Diary in America, Series Two
by Frederick Marryat · English · Gutenberg #23138 · 986,447 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: Diary in America, Series Two
Author: Frederick Marryat
Release date: October 21, 2007 [eBook #23138]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/23138
Credits: Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK DIARY IN AMERICA, SERIES TWO ***
Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England
Diary in America--Series Two, by Captain Marryat.
________________________________________________________________________
In the late 1830s Captain Marryat, already a famous literary figure in
North America, visited the United States and Canada, writing his
observations in two Series of volumes, each containing three books.
These were published in Britain as the six books, but were published in
America as two books with small print and thin paper, thus enabling the
Diary to be published as two books only. It is from first editions of
the American version that we have worked, though we do possess three of
the British first edition of six volumes.
While some of the observations are trivial, and some even possibly
misleading, there is a great deal of useful fact in these books, making
them well worth looking at. There are some tables that may not
reproduce well in the PDA version of these books.
Marryat used his knowledge of America to write a novel based in the
more southerly part, especially California and Texas.
________________________________________________________________________
DIARY IN AMERICA--SERIES TWO, BY CAPTAIN MARRYAT.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ONE.
TRAVELLING.
I believe that the remarks of a traveller in any country not his own,
let his work be ever so trifling or badly written, will point out some
peculiarity which will have escaped the notice of those who were born
and reside in that country, unless they happen to be natives of that
portion of it in which the circumstance alluded to was observed. It is
a fact that no one knows his own country; from assuetude and, perhaps,
from the feelings of regard which we naturally have for our native land,
we pass over what nevertheless does not escape the eye of a foreigner.
Indeed, from the consciousness that we can always see such and such
objects of interest whenever we please, we very often procrastinate
until we never see them at all. I knew an old gentleman who having
always resided in London, every year declared his intention of seeing
the Tower of London with its Curiosities. He renewed this declaration
every year, put it off until the next, and has since left the world
without having ever put his intention into execution.
That the Americans would cavil at portions of the first part of my work,
I was fully convinced, and as there are many observations quite new to
most of them, they are by them considered to be false; but the United
States, as I have before observed, comprehend an immense extent of
territory, with a population running from a state of refinement down to
one of positive barbarism; and although the Americans travel much, they
travel the well beaten paths, in which that which is peculiar is not so
likely to meet the eye or even the ear. It does not, therefore, follow
that because what I remark is new to many of them, that therefore it is
false. The inhabitants of the cities in the United States, (and it is
those who principally visit this country), know as little of what is
passing in Arkansas and Alabama as a cockney does of the manners and
customs of Guernsey, Jersey, and the Isle of Man.
The other day, one American lady observed that, "it was too bad of
Captain Marryat to assert that ladies in America carried pigtail in
their work-boxes to present to the gentlemen;" adding, "I never heard or
saw such a thing in all my life." Very possible; and had I stated that
at New York, Philadelphia, Boston, or Charleston, such was the practice,
she then might have been justifiably indignant. But I have been very
particular in my localities, both in justice to myself and the
Americans, and if they will be content to confine their animadversions
to the observations upon the State to which they belong, or my general
observations upon the country and government, I shall then be content;
if, on the contrary, their natural vanity will not allow any remarks to
be made upon the peculiarities of one portion of society without
considering them as a reflection upon the whole of the Union, all I can
say is that they must, and will be annoyed.
The answer made to the lady who was "wrathy" about the pigtail was,
"Captain M has stated it to be a custom in one State. Have you ever
been in that State?"
"No, I have not," replied the lady, "but I have never heard of it." So
then, on a vast continent, extending almost from the Poles to the
Equator, because one individual, one mere mite of creation among the
millions (who are but a fraction of the population which the country
will support), has not heard of what passes thousands of miles from her
abode, therefore it cannot be true! Instead of cavilling, let the
American read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest all that I have already
said, and all that I intend to say in these volumes; and although the
work was not written for them, but for my own countrymen, they will find
that I have done them friendly service.
There is much comprehended in the simple word "travelling" which heads
this chapter, and it is by no means an unimportant subject, as the
degree of civilisation of a country, and many important peculiarities,
bearing strongly upon the state of society, are to be gathered from the
high road, and the variety of entertainment for man and horse; and I
think that my remarks on this subject will throw as much light upon
American society as will be found in any chapter which I have written.
In a country abounding as America does with rivers and railroads, and
where locomotion by steam, wherever it can be applied, supersedes every
other means of conveyance, it is not to be expected that the roads will
be remarkably good; they are, however, in consequence of the excellent
arrangements of the townships and counties, in the Eastern States, as
good, and much better, than could be expected. The great objection to
them is that they are not levelled, but follow the undulations of the
country, so that you have a variety of short, steep ascents and descents
which are very trying to the carriage-springs and very fatiguing to the
traveller. Of course in a new country you must expect to fall in with
the delightful varieties of _Corduroy_, etcetera, but wherever the
country is settled, and the population sufficient to pay the expense,
the roads in America may be said to be as good as under circumstances
could possibly be expected. There are one or two roads, I believe, not
more, which are government roads; but, in general, the expense of the
roads is defrayed by the States.
But, before I enter into any remarks upon the various modes of
travelling in America, it may be as well to say a few words upon the
horses, which are remarkably good in the United States: they appear to
be more hardy, and have much better hoofs, than ours in England;
throwing a shoe therefore is not of the same consequence as it is with
us, for a horse will go twenty miles afterwards with little injury. In
Virginia and Kentucky the horses are almost all thorough-bred, and from
the best English stock.--The distances run in racing are much longer
than ours, and speed without bottom is useless.
The Americans are very fond of fast trotting horses; I do not refer to
rackers, as they term horses that trot before and gallop behind, but
fair trotters, and they certainly have a description of horse that we
could not easily match in England. At New York, the Third Avenue, as
they term it, is the general rendezvous, I once went out there mounted
upon Paul Pry, who was once considered the fastest horse in America; at
his full speed he performed a mile in two minutes and thirty seconds,
equal to twenty-four miles per hour. He took me at this devil of a pace
as far as Hell Gate; not wishing "to intrude," I pulled up there, and
went home again. A pair of horses in harness were pointed out to me who
could perform the mile in two minutes fifty seconds. They use here
light four-wheeled vehicles which they call wagons, with a seat in the
front for two persons and room for your luggage behind; and in these
wagons, with a pair of horses, they think nothing of trotting them
seventy or eighty miles in a day, at the speed of twelve miles an hour;
I have seen the horses come in, and they did not appear to suffer from
the fatigue. You seldom see a horse bent forward, but they are all
daisy cutters.
The gentlemen of New York give very high prices for fast horses; 1,000
dollars is not by any means an uncommon price. In a country where time
is every thing, they put a proportionate value upon speed. Paul Pry is
a tall grey horse (now thirteen years old); to look at, he would not
fetch 10 pounds,--the English omnibuses would refuse him.
Talking about omnibuses, those of New York, and the other cities in
America, are as good and as well regulated as those of Paris; the larger
ones have four horses. Not only their omnibuses, but their hackney
coaches are very superior to those in London; the latter are as clean as
private carriages; and with the former there is no swearing, no
dislocating the arms of poor females, hauling them from one omnibus to
the other,--but civility without servility.
The American stage-coaches are such as experience has found out to be
most suitable to the American roads, and you have not ridden in them
five miles before you long for the delightful springing of four horses
upon the level roads of England. They are something between an English
stage [see note 1] and a French diligence, built with all the panels
open, on account of the excessive heat of the summer months. In wet
weather these panels are covered with leather aprons, which are fixed on
with battons, a very insufficient protection in the winter, as the wind
blows through the intermediate spaces, whistling into your ears, and
rendering it more piercing than if all was open. Moreover, they are no
protection against the rain or snow, both of which find their way in to
you. The coach has three seats, to receive nine passengers; those on
the middle seat leaning back upon a strong and broad leather brace,
which runs across. This is very disagreeable, as the centre passengers,
when the panels are closed, deprive the others of the light and air from
the windows. But the most disagreeable feeling arises from the body of
the coach not being upon springs, but hung upon leather braces running
under it and supporting it on each side; and when the roads are bad, or
you ascend or rapidly descend the pitches (as they term short hills) the
motion is very similar to that of being tossed in a blanket, often
throwing you up to the top of the coach, so as to flatten your hat--if
not your head.
The drivers are very skilful, although they are generally young men--
indeed often mere boys--for they soon better themselves as they advance
in life. Very often they drive six in hand; and if you are upset, it is
generally more the fault of the road than of the driver. I was upset
twice in one half hour when I was travelling in the winter time; but the
snow was very deep at the time, and no one thinks anything of an upset
in America. More serious accidents do, however, sometimes happen. When
I was in New Hampshire, a neglected bridge broke down, and precipitated
coach, horses, and passengers into a torrent which flowed into the
Connecticut river. Some of the passengers were drowned. Those who were
saved, sued the township and recovered damages; but these mischances
must be expected in a new country. The great annoyance of these public
conveyances is, that neither the proprietor or driver consider
themselves the servants of the public; a stage-coach is a speculation by
which as much money is to be made as possible by the proprietors; and as
the driver never expects or demands a fee from the passengers, they or
their comforts are no concern of his. The proprietors do not consider
that they are bound to keep faith with the public, nor do they care
about any complaints.
The stages which run from Cincinnati to the eastward are very much
interfered with when the Ohio river is full of water, as the travellers
prefer the steam-boats; but the very moment that the water is so low on
the Ohio that the steam-boats cannot ascend the river up to Wheeling,
double the price is demanded by the proprietors of the coaches. They
are quite regardless as to the opinion or good-will of the public; they
do not care for either, all they want is their money, and they are
perfectly indifferent whether you break your neck or not. The great
evil arising from this state of hostility, as you may almost call it, is
the disregard of life which renders travelling so dangerous in America.
You are completely at the mercy of the drivers, who are, generally
speaking, very good-tempered, but sometimes quite the contrary; and I
have often been amused with the scenes which have taken place between
them and the passengers. As for myself, when the weather permitted it,
I invariably went outside, which the Americans seldom do, and was always
very good friends with the drivers. They are full of local information,
and often very amusing. There is, however, a great difference in the
behaviour of the drivers of the mails, and coaches which are _timed_ by
the post-office, and others which are not. If beyond his time, the
driver is mulcted by the proprietors; and when dollars are in the
question, there is an end to all urbanity and civility.
A gentleman of my acquaintance was in a mail which was behind time, and
the driver was proceeding at such a furious pace that one jerk threw a
lady to the top of the coach, and the teeth of her comb entering her
head, she fainted with pain. The passengers called out to the driver to
stop. "What for?" "That last jerk has struck the lady, and she has
fainted." "Oh, that's all! Well, I reckon I'll give her another jerk,
which will bring her to again." Strange to say, he prophesied right;
the next jerk was very violent, and the lady recovered her senses.
Mr E, an employe of the American government, was travelling in the
state of Indiana--the passengers had slept at an inn, and the coach was
ready at the door, but Mr E had not quite finished his toilet; the
driver dispatched the bar-keeper for him, and Mr E sent word he would
be down immediately.
"What is he about?" said the driver impatiently to the bar-keeper when
he came down again.
"Cleaning his teeth."
"_Cleaning his teeth_!" roared the driver, indignantly; "by the --," and
away went the horses at a gallop, leaving Mr E behind.
The other passengers remonstrated, but without avail; they told him that
Mr E was charged with government despatches--he didn't care; at last,
one of them offered him a dollar if he would go back. They had
proceeded more than a mile before the offer was made; the man
immediately wheeled his horses round, and returned to the inn.
The Rev Mr Reid gives an anecdote very characteristic of American
stage-coach travelling, and proving how little the convenience of the
public is cared for.
"When we stopped at Lowell to change horses, a female wished to secure a
place onward. We were already, as the phrase is, more than full; we had
nine persons, and two children, which are made to go for nothing, except
in the way-bill. Our saucy driver opened the door, and addressing two
men, who, with us, would have been outside passengers--`now, I say, I
want one of you to ride with me, and let a lady have your seat.' The
men felt they were addressed by a superior, but kept their places.
`Come, I say,' he continued, `you shall have a good buffalo and
_umbrel_, and nothing will hurt you.' Still they kept their places, and
refused him. His lordship was offended, and ready to lay hands on one
of them; but, checking himself, exclaimed, `Well, if I can't get you
out, hang it if I'll take you on till one of you gets out.' And there
we stood for some time; and he gained his point at last, and in civiller
terms, by persuading the persons on the middle seat to receive the lady;
so that we had now twelve inside."
I once myself was in a stage-coach, and found that the window glasses
had been taken out; I mentioned this to the driver, as it rained in very
fast--"Well, now," replied he, "I reckon you'd better ax the
proprietors; my business is to drive the coach." And that was all the
comfort I could procure. As for speaking to them about stopping, or
driving slow, it is considered as an unwarrantable interference.
I recollect an Englishman at New York telling me, that when in the
Eastern States, he had expressed a wish to go a little faster--"Oh,"
said the driver, "you do, do you; well, wait a moment, and I'll go
faster than you like." The fellow drove very slow where the road was
good; but as soon as he came to a bad piece, he put his horses to the
gallop, and, as my friend said, they were so tossed and tumbled about,
that they hardly knew where they were. "Is that fast enough, Mister,"
said the driver, leering in at the couch window.
As for stopping, they will stop to talk to any one on the road about the
price of the markets, the news, or any thing else; and the same
accommodation is cheerfully given to any passenger who has any business
to transact on the way. The Americans are accustomed to it, and the
passengers never raise any objections. There is a spirit of
accommodation, arising from their natural good temper (note 2).
