had no friends. " As to the word Union,"
said one, " they all knew It was a political catchword ; it
was equivalent to the word ' loyalty ' in monarchies, which
makes men think themselves patriots Avhen they are only
flunkeys." Another read some resolutions, in which was intro
duced the expression used by some one else — " I would,
in God's name, say. Give us a Palmetto man always,
and for ever, because where there is a Palmetto man
there is always a will " (South Carolina is the Pal
metto State — a noteworthy acknowledgment of Southern
superiority). Mr. Garrison thought their prospects gloomy. The
people had no conscience. His only hope was iu the
destruction of the blood-stained Union.
Mr. Edmund Quincey wished for the dissolution of the
Union, that Massachusetts might right her own Avrongs ;
she could easily send ships to Charleston and lay it in
ashes. Any State in the Union would contract at a low
figure to whip South Carolina ; Massachusetts could do it
with one hand tied behind her back.
A runaway slave spoke ; he would rather see the slaves
emancipated by Insurrection than by any other means.
He saw some did not like this remark — a friend was, he
saw, snapping his eyes at him, ready to pounce upon him
like a tiger on a lamb ; nevertheless, that was what he
longed to see.
True, all this Is folly. But folly is not to be despised ;
especially in a corrupt miscellaneous Democracy. The

Abolitionists once eager for Disunion. 295
utterers of this folly were respectable, more or less- edu
cated, well-meaning people ; they have dissolved the
Union, and enriched the soil of the South with the
blood and bodies of a quarter of a million of men in
their prime. Folly, errors, or fanaticism, deserve con
sideration, seeing hoAV great a share they have In human
affairs. Those whose negromania brought about disunion were
continually crying for it, till it really came, and now they
are as rabidly crying for re-union. As I wish to leave
no doubt on reasonable and cautious minds as to my leading
assertions, I insert the following advertisement of about
this date : —
Call for a Noethern CoirfENTiOH'. — Whereas it must be
obvious to all that the American Union is constantly becoming
more and more divided, by Slavery, into two distinct and antago
nistic nations, between whom harmony is impossible, and even
ordinary intercourse is becoming dangerous ;
And whereas Slavery has now gained entire control over the
three branches of our National Government, Executive, Judicial,
and Legislative ; has so interpreted the Constitution as to deny
the right of Congress to establish freedom even in the Territories,
and by the same process has removed all legal protection from
a large portion of the people of the Free States, and has inflicted,
at many times and places, outrages far greater than those which
our fathers rose in arms to repel ;
And whereas there seems no probability that the future will;
in these respects, be different from the past, under existing
State relations ;
The undersigned respectfully invite thefr fellow-citizens of the
Free States to meet in Convention, at Cleveland, Ohio, on
Wednesday and Thursday, October 28 and 29, 1857, to consider
the praoticabiHty, probability, and expediency of a separation of

296 Ten Years in the United States.
the Free and Slave States, and to take such other measures as the
condition of the times may require.
Committee of Arrangements.
Thos. W. Higginson, Wendell Phillips,
F. W. BiED, Daniel Mann,
William Lloyd Garrison,
Joseph A. IIowland, Secretary.
More than 6,400 names have been appended to this call, repre
senting every Free State but California.
I should be sorry to be understood as stigmatizing all
these men as mere partisans, or unconscious hypocrites.
Many of them finding the evils nearest to them too trouble
some to deal Avith, have turned their attention to undenia
ble wrongs and sufferings connected with negro slavery ;
and (to use the words of Daniel Webster, uttered In the
same debate on Slavery and California, on Avhich Mr.
Seward's previously quoted speech was given) when such
questions come to be discussed especially In religious
bodies, and from a sectarian point of view, too many avIU
be found AA'Ith whom things are either absolutely wrong or
absolutely right: — men Avho, with clear perceptions, as
they think,' of their own duty, do not see how too hot a
pursuit of one duty may Involve them in the violation
of others ; or how too warm an embracement of one truth
may lead them to disregard other equally Important
truths ; who deal Avith morals as they might with mathe
matics, and think that right may be distinguished from
wrong with all the precision of an algebraical equation.
Such men come to think that nothing Is good but Avhat is
perfectly good ; that there are no compromises to be made

Too many merely Clever Men. 297
in deference to differences of opinions ; no modifications on
account of circumstances or difficulties.
I very much regret that I have been obliged in these
pages to present too generally theleast pleasant aspect of
United States affairs and character to the British reader.
No country has provided greater minds ; and when Its brief
history from the Revolution to the Dissolution shall be
Aviitten, It wUl perhaps be seen that they have done great
things. Of the statesmen above quoted, the two-idea'd but
eloquent Wendell PhUlips says, " I dispute the value of
the Union ; I do not believe in it. Grant all it claims as
the parent of icealth. It has not produced men. Daniel
Webster said that the virtue of the colonial institutions
was that they produced Washington. The sin of the
Union is that it manufactured Webster. Carlyle says the
test of Governments Is the men they make. Where are
our men ? " Here Mr. P. paused for a reply, but none of
his friends seized the opportunity of suggesting that he
Avas one of them. The fact is, there are too many merely
clever men in the United States : hence, of late years
they have talked about an empire on AA'hich to employ
their superabundant ability.
Garrison's Liberator was one of the leading and most
thorough organs of the old true Abolitionists — the honest
Abolitionists, It is but just to say, who declared their prin
ciples, and stuck to them through thick and thin. The
motto of this Liberator declared the United States Consti
tution to be " a covenant with death and a league AvIth
hell." When AboUtlonists had brought about the dis
union it desired, and dissolved the league it had so
bitterly hated ; and whUe the North are stUl striving.