I was once in a coach when the driver pulled up, and entered a small
house on the road side; after he had been there some time, as it was not
an inn, I expressed my wonder what he was about. "I guess I can tell
you," said a man who was standing by the coach, and overheard me;
"there's a pretty girl in that house, and he's doing a bit of courting,
I expect." Such was the fact: the passengers laughed, and waited for
him very patiently. He remained about three-quarters of an hour, and
then came out. The time was no doubt to him very short; but to us it
appeared rather tedious.
Mrs Jamieson, in her last work, says: "One dark night, I remember, as
the sleet and rain were falling fast, and our Extra was slowly dragged
by wretched brutes of horses through what seemed to me `Sloughs of
Despond,' some package ill stowed on the roof, which in the American
stages presents no resting-place for man or box, fell off. The driver
alighted to fish it out of the mud. As there was some delay, a
gentleman seated opposite to me put his head out of window to inquire
the cause; to whom the driver's voice replied, in an angry tone, `I say,
you mister, don't you sit jabbering there; but lend a hand to heave
these things aboard!' To my surprise, the gentleman did not appear
struck by the insolence of this summons, but immediately jumped out and
rendered his assistance. This is merely the _manner_ of the people.
The driver intended no insolence, nor was it taken as such; and my
fellow-travellers could not help laughing at my surprise."
I have mentioned these little anecdotes, as they may amuse the reader;
but it must be understood that, generally speaking, the drivers are very
good-natured and obliging, and the passengers very accommodating to each
other, and submitting with a good grace to what cannot be ameliorated.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. Miss Martineau in her work speaks of that most _delightful_ of
all conveyances--an American stage-coach; but Miss M is so very peculiar
in her ideas, that I am surprised at nothing that she says. I will,
however, quote the Reverend Mr Reid against her:--
"I had no sooner begun to enter the coach than splash went my foot in
mud and water. I exclaimed with surprise. `Soon be dry, sir,' was the
reply; while he withdrew the light; that I might not explore the cause
of complaint. The fact was, that the vehicle, like the hotel and
steam-boat, was not water-tight, and the rain had found an entrance.
There was, indeed, in this coach, as in most others, a provision in the
bottom, of holes, to let off both water and dirt; but here the dirt had
become mud, and thickened about the orifices, so as to prevent escape.
I found I was the only passenger; the morning was damp and chilly; the
state of the coach added to the sensation; and I eagerly looked about
for some means of protection. I drew up the wooden windows; out of five
small panes of glass in the sashes three were broken. I endeavoured to
secure the curtains; two of them had most of the ties broken, and
flapped in one's face. There was no help in the coach, so I looked to
myself. I made the best use I could of my garments, and put myself as
snugly as I could in the corner of a stage meant to accommodate nine
persons. My situation just then was not among the most cheerful. I
could see nothing; every where I could feel the wind drawn in upon me;
and as for sounds I had the calls of the driver, the screeching of the
wheels, and the song of the bull-frog for my entertainment."--Rev Mr
Reid's Tour, vol. I, page 100.--Very delightful, indeed!
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 2. This spirit of accommodation produces what would at first
appear to be rudeness, but is not intended for it. When you travel, or
indeed when walking the streets in the Western country, if you have a
cigar in your mouth, a man will come up--"Beg pardon, stranger," and
whips your cigar out of your mouth, lights his own, and then returns
yours. I thought it rather cool at first, but as I found it was the
practice, I invariably did the same whenever I needed a light.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER TWO.
TRAVELLING.
In making my observations upon the rail-road and steam-boat travelling
in the United States, I shall point out some facts with which the reader
must be made acquainted. The Americans are a restless, locomotive
people: whether for business or pleasure, they are ever on the move in
their own country, and they move in masses. There is but one
conveyance, it may be said, for every class of people, the coach,
rail-road, or steam-boat, as well as most of the hotels, being open to
all; the consequence is that the society is very much mixed--the
millionaire, the well-educated woman of the highest rank, the senator,
the member of Congress, the farmer, the emigrant, the swindler, and the
pick-pocket, are all liable to meet together in the same vehicle of
conveyance. Some conventional rules were therefore necessary, and those
rules have been made by public opinion--a power to which all must submit
in America. The one most important, and without which it would be
impossible to travel in such a gregarious way, is an universal deference
and civility shewn to the women, who may in consequence travel without
protection all over the United States without the least chance of
annoyance or insult. This deference paid to the sex is highly
creditable to the Americans; it exists from one end of the Union to the
other; indeed, in the Southern and more lawless States, it is even more
chivalric than in the more settled. Let a female be ever so
indifferently clad, whatever her appearance may be, still it is
sufficient that she is a female; she has the first accommodation, and
until she has it, no man will think of himself. But this deference is
not only shewn in travelling, but in every instance. An English lady
told me, that wishing to be present at the inauguration of Mr Van
Buren, by some mistake, she and her daughters alighted from the carriage
at the wrong entrance, and in attempting to force their way through a
dense crowd were nearly crushed to death. This was perceived, and the
word was given--`make room for the ladies.' The whole crowd, as if by
one simultaneous effort, compressed itself to the right and left,
locking themselves together to meet the enormous pressure, and made a
wide lane, through which they passed with ease and comfort. "It
reminded me of the Israelites passing through the Red Sea with the wall
of waters on each side of them," observed the lady. "In any other
country we must have been crushed to death."
When I was on board one of the steam-boats, an American asked one of the
ladies to what she would like to be helped. She replied, to some
turkey, which was within reach, and off of which a passenger had just
cut the wing and transferred it to his own plate. The American who had
received the lady's wishes, immediately pounced with his fork upon the
wing of the turkey and carried it off to the young lady's plate; the
only explanation given, "a _lady, Sir_!" was immediately admitted as
sufficient.
The authority of the captain of a steam-boat is never disputed; if it
were, the offender would be landed on the beach. I was on board of a
steam-boat when, at tea time, a young man sat down with his hat on.
"_You_ are in the company of ladies, sir," observed the captain very
civilly, "and I must request you to take your hat off."
"Are you the captain of the boat?" observed the young man, in a sulky
tone.
"Yes, sir, I am."
"Well, then, I suppose I must," growled the passenger, as he obeyed.
But if the stewards, who are men of colour, were to attempt to enforce
the order, they would meet with such a rebuff as I have myself heard
given.
"If it's the captain's orders, let the captain come and give them. I'm
not going to obey a _Nigger_ like you."
Perhaps it is owing to this deference to the sex that you will observe
that the Americans almost invariably put on their best clothes when they
travel; such is the case whatever may be the cause; and the ladies in
America, travelling or not, are always well, if not expensively dressed.
They don't all swap bonnets as the two young ladies did in the
stage-coach in Vermont.
But, notwithstanding the decorum so well preserved as I have mentioned,
there are some annoyances to be met with from gregarious travelling.
One is, that occasionally a family of interesting young citizens who are
suffering from the whooping-cough, small-pox, or any other complaint,
are brought on board, in consequence of the medical gentlemen having
recommended change of air. Of course the other children, or even
adults, may take the infection, but they are not refused admittance upon
such trifling grounds; the profits of the steam boat must not be
interfered with.
Of all travelling, I think that by railroad the most intriguing,
especially in America. After a certain time the constant coughing of
the locomotive, the dazzling of the vision from the rapidity with which
objects are passed, the sparks and ashes which fly in your face and on
your clothes become very annoying; your only consolation is the speed
with which you are passing over the ground.
The railroads in America are not so well made as in England, and are
therefore more dangerous; but it must be remembered that at present
nothing is made in America but to last a certain time; they go to the
exact expense considered necessary and no further, they know that in
twenty years they will be better able to spend twenty dollars than one
now. The great object is to obtain quick returns for the outlay, and,
except in few instances, durability or permanency is not thought of.
One great cause of disasters is, that the railroads are not fenced on
the sides, so as to keep the cattle off them, and it appears as if the
cattle who range the woods are very partial to take their naps on the
roads, probably from their being drier than the other portions of the
soil. It is impossible to say how many cows have been cut into atoms by
the trains in America, but the frequent accidents arising from these
causes has occasioned the Americans to invent a sort of shovel, attached
to the front of the locomotive, which takes up a cow, tossing her off
right or left. At every fifteen miles of the rail-roads there are
refreshment rooms; the cars stop, all the doors are thrown open, and out
rush the passengers like boys out of school, and crowd round the tables
to solace themselves with pies, patties, cakes, hard-boiled eggs, ham,
custards, and a variety of railroad luxuries, too numerous to mention.
The bell rings for departure, in they all hurry with their hands and
mouths full, and off they go again, until the next stopping place
induces them to relieve the monotony of the journey by masticating
without being hungry.
The Utica railroad is the best in the United States. The general
average of speed is from fourteen to sixteen miles an hour; but on the
Utica they go much faster. [See note 1.] A gentleman narrated to me a
singular specimen of the ruling passion which he witnessed on an
occasion when the rail-cars were thrown off the road, and nearly one
hundred people killed, or injured in a greater or less degree.
On the side of the road lay a man with his leg so severely fractured,
that the bone had been forced through the skin, and projected outside
his trowsers. Over him hung his wife, with the utmost solicitude, the
blood running down from a severe cut received on her head, and kneeling
by his side was his sister, who was also much injured. The poor women
were lamenting over him, and thinking nothing of their own hurts; and
he, it appears, was also thinking nothing about his injury, but only
lamenting the delay which would be occasioned by it.
"Oh! my dear, dear Isaac, what can be done with your leg?" exclaimed the
wife in the deepest distress.
"What will become of my leg!" cried the man. "What's to become of my
business, I should like to know?"
"Oh! dear brother," said the other female, "don't think about your
business now; think of getting cured."
"Think of getting cured--I must think how the bills are to be met, and I
not there to take them up. They will be presented as sure as I lie
here."
"Oh! never mind the bills, dear husband--think of your precious leg."
"Not mind the bills! but I must mind the bills--my credit will be
ruined."
"Not when they know what has happened, brother. Oh! dear, dear--that
leg, that leg."
"D---n the leg; what's to become of my business," groaned the man,
falling on his back from excess of pain.
Now this was a specimen of true commercial spirit. If this man had not
been nailed to the desk, he might have been a hero.
I shall conclude this chapter with an extract from an American author,
which will give some idea of the indifference as to loss of life in the
United States.
"Every now and then is a tale of railroad disaster in some part of the
country, at inclined planes, or intersecting points, or by running off
the track, making splinters of the cars, and of men's bones; and
locomotives have been known to encounter, head to head, like two rams
fighting. A little while previous to the writing of these lines, a
locomotive and tender shot down the inclined plain at Philadelphia, like
a falling star. A woman, with two legs broken by this accident, was put
into an omnibus, to be carried to the hospital, but the driver, in his
speculations, coolly replied to a man, who asked why he did not go on?--
that he was waiting for a _full load_."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. The railroads finished in America in 1835 amounted in length to
1,600 miles; those in progress, and not yet complete, to 1,270 miles
more. The canals completed were in length 2,500 miles, unfinished 687
miles.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER THREE.
TRAVELLING.
The most general, the most rapid, the most agreeable, and, at the same
time, the most dangerous, of American travelling is by steam boats. It
will be as well to give the reader an idea of the extent of this
navigation by putting before him the lengths of some of the principal
rivers in the United States.
+=====================================================+======+
Ý ÝMiles.Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝMissouri and Mississippi Ý 4490Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝDo. to its junction with the Mississippi Ý 3181Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝMississippi proper, to its junction with the MissouriÝ 1600Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝDo. to the Gulf of Mexico Ý 2910Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝArkansas River, a branch of the Mississippi Ý 2170Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝSt Lawrence River, including the Lakes Ý 2075Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝPlatte River, a branch of the Missouri Ý 1600Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝRed River, a branch of the Mississippi Ý 1500Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝOhio River, Do. Do. Ý 1372Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝColumbia River, empties into the Pacific Ocean, Ý 1315Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝKansas River, a branch of the Missouri Ý 1200Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝYellowstone Do. Do. Ý 1100Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝTennessee Do. Ohio Ý 756Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝAlabama River, empties into the Gulf of Mexico Ý 575Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝCumberland River, a branch of the Ohio Ý 570Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝSusquehanna River, empties into Chesapeake Bay Ý 460Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝIllinois River, a branch of the Mississippi Ý 430Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝAppalachicola River, empties into the Gulf of Mexico Ý 425Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝSt John's River, New Brunswick, rises in Maine Ý 415Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝConnecticut River, empties into Long Island Sound Ý 410Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝWabash River, a branch of the Ohio Ý 360Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝDelaware River, empties into the Atlantic Ocean Ý 355Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝJames River, empties into Chesapeake Bay Ý 350Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝRoanoke River, empties into Albemarle Sound Ý 350Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝGreat Pedee River, empties into Atlantic Ocean Ý 350Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝSantee River, empties into Atlantic Ocean Ý 340Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝPotomac River, empties into Chesapeake Bay Ý 335Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝHudson River, empties into Atlantic Ocean Ý 320Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝAltamaha River, empties into Atlantic Ocean Ý 300Ý
+-----------------------------------------------------+------+
ÝSavannah River, empties into Atlantic Ocean Ý 290Ý
+=====================================================+======+
Voice from America.
Many of the largest of these rivers are at present running through
deserts--others possess but a scanty population on their banks; but, as
the west fills up, they will be teeming with life, and the harvest of
industry will freight many more hundreds of vessels than those which at
present disturb their waters.
The Americans have an idea that they are very far ahead of us in steam
navigation, a great error which I could not persuade them of. In the
first place, their machinery is not by any means equal to ours; in the
next, they have no sea-going steam vessels, which after all is the great
desideratum of steam navigation. Even in the number and tonnage of
their mercantile steam vessels they are not equal to us, as I shall
presently show, nor have they yet arrived to that security in steam
navigation which we have.
The return of vessels belonging to the Mercantile Steam Marine of Great
Britain, made by the Commissioners on the Report of steam-vessel
accidents in 1839, is, number of vessels, 810; tonnage, 157,840; horse
power, 63,250.
Mr Levi Woodbury's Report to Congress in December, 1838, states the
number of American steam vessels to be 800, and the tonnage to be
155,473; horse power, 57,019.
It is but fair to state, that the Americans have the credit of having
sent the first steam vessel across the Atlantic. In 1819, a steam
vessel, built at New York, crossed from Savannah to Liverpool in
twenty-six days.
The number of _sea-going_ steam vessels in England is _two hundred and
eighty-two_, while in the United States they have not more than ten at
the outside calculation. In the size of our vessels also we are far
superior to them. I here insert a table, shewing the dimensions of our
largest vessels, as given in the Report to the House of Commons, and
another of the largest American vessels collected from the Report of Mr
Levi Woodbury to Congress.
_Table shewing some of the Dimensions of the Hull and Machinery of the
five largest ships yet built or building_.
[Table to be added in a later edition.]
But the point on which we are so vastly superior to the Americans, is in
our steam vessels of war. They have but one in the United States, named
the Fulton the Second. The following is a list of those belonging to
the Government of Great Britain, with their tonnage:--
+=========+=====+=========+=====+===========+=====+
Ý ÝTons.Ý ÝTons.Ý ÝTons.Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAcheron Ý 722ÝFearless Ý 165ÝMyrtle Ý 116Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAdder Ý 237ÝFirebrandÝ 495ÝOtter Ý 237Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAdvice Ý 475ÝFire Fly Ý 550ÝPhoenix Ý 809Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAfrican Ý 295ÝFlamer Ý 496ÝPigmy Ý 230Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAlban Ý 294ÝFury Ý 166ÝPike Ý 112Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAriel Ý 149ÝGleaner Ý 306ÝPluto Ý 365Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAsp Ý 112ÝGorgon Ý 1111ÝProspero Ý 244Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝAvon Ý 361ÝHecate Ý 815ÝRedwing Ý 139Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝBeaver Ý 128ÝHecla Ý 815ÝRadamanthusÝ 813Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝBlazer Ý 527ÝHermes Ý 716ÝSalamander Ý 818Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝBoxer Ý 159ÝHydra Ý 818ÝShearwater Ý 343Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝCarron Ý 294ÝJasper Ý 230ÝSpitfire Ý 553Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝCharon Ý 125ÝKite Ý 300ÝSprightly Ý 234Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝColumbia Ý 360ÝLightningÝ 296ÝStrombolo Ý 966Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝComet Ý 238ÝLucifer Ý 387ÝSwallow Ý 133Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝConfianceÝ 295ÝMedea Ý 835ÝTartarus Ý 523Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝCuckoo Ý 234ÝMedusa Ý 889ÝUrgent Ý 583Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝCyclops Ý 1190ÝMegaera Ý 717ÝVesuvius Ý 966Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝDasher Ý 260ÝMerlin Ý 889ÝVolcano Ý 720Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝDee Ý 704ÝMessengerÝ 733ÝWidgeon Ý 164Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝDoterel Ý 723ÝMeteor Ý 296ÝWildfire Ý 186Ý
+---------+-----+---------+-----+-----------+-----+
ÝEcho Ý 298ÝMonkey Ý 211ÝZephyr Ý 237Ý
+=========+=====+=========+=====+===========+=====+
_Government Steam Vessels Building_.
+======+====+======+===+==========+===+
ÝAlectoÝ 799ÝLizardÝ282ÝPolyphemusÝ799Ý
+------+----+------+---+----------+---+
ÝArdentÝ 799ÝLocustÝ282ÝPrometheusÝ799Ý
+------+----+------+---+----------+---+
ÝDover ÝIronÝMedinaÝ889Ý Ý Ý
+======+====+======+===+==========+===+
I trust that the above statement will satisfy the Americans that we are
ahead of them in steam navigation. In consequence of their isolation,
and having no means of comparison with other countries, the Americans
see only their own progress, and seem to have forgotten that other
nations advance as well as themselves. They appear to imagine that
while they are going ahead all others are standing still: forgetting
that England with her immense resources is much more likely to surpass
them than to be left behind.
We must now examine the question of the proportionate security in steam
boat travelling in the two countries. The following table, extracted
from the Report of the Commissioners on Steam boat Accidents, will show
the casualties which have occurred in this country in _ten_ years.
Abstract of ninety-two Accidents. Table not included.
The principal portion of this loss of life has been occasioned by
vessels having been built for _sale_, and not sea-worthy; an occurrence
too common, I am afraid, in both countries.
The author of "A Voice from America" states the list of steamboat
disasters, on the waters of the United States, for _twelve months_ out
of the years 1837-38, by bursting of boilers, burning, wrecks, etcetera,
besides numerous others of less consequence, comprehends the total loss
of eight vessels and _one thousand and eighty lives_.
So that we have in England, loss in ten years, 634; one year, 63.
In America, loss in one year, 1,080.
The report of Mr Woodbury to Congress is imperfect, which is not to be
wondered at, as it is almost impossible to arrive at the truth; there
is, however, much to be gleaned from it. He states that, since the
employment of steam vessels in the United States, 1,300 have been built,
and of them _two hundred and sixty_ have been lost by accidents.
The greatest loss of life by collision and sinking, was in the Monmouth,
(Indians transporting to the West), in 1837, by which three hundred
lives were lost; Oronoka, by explosion, by which one hundred and thirty
or more lives were lost and Moselle, at Cincinnati, by which from one
hundred to one hundred and twenty lives were lost.
The greatest loss by shipwreck was in the case of the Home, on the coast
of South Carolina, when one hundred lives were lost; the greatest by
fire, the Ben Sherrod, in 1837, by which one hundred and thirty
perished.
The three great casualties which occurred during my stay in America,
were those of the Ben Sherrod, by fire; the Home, by wreck; and the
Moselle, by explosion: and as I have authentic details of them, by
Americans who were on board, or eye-witnesses, I shall lay them before
my readers. The reader will observe that there is a great difference in
the loss of life mentioned in Mr Woodbury's report and in the
statements of those who were present. I shall hereafter state why I
consider the latter as the more correct.
LOSS OF THE BEN SHERROD, BY A PASSENGER.
"On Sunday morning, the 6th of May 1837, the steam-boat Ben Sherrod,
under the command of Captain Castleman, was preparing to leave the levee
at New Orleans. She was thronged with passengers. Many a beautiful and
interesting woman that morning was busy in arranging the little things
incident to travelling, and they all looked forward with high and
certain hope to the end of their journey. Little innocent children
played about in the cabin, and would run to the guards--the _guards_ of
an American steam-boat are an extension of the deck on each side, beyond
the paddle boxes, which gives great width for stowage--now and then, to
wonder, in infantine language, at the next boat, or the water, or
something else that drew their attention. "Oh, look here, Henry--I
don't like that boat, Lexington."--"I wish I was going by her," said
Henry, musingly. The men too were urgent in their arrangements of the
trunks, and getting on board sundry articles which a ten days' passage
rendered necessary. In fine all seemed hope, and joy, and certainty.
"The cabin of the Ben Sherrod was on the upper deck, but narrow in
proportion to her build, for she was what is technically called a
Tennessee cotton boat. To those who have never seen a cotton boat
loaded, it is a wondrous sight. The bales are piled up from the lower
guards wherever there is a cranny until they reach above the second
deck, room being merely left for passengers to walk outside the cabin.
You have regular alleys left amid the cotton in order to pass about on
the first deck. Such is a cotton boat carrying from 1,500 to 2,000
bales.
"The Ben's finish and accommodation of the cabin was by no means such as
would begin to compare with the regular passenger boats. It being late
in the season, and but few large steamers being in port in consequence
of the severity of the times, the Ben Sherrod got an undue number of
passengers, otherwise she would have been avoided, for her
accommodations were not enticing. She had a heavy freight on board, and
several horses and carriages on the forecastle. The build of the Ben
Sherrod was heavy, her timbers being of the largest size.
"The morning was clear and sultry--so much so, that umbrellas were
necessary to ward off the sun. It was a curious sight to see the
hundreds of citizens hurrying on board to leave letters, and to see them
coming away. When a steam-boat is going off on the Southern and Western
waters, the excitement is fully equal to that attendant upon the
departure of a Liverpool packet. About ten o'clock AM the ill-fated
steamer pushed off upon the turbid current of the Mississippi, as a swan
upon the waters. In a few minutes she was under way, tossing high in
air, bright and snowy clouds of steam at every half revolution of her
engine. Talk not of your northern steam-boats! A Mississippi steamer
of seven hundred tons burthen, with adequate machinery, is one of the
sublimities of poetry. For thousands of miles that great body forces
its way through a desolate country, against an almost restless current,
and all the evidence you have of the immense power exerted, is brought
home to your senses by the everlasting and majestic burst of exertion
from her escapement pipe, and the ceaseless stroke of the paddle wheels.
In the dead of night, when amid the swamps on either side, your noble
vessel winds her upward way--when not a soul is seen on board but the
officer on deck--when nought is heard but the clang of the fire-doors
amid the hoarse coughing of the engine, imagination yields to the
vastness of the ideas thus excited in your mind, and if you have a soul
that makes you a man, you cannot help feeling strongly alive to the
mightiness of art in contrast with the mightiness of nature. Such a
scene, and hundreds such have I realised, with an intensity that cannot
be described, always made me a better man than before. I never could
tire of the steam-boat navigation of the Mississippi.
"On Tuesday evening, the 9th of May 1837, the steam-boat Prairie, on her
way to St Louis, bore hard upon the Sherrod. It was necessary for the
latter to stop at Fort Adams, during which the Prairie passed her.
Great vexation was manifested by some of the passengers, that the
Prairie should get to Natchez first. This subject formed the theme of
conversation for two or three hours, the captain assuring them that he
would beat her _any how_. The Prairie is a very fast boat, and under
equal chances could have beaten the Sherrod. So soon as the business
was transacted at Fort Adams, for which she stopped, orders were given
to the men to keep up their fires to the extent. It was now a little
after 11 p.m. The captain retired to his berth, with his clothes on,
and left the deck in charge of an officer. During the evening a barrel
of whisky had been turned out, and permission given to the hands to do
as they pleased. As may be supposed, they drew upon the barrel quite
liberally. It is the custom on all boats to furnish the firemen with
liquor, though a difference exists as to the mode. But it is due to the
many worthy captains now on the Mississippi, to state that the practice
of furnishing spirits is gradually dying away, and where they are given,
it is only done in moderation.
"As the Sherrod passed on above Fort Adams towards the mouth of the
Homochitta, the wood piled up in the front of the furnaces several times
caught fire, and was once or twice imperfectly extinguished by the
drunken hands. It must be understood by those of my readers who have
never seen a western steamboat, that the boilers are entirely above the
first deck, and that when the fires are well kept up for any length of
time, the heat is almost insupportable. Were it not for the draft
occasioned by the speed of the boat it would be very difficult to attend
the fires. As the boat was booming along through the water close
in-shore, for, in ascending the river, boats go as close as they can to
avoid the current, a negro on the beach called out to the fireman that
the wood was on fire. The reply was, "Go to h---l, and mind your own
business," from some half intoxicated hand. "Oh, massa," answered the
negro, "if you don't take care, you will be in h---l before I will."
On, on, on went the boat at a tremendous rate, quivering and trembling
in all her length at every revolution of the wheels. The steam was
heated so fast, that it continued to escape through the safety valve,
and by its sharp singing, told a tale that every prudent captain would
have understood. As the vessel rounded the bar that makes off from the
Homochitta, being compelled to stand out into the middle of the river in
consequence, the fire was discovered. It was about one o'clock in the
morning. A passenger had got up previously, and was standing on the
boiler deck, when to his astonishment, the fire broke out from the pile
of wood. A little presence of mind, and a set of men unintoxicated,
could have saved the boat. The passenger seized a bucket, and was about
to plunge it overboard for water, when he found it locked. An instant
more, and the fire increased in volumes. The captain was now awaked.
He saw that the fire had seized the deck. He ran aft, and announced the
ill-tidings. No sooner were the words out of his mouth, than the
shrieks of mothers, sisters, and babes, resounded through the hitherto
silent cabin in the wildest confusion. Men were aroused from their
dreaming cots to experience the hot air of the approaching fire. The
pilot, being elevated on the hurricane deck, at the instant of
perceiving the flames, put the head of the boat shoreward. She had
scarcely got under good way in that direction, than the tiller ropes
were burnt asunder. Two miles at least, from the land, the vessel took
a sheer, and, borne upon by the current, made several revolutions, until
she struck off across the river. A [sand] bar brought her up for the
moment.
"The flames had now extended fore and aft. At the first alarm several
deck passengers had got in the yawl that hung suspended by the davits.
A cabin passenger, endowed with some degree of courage and presence of
mind, expostulated with them, and did all he could to save the boats for
the ladies. 'Twas useless. One got out his knife and cut away the
forward tackle. The next instant and they were all, to the number of
twenty or more, launched onto the angry waters. They were seen no more.