298 Ten Years in the United States.
madly by force to restore that Union, that motto Is with
drawn. The cry for disunion was raised very early, almost as
soon as the Union documents were dry, and sometimes by
much stronger men and cliques than those who have been
the tools of Mr. Seward. Respectable sensible people,
with a few exceptions, smiled knowingly at the cry, and
when the wolf really did come, they could not and would
not see It.
The people of the United States have had warnings
enough of the ruin threatening their Union. But they
would not hear ; they scorned to pause and consider : they
trusted In their money and their numbers. In 'cuteness and
the almighty dollar.
In the beginning of 1850 the Boston Liberator, the
organ of the Abolitionists of that section of the land of
steady habits but most unsettled mind, recommended that
no time should be lost In getting up petitions — the Legis
lature of Massachusetts being then in session —
1st. For the secession of Massachusetts from the Union,
that being a poUtical, moral, and religious duty, for the
neglect of which " damnation Is certain."
2nd. For the abolition of all legal enactments concerning
the observance of the or a Sabbath, and for more religious
liberty. 3rd. For the abolition of that hideous and abortive
Instrument of punishment, the gallows.
[And yet these rose-water enthusiasts would regard a
negro insurrection as an occasion on which they might
piously sing, " Oh ! let us be joyful."]
4th. For political equality before the law, without regard

The Abolitionist School. 299
to sex ; because the women of the State, being made to pay
taxes, and being amenable to its criminal laws, ought to
have a vote, and to be eligible to office.
5th. For political equality before the law, without regard
to age, of chUdren, criminals, lunatics. Idiots, they paying
taxes indirectly, and being bound by the laAv ; above aU,
being human beings, born free and equal, one as good as
another, with the Inalienable rights of man — of humanity,
that Is — or else the theory announced In our Declaration
of Independence is all bosh. [This 5th, no doubt, would
have been recommended, but it was necessary to draw an
arbitrary line somewhere.]
All this is but the logical result of the dogma of human
equality ; which, indeed, even Mr. Garrison has never had
the courage to urge to its full consequences.
Others are bolder and more consistent, and follow out
more fully and faithfully the equality and " higher law "
principles laid down by such men as Garrison, Greeley, and
Seward. "Free Love" is but a logical amplification of these
principles. The reader has, no doubt, heard of this little
sect, of AvhIch the following paragraphs will give him,
perhaps, a sufficient knowledge. They are from a sort of
Declaration of Independence, caUed forth by discussions
held among the less advanced and mere common respectable
members of the community, as to the best means of ridding
their neighbourhood of the " Free Lovers," who had esta
blished themselves at a place In the West, called Berlin.
The fair rebel Is, or was, editor of the Age of Freedom.
Bom in Berlin, I consider myself " naturalized," feel I have
the privileges of a "native American," and I expect to remain

300 Ten Years in the United States.
here. Thinking as I must on all subjects ; acting as my highest
convictions impel me on aU occasions ; advocating such faith and
such life as is good to me always, I expect stiU to remain.
Eejecting all religious dogmas ; repudiating all arbitrary marriage
bonds ; believing in no government save the ever acting laws
of all being — I shall utter my thoughts as I am moved — and
shall utter them here. Scorning that purity manufactured by
legal force — despising that virtue based only on the opinion of
the world — the truth I feel shall not be stifled in my soul,
anywhere on (^^od's earth.
Seeing clearly that woman, as well as man, has the natural
right to the fullest action of all the faculties and passions of the
soul ; that she must be self-owned and self- whole ; that her
Avomanhood and maternal relations should be sacredly held in her
OAvn hands : — I bid her keep herself — never become a slave —
never yield to the mercenary obligations of the marriage-bond ;
but accept alone the truest Hfe up-welling in her own soul ; letting
a wise lovingness be ever the only parent power that shall give
her a child ; and despite threats, despite churches and priesthood,
despite the howling of the rabble, and the unlawful persecutions
of legalized power, despite misrepresentations, and calumny, and
abuse, and vilification, this truth wiU I proclaim from my native
hill-tops, and send it reverberating through the vaUeys where my
childhood wandered. I shall still sit among the orchard blooms
that draped my cradle ; they shall give their fragrance to my life,
and shroud my grave with the rose-hued mantle ; and yet that
Hfe shall be lived unnttered ; that grave shall be no coward's
tomb. The scented slopes, where my childhood's Avinged hours
went by, are still to give their sweetness and their sunshine to my
riper years ; and the mother's love and the father's smile are still
to be mine for the faith they have in their child ; and yet more
for the supremer faith in Truth.
All this is but the natural and logical consequence of
the assertion of the principles of absolute human equality.

Elihu Burritt. 301
and the still more dangerous doctrine that each individual
conscience Is superior to the law of the land when the two
Conflict. Under such disorganizing dogmas, so unhappy,
and discontented with themselves and their environments,
are numbers of the Northern people, that every novelty
and well-puffed quackery finds a fair field among them,
and a better chance of success than In any other English-
speaking community.
It is a paradoxical fact, that while the genuine Yankee
population — I use the term, not In its Southern and offen
sive sense, but as the Massachusetts man accepts and uses
It — that Is, the people of the five New England States, are
in their everyday life pre-eminently of an acute, calcu
lating, practical, cautious, secretive character; and, to a
stranger's observation, deficient iu enthusiasm, Avanting
even in warmth of social affection, and altogether a hard,
dry, unamiable, money-loving race, compared with the
rest of the Caucasian world ; yet New England is the
great nursery of extravagances and delusions that have
arisen, or flourished, and spread In the United States.
Extremes follow extremes. The puritanical restraints on
social life produce a tendency to reaction, which impels
the Aveaker minds to find excitement of some kind.
Elihu Burritt, the learned blacksmith, who knows sixty
or seventy languages, but Avho is very ignorant of human
nature, a benevolent man, full of good intentions, sought
to unite all parties and both sections of his comitry in a
fair, humane, peaceful, and honourable plan for compen
sating the Southerners disposed to emancipate their slaves.
" Union for Emancipation and Emancipation for Union,"
was his motto, and he started with these views the North

302 Ten Years in the United States.
and South journal and a National Emancipation Society.
I need not say his plan fell to the ground; although
everybody he spoke to on the subject, I believe, highly
approved of his scheme.
For every disease a remedy may be proposed, and prove
worse than the disease itself. Below what we thought the
lowest depth a still lower deep opens. We have often but
a choice of evils, each great and almost unbearable, all
hard to choose among; the least evil being the greatest
good. In human affairs very often bad Is the best, as the
saying Is, and it Is hard to imagine a condition of things
which could not be worse. These are mere truisms ; but
these truisms are apt to be forgotten. Common expe
rience says, let well alone ; but It Is also often best to let
ill alone for a time — to suffer Avrong, and silently see
injustice. For, In many respects, this world of ours Is
a very hard, unmanageable, and imperfectly understood
world — quite a different one from what each of us thinks
he would make. If he had the power, — seeing no necessity
for human misery. Practically, Indeed, in their own
affairs, men seldom forget these truths ; it is only when
judging or advising others, that they become impracticably
transcendental. The history of this once despised Abolition party should
be studied by all those who would Americanize British or
any other Institutions. By sacrificing everything else to
their one object, namely, the destruction of negro-slavery
in the Southern States, they succeeded in setting the
North and South against each other. But their principles
made no progress. The mass of the Northern people
would at this moment be deUghted to get rid of negroes