"The boat being lowered from the other end, filled and was useless. Now
came the trying moment. Hundreds leaped from the burning wreck into the
waters. Mothers were seen standing on the guards with hair dishevelled,
praying for help. The dear little innocents clung to the side of their
mothers and with their tiny hands beat away the burning flames. Sisters
calling out to their brothers in unearthly voices--`Save me, oh save me,
brother!'--wives crying to their husbands to save their children, in
total forgetfulness of themselves,--every second or two a desperate
plunge of some poor victim falling on the appalled ear,--the dashing to
and fro of the horses on the forecastle, groaning audibly from pain of
the devouring element--the continued puffing of the engine, for it still
continued to go, the screaming mother who had leaped overboard in the
desperation of the moment with her only child,--the flames mounting to
the sky with the rapidity of lightning,--shall I ever forget that
scene--that hour of horror and alarm! Never, were I to live till the
memory should forget all else that ever came to the senses. The short
half hour that separated and plunged into eternity two human beings has
been so burnt into the memory that even now I think of it more than half
the day.
"I was swimming to the shore with all my might, endeavoured to sustain a
mother and her child. She sank twice, and yet I bore her on. My
strength failed me. The babe was nothing--a mere cork. `Go, go,' said
the brave mother, `save my child, save my--' and she sank, to rise no
more. Nerved by the resolution of that woman, I reached the shore in
safety. The babe I saved. Ere I had reached the beach, the Sherrod had
swung off the bar, and was floating down, the engine having ceased
running. In every direction heads dotted the surface of the river. The
burning wreck now wore a new, and still more awful appearance. Mothers
were seen clinging, with the last hope to the blazing timbers, and
dropping off one by one. The screams had ceased. A sullen silence
rested over the devoted vessel. The flames became tired of their
destructive work.
"While I sat dripping and overcome upon the beach, a steam boat, the
Columbus, came in sight, and bore for the wreck. It seemed like one
last ray of hope gleaming across the dead gloom of that night. Several
wretches were saved. And still another, the Statesman, came in sight.
More, more were saved.
"A moment _to me_ had only elapsed, when high in the heavens the cinders
flew, and the country was lighted all round. Still another boat came
booming on. I was happy that more help had come. After an exchange of
words with the Columbus, the captain continued on his way under full
steam. Oh, how my heart sank within me! The waves created by his boat
sent many a poor mortal to his long, long home. A being by the name of
Dougherty was the captain of that merciless boat. Long may he be
remembered!
"My hands were burnt, and now I began to experience severe pain. The
scene before me--the loss of my two sisters and brother, whom I had
missed in the confusion, all had steeled my heart. I could not weep--I
could not sigh. The cries of the babe at my side were nothing to me.
"Again--another explosion! and the waters closed slowly and sullenly
over the scene of disaster and death. Darkness resumed her sway, and
the stillness was only interrupted by the distant efforts of the
Columbus and Statesman in their laudable exertions to save human life.
"Captain Castleman lost, I believe, a father and child. Some argue,
this is punishment enough. No, it is not. He had the lives of hundreds
under his charge. He was careless of his trust; he was guilty of a
crime that nothing will ever wipe out. The bodies of two hundred
victims are crying out from the depth of the father of waters for
vengeance. Neither society nor law will give it. His punishment is yet
to come. May I never meet him!
"I could tell of scenes of horror that would rouse the indignation of a
stoic; but I have done. As to myself, I could tell you much to excite
your interest. It was more than three weeks after the occurrence before
I ever shed a tear. All the fountains of sympathy had been dried up,
and my heart was as stone. As I lay on my bed the twenty-fourth day
after, tears, salt tears, came to my relief, and I felt the loss of my
sisters and brother more deeply than ever. Peace be to their spirits!
they found a watery grave.
"In the course of all human events, scenes of misery will occur. But
where they rise from sheer carelessness, it requires more than christian
fortitude to forgive the being who is in fault. I repeat, may I never
meet Captain Castleman or Captain Dougherty!
"I shall follow this tale of woe by some strictures on the mode of
building steam-boats in the west, and show that human life has been
jeopardised by the demoniac spirit of speculation, cheating and roguery.
The fate of the Ben Sherrod shall be my text."
It will be seen from this narrative, that the loss of the vessel was
occasioned by racing with another boat, a frequent practice on the
Mississippi. That people should run such risk, will appear strange but
if any of my readers had ever been on board of a steam vessel in a race,
they would not be surprised; the excitement produced by it is the most
powerful that can be conceived--I have myself experienced it, and can
answer for the truth of it. At first, the feeling of danger
predominates, and many of the passengers beg the captain to desist: but
he cannot bear to be passed by, and left astern. As the race continues,
so do they all warm up, until even those who, most aware of the danger,
were at first most afraid, are to be seen standing over the very
boilers, shouting, huzzaing, and stimulating the fireman to blow them
up; the very danger gives an unwonted interest to the scene; and
females, as well as men, would never be persuaded to cry out, "Hold,
enough!"
Another proof of the disregard of human life is here given in the fact
of one steam-boat passing by and rendering no assistance to the drowning
wretches; nay, it was positively related to me by one who was in the
water, that the blows of the paddles of this steam-boat sent down many
who otherwise might have been saved.
When I was on the Lakes, the wood which was piled close to the
fire-place caught fire. It was of no consequence, as it happened, for
it being a well-regulated boat, the fire was soon extinguished; but I
mention it to show the indifference of one of the men on board. About
half an hour afterwards, one of his companions roused him from his
berth, shaking him by the shoulder to wake him, saying, "Get up, the
wood's a-fire--quick." "Well, I knew that 'fore I turn'd in," replied
the man, yawning.
The loss of the Home occasioned many of the first families in the states
to go into deep mourning, for the major portion of the passengers were
highly respectable. I was at New York when she started. I had had an
hour's conversation with Professor Nott and his amiable wife, and had
made arrangements with them to meet them in South Carolina. We never
met again, for they were in the list of those who perished.
LOSS OF THE HOME.
"The steam-packet Home, commanded by Capt. White, left New York, for
Charleston, South Carolina, at four o'clock, p.m., on Saturday, the 7th
Oct. 1837, having on board between eighty and ninety passengers, and
forty-three of the boat's crew, including officers, making in all about
one hundred and thirty persons. The weather at this time was very
pleasant, and all on board appeared to enjoy, in anticipation, a
delightful and prosperous passage. On leaving the wharf, cheerfulness
appeared to fill the hearts and enliven the countenances of this
floating community. Already had conjectures been hazarded, as to the
time of their arrival at the destined port, and high hopes were
entertained of an expeditious and pleasant voyage. Before six
o'clock,--a check to these delusive expectations was experienced, by the
boat being run aground on the Romer Shoal, near Sandy Hook. It being
ebb tide, it was found impossible to get off before the next flood;
consequently, the fires were allowed to burn out, and the boat remained
until the flood tide took her off, which was between ten and eleven
o'clock at night, making the time of detention about four or five hours.
As the weather was perfectly calm, it cannot, reasonably, be supposed
that the boat could have received any material injury from this
accident; for, during the time that it remained aground, it had no other
motion than an occasional roll on the keel from side to side. The night
continued pleasant. The next morning, (Sunday,) a moderate breeze
prevailed from the north-east. The sails were spread before the wind,
and the speed of the boat, already rapid, was much accelerated. All
went on pleasantly till about noon, when the wind had increased, and the
sea became rough. At sunset, the wind blew heavily, and continued to
increase during the night; at daylight, on Monday, it had become a gale.
During the night, much complaint was made that the water came into the
berths, and before the usual time of rising, some of the passengers had
abandoned them on that account.
"The sea, from the violence of the gale, raged frightfully, and caused a
general anxiety amongst the passengers; but still, they appeared to rely
on the skill and judgment of the captain and officers,--supposing, that
every exertion would be used, on their part, for the preservation of so
many valuable lives as were then entrusted to those who had the charge
of this frail boat. Early on Monday, land was discovered, nearly ahead,
which, by many, was supposed to be False Cape, on the northern part of
Hatteras. Soon after this discovery, the course of the boat was changed
from southerly to south-easterly, which was the general course through
the day, though with some occasional changes. The condition of the boat
was now truly alarming; it bent and twisted, when struck by a sea, as if
the next would rend it asunder: the panels of the ceiling were falling
from their places; and the hull, as if united by hinges, was bending
against the feet of the braces. Throughout the day, the rolling and
pitching were so great, that no cooking could be done on board.
"It has already been stated, that the general course of the boat was,
during the day, south-easterly, and consequently in what is called the
trough of the sea, as the wind was from the north-east. Late in the
afternoon, the boat was reported to be in twenty-three fathoms of water,
when the course was changed to a south-westerly. Soon after this, it
was observed that the course was again changed, to north-westerly; when
the awful truth burst upon us, that the boat must be filling; for we
could imagine no other cause for this sudden change. This was but a
momentary suspense; for within a few minutes, all the passengers were
called on to bale, in order to prevent the boat from sinking.
Immediately, all were employed, but with little effect; for,
notwithstanding the greatest exertion on the part of the passengers,
including even many of the ladies, the water was rapidly increasing, and
gave most conclusive evidence, that, unless we reached the shore within
a few hours, the boat must sink at sea, and probably not a soul be left
to communicate the heart-rending intelligence to bereaved and
disconsolate friends. Soon after the boat was headed towards the land,
the water had increased so much, as to reach the fire under the boilers,
which was soon extinguished. Gloomy indeed was the prospect before us.
With one hundred and thirty persons in a sinking boat, far out at sea,
in a dark and tempestuous night, with no other dependence for reaching
the shore than a few small and tattered sails, our condition might be
considered truly awful. But, with all these disheartening
circumstances, hope, delusive hope, still supported us. Although it was
evident that we must soon sink, and our progress towards the land was
very slow, still we cherished the expectation that the boat would
finally be run on shore, and thus most of us be delivered from a watery
grave. Early in the afternoon, the ladies had been provided with strips
of blankets, that they might be lashed to such parts of the boat as
would afford the greatest probability of safety.
"In this condition, and with these expectations, we gradually, but with
a motion nearly imperceptible, approached, what to many of us was an
untried, and almost an unknown shore. At about eleven o'clock, those
who had been employed in baling were compelled to leave the cabin, as
the boat had sunk until the deck was nearly level with the water, and it
appeared too probable that all would soon be swallowed up by the foaming
waves. The heaving of the lead indicated an approach to the shore.
Soon was the cheering intelligence of `Land! land!' announced by those
on the look-out. This, for a moment, aroused the sinking energies of
all, when a general bustle ensued, in the hasty, but trifling,
preparations that could be made for safety, as soon as the boat should
strike. But what were the feelings of an anxious multitude, when,
instead of land, a range of angry breakers were visible just ahead; and
land, if it could be seen at all, was but half perceptible in the
distance far beyond.
"As every particular is a matter of interest, especially to those who
had friends and relatives on board,--it may not be improper to state,
that one individual urged the propriety of lowering the small boats, and
putting the ladies and children into them for safety, with suitable
persons to manage them, before we struck the breakers. By this
arrangement, had it been effected, it is believed that the boats might
have rode out the gale during the night, and have been rescued in the
morning by passing vessels, and thus all, or nearly all, have been
saved. But few supported this proposition, and it could not be done
without the prompt interference of those who had authority to command,
and who would be obeyed.
"Immediately before we struck, one or two passengers, by the aid of some
of the seamen, attempted to seek safety in one of the bouts at the
quarter, when a breaker struck it, swept it from the davits, and carried
with it a seaman, who was instantly lost. A similar attempt was made to
launch the long-boat from the upper deck, by the chief mate Mr Mathews,
and others. It was filled with several passengers, and some of the
crew; but, as we were already within the verge of the breakers, this
boat shared the fate of the other, and all on board (about ten in
number) perished.
"Now commenced the most heart-rending scene. Wives clinging to
husbands,--children to parents,--and women who were without protectors,
seeking aid from the arm of the stranger, all awaiting the results of a
moment, which would bring with it either life or death. Though an
intense feeling of anxiety must, at this time, have filled every breast,
yet not a shriek was heard, nor was there any extraordinary exclamation
of excitement or alarm. A slight agitation was, however, apparent in
the general circle. Some few hurried from one part of the boat to
another, as if seeking place of greater safety; yet most, and
particularly those who had the melancholy charge of wives and children,
remained quiet and calm observers of the scene before them.
"The boat, at length, strikes; it stops, as motionless as a bar of lead.
A momentary pause follows, as if the angel of death shrunk from so
dreadful a work of slaughter. But soon the work of destruction
commenced. A breaker with a deafening crash, swept over the boat,
carrying its unfortunate victims into the deep. At the same time, a
simultaneous rush was made towards the bows of the boat. The forward
deck was covered. Another breaker came, with irresistible force, and
all within its sweep disappeared. Our numbers were now frightfully
reduced. The roaring of the waters, together with the dreadful crash of
breaking timbers, surpasses the power of description. Some of the
remaining passengers sought shelter from the encroaching dangers, by
retreating to the passage, on the lee side of the boat, that leads from
the after to the forward deck, as if to be as far as possible from the
grasp of death. It may not be improper here to remark, that the
destruction of the boat, and loss of life, was, doubtless, much more
rapid than it otherwise would have been, from the circumstance of the
boat heeling to windward, and the deck, which was nearly level with the
water, forming, in consequence, an inclined plane, upon which the waves
broke with their full force.
"A large proportion of those who rushed into this passage, were ladies
and children, with a few gentlemen who had charge of them. The crowd
was so dense, that many were in danger of being crushed by the
irresistible pressure. Here were perhaps some of the most painful
sights ever beheld. Before introducing any of the closing scenes of
individuals, which the writer witnessed, or which he has gathered from
his fellow passengers, he would beg to be understood, that it is not for
the gratification of the idle curiosity of the careless and indifferent
reader, or to pierce afresh the bleeding wounds of surviving friends,
but to furnish such facts as may be interesting, and which, perhaps,
might never be attained through any other channel.