" Physician, heal Thyself." 303
and Abolitionists together ; more especially of the latter.
StiU, the Abolitionists stuck to their one idea. They
Avatched and studied the political game — they under
stood the working of their country's institutions ; and the
miUions of the North, AvIth all their boasted education,
intelligence, freedom, free speech, free press, and so forth,
have found themselves somehow fighting for a party and
principles with which they had no sympathy : to which, ui
fact, they were strongly opposed.
These Yankee Abolitionists would also identify their
schemes with British West India Emancipation, and claim
the sympathy of British anti-slavery feeling ; but the whole
history of the course of this country on the subject is
the most complete rebuke of their illegal, selfish, and
unprincipled proceedings.
There are some Avho have a good deal to answer for, in
having taught their fellow-countrymen to form so false
and contemptuous an opinion of the slaveholding South
that they thought to ride over it rough-shod and easily
triumphant. To all these one-idea'd meddlers the slaveholding Anglo-
Saxon of the Confederated States can truthfully say, "Let
your charity begin at home ; show some wisdom in your
own affairs, before going forth to set the world in order ;
at least, leave me alone. In my reviled and calum
niated country, the black man and the white live side
by side peacefully and mutually helpful; both increas
ing In numbers and well-being, both sharing in the
benefits of cIvUizatlon ; and although the black man is
stiU in a very inferior condition compared with his white
master, yet he Is In a very superior condition compared

304 Ten Years in the United States.
with that of his ancestors — his African grandfathers and
grandmothers in their lurid Africa, sunk in hideous
time-immemorial abominations. Under our system, he
runs no risk of extermination, and enjoys the best oppor
tunity yet offered him of showing his capabilities; no
longer a mere savage, he plays an important part Iu the
progress of civilization, which elsewhere Is crushing him
out of existence."

305

CHAPTER XVIIL
State Constitutions — ^New York Constitution — Theory of Equal KightS
abandoned — Extent of State Sovereignty — Coloured People — ^Extent
of Powers of the United States Constitution — A Treaty between Sove
reign States for Foreign and Inter-State Purposes — Eugitive Slave
Provision in the Constitution of United States — Repudiated by Penn
sylvania, &c. — Constitutionality of the South — Written Constitution
no Safeguard against actual Powers— Constitution of Mexico for
Example.
It Is a considerable difficulty, in the way of forming a
correct public opinion on important matters, that a large
portion of the public have a habit of skipping the dry
parts of the A'olumes they condescend to read. To arrive
at the truth, a little such reading Is often necessary.
The British public have heard and read a good deal
about the Constitution of the United States. It should
be remembered that it Is, iu fact, a one-sided instrument.
Fairly to understand the document, it should be compared
with the Constitutions of the several States.
After reading a Union representation of the Federal
Constitution, an ordinary careless reader might suppose
that the United States had a Government as centralized
and consoUdated as that of England or France; but
each State had large powers and rights reserved. The
foUowing abstract of the Constitution of Ncav York State
may be taken as a specimen of those separate Governments
20

306 Ten Years in tlie United States.
which must be included in any complete view of the
political system of the Republic. Having perused it,
probably the reader will be Inclined to wonder what was
left for the Government at Washington to do. He will
be apt to think that, whatever might be the letter of the
law. Its spirit would certainly Impel a State with such a
Constitution to judge for Itself as to Its own rights and
wrongs. In case of any real or supposed attack upon Its
welfare and Independence.
Gentlemen of high position and commanding influence,
have compared the secession of the several Southern States
from the Union to a secession of Ireland, or even York
shire or Cornwall, from the British Government ; they ask,
" If you commence secession, Avhere are you to stop ? If
the South may leave the Union, any State may leave the
South; the west of a State may secede from the east,
and so on." Of course, men can always argue thus in
morals and politics ; In those domains of science. Nature
has draAA'u few clear, visible, straight lines. In this case,
self-interest, self-preservation, nature, and a little common
sense, combine to limit national powers and boundaries.
If it be for the good of mankind, that the whole continent
of North America should not be directed and controUed
by an aspiring and overbearing central government at
Washington, It surely does not follow that this compact,
tight little island of Great Britain — not so large as the
average of each of the thirty -two States forming the
huge United States — should be divided Into two or three
kingdoms or republics.
The United States Is a sort of abstraction created by
the independent States : they can constitutionally alter

Constitution of the State of New York. 307
its constitution, but it cannot meddle with theirs. If
Massachusetts should again compel its people to attend
worship every Sunday, or make polygamy lawful, the
United States cannot legally interfere In the matter. A
perusal of the following document will shoAV the nature
and extent of the independence of the several States, and
illustrate the great constitutional doctrine of State rights.
The Constitution of the State op New York.
[As revised by the Convention of 1846.)
We, the people of the State of New York, grateful to Almighty
God for our freedom, in order to secure its blessings, do estabhsh
this Constitution.
The trial by jury, in all cases m which it has been heretofore
used, shall remain inviolate for ever.
The free exercise and enjoyment of religious profession and
worship, without discrimination or preference, shall for ever be
allowed in this State to all mankind.
The privilege of the writ of habeas coipiis shall not be
suspended, unless when in cases of rebelHon or invasion the
pubHc safety may require its suspension.
Every citizen may freely speak, Avrite, and pubHsh his senti
ments on all subjects, being responsible for the abuse of that
right, and no law shall be passed to restrain or abridge the liberty
of speech or of the press.
In all criminal prosecutions or indictments for Hbels, the truth
may be given in evidence to the jury.
The people of this State, in their right of sovereignty, are
deemed to possess the original and ultimate property in and to all
lands Asdthin the jurisdiction of the State.
All feudal tenures of every description, with all their incidents,
are declared to be aboUshed.
AU lands within this State are declared to be allodial.
Every male citizen of the age of twenty-one years, who shall
20—2

308 Ten Years in tlie United States.
have been a citizen for ten days, and an inhabitant of this State
one year next preceding any election, and for the last four months
a resident of the county where he may offer his vote, shall be
entitled to vote.
But no man of colour, unless he shall have been for three years
a citizen of this State, and for one year next preceding any
election shall have been seised and possessed of a freehold estate
of the value of two hundred and fifty dollars over and above
all debts and incumbrances charged thereon, and shall have been
actuaUy rated and paid a tax thereon, shall be entitled to vote at
such election.
No person of colour shall be subject to direct taxation, unless
he shall be seised and possessed of such real estate as aforesaid.
This last clause Is merely a conscience salve ; but it Is
an abandonment of the principles of the sovereignty of the
people and of the rights of man — so much vaunted in
orations and editorials: principles not clearly laid down
in this Constitution, nor acted upon by any State of the
Union, and entirely ignored by the United States Consti
tution. This clause is au adoption of the maxim that
taxation and representation should go together.
It will be seen by these extracts that the suffrage is very
extensive in New York State ; but many restrictions,
conditions, and qualifications entirely set aside the imagi
nary " rights of man " basis, and acknowledge the right of
the State to say Avho shall and who shall not have a voice In
the making of the laws. Expediency, riot abstract right,
determines Avho are to have a share of political poAver.
Human equality, the rights of man, the right of self-
government, are as completely abandoned as though none
but native Americans, Avith freeholds, and over fifty years
of age, were allowed to vote. The "inalienable rights