"As the immediate connections of the writer are already informed of the
particulars relating to his own unhappy bereavement, there is no
necessity for entering in a minute detail of this melancholy event.
"This passage contained perhaps thirty or more persons, consisting of
men, women and children, with no apparent possibility of escape;
enclosed within a narrow aperture, over which was the deck, and both
ends of which were completely closed by the fragments of the boat and
the rushing of the waves. While thus shut up, death appeared
inevitable. Already were both decks swept of everything that was on
them. The dining cabin was entirely gone, and everything belonging to
the quarter-deck was completely stripped off, leaving not even a
stanchion or particle of the bulwarks; and all this was the work of
about five minutes.
"The starboard wheel-house, and everything about it, was soon entirely
demolished. As much of the ceiling forward of the starboard wheel had,
during the day, fallen from its place, the waves soon found their way
through all that remained to oppose them, and were in a few minutes'
time forcing into the last retreat of those who had taken shelter in the
passage already mentioned.
"Every wave made a frightful encroachment on our narrow limits, and
seemed to threaten us with immediate death. Hopeless as was the
condition of those thus hemmed in, yet not a shriek was heard from them.
One lady, unknown to the writer, begged earnestly for some one to save
her. In a time of such alarm, it is not strange that a helpless female
should plead with earnestness for assistance from those who were about
her, or even offer them money for that aid which the least reflection
would have convinced her it was not possible to render. Another scene,
witnessed at this trying hour, was still more painful. A little boy was
pleading with his father to save him. `Father,' said the boy, `you will
save me, won't you? you can swim ashore with me, can't you, father?'
But the unhappy father was too deeply absorbed in the other charges that
leant on him, even to notice the imploring accents of his helpless
child. For at that time, as near as the writer can judge, from the
darkness of the place they were in, his wife hung upon one arm, and his
daughter of seventeen upon the other. He had one daughter besides, near
the age of this little boy, but whether she was at that time living or
not, is uncertain.
"After remaining here some minutes, the deck overhead was split open by
the violence of the waves, which allowed the writer an opportunity of
climbing out. This he instantly did, and assisted his wife through the
same opening. As he had now left those below, he is unable to say how
they were finally lost; but, as that part of the boat was very soon
completely destroyed, their further sufferings could not have been much
prolonged. We were now in a situation which, from the time the boat
struck, we had considered as the most safe, and had endeavoured to
attain. Here we resolved to await our uncertain fate. From this place
we could see the encroachment of the devouring waves, every one of which
reduced our thinned numbers, and swept with it parts of our crumbling
boat. For several hours previously, the gale had been sensibly abating;
and, for a moment, the pale moon broke through the dispersing clouds, as
if to witness this scene of terror and destruction, and to show to the
horror-stricken victims the fate that awaited them. How few were now
left, of the many who, but a little before, inhabited our bark! While
the moon yet shone, three men were seen to rush from the middle to the
stern of the boat. A wave came rushing on. It passed over the deck.
One only, of the three, was left. He attempted to gain his former
position. Another wave came. He had barely time to reach a large
timber, to which he clung, when this wave struck him, and he too was
missing. As the wave passed away, the heads of two of these men were
seen above the water; but they appeared to make no effort to swim. The
probability is, that the violence with which they were hurled into the
sea disabled them. They sunk to rise no more.
"During this time, Mr Lovegreen, of Charleston, continued to ring the
boat's bell, which added if possible to the gloom. It sounded, indeed,
like the funeral knell over the departed dead. Never before, perhaps,
was a bell tolled at such a funeral as this. While in this situation,
and reflecting on the necessity of being always prepared for the
realities of eternity, our attention was arrested by the appearance of a
lady, climbing upon the outside of the boat, abaft the wheel near where
we were. Her head was barely above the deck on which we stood, and she
was holding to it, in a most perilous manner. She implored help,
without which she must soon have fallen into the deep beneath, and
shared the fate of the many who had already gone. The writer ran to her
aid, but was unable to raise her to the deck. Mr Woodburn, of New
York, now came, and, with his assistance, the lady was rescued; she was
then lashed to a large piece of timber, by the side of another lady, the
only remaining place that afforded any prospect of safety. The former
lady (Mrs Shroeder) was washed ashore on this piece of wreck, one of
the two who survived. The writer having relinquished to this lady the
place he had occupied, was compelled to get upon a large piece of the
boat, that lay near, under the lee of the wheel; this was almost
immediately driven from its place into the breakers, which instantly
swept him from it, and plunged him deep into the water. With some
difficulty he regained his raft. He continued to cling to this
fragment, as well as he could, but was repeatedly washed from it.
Sometimes when plunged deep into the water, he came up under it. After
encountering all the difficulties that seemed possible to be borne, he
was at length thrown on shore, in an exhausted state. At the time the
writer was driven from the boat, there were but few left. Of these,
four survived, _viz_. Mrs Shroeder and Mr Lovegreen, of Charleston;
Mr Cohen, of Columbia; and Mr Vanderzee, of New York.
"On reaching the beach, there was no appearance of inhabitants; but
after wandering some distance, a light was discovered, which proved to
be from Ocracoke lighthouse, about six miles south-west of the place
where the boat was wrecked. The inhabitants of the island, generally,
treated us with great kindness, and, so far as their circumstances,
would allow, assisted in properly disposing the numerous bodies thrown
upon the shore.
"The survivors, after remaining on the island till Thursday afternoon,
separated, some returning to New York, others proceeding on to
Charleston. Acknowledgment is due to the inhabitants of Washington,
Newbern, and Wilmington, as well as of other places through which we
passed, for the kind hospitality we received, and the generous offers
made to us. Long will these favours be gratefully remembered by the
survivors of the unfortunate Home."
Even if the captain of the Home was intoxicated, it is certain that the
loss of the vessel was not occasioned by that circumstance, but by the
vessel not having been built sea-worthy.
The narrative of the loss of the Moselle is the last which I shall give
to the reader. It is written by Judge Hall, one of the best of the
American writers.
LOSS OF THE MOSELLE.
"The recent explosion of the steam-boat Moselle, at Cincinnati, affords
a most awful illustration of the danger of steam navigation, when
conducted by ignorant or careless men: and fully sustains the remark
made in the preceding pages, that, `the accidents are almost wholly
confined to insufficient or badly managed boats.'
"The Moselle was a new boat, intended to ply regularly between
Cincinnati and St Louis. She had made but two or three trips, but had
already established a high reputation for speed; and, as is usual in
such cases, those by whom she was owned and commanded, became ambitious
to have her rated as a `crack boat,' and spared no pains to exalt her
character. The newspapers noticed the _quick trips_ of the Moselle, and
passengers chose to embark in this boat in preference to others. Her
captain was an enterprising young man, without much experience, bent
upon gaining for his boat, at all hazards, the distinction of being the
fastest upon the river, and not fully aware, perhaps, of the inevitable
danger which attended this rash experiment.
"On Wednesday the 25th of April, between four and five o'clock in the
afternoon, this shocking catastrophe occurred. The boat was crowded
with passengers; and, as is usually the case on our western rivers, in
regard to vessels passing westerly, the largest proportion were
emigrants. They were mostly deck passengers, many of whom were poor
Germans, ignorant of any language but their own, and the larger portion
consisted of families, comprising persons of all ages. Although not a
large boat, there were eighty-five passengers in the cabin, which was a
much larger number than could be comfortably accommodated; the number of
deck passengers is not exactly known, but, as is estimated, at between
one hundred and twenty and one hundred and fifty; and the officers and
crew amounted to thirty, making in all about two hundred and sixty
souls.
"It was a pleasant afternoon, and the boat, with steam raised, delayed
at the wharf, to increase the number--already too great--of her
passengers, who continued to crowd in, singly or in companies, all
anxious to hurry onwards in the first boat, or eager to take passage in
the _fast-running_ Moselle. They were of all conditions--the military
officer hastening to Florida to take command of his regiment--the
merchant bound to St Louis--the youth seeking a field on which to
commence the career of life--and the indigent emigrant with his wife and
children, already exhausted in purse and spirits, but still pushing
onward to the distant frontier.
"On leaving the wharf, the boat ran up the river about a mile, to take
in some families and freight, and having touched at the shore for that
purpose, for a few minutes, was about to lay her course down the river.
The spot at which she thus landed was at a suburb of the city, called
Fulton, and a number of persons had stopped to witness her departure,
several of whom remarked, from the peculiar sound of the steam, that it
had been raised to an unusual height. The crowd thus attracted--the
high repute of the Moselle--and certain vague rumours which began to
circulate, that the captain had determined, at every risk, to beat
another boat which had just departed--all these circumstances gave an
unusual eclat to the departure of this ill-fated vessel.
"The landing completed, the bow of the boat was shoved from the shore,
when an explosion took place, by which the whole of the forepart of the
vessel was literally blown up. The passengers were unhappily in the
most exposed positions on the deck, and particularly on the forward
part, sharing the excitement of the spectators on shore, and
anticipating the pleasure of darting rapidly past the city in the swift
Moselle. The power of the explosion was unprecedented in the history of
steam; its effect was like that of a mine of gunpowder. All the
boilers, four in number, were simultaneously burst; the deck was blown
into the air, and the human beings who crowded it hurried into instant
destruction. Fragments of the boilers, and of human bodies, were thrown
both to the Kentucky and the Ohio shore; and as the boat lay near the
latter, some of these helpless victims must have been thrown a quarter
of a mile. The body of Captain Perry, the master, was found dreadfully
mangled, on the nearest shore. A man was hurled with such force, that
his head, with half his body, penetrated the roof of a house, distant
more than a hundred yards from the boat. Of the number who had crowded
this beautiful boat a few minutes before, nearly all were hurled into
the air, or plunged into the water. A few, in the after part of the
vessel, who were uninjured by the explosion, jumped overboard. An
eye-witness says that he saw sixty or seventy in the water at one time,
of whom not a dozen reached the shore.
"The news or this awful catastrophe spread rapidly through the city,
thousands rushed to the spot, and the most benevolent aid was promptly
extended to the sufferers--to such, we should rather say, as were within
the reach of human assistance--for the majority had perished.
"The writer was among those who hastened to the neighbourhood of the
wreck, and witnessed a scene so sad that no language can depict it with
fidelity. On the shore lay twenty or thirty mangled and still bleeding
corpses, while others were in the act of being dragged from the wreck or
the water. There were men carrying away the wounded, and others
gathering the trunks, and articles of wearing apparel, that strewed the
beach.
"The survivors of this awful tragedy presented the most touching objects
of distress. Death had torn asunder the most tender ties; but the
rupture had been so sudden and violent, that as yet none knew certainly
who had been taken, nor who had been spared. Fathers were inquiring for
children, children for parents, husbands and wives for each other. One
man had saved a son, but lost a wife and five children. A father,
partially deranged, lay with a wounded child on one side, a dead
daughter on the other, and his wife, wounded, at his feet. One
gentleman sought his wife and children, who were as eagerly seeking him
in the same crowd--they met, and were re-united.
"A female deck passenger, that had been saved, seemed inconsolable for
the loss of her relations. To every question put to her, she would
exclaim, `Oh my father! my mother! my sisters!' A little boy, about
four or five years of age, whose head was much bruised, appeared to be
regardless of his wounds, but cried continually for a lost father; while
another lad, a little older, was weeping for his whole family.
"One venerable looking man wept a wife and five children; another was
bereft of nine members of his family. A touching display of maternal
affection was evinced by a lady who, on being brought to the shore,
clasped her hands and exclaimed, `Thank God, I am safe!' but instantly
recollecting herself, ejaculated in a voice of piercing agony, `where is
my child!' The infant, which had been saved, was brought to her, and
she fainted at the sight of it.
"A public meeting was called in Cincinnati, at which the mayor presided,
when the facts of this melancholy occurrence were discussed, and among
other resolutions passed, was one deprecating `the great and increasing
carelessness in the navigation of steam vessels,' and urging this
subject upon the consideration of Congress. No one denied that this sad
event, which had filled our city with consternation, sympathy, and
sorrow, was the result of a reckless and criminal inattention to their
duty, on the part of those having the care of the Moselle, nor did any
one attempt to palliate their conduct. Committees were appointed to
seek out the sufferers, and perform the various duties which humanity
dictated. Through the exertions of the gentlemen appointed on this
occasion, lists were obtained and published, showing the names of the
passengers as far as could be obtained, and giving the following
result:--"
+=============+===+
ÝKilled Ý 81Ý
+-------------+---+
ÝBadly woundedÝ 18Ý
+-------------+---+
ÝMissing Ý 55Ý
+-------------+---+
ÝSaved Ý117Ý
+-------------+---+
Ý Ý266Ý
+=============+===+
"As many strangers entered the boat but a few minutes before its
departure, whose names were not registered, it is probable that the
whole number of souls on board was not less than _two hundred and
eighty_. Of the missing, many dead bodies have since been found, but
very few have been added to the list of _saved_. The actual number of
lives lost, therefore, does not vary much from _one hundred and fifty_."
The following observations are made in the Report of the Committee,
relative to the tremendous force of the steam:
"Of the immense force exerted in this explosion, there is abundant
evidence: still in this extraordinary occurrence in the history of
steam, I deem it important to be particular in noting the facts, and for
that purpose I have made some measurements and calculations. The boat
was one hundred and sixteen feet from the water's edge, one hundred and
ninety-two from the top of the bank, which was forty-three feet in
perpendicular height above the water. The situations of projected
bodies ascertained were as follows: Part of the body of a man, thrown
nearly horizontally into a skiff at the water's edge, one hundred and
sixteen feet. The body of the captain thrown nearly to the top of the
bank, two hundred feet. The body of a man thrown through the roof of a
house, at the distance of one hundred and twelve feet, and fifty-nine
feet above the water's edge. A portion of the boiler, containing about
sixty square feet, and weighing about four hundred and fifty pounds,
thrown one hundred and seventy feet, and about two-thirds of the way up
the bank. A second portion of the boiler, of about thirty-five square
feet, and weighing about two hundred and forty-five pounds, thrown four
hundred and fifty feet on the hill side, and seventy feet in altitude.
A third portion of the boiler, twenty-one square feet, one hundred and
forty-seven pounds, thrown three hundred and thirty feet into a
tan-yard. A fourth portion, of forty-eight square feet, and weighing
three hundred and thirty-six pounds, thrown four hundred and eighty feet
into the garret of a back shop of a tan-yard; having broken down the
roof and driven out the gable-end. The last portion must have been
thrown to a very great height, as it had entered the roof of [sic] an
angle of at least sixty degrees. A fifth portion, weighing two hundred
and thirty-six pounds, went obliquely up the river eight hundred feet,
and passing over the houses, landed on the side walk, the bricks of
which had been broken and driven deeply into the ground by it. This
portion had encountered some individual in its course, as it came
stained with blood. Such was the situation of the houses that it must
have fallen at an angle as high as forty-five degrees. It has been
stated, that bodies of persons were projected quite across the river
into Kentucky. I can find no evidence of the truth of this: on the
contrary, Mr Kerr informs me that he made inquiries of the people on
the opposite shore, and could not learn that anything was seen to fall
farther than half way across the river, which is at that place about
sixteen hundred feet wide."
I was at Cincinnati some time after the explosion, and examined the
wreck which still lay on the Ohio shore. After the report was drawn up
it was discovered that the force of the explosion had been even greater
than was supposed, and that portions of the engine and boilers had been
thrown to a much greater distance. It is to be remarked, that Mr
Woodbury's report to Congress states from one hundred to one hundred and
twenty persons as having been killed. Judge Hall, in the report of the
committee, estimates it at one hundred and fifty; but there is reason to
believe that the loss on this occasion, as well as in many others, was
greater than even in the report of the committee. The fact is, it is
almost impossible to state the loss on these occasions; the only data to
go upon are the books in which the passengers' names are taken down when
the fare is paid, and this is destroyed. In a country like America,
there are thousands of people unknown to anybody, migrating here and
there, seeking the Far West to settle in; they come and go, and nobody
knows anything of them; there might have been one hundred more of them
on board the Moselle at the time that she exploded; and as I heard from
Captain Pearce, the harbour-master, and others, it is believed that such
was the case, and that many more were destroyed than was at first
supposed.
The American steam-boats are very different from ours in appearance, in
consequence of the engines being invariably on deck. The decks also are
carried out many feet wider on each side than the hull of the vessel, to
give space; these additions to the deck aye called guards. The engine
being on the first deck, there is a second deck for the passengers,
state-rooms, and saloons; and above this deck there is another, covered
with a white awning. They have something the appearance of two-deckers,
and when filled with company, the variety of colours worn by the ladies
have a very novel and pleasing effect. The boats which run from New
York to Boston, and up the Hudson river to Albany, are very splendid
vessels; they have low-pressure engines, are well commanded, and I never
heard of any accident of any importance taking place; their engines are
also very superior--one on board of the Narangassett, with a horizontal
stroke, was one of the finest I ever saw. On the Mississippi, Ohio, and
their tributary rivers, the high-pressure engine is invariably used;
they have tried the low-pressure, but have found that it will not
answer, in consequence of the great quantity of mud contained in
solution on the waters of the Mississippi, which destroys all the valves
and leathers; and this is the principal cause of the many accidents
which take place. At the same time it must be remembered, that there is
a recklessness--an indifference to life--shown throughout all America;
which is rather a singular feature, inasmuch as it extends East as well
as West. It can only be accounted for by the insatiate pursuit of gain
among a people who consider that time is money, and who are blinded by
their eagerness in the race for it, added to that venturous spirit so
naturally imbibed in a new country, at the commencement of its
occupation. It is communicated to the other sex, who appear equally
indifferent. The Moselle had not been blown up two hours, before the
other steamboats were crowded with women, who followed their relations
on business or pleasure, up and down the river. "Go a-head," is the
motto of the country; both sexes join in the cry; and they do go
a-head--that's a fact!
I was amused with a story told me by an American gentleman: a steamboat
caught fire on the Mississippi, and the passengers had to jump overboard
and save themselves by swimming. One of those reckless characters, a
gambler, who, was on board, having apparently a very good idea of his
own merits, went aft, and before he leapt overboard, cried out, "Now,
gallows, claim your own!"
The attention of the American legislature has at length been directed to
the want of security in steam navigation; and in July, 1838, an act was
passed to provide for the better security of the passengers. Many of
the clauses are judicious, especially as far as the inspecting of them
is regulated; but that of iron chains or rods for tiller ropes is not
practicable on a winding river, and will be the occasion of many
disasters. Had they ordered the boats to be provided with iron chains
or rods, to be used as preventive wheel-ropes, it would have answered
the purpose. In case of fire they could easily be hooked on; but to
steer with them in tide-ways and rapid turns is almost impossible. The
last clause, No. 13, (page 170, Report) is too harsh, as a flue may
collapse at any time, without any want of care or skill on the part of
the builders or those on board.
It is to be hoped that some good effects will be produced by this act of
the legislature. At present, it certainly is more dangerous to travel
one week in America than to cross the Atlantic a dozen times. The
number of lives lost in one year by accidents in steam boats,
rail-roads, and coaches, was estimated, in a periodical which I read in
America, at _one thousand seven hundred and fifty_.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER FOUR.
TRAVELLING.
To one who has been accustomed to the extortion of the inns and hotels
in England, and the old continent, nothing at first is more remarkable
than to find that there are more remains of the former American purity
of manners and primitive simplicity to be observed in their
establishments for the entertainment of man and horse, than in any
portion of public or private life. Such is the case, and the causes of
the anomaly are to be explained.
I presume that the origin of hotels and inns has been much the same in
all countries. At first the solitary traveller is received, welcomed,
and hospitably entertained; but, as the wayfarers multiply, what was at
first a pleasure becomes a tax. For instance, let us take Western
Virginia, through which the first irruption to the Far West may be said
to have taken place. At first every one was received and accommodated
by those who had settled there; but as this gradually became
inconvenient, not only from interfering with their domestic privacy, but
from their not being prepared to meet the wants of the travellers, the
inhabitants of any small settlement met together and agreed upon one of
them keeping the house of reception; this was not done with a view of
profit, the travellers being only charged the actual value of the
articles consumed. Such is still the case in many places in the Far
West; a friend of mine told me that he put up at the house of a widow
woman; he supped, slept, had his breakfast, and his horse was also well
supplied. When he was leaving, he inquired what he had to pay, the
woman replied--, "Well, if I don't charge something, I suppose you will
be affronted. Give me a shilling;" a sum not sufficient to pay for the
horse's corn.
The American innkeeper, therefore, is still looked upon in the light of
your host; he and his wife sit at the head of the _table-d'hote_ at meal
times; when you arrive he greets you with a welcome, shaking your hand;
if you arrive in company with those who know him, you are introduced to
him; he is considered on a level with you; you meet him in the most
respectable companies, and it is but justice to say that, in most
instances, they are a very respectable portion of society. Of course,
his authority, like that of the captains of the steam-boats, is
undisputed; indeed the captains of these boats may be partly considered
as classed under the same head.
This is one of the most pleasing features in American society, and I
think it is likely to last longer than most others in this land of
change, because it is upheld by public opinion, which is so despotic.
The mania for travelling, among the people of the United States, renders
it most important that every thing connected with locomotion should be
well arranged; society demands it, public opinion enforces it, and
therefore, with few exceptions, it is so. The respect shown to the
master of a hotel induces people of the highest character to embark in
the profession; the continual streams of travellers which pours through
the country, gives sufficient support by moderate profits, to enable the
innkeeper to abstain from excessive charges; the price of every thing is
known by all, and no more is charged to the President of the United
States than to other people. Every one knows his expenses; there is no
surcharge, and fees to waiters are voluntary, and never asked for. At
first I used to examine the bill when presented, but latterly I looked
only at the sum total at the bottom and paid it at once, reserving the
examination of it for my leisure, and never in one instance found that I
had been imposed upon. This is very remarkable, and shows the force of
public opinion in America; for it can produce, when required, a very
scarce article all over the world, and still more scarce in the
profession referred to, Honesty. Of course there will be exceptions,
but they are very few, and chiefly confined to the cities. I shall
refer to them afterwards, and at the same time to some peculiarities,
which I must not omit to point out, as they affect society. Let me
first describe the interior arrangements of a first-rate American hotel.
The building is very spacious, as may be imagined when I state that in
the busy times, from one hundred and fifty to two, or even three
hundred, generally sit down at the dinner-table. The upper stories
contain an immense number of bed-rooms, with their doors opening upon
long corridors, with little variety in their furniture and arrangement,
except that some are provided with large beds for married people, and
others with single beds. The basement of the building contains the
dinner-room, of ample dimensions, to receive the guests, who at the
sound of a gong rush in, and in a few minutes have finished their
repast. The same room is appropriated to breakfast and supper. In most
hotels there is but one dining-room, to which ladies and gentlemen both
repair, but in the more considerable, there is a smaller dining-room for
the ladies and their connexions who escort them. The ladies have also a
large parlour to retire to; the gentlemen have the reading-room,
containing some of the principal newspapers, and the _Bar_, of which
hereafter. If a gentleman wants to give a dinner to a private party in
any of these large hotels, he can do it; or if a certain number of
families join together, they may also eat in a separate room (this is
frequently done at Washington;) but if a traveller wishes to seclude
himself _a l'Anglaise_, and dine in his own room, he must make up his
mind to fare very badly, and, moreover, if he is a foreigner, he will
give great offence, and be pointed out as an aristocrat--almost as
serious a charge with the majority in the United States, as it was in
France during the Revolution.
The largest hotels in the United States are Astor House, New York;
Tremont House, Boston; Mansion house, Philadelphia; the hotels at West
Point, and at Buffalo; but it is unnecessary to enumerate them all. The
two pleasantest, are the one at West Point, which was kept by Mr
Cozens, and that belonging to Mr Head, the Mansion House at
Philadelphia; but the latter can scarcely be considered as a hotel, not
only because Mr Head is, and always was, a gentleman with whom it is a
pleasure to associate, but because he is very particular in whom he
receives, and only gentlemen are admitted. It is more like a private
club than any thing else I can compare it to, and I passed some of my
pleasantest time in America at his establishment, and never bid farewell
to him or his sons, or the company, without regret. There are some
hotels in New York upon the English system: the Globe is the best, and I
always frequented it; and there is an excellent French restaurateur's
(Delmonico's).
Of course, where the population and traffic are great, and the
travellers who pass through numerous, the hotels are large and good;
where, on the contrary, the road is less and less frequented, so do they
decrease in importance, size, and respectability, until you arrive at
the farm-house entertainment of Virginia and Kentucky; the grocery, or
mere grog-shop, or the log-house of the Far West. The way-side inns are
remarkable for their uniformity; the furniture of the bar-room is
invariably the same: a wooden clock, map of the United States, map of
the State, the Declaration of Independence, a looking-glass, with a
hair-brush and comb hanging to it by strings, _pro bono publico_;
sometimes with the extra embellishment of one or two miserable pictures,
such as General Jackson scrambling upon a horse, with fire or steam
coming out of his nostrils, going to the battle of New Orleans,
etcetera, etcetera.
He who is of the silver-fork school, will not find much comfort out of
the American cities and large towns. There are no neat, quiet little
inns, as in England. It is all the "rough and tumble" system, and when
you stop at humble inns you must expect to eat peas with a two-pronged
fork, and to sit down to meals with people whose exterior is any thing
but agreeable, to attend upon yourself, and to sleep in a room in which
there are three or four other beds; (I have slept in one with nearly
twenty,) most of them carrying double, even if you do not have a
companion in your own.
A New York friend of mine travelling in an Extra with his family, told
me that at a western inn he had particularly requested that he might not
have a bed-fellow, and was promised that he should not. On his
retiring, he found his bed already occupied, and he went down to the
landlady, and expostulated. "Well," replied she, "it's only your own
_driver_; I thought you wouldn't mind him."
Another gentleman told me, that having arrived at a place called Snake's
Hollow, on the Mississippi, the bed was made on the kitchen-floor, and
the whole family and travellers, amounting in all to seventeen, of all
ages and both sexes, turned into the same bed altogether. Of course
this must be expected in a new country, and is a source of amusement,
rather than of annoyance.
I must now enter into a very important question, which is that of eating
and drinking. Mr Cooper, in his remarks upon his own countrymen, says,
very ill-naturedly--"The Americans are the grossest feeders of any
civilised nation known. As a nation, their food is heavy, coarse, and
indigestible, while it is taken in the least artificial forms that
cookery will allow. The predominance of grease in the American kitchen,
coupled with the habits of hearty eating, and of constant expectoration,
are the causes of the diseases of the stomach which are so common in
America."