Rights Divine. 309
of man" theory of the First French Revolution, and of
the somewhat longer-lived United States " Declaration of
Independence," is now practically given up, except by the
true Abolitionists. The right divine of numbers' and
majorities to rule, sleeps for ever side by side with the
divine right of kings, and many other cast-off errors of
the past. The right of man to a voice in the making
of the laws he is compeUed to obey, Is reduced to a matter
of fitness and expediency In the United States, as much
as in Russia.
This New York Constitution goes on to say: —
AU elections by the citizens shaU be by Ballflt.
The Legislative power of this State shaU be vested in a Senate
and Assembly.
The principal legal difference between these two bodies,
which may be said to amount to nothing, is that one Is
elected by voters according to Senate districts, the other
by the same people, but arranged or divided into Assembly
districts. The form of the British Constitution was in the
minds of the founders of this and of all the other Consti
tutions of the States, and of the United States Constitution
also : it was, perhaps, impossible, even if desirable, to
adopt the spirit of that inconsistent, unphllosophical, yet
serviceable old system. We must not fall Into the error
of Imagining that those Avho framed the United States
Government had merely to ascertain the wisest and best
system : prejudices and Interests, ignorance and selfishness
— personal, local, and public, often conflicting — existed
then, and had to be consulted. But, to proceed : —
No person being a Member of Congress, or holding any judicial

310 Ten Years in the United States.
or mUitary ofiice under the United States, shall hold a seat in the
Legislature of this State.
The executive power shall be vested in a Governor.
No person except a citizen of the United States shall be eligible
to the office of Governor.
The Governor shall be Commander-in-Chief of the mUitary and
naval forces of the State.
The Governor shaU have the power to grant Eeprieves, Com
mutations, and Pardons, after conviction, for all offences except
treason and cases of impeachment.
A State which recognizes laws as to treason, must
evidently be possessed of a very large amount of inde
pendence and sovereignty.
Every bill which shaU have passed the Senate and Assembly
shaU, before it becomes a law, be presented to the Governor ; if
he approve, he shall sign it. [If not, then there is a mode by
which the Legislature may make it law, Avithout his consent.]
There shall be a court of appeals, composed of eight judges,
of whom four shall be elected by the electors of the State for
eight years [by the people, the voters, that is], and fom- selected
from the class of justices of the supreme court having the shortest
time to serve.
There shall be a supreme court, having general jurisdiction in
law and equity. [Elected also by the people, divided into judicial
districts.] Any male citizen of the age of twenty-one years, of good moral
character, and who possesses the requisite quaHfications of learning
and ability, shall be entitled to admission to practise in aU the
courts of this State.
The State is divided into counties, and a county judge
Is elected by the voters, holding office for four years.
The electors of the several toAvns elect justices of the
peace, whose term of office Is four years.

Military Powers of a State Government. 311
Tribunals of conciliation may be established, to which recourse
might be had by mutual consent.
In certain cases the State may contract debts, not exceeding in
all one miUion of doUars, except to suppress insurrection or to
repel invasion, then ad libitum.
Corporations or associations for banking purposes may be formed
under general laws only.
The Legislature shall have no power to pass any law sanction
ing, directly or indirectly, the suspension of specie payments by
any person, association, or corporation issuing bank notes.
The Legislature shall require ample security for the redemption
in specie of aU bills or notes circulated as money.
The MUitia of this State shall at all times hereafter be armed
and disciplined, and in readiness for service. [The Governor is
Commander-in- Chief. ]
Captains, subalterns, and non-commissioned ofiicers shaU be
chosen by the Avritten votes of the members of their respective
companies. Field officers of regiments and separate battalions by the
Avritten votes of the commissioned officers of the respective regi
ments and separate battaHons, and so on.
The Governor shall nominate, and Avith the consent of the
Senate appoint, all major-generals and the commissary-general
and others.
The commissioned officers of the militia shall be commissioned
by the Governor.
AU officers of the State, except a few of very inferior duties,
have to swear or make affirmation to " support the Constitution
of the United States and the Constitution of the State of New
York." This Constitution shaU be in force fi-om and including the first
day of January, 1847.
Done in Convention, at the Capitol, in the City of Albany, the
ninth day of October, in the year one thousand eight hundred
iand forty-six, and of the Independence of the United States of
America the seventy-first.

312 Ten Years in the United States.
Provision was made In the following manner for ascer-
taluing the sense of the people as to adopting this Con
stitution : —
Form of the ballot to be used by those electors who vote for
the Constitution as proposed to be amended —
Constitution.: — Amended Constitution — Yes.
For those against the proposed new Constitution— :r
Constitution. — ^Amended Constitution — No.
At the same time, the people were called on to decide
upon the political condition of the coloured people by
ballot : —
Constitution : Suffrage. — Equal suffrage to coloured persons — Yes.
And a similar ballot, ending "No." I guess the noes
had it. Finally, said the Convention : —
If the Constitution now proposed be adopted the happiness and
progress of the people of this State Avill, under God, be in their
ovm hands. Albany, October 9, 1846.
It will be seen from this Constitution how large a share
of sovereignty Avas reserved by this State when it and Its
sister States established the Federal or General Government
at Washington. After reading It one might be puzzled as
to what the United States could find to do in a State
so well provided for ; and certainly, were the President
and Congress suddenly to vanish, the business of the
several States Avould seem to be in no danger of any great
damage or interruption. In fact, the duties and proper
objects of the Congress at Washington were few and
clear, though important; but the political machinery by

Powers of the United States Constitution. 313
which it was supported w*s wasteful, clumsy, and, for Its
proper work, ineificlent. A great error the American
Congress fell Into was the fancying Itself a British Parlia
ment.

All that the United States Government has to do, all
that it has a right to meddle with, is laid down in
Section VIII. of the Constitution of the United States.
The true theory of the Union eA'Idently was, that the
Congress at Washington was a Congress or Council of the
States for the management of their foreign and inter-state
affairs : each State retaining its full sovereignty In all
domestic matters. Just as France and England might
appoint a council and make an agreement for certain
International purposes. Clause 3 of this section of the
United States Constitution gives Congress power —
To regulate commerce with foreign nations and among the
several States, and Avith the Indian tribes.
¦ 4. To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform
laws on the subject of bankruptcies.
5. To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign
coin ; and fix the standard of weights and measures.
7. To establish post-offices and post-roads.
8. To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by
securing, for Umited times, to authors and inventors the exclusive
right to their respective Avritings and discoveries.
10. To define and punish piracies and felonies committed on
the high seas, and offences against the law of nations.
11. To declare war, grant letters of marque and reprisal.
12. To raise and support armies. 13. To provide and main
tain a navy. 15. To provide for calling forth the militia to
support the laws of the Union, repel invasion, &c.

314 Ten Years in the United States.
' Clause 16 shows the State jealousy of the United
States GoA'ernment : —
16. To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining the
miHtia, and for governing such part of them as may be employed
in the service of the United States, reserving to the States
respectively the appointment of the officers.
Each State also must have a Republican form of
government, Avhich amounts to nothing ; and an important
clause relates to fugitive slaves.
For these purposes — to perform these few functions —
Congress is empowered : —
1. To levy and collect taxes, duties, imports, and excises, to
pay the debts, and provide for the common defence and general
Avelfare of the United States.
The term " general welfare " ought not to have been
allowed In a document so definitely and particularly enu
merating the powers It granted. The rest of the Constitu
tion merely relates to the means of carrying out these few
objects. An amendment was added declaring that —
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitu
tion, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States
respectively, or to the people.
And another, with a similar view of guarding the States
against the United States : —
The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shaU not
be constrained to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
AU these objects, for which the Constitution was formed,
and for which alone, if It confined Itself to its duties. Con
gress meets, are such as any two or more Independent

State Independence. 315
States or nations may at any time agree to settle and
regulate by treaty, for the promotion of peace and civiliza
tion. Probably, several of these objects avUI be considered
by a congress of some of the European States, before
many years have passed.
Is it not clear, from this enumeration of the powers of
the Federal Government, that the sole use and duty of
that Government was to regulate, so far as the Constitution
gave It power, foreign and Inter-state affairs only ? The
GoA'ernment at Washington has nothing to do with. Is In
no way responsible for, the laws or doings of any State, so
long as the feAV Federal functions are not interfered with ;
and, of course, each State is still more independent of
each and all other States. Ncav York, for instance, may
establish the feudal system with regard to land ; and Its
neighbour, Connecticut, may carry out by law the most
complete agrarianism or communism. There Is no power
that can legally Interfere In either case. They are as in
dependent In all domestic matters as France and England.
The United States constitution Is but a treaty between
Sovereign States.
One principal aim of the combination of the several
weak and young States Avas to have a common flag.
Each State has Its own flag, AvhIch is raised over the
edifice In which Its Legislature Is sitting. The only
permanent territory of the United States is the few square
miles amidst which the city of Washington stands (which
were given, I believe, by Maryland) and also a few
fortifications. If, in the present troubles in North America, there Is
one thing clearer than the Intention of the North to get

316 Ten Years in the United States.
rid of the negro question, by getting rid of the negro. It
Is that the South is fighting for constitutionalism, against
the strong and growing tendency In the North to decide
every dispute by the vox populi : to compel everybody and
everything to bow down to public opinion, however tem
porary, illegal, or unconstitutional. This, in fact, however
flattering it may sound to European democrats, means the
control of the whole population and of all the separate
States by the professional Avire-puUers, politicians, and
electloueerers — the class of men whose skill and industry
are devoted to keeping up and leading political excite
ment, and who pay tbemselA'es and each other by a share
of " the spoils." " To the victors belong the spoils ! " —
that was the motto of every triumphant faction ; the city
of Washington being the principal rendezvous where,
after victory, these spoils were divided, or, rather,
scrambled for.
The last constitutional disturbance In the United States
related to fugitive slaves. The letter and spirit of the
constitution of the United States guaranteed the rendition
of these " persons held to service," as It called them ; jnst
as a runaway apprentice, a deserter, a criminal, may be
agreed to be delivered up by one Government to another,
on being regularly demanded. Such a law was a matter
of necessity before the States of the South would join the
proposed Union. But the conscience of the North, grow
ing of late more tender, as the country grew more and
more corrupt, easily found means to avoid the performance
of their part of the constitutional compact ; and sometimes
for one, sometimes for another reason, that provision of
the constitution so important to the comfort and peace

The Fugitive Slave Law. 317
of the Border States especially, became of little or no
effect. By the Constitution of the United States, " No person
held to service or labour In one State under the laws
thereof, escaping Into another, shaU, in consequence of
any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such
service or labour, but shall be delivered up on claim of
the party to whom such service or labour may be due."
From very early times, before the separation from England,
this had been the custom — by courtesy and from mutual
Interest; and the best men of the young repubUc con
curred In embodying It, first into the Articles of Con
federation, and afterwards into the constitution, as a
matter of inter-state policy, justice, and necessity. It was
an extradition clause in the mutual constitutional treaty.
For many years It was satisfactorily effective — ^years when
the United States had a more homogeneous, law-abiding
population of British descent. When Missouri, having the
requisite population, demanded admission to the Union,
her people reserved to themselves the right of alloAving
or disallowing negro slavery ; and, having gained admis
sion, they chose to retain slavery. Then sectional agitation
began, to end only In the separation of the sections.
The execution of the above clause Avas impeded, and
finally became impracticable, through mob-law, or, worse
still, legal violence. For instance, in 1843, the General
Assembly of the State of Vermont enacted that no
magistrate, or legal authority of the State, should
recognize, in any way, any process under the Act of
Congress, respecting fugitlA'es from service: no gaol
was to be used ; no oflScer might, under penalties, assist

318 Ten Years in tlie United States.
in the recovery. In this spirit many of the States
acted; while abolitionists sent emissaries into the South
to urge the slaves to run away, and organized the " under
ground railroad," by which they evaded pursuit more
effectually, and were distributed over the free-labour
States, amidst a population which despises and hates them.
This Is but one of the sources of disunion. But If the
above are the facts of the case, without any material omis
sion, is It not clear that the South was on the side of
constitutional government against the encroachment of
anti-constitutional power ?
But, after all, it matters little what any given constitution
is in print or on parchment. It may read very well, or
very ill ; but how does It act ? How is It carried out ?
Does it suit the people, the times, the circumstances?
These are the questions. The Constitution of Mexico, on
the whole, reads as well, to a man of the popular liberal
school, as this New York Constitution. If England were
to annex the Fiji Islands, a similar Constitution might
be given to them — the Cannibal Islands. Laws and
Constitutions are trifles Avhen they pretend to bind and
limit real power bent on aggrandizement and unopposed
by any power as real as Itself, Any Government may
assume any form or fashion of constitution that suits the
taste of the day, and yet retain in full force and spirit
a system nominally condemned and abandoned. ,.|t Is
rather surprising that no politician of the Southern
States has ever proposed a plan by which negro slavery
should be abolished in name and in letter, and still the
negro be kept In a servitude as real and even severer,
but by more euphonious means. Were Mr. Seward