This is not correct. The cookery in the United States is exactly what
it is and must be every where else--in a ratio with the degree of
refinement of the population. In the principal cities, you will meet
with as good cookery in private houses as you will in London, or even
Paris; indeed, considering the great difficulty which the Americans have
to contend with, from the almost impossibility of obtaining good
servants, I have often been surprised that it is so good as it is. At
Delmonico's, and the Globe Hotel at New York, where you dine from the
Carte, you have excellent French cookery; so you have at Astor House,
particularly at private parties; and, generally speaking, the cooking at
all the large hotels may be said to be good; indeed, when it is
considered that the American table-d'hote has to provide for so many
people, it is quite surprising how well it is done. The daily dinner,
at these large hotels, is infinitely superior to any I have ever sat
down to at the _public_ entertainments given at the Free-Masons' Tavern,
and others in London, and the company is usually more numerous. The
bill of fare of the table-d'hote of the Astor House is _printed every
day_. I have one with me which I shall here insert, to prove that the
eating is not so bad in America as described by Mr Cooper.
+=======================================+
ÝAstor House, Wednesday, March 21, 1838.Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝTable-d'Hote Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝVermicelli Soup Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝBoiled Cod Fish and Oysters Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Corn'd Beef Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Ham Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Tongue Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Turkey and Oysters Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Chickens and Pork Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Leg of Mutton Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝOyster Pie Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCuisse de Poulet Sauce Tomate Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝPoitrine de Veau au Blanc Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝBallon de Mouton au Tomate Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝTete de Veau en Marinade Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝSalade de Volaille Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCasserolle de Pomme de Terre garnie Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCompote de Pigeon Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRolleau de Veau a la Jardiniere Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCotelettes de Veau Saute Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝFilet de Mouton Pique aux Ognons Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRonde de Boeuf Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝFricandeau de Veau aux Epinards Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCotelettes de Mouton Panee Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝMacaroni au Parmesan Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRoast Beef Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Pig Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Veal Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Leg of Mutton Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRoast Goose Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Turkey Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRoast Chickens Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Wild Ducks Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Wild Goose Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDo. Guinea Fowl Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝRoast Brandt Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝQueen Pudding Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝMince Pie Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝCream Puffs Ý
+---------------------------------------+
ÝDessert. Ý
+=======================================+
There are some trifling points relative to eating which I shall not
remark upon until I speak of society, as they will there be better
placed. Of course, as you advance into the country, and population
recedes, you run through all the scale of cookery until you come to the
"_corn bread, and common doings_," (i.e. bread made of Indian meal, and
fat pork,) in the Far West. In a new country, pork is more easily
raised than any other meat, and the Americans eat a great deal of pork,
which renders the cooking in the small taverns very greasy; with the
exception of the Virginian farm taverns, where they fry chickens without
grease in a way which would be admired by Ude himself; but this is a
State receipt, handed down from generation to generation, and called
_chicken fixings_. The meat in America is equal to the best in England;
Miss Martineau does indeed say that she never ate good beef during the
whole time she was in this country; but she also says that an American
stage-coach is the most delightful of all conveyances, and a great many
other things, which I may hereafter quote, to prove the idiosyncracy of
the lady's disposition; so we will let that pass, with the observation
that there is no accounting for taste. The American markets in the
cities are well supplied. I have been in the game market, at New York,
and seen at one time nearly three hundred head of deer, with quantities
of bear, racoons, wild turkeys, geese, ducks, and every variety of bird
in countless profusion. Bear I abominate; racoon is pretty good. The
wild turkey is excellent; but the great delicacies in America are the
terrapin, and the canvas-back ducks. To like the first I consider as
rather an acquired taste. I decidedly prefer the turtle, which are to
be had in plenty, all the year round; but the canvas-back duck is
certainly well worthy of its reputation. Fish is well supplied. They
have the sheep's head, shad, and one or two others, which we have not.
Their salmon is not equal to ours, and they have no turbot.
Pine-apples, and almost all the tropical fruits, are hawked about in
carts in the Eastern cities; but I consider the fruit of the temperate
zone, such as grapes, peaches, etcetera, inferior to the English.
Oysters are very plentiful, very large, and, to an English palate,
rather insipid. As the Americans assert that the English and French
oysters taste of copper, and that therefore they cannot eat them, I
presume they do; and that's the reason why we do not like the American
oysters, copper being better than no flavour at all.
I think, after this statement, that the English will agree with me that
there are plenty of good things for the table in America; but the old
proverb says, "God sends meat, and the devil sends cooks;" and such is,
and unfortunately must be, the case for a long while, in most of the
houses in America, owing to the difficulty of obtaining, or keeping
servants. But I must quit the subject of eating, for one of much more
importance in America, which is that of drinking.
I always did consider that the English and the Swiss were the two
nations who most indulged in potations; but on my arrival in the United
States, I found that our descendants, in this point most assuredly, as
they fain would be thought to do in all others, surpassed us altogether.
Impartiality compels me to acknowledge the truth; we must, in this
instance, submit to a national defeat. There are many causes for this:
first, the heat of the climate, next the coldness of the climate, then
the changeableness of the climate; add to these, the cheapness of liquor
in general, the early disfranchisement of the youth from all parental
control, the temptation arising from the bar and association, and,
lastly, the pleasantness, amenity, and variety of the potations.
Reasons, therefore, are as plentiful as blackberries, and habit becomes
second nature.
To run up the whole catalogue of the indigenous compounds in America,
from "iced water" to a "stone fence," or "streak of lightning," would
fill a volume; I shall first speak of foreign importations.
The Port in America is seldom good; the climate appears not to agree
with the wine. The quantity of Champagne drunk is enormous, and would
absorb all the vintage of France, were it not that many hundred thousand
bottles are consumed more than are imported.
The small state of New Jersey has the credit of supplying the _American_
Champagne, which is said to be concocted out of turnip juice, mixed with
brandy and honey. It is a pleasant and harmless drink, a very good
imitation, and may be purchased at six or seven dollars a dozen. I do
not know what we shall do when America fills up, if the demand for
Champagne should increase in proportion to the population; we had better
drink all we can now.
Claret, and the other French wines, do very well in America, but where
the Americans beat us out of the field is in their Madeira, which
certainly is of a quality which we cannot procure in England. This is
owing to the extreme heat and cold of the climate, which ripens this
wine; indeed, I may almost say, that I never tasted good Madeira, until
I arrived in the United States. The price of wines, generally speaking,
is very high, considering what a trifling duty is paid, but the price of
good Madeira is surprising. There are certain brands, which if exposed
to public auction, will be certain to fetch from twelve to twenty, and I
have been told even forty dollars a bottle. I insert a list of the
wines at Astor House, to prove that there is no exaggeration in what I
have asserted. Even in this list of a tavern, the reader will find that
the best Madeira is as high as twelve dollars a bottle, and the list is
curious from the variety which it offers.
But the Americans do not confine themselves to foreign wines or liquors;
they have every variety at home, in the shape of compounds, such as
mint-julep and its varieties; slings in all their varieties; cocktails,
but I really cannot remember, or if I could, it would occupy too much
time to mention the whole battle array against one's brains. I must,
however, descant a little upon the mint-julep; as it is, with the
thermometer at 100 degrees, one of the most delightful and insinuating
potations that ever was invented, and may be drank with equal
satisfaction when the thermometer is as low as 70 degrees. There are
many varieties, such as those composed of Claret, Madeira, etcetera; but
the ingredients of the real mint-julep are as follows. I learnt how to
make them, and succeeded pretty well. Put into a tumbler about a dozen
sprigs of the tender shoots of mint, upon them put a spoonful of white
sugar, and equal proportions of peach and common brandy, so as to fill
it up one third, or perhaps a little less. Then take rasped or pounded
ice, and fill up the tumbler. Epicures rub the lips of the tumbler with
a piece of fresh pine-apple, and the tumbler itself is very often
incrusted outside with stalactites of ice. As the ice melts, you drink.
I once overheard two ladies talking in the next room to me, and one of
them said, "Well, we have a weakness for any one thing, it is for a
mint-julep--" a very amiable weakness, and proving her good sense and
good taste. They are, in fact, like the American ladies, irresistible.
The Virginians claim the merit of having invented this superb compound,
but I must dispute it for my own country, although it has been forgotten
of late. In the times of Charles the First and Second it must have been
known, for Milton expressly refers to it in his Comus:--
"Behold the cordial julep--here
Which flames and dances in its crystal bounds
With spirits of _balm_ and _fragrant syrups_ mixed.
Not that Nepenthes, which the wife of Thone
In Egypt gave to Jove-born Helena
Is of such power to stir up joy like this,
To life so friendly, or so _cool to thirst_."
If that don't mean mint-julep, I don't know the English language.
The following lines, however, which I found in an American newspaper,
dates its origin very far back, even to the period when the heathen gods
were not at a discount as they are now.
ORIGIN OF MINT-JULEP.
'Tis said that the gods, on Olympus of old,
(And who, the bright legend profanes, with a doubt,)
One night, 'mid their revels, by Bacchus were told
That his last butt of nectar had somewhat run out!
But determined to send round the goblet once more,
They sued to the fairer immortals--for aid
In composing a draught which, till drinking were o'er,
Should cast every wine ever drank in the shade.
Grave Cerce herself blithely yielded her corn,
And the spirit that lives in each amber-hued grain,
And which first had its birth from the dews of the morn,
Was taught to steal out in bright dew drops again.
Pomona, whose choicest of fruits on the board,
Were scattered profusely in every one's reach,
When called on a tribute to cull from the board,
Expressed the mild juice of the delicate peach.
The liquids were mingled while Venus looked on
With glances so fraught with sweet-magical power,
That the honey of Ilybla, e'en when they were gone,
Has never been missed in the draught from that hour.
Flora, then, from her bosom of fragrance shook,
And with roseate fingers pressed down in the bowl,
As dripping and fresh as it came from the brook,
The herb whose aroma should flavour the whole.
The draught was delicious, each god did exclaim,
Though something yet wanting they all did bewail,
But Julep the drink of immortals became,
When Jove himself added a handful of hail.
I have mentioned the principal causes to which must be assigned the
propensity to drink, so universal in America. This is an undeniable
fact, asserted by every other writer, acknowledged by the Americans
themselves in print, and proved by the labours of their Temperance
Societies. It is not confined to the lower classes, but pervades the
whole mass: of course, where there is most refinement, there is less
intoxication, and in the Southern and Western States, it is that the
custom of drinking is most prevalent.
I have said that in the American hotels there is a parlour for the
ladies to retire to: there is not one for the gentlemen, who have only
the reading-room, where they stand and read the papers, which are laid
out on desks, or the bar.
The bar of an American hotel is generally a very large room on the
basement, fitted up very much like our gin palaces in London, not so
elegant in its decorations indeed, but on the same system. A long
counter runs across it, behind which stand two or three bar-keepers to
wait upon the customers, and distribute the various potations,
compounded from the contents of several rows of bottles behind them.
Here the eye reposes on masses of pure crystal ice, large bunches of
mint, decanters of every sort of wine, every variety of spirits, lemons,
sugar, bitters, cigars and tobacco; it really makes one feel thirsty,
even the going into a bar. [See Note 3.] Here you meet every body and
every body meets you. Here the senator, the member of Congress, the
merchant, the store-keeper, travellers from the Far West, and every
other part of the country, who have come to purchase goods, all
congregate.
Most of them have a cigar in their mouth, some are transacting business,
others conversing, some sitting down together whispering confidentially.
Here you obtain all the news, all the scandal, all the politics, and
all the fun; it is this dangerous propinquity, which occasions so much
intemperance. Mr Head has no bar at the Mansion-house in Philadelphia,
and the consequence is, that there is no drinking, except wine at
dinner; but in all the other hotels, it would appear as if they
purposely allowed the frequenters no room to retire to, so that they
must be driven to the bar, which is by far the most profitable part of
the concern.
The consequence of the bar being the place of general resort, is, that
there is an unceasing pouring out, and amalgamation of alcohol, and
other compounds, from morning to late at night. To drink with a friend
when you meet him is good fellowship, to drink with a stranger is
politeness, and a proof of wishing to be better acquainted.
Mr A is standing at the bar, enter B. "My dear B, how are
you?"--"Quite well, and you?"--"Well, what shall it be?"--"Well, I don't
care--a gin sling."--"Two gin slings, Bar-keeper." Touch glasses, and
drink. Mr A has hardly swallowed his gin sling, and replaced his
cigar, when, in comes Mr D. "A, how are you?"--"Ah! D, how goes it on
with you?"--"Well, I thankey--what shall we have?"--"Well, I don't care;
I say brandy cocktail."--"Give me another," both drink, and the shilling
is thrown down on the counter.
Then B comes up again. "A, you must allow me to introduce my friend
C."--"Mr A"--shake hands--"Most happy to make the acquaintance. I
trust I shall have the pleasure of drinking--something with you?"--"With
great pleasure, Mr A, I will take a julep."--"Two juleps,
Bar-keeper."--"Mr C, your good health"--"Mr A, yours; if you should
come our way, most happy to see you,"--drink.
Now, I will appeal to the Americans themselves, if this is not a fair
sample of a bar-room.
They say that the English cannot settle any thing properly, without a
dinner. I am sure the Americans can fix nothing, without a drink. If
you meet, you drink; if you part, you drink; if you make acquaintance,
you drink; if you close a bargain you drink; they quarrel in their
drink, and they make it up with a drink. They drink, because it is hot;
they drink because it is cold. If successful in elections, they drink
and rejoice; if not, they drink and swear; they begin to drink early in
the morning, they leave off late at night; they commence it early in
life, and they continue it, until they soon drop into the grave. To use
their own expression, the way they drink, is "quite a caution" [See Note
4.] As for water, what the man said, when asked to belong to the
Temperance Society, appears to be the general opinion, "it's very good
for navigation."