Effects on the Population. 319
a Southerner, he could concoct such a system in three
days. But as to this New York State Constitution, distinguished
by Its extreme development of the Democratic principle.
the final test by which it must be tried is. Its results. How
has It worked? What have been its fruits ? Or, to put
the question fully and fairly, is there good reason to
believe that this ultra-democratic constitution has im
proved and elevated the condition of the people under its
Influence ? The first inquiry would be as to whether the
people of this State are now more moral, more intelligent
and reasonable, or In a happier and more civilized, pros
perous, and progressive condition than when they Avere
British colonists, or than when. In the days of Washing
ton, they had become a young independent republics
History will record, or ought to record, that In reading
and writing, in a certain quality called smartness, and
also the possession of general wealth In the politico-
economical sense, and a participation In many improve
ments in the arts and sciences, the people have during
this period considerably advanced ; but that In all other
respects they have retrograded : especially in domestic
happiness, in public Aartue and ability, and In the character
of that now large and ruling class, the public men. In
this assertion, I believe I shall be borne out by two-thirds
of the native-born adults, men and women, of the State.
We must not put much faith iu Avritten constitutions.
Mexico, which has tried universal suffrage, abolitionism,
and amalgamation, and has lately been declared by three
great European Powers unfit to manage Its oavu affairs,
has a constitution, which the famous Abbe Siey^s would

320 Ten Years in tlie United States.
have been proud to acknowledge as a masterpiece : a
constitution which great numbers of our young men, and
some old ones, would pronounce Infinitely superior to the
indefinite, illogical, antiquated, gnarled affair called the
British Constitution. Here are some of Its principles and
propositions : —
The Mexican people recognize that the rights of man are the
basis and the object of social institutions.
All are born free in the Eepublic. Slaves that set foot upon
the national territory recover by that single act their Hberty, and
have a right to the protection of the laws. Education is free.
Every man is free to adopt such profession as he may prefer,
the same being useful and honourable.
The expression of opinions shall not be the object of any
inquisition, judicial or administrative, except where the same is
an attack upon morals, assails the rights of third parties, incites
to any crime or offence, or disturbs public order. The liberty
of writing and publishing works on whatsoever subjects is
inviolable. The right of petition is inviolable.
-None shall be restricted the right to assemble peaceably for
any lawful object whatever.
All men have the right to possess and carry arms for their
security and legitimate defence.
There are not, nor shall be recognized in the Eepublic, titles of
nobility, prerogatives, or hereditary honours.
What more could any Amerlcanizer ask ?
The citizens are entitled to vote at popular elections; to be
voted for, for any office subject to popular election.
Those are citizens of the Eepublic who, having the quality '
of Mexicans [natives, that is], have also the following requisites : — •
1. Eighteen years of age, if married; or twenty-one, if not
married. 2. An honest means of Hvelihood.

Constitutions. 321
The national sovereignty resides essentially and originally in
the people. AU public power springs from the people, and is
instituted for their benefit. The people have at all times the
inaUenable right of altering or modifying thefr form of Govern
ment. The exercise of the supreme executive power of the Union
shaU be deposited in one sole individual, who shaU be caUed
"President of the United States."
In fact, we might suppose ourselves to be reading the
Constitution of the other " United States," which has been
thus imitated by I know not how many republics in the
New World : almost all of them now In a Mexican con
dition, and some of them promising or threatening to
revert to aboriglnaUsm — If I may so speak — from the
practice of amalgamation and from putting all races on an
equal footing.
The reader wIU excuse this digression. In fact, it is
hardly one, because Mexico has long been regarded as ma
nifestly destined at earliest convenience to add three or four
stars to the star-spangled banner, according to the ina
lienable right of the strongest :
The simple plan —
That he should take who has the power,
And he should keep who can.
That Is the nature of things in this struggling world, in
which might makes right, whether we Uke it or not :
and Avhen It comes Into collision with inferiority, moral,
inteUectual, or physical, pays little regard to either the
most perfect glass ballot-box or the most Ingenious con-
istitutlon.

21

322 Ten Years in the United States.

CHAPTER XIX.
Unsettled State of Society — Want of Home Influences— The West —
Emigrating — Malaria — The Laud — Land Speculations — Effects of Suc
cess and Prosperity — Trading in the Progi-ess of the Country — The
Railway System — Western Land Mania — The Panic — John BuU's
Stamina acknowledged — Charitableness and Generosity of the People.
I AM sorry I have not been able to enter more into the
domestic life of the United States people; they are so
different at home from what one would suppose after
witnessing their reckless political and public life. There
Is a constant struggle going on between the instinctive
tendency of the German and Anglo-Saxon races to form
a home, in the English social sense of the word, on the
one hand; and the counteracting influences of the poli
tical condition of the country, the rapid development of
business and population, the temptations to change for the
sake of rising in the world more rapidly, on the othjSr.
The women, the mothers of families especially, very many
of them, lead, from these causes, a life of incessant worry
and disappointment; again and again they arrange the
family nest in some new spot, and when they are able to
sit down with some satisfaction are suddenly obliged to
abandon the comfortable home. The husband thinks he
sees someAvhere a fine opening; the family pack up and

Neiglihourly Character of the People. 323
away they go, perhaps Into the midst of the most unsettled
population In Christendom — that of the West.
The neighbourly character of the people, the ease with
which they form new habits and new acquaintances, make
these changes much less serious affairs than they would be
to English people. And It Is partly this unsettled state
that makes Englishwomen the most discontented people in
the New World. I have known some of these whose hus
bands have done well, living in a style far above what
they eA'er expected at home, with American-born sons and
daughters, respected and prosperous, who were yet ever
longing to recross the Atlantic, and fly to — perhaps some
dingy street in London. Yes, strange as it may seem,
this great metropolis, with Its fogs and mud, and miles
upon miles of dirty brick houses, and myriads of strange
faces, with its characteristic, noblest feature — its beau
tiful, far-seen dome — Is scarcely less loved by many of its
widely-scattered sons and daughters (the last especially)
than his native valley or mountain Is by the home-sick
Swiss. Among the things that led me to America was the
West; to see Niagara, the prairies, the buffaloes, and the
wild red men ; as to all of which I was either disappointed
(from curious accidental circumstances) or changed my
mind. The West is more beautiful on paper or in song
than in reality ; and even the romance of danger has
departed from It with the unpltled and unpltying Indian.
In fact, after living a while in the United States, out of the
few great cities, one sees so much of nature that one is little
inclined to travel merely to see her in some fresh aspect ;
those who go to the mountains or the sea-side go there to
21—2

324 Ten Years in the United States.
get cool, and to enjoy themselves without undergoing ex
cessive perspiration. The real and the 'imaginary West
are about as like and unlike each other as the actual abo
rigines and the sentimental creations of the novelist's brain
which pass under the name of Indian.
Men and newspapers talk very glibly about emigrating
and going to the West, as If It were a pleasant trip, or a
friendly visit to one's rich relations ; little thinking of the
suffering, and disappointment, and waste of life attending
the migration. There are no statistics on the subject
that I know of, and if there were, I doubt whether the
reader would place much faith In United States' figures ;
but disease makes sad havoc among the early settlers in
the wilderness, and even In the villages and towns of the
West, The perfectly healthy prairie and forest emit a
poisonous miasma Avhen their virgin soil is disturbed by
the plough ; pale, yellow, haggard faces become quite fa
miliar ; ague, chills and fevers are thought nothing of, or
at least spoken of lightly, although they finally ruin the
constitution, and break up many a too hard-working famUy.
Of the able-bodied men who go to the West and take to
farming, the majority, I fear, are entirely disappointed ;
although they may have promoted the growth of the
country and raised the value of land, and many of them
will have accumulated more for their children than they
would have done at home. The subject of European emi
gration, hov,rever, is too interesting and important to be
entered upon in the few remaining pages of this volume.
Men often make blessings into curses, but heaven con
verts the curses back Into blessings. The prodigious
wide-spread wealth which, for incalculable ages, nature

Land Speculators. 325
has been slowly treasuring up In the Western continent,
till the once bare rocks are now covered In excessive
abundance with precious fertile soil, capable of support
ing and satisfying even the omnivorous Anglo-Saxon;
this wealth, or means of wealth, has long attracted the
greedy gaze of that class now recognized as " specu
lators" — a class whose object may be defined to be to
discover how to make for themselves, at the cost of others,
something out of nothing ; or to procure hard substantial
cash, in exchange for Ingenious, promising, and tempting
schemes for money-making. Ever since the days of
Columbus, speculators, or peculators, have from time to
time contrived to make a living out of these rich virgin
lands by some easier means than honest agriculture ; but
the railroad had become, at the time I speak of, the
gigantic machine for transferring money from the pro
ducers to the speculators.
Speculation in real estate has for many years been the
ruling Idea and occupation of the Western mind. Clerks,
labourers, farmers, storekeepers, merely followed their
callings for a living, while they were speculating for their
fortunes. There are no statistics which show how many
Yankees went out West to buy a piece of land and make a
farm and home, and live and settle, and die there. I
think that not more than one-half per cent, of the
migration from the East started with that Idea : and not
even half of these carried out the idea. The German
immigrants, indeed, were better entitled to be called
settlers; but all classes and people of all kinds became
agitated and unsettled, and had their acquisitiveness per
petually excited by land speculations in some shape or

326 Ten Years in the United States.
other — new railways, roads, proposed villages and towns,
gold mines, water-powers, coal mines — some opportunity
or other of getting rich all at once by a lucky hit.
Prominent among the causes of the downfall of the
Union must be ranked the easy yet brilliant conquest
of Mexico by the armies of the United States, the dis
covery of the gold fields of California, the great and sudden
prosperity and wealth of the country and the people in
general, and the immense national resources in the shape
of land, the market value of which was greatly increased
by every venturesome pioneer. Even In this slow Old
England, we often enough see the bad effects of too easily
or too suddenly acquired wealth; In the United States,
vast numbers of the population became excited with
dreams of sudden wealth, and the Idea of a life of labour
was scouted as the suitable destiny of mere timid, un
enterprising, weak people, or plodding Dutch or English,
but altogether beneath the notice of Young America.
The people of the West became dealers in land, rather
than its cultivators. Scorning cheap clocks, wooden nut
megs, and apple-parers, the Yankee, stepping from the
almost ridiculous to the decidedly sublime, went out West,
and traded In the progress of the country. Every one of
any spirit, ambition, and Intelligence (cash was not essen
tial), frequented the National Land Exchange, a vast
concern : extending from the Mississippi to the Pacific.
By convenient laws, land was made as easily transfer
able and convertible as any other species of property. It
might and did pass through a dozen hands within sixty
days, rising In price at each transfer; In the meantime
producing buffaloes and Red Indians. Millions of acres

Railway Allotments. 327
were bought and sold without buyer or seller knowing
where they were, or whether they were anywhere ; the
buyer only knowing that he hoped to sell his title to them
at a handsome profit.
To keep up and encourage the great western staple,
the Progress of the Country; to Inflate as largely and
rapidly as possible the magnificent bubble, public im
provements were called for: canals and railroads were
made or proposed, from the established centres of trade,
commerce, and travel, to the Indefinite West. Where
was the money to come from to create these costly works,
on a vast scale, In a savage territory, to give value to that
territory on the Land Exchange ? It was a grand problem,
one would think, but really as simple as the discovery of
America. Endow the raUway with a few millions of acres
of the lands it runs through and brings into the market ;
then sell these acres to pay for constructing the line, and
to yield the shareholders their Interest.
To extend and facilitate these land transactions, these
speculations in the Progress of the Country, the system
of selling land on time was adopted. The Instalments of
the purchase-money were made payable within various
periods (frequently ten years) at low Interest, in the first
instance. Thus, A., after much thinking, and watching,
and saving, or borrowing, secured a " corner lot in his
favourite city (that was to be), or his half-section In
some future garden of the Union (often actually indi
cated in the deed of sale by the latitude and longitude) ;
this he sold at a profit to B., on a few years' credit
(secured, of course, by mortgage); B. did the same to
C. ; and so on.

328 Ten' Years in the United States.
It happened that, while this system was going on, the
United States Government rewarded the services of those
who had borne arms In the wars of the country, by
giving them Land Warrants for 80, or 160, or 320 acres,
according to services — In all amounting to many millions
of acres. So in 1856 the railroad and canal companies
and the holders of these Land Warrants were everywhere
selling, selling, selling, in large or small parcels of land,
until everybody in the West had a share of God's earth,
quietly increasing In value at the rate of perhaps a hundred,
or at least twenty per cent, per annum — it was hoped.
As an example of the effects of this real estate mania
take Chicago. There land, for building purposes, was
dearer than in the larger Eastern cities; and house-rent
twice as much as in New York. In 1857 It Is probable
that upwards of eight hundred millions of dollars were
invested in Idle Western lands, and lots in proposed cities,
which had been paid for to the extent of one-fourth, the
remainder continually being paid In instalments.
Of course, this business, then, required a good deal of
money, which was forthcoming — while prices were still
rising. But the progress of speculation had got far ahead
of its object or subject, the Progress of the Country.
The Western merchant or storekeeper came to New
York, Boston, Philadelphia, bought goods on credit of the
jobbers or importers, went home, sold them, and invested
the proceeds in lands and lots. Land was becoming the
circulating medium. The importers had to obtain an ex
tension of time to pay the European manufacturer his
dues — unless he wt)uld take a few sections of land in such
and such a latitude and longitude.

Panic of 1857. 329
Of course, such a business as this, engrossing the atten
tion of perhaps a majority of the population, could not
go on long. Unfortunately, the bankruptcy and misery
that foUowed the long put-off day of settling accounts are
already almost forgotten. The whole domestic history
of the time, which ended in the panic of 1857, affords a
striking iUustration of the state of mind which has become
habitual In the Northern States ; the tendency to seize
upon some project or Idea, to dwell upon It, inflate it,
make It into a mania, run it into the ground, as they
say, and then forget all about it. But what Is most im
portant to consider Is, that the leaders and promoters of
these ruinous, demoralizing manias are, In public opinion,
respectable, inteUigent, and educated people.
The American is not a sullen, obstinate animal. When
the Arabia brought to New York, in November, 1857, the
news that the English were not scared at all the American
bank suspensions which had taken place in the New York
and other Northern states ; that Delhi was taken and the
terrible Indian mutiny crushed; and that the American
horses. Prioress and Babylon, were badly beaten at New
market, there was a grim smiling acknowledgment that
after all there was yet a good deal of life and pluck In
John Bull. For Instance, thus said a morning paper (I
prefer to let the people of the United States and their press
speak for themselves) : —
We may learn a wholesome lesson from the British reception of
onr financial troubles. There was no flurry in the street, no
clamour in the newspapers. The suspension of the banks was
haUed as " a very good thing " on the whole ; and as for specie, it
was proclaimed that England would send as much as we wanted.

330 Ten Years in the United States.
provided we paid for it. This is the tone and language of a
sensible, practical, ripely intelligent people. We could do no harm
by copying them sometimes. When the time comes that we shall
know the inside history of the revulsion and bank suspension of
1857, perhaps it may be found that this community did not distin
guish itself in that year for coolness, sagacity, courage, or common
sense ; and possibly it may occur to the future historian of these
times to illustrate his meaning by contrasting with our flurry and
panic the manly attitude of some other people in a like crisis.
England would present an obrious paraUel.
No doubt the New York mind was rather disappointed
that the wide-spread ruin, bankruptcies, and suspensions
of the States affected British equanimity and confidence so
much less than was expected. Since then it has been still
more astonished : so thoroughly had all those who pre
tended to be the teachers and enlighteners of the people,
indoctrinated the public mind with the Idea that in the Old
World everything was decaying and degenerating, and that
the only hope of its people was In copying the Institutions
of self-styled " America."
StUI, amidst the deep, lasting, wide-spread distress that
followed years of extravagance, the people generally of all
classes in the States behaved nobly; rich and poor alike
liberally assisting those most In need. One instance I recol
lect may be worth recording : — A respectable-looking man,
dressed in shabby black, was noticed hanging about one
of the butcher's markets, and at last was seen by one of the
boys to take a piece of meat from a stall and walk off with
it without paying. The lad told his employer, who had
the man watched, and after mentioning the fact to his
neighbouring tradesmen, a policeman was requested to
follow the thief; not to apprehend him, but to learn what

Charitableness of tlie People. 33 1
he could. The officer accordingly rapped at the door of
the man's room, and was told to walk In. " I know what
you are come for ; you're right," said the thief, coming
forward : " but look here," and he pointed to bis wife and
children, crouching against one another, cold and hungry.
In the wretched room. The policeman said nothing, but
left the room, and going to those who had sent him told
them how things stood. Whereupon after brief consulta
tion among the butchers, a boy was hurried off to the poor
family with some more meat and other things, and with a
message which encouraged him to keep up his spirits till
better times came round.
Many and abundant facts of the kind I could relate,
were it necessary to prove that the people whose follies
and weaknesses I have been dwelling upon for useful
purposes, are highly charitable and generous ; though
even these virtues, vile politicians have endeavoured to
pervert and degrade, by getting up demonstrations of
benevolence for " buncombe " purposes.
But I must conclude ; leaving, scarcely touched upon,
many matters which it were highly desirable that English
men — public men especially — should understand. My
principal task, I have found, has been to expose the reali
ties that lie beneath deceptive names and forms, to remove
appearances, and show the real state of things. In doing
this, I feel satisfied that any dispassionate United States
man will allow that I have extenuated rather than exagge
rated the faults and vices of his country and countrymen
which I have pointed out, aud that no one well informed
on the subjects wIU deny that a much more unfavourable
account might be given of matters, public and private.

332 Ten Years in ihe United States.
in the United States, without garbling, or unfairly select
ing and presenting facts. I have. Indeed, almost un
avoidably and very unwillingly, passed hastily over the
more pleasing and admirable features of the versatile and
many-sided character of the people under consideration.
We should never forget how difficult It is to give or to
form a full and fair judgment concerning our fellow-men.
The Northern people, despite their courage, ability, skill,
and determination, have been and are labouring under a
system controlled by office-holders, office-seekers, and tax-
consumers ; a few successful demagogue politicians being
the managers, and the whole forming a most dangerous.
Irresponsible ruling class. Such a class must look upon
every Independent man of Integrity and ability as a
natural enemy, and keep him down if possible. The
party carrying on the war, is in constant dread of a
popular reaction against the war Itself and the ruling
faction : this explains the late removal of the only general
in whom the army had some confidence. This system Is
the enemy which the people of the North have to subdue,
or they must fall Into the rear of progressive nations.
But, before either of these events occur, Europe may
be surprised by beholding a reconstruction of the Fede
ralism of the States; for between the masses of the American
people there Is no rivalry or enmity sufficient to prevent
such a reunion. THE END.

London : Printed by Smith, Eldeb & Co., Little Green Arbour Court, Old Bailey, E.G.

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