So much has it become the habit to cement all friendship, and commence
acquaintance by drinking, that it is a cause of serious offence to
refuse, especially in a foreigner, as the Americans like to call the
English. I was always willing to accommodate the Americans in this
particular, as far as I could; (there at least, they will do me
justice;) that at times I drank much more than I wished is certain, yet
still I gave most serious offence, especially in the West, because I
would not drink early in the morning, or before dinner, which is a
general custom in the States, although much more prevalent in the South
and West, where it is literally, "Stranger, will you drink or fight?"
This refusal on my part, or rather excusing myself from drinking with
all those who were introduced to me, was eventually the occasion of much
disturbance and of great animosity towards me--certainly, most
unreasonably, as I was introduced to at least twenty every forenoon; and
had I drunk with them all, I should have been in the same state as many
of them were--that is, not really sober for three or four weeks at a
time.
That the constitutions of the Americans must suffer from this habit is
certain; they do not, however, appear to suffer so much as we should.
They say that you may always know the grave of a Virginian; as from the
quantity of juleps he has drunk, mint invariably springs up where he has
been buried. But the Virginians are not the greatest drinkers, by any
means. I was once looking for an American, and asked a friend of his,
where I should find him. "Why," replied he, pointing to an hotel
opposite, "that is his _licking place_, (a term borrowed from deer
resorting to lick the salt:) we will see if he is there." He was not;
the bar-keeper said he had left about ten minutes. "Well, then, you had
better remain here, he is certain to be back in ten more--if not
sooner." The American judged his friend rightly; in five minutes he was
back again, and we had a drink together, of course.
I did not see it myself, but I was told that somewhere in Missouri, or
thereabouts, west of the Mississippi, all the bars have what they term a
_kicking-board_, it being the custom with the people who live there,
instead of touching glasses when they drink together, to kick sharply
with the side of the foot against the board, and that after this
ceremony you are sworn friends. I have had it mentioned to me by more
than one person, therefore I presume it is the case. What the origin of
it is I know not, unless it intends to imply, "I'm your's to the _last
kick_."
Before I finish this article on hotels, I may as well observe here that
there is a custom in the United States, which I consider very
demoralising to the women, which is that of taking up permanent
residence in large hotels.
There are several reasons for this: one is, that people marry so very
early that they cannot afford to take a house with the attendant
expenses, for in America it is cheaper to live in a large hotel than to
keep a house of your own; another is, the difficulty of obtaining
servants, and, perhaps, the unwillingness of the women to have the
fatigue and annoyance which is really occasioned by an establishment in
that country: added to which is the want of society, arising from their
husbands being from morning to night plodding at their various
avocations. At some of the principal hotels you will find the
apartments of the lodgers so permanently taken, that the plate with
their name engraved on it is fixed on the door. I could almost tell
whether a lady in America kept own establishment or lived at an hotel,
the difference of manners are so marked; and, what is worse, it is
chiefly the young married couples who are to be found there. Miss
Martineau makes some very just comments upon this practice:--
"The uncertainty about domestic service is so great, and the economy of
boarding-house life so tempting to people who have not provided
themselves with house and furniture, that it is not to be wondered at
that many young married people use the accommodation provided. But no
sensible husband, who could beforehand become acquainted with the
liabilities incurred, would willingly expose his domestic peace to the
fearful risk. I saw enough when I saw the elegantly dressed ladies
repair to the windows of the common drawing-room, on their husbands'
departure to the counting-house after breakfast.
"I have been assured that there is no end to the difficulties in which
gentlemen have been involved, both as to their commercial and domestic
affairs, by the indiscretion of their thoughtless young wives, amidst
the idleness and levities of boarding-house life. As for the gentlemen,
they are much to be pitied. Public meals, a noisy house, confinement to
one or two private rooms, with the absence of all gratifications of
their own peculiar convenience and taste, are but a poor solace to the
man of business, after the toils and cares of the day. When to these
are added the snares to which their wives are exposed, it may be
imagined that men of sense and refinement would rather bear with any
domestic inconvenience from the uncertainty and bad quality of help,
than give up housekeeping."
If such is the case in boarding-houses, what must it be in hotels, where
the male company is ever changing. It is one constant life of scandal,
flirting, eating, drinking, and living in public; the sense of delicacy
is destroyed, and the women remind you of the flowers that have been
breathed upon till they have lost their perfume.
Miss M observes:--
"I can only say, that I unavoidably knew of more eases of lapse in
highly respectable families in one State than ever came to my knowledge
at home; and that they were got over with a disgrace far more temporary
and superficial than they could have been visited with in England."
If this observation is correct, it must, in my opinion, be considered as
referring to that portion of the sex who live in _hotels_, certainly not
to the mass, for reasons which I shall hereafter point out.
Indeed, what I have seen at some of the large hotels fully bears out her
assertion. Miss M talks of young ladies being _taken_ to the piano in a
promiscuous company. I have seen them go to the piano without being
taken there, sit down and sing with all the energy of peacocks, before
total strangers, and very often without accompaniment. In the hotels,
the private apartments of the boarders seldom consist of more than a
large bed-room, and although company are admitted into it, still it is
natural that the major portion of the women's time should be passed down
below in the general receiving room. In the evening, especially in the
large western cities, they have balls almost every night; indeed it is a
life of idleness and vacuity of outward pretence, but of no real good
feeling.
Scandal rages--every one is busy with watching her neighbour's affairs;
those who have boarded there longest take the lead, and every newcomer
or stranger is canvassed with the most severe scrutiny; their histories
are ascertained, and they are very often sent to Coventry, for little
better reason than the will of those who, as residents, lay down the
law.
Indeed, I never witnessed a more ridiculous compound of pretended
modesty, and real want of delicacy, than is to be found with this class
of sojourners on the highway. Should any of their own sex arrive, of
whom some little scandal has been afloat, they are up in arms, and down
they plump in their rocking-chairs; and although the hotel may cover
nearly an acre of ground, so afraid are they of contamination, that they
declare they will not go down to dinner, or eat another meal in the
hotel, until the obnoxious parties "clear out." The proprietors are
summoned, husbands are bullied, and, rather than indignant virtue should
starve in her rocking-chair, a committee is formed, and the libelled
parties, guilty or not guilty, are requested to leave the hotel. As
soon as this purification is announced, virtue, appeased, recovers her
appetite, and they all eat drink, talk scandal, flirt, and sing without
invitation as before.
I have been severe upon this class of society in America, not only
because I consider that it deserves it, but because I wish to point out
that Miss Martineau's observations must be considered as referring to
it, and not to the general character of the American woman.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. The Americans are apt to boast that they have not to pay for
civility, as we do in England, by facing waiters, coachmen, etcetera.
In some respects this is true, but in the cities the custom has become
very prevalent. A man who attends a large dinner-table, will of course
pay more attention to those who give him something, than to those who do
not; one gives him something, and another, if he wishes for attention
and civility, is obliged to do the same thing. In some of the hotels at
New York, and in the principal cities, you not only must fee, but you
must fee much higher than you do in England, if you want to be
comfortable.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 2. If I am rightly informed; there are very unpleasant cutaneous
diseases to which the Americans are subject, from the continual use of
the same brush and comb, and from sleeping together, etcetera, but it is
a general custom. At Philadelphia, a large ball was given, (called, I
think, the Fireman's Ball,) and at which about 1,500 people were
present, all the fashion of Philadelphia; yet even here there were six
combs, and six brushes, placed in a room with six looking-glasses for
the use of _all_ the gentlemen. An American has come into my room in
New York, and _sans ceremonie_ taken up my hair-brush, and amused
himself with brushing his head. They are certainly very unrefined in
the toilet as yet. When I was travelling, on my arrival at a city I
opened my dressing case, and a man passing by my room when the door was
open, attracted by the glitter, I presume, came in and looked at the
apparatus which is usually contained in such articles--"Pray, Sir," said
he, "are you a _dentist_?"
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 3. Every steam-boat has its bar. The theatres, all places of
public amusement, and even the capitol itself; as I have observed in my
Diary.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 4. It was not a bad idea of a man who, generally speaking, was
very low-spirited, on being asked the cause, replied, that he did not
know, but he thought "that he had been born with _three drinks too
little_ in him."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 5. In a chapter which follows this, I have said that the women of
America are physically superior to the men. This may appear
contradictory, as of course they could not be born so; nor are they, for
I have often remarked how very fine the American male children are,
especially those lads who have grown up to the age of fourteen or
sixteen. One could hardly believe it possible that the men are the same
youths, advanced in life. How is this to be accounted for? I can only
suppose that it is from their plunging too early into life as men,
having thrown off parental control, and commencing the usual excesses of
young men in every country at too tender an age. The constant stimulus
of drink must, of course, be another powerful cause; not that the
Americans often become intoxicated, on the contrary, you will see many
more in this condition every day in this country than you will in
America. But occasional intoxication is not so injurious to the
constitution as that continual application of spirits, which must
enfeeble the stomach, and, with the assistance of tobacco, destroy its
energies. The Americans are a _drinking_ but not a _drunken_, nation,
and, as I have before observed, the climate operates upon them very
powerfully.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER FIVE.
EMIGRATION AND MIGRATION.
In this chapter I shall confine myself to the emigration to the United
States, reserving that to Canada until I remark upon that colony. In
discussing this question I have no statistics to refer to, and must,
therefore, confine myself to general observations.
What the amount of emigration from the Old Continent to the United
States may be at present I do not think the Americans themselves can
tell, as many who arrive at New York go on to the Canadas. The
emigrants are, however, principally English, Irish, and German;
latterly, the emigration to New South Wales, New Zealand, and
particularly Texas, has reduced the influx of emigrants to the United
States.
It ought to be pointed out, that among the emigrants are to be found the
portion of the people in the United States the most disaffected and the
most violent against England and its monarchical institutions; and who
assist very much to keep up the feelings of dislike and ill-will which
exist towards us. Nor is this to be wondered at; the happy and the
wealthy do not go into exile; they are mostly disappointed and unhappy
men, who attribute their misfortunes, often occasioned by their own
imprudence, to any cause but the true one, and hate their own country
and its institutions because they have been unfortunate in it. They
form Utopian ideas of liberty and prosperity to be obtained by
emigration; they discover that they have been deceived, and would
willingly, if possible, return to the country they have abjured, and the
friends they have left behind. This produces an increase of irritation
and ill-will, and they become the more violent vituperative in
proportion as they feel the change. [See Note 1.]
I have had many conversations with English emigrants in the United
States, and I never yet found one at all respectable, who did not
confess to me that he repented of emigration. One great cause of this
is honourable to them; they feel that in common plain-dealing they are
no match for the keen-witted, and I must add unprincipled, portion of
the population with which they are thrown in contact. They must either
sacrifice their principle or not succeed.
Many have used the same expression to me. "It is no use, sir, you must
either turn regular Yankee and do as they do, or you have no chance of
getting on in this country."
These people are much to be pitied; I used to listen to them with
feelings of deep compassion. Having torn themselves away from old
associations, and broken the links which should have bound them to their
native soil, with the expectation of finding liberty, equality, and
competence in a new country, they have discovered when too late that
they have not a fraction of the liberty which is enjoyed in the country
which they have left; that they have severed themselves from their
friends to live amongst those with whom they do not like to associate;
that they must now labour with their own hands, instead of employing
others; and that the competence they expected, if it is to be obtained,
must be so by a sacrifice of those principles of honesty and
fair-dealing imbibed in their youth, adhered to in their manhood, but
which now that they have transplanted themselves, are gradually,
although unwillingly, yielded up to the circumstances of their position.
I was once conversing with an Irishman; he was not very well pleased
with his change; I laughed at him, and said, "But here you are free,
Paddy."--"Free?" replied he, "and pray who the devil was to buy or sell
me when I was in Ireland? Free! och! that's all talk; you're free to
work as hard as a horse, and get but little for so doing."
The German emigrants are by far the most contented and well-behaved.
They trouble themselves less about politics, associate with one another
as much as possible, and when they take a farm, always, if they possibly
can, get it in the neighbourhood of their own countrymen.
The emigrants most troublesome, but, at the same time, the most valuable
to the United States, are the Irish. Without this class of people the
Americans would not have been able to complete the canals and
rail-roads, and many other important works. They are, in fact, the
principal labourers of the country, for the poor Germans who come out
prefer being employed in any other way than in agriculture, until they
amass sufficient to obtain farms of their own. As for the Irish, there
are not many of them who possess land in the United States, the major
portion of them remain labourers, and die very little better off than
when they went out. Some of them set up groceries (these are the most
calculating and intelligent,)--and by allowing their countrymen to run
in debt for liquor, etcetera, they obtain control over them, and make
contracts with the government agents, or other speculators (very
advantageous to themselves,) to supply so many men for public works; by
these means a few acquire a great deal of money, while the many remain
in comparative indigence.
We have been accustomed to ascribe the turbulence of the Irish lower
classes to ill-treatment and a sense of their wrongs, but this
disposition appears to follow them every where. It would be supposed
that, having emigrated to America and obtained the rights of citizens,
they would have amalgamated and fraternised to a certain degree with the
people: but such is not the case; they hold themselves completely apart
and distinct, living with their families in the same quarter of the
city, and adhering to their own manners and customs. They are just as
little pleased with the institutions of the United States as they are
with the government at home; the fact is, that they would prefer no
government at all, if (as Paddy himself would say) they knew where to
find it. They are the leaders in all the political rows and commotions,
and very powerful as a party in all elections, not only on account of
their numbers (if I recollect rightly, they muster 40,000 at New York,)
but by their violence preventing other people from coming to the poll;
and, farther, by multiplying themselves, so as greatly to increase their
force, by voting several times over, which they do by going from one
ward to another. I was told by one of them that, on the last election
he had voted _seven_ times. [See Note 2.]
An American once said to me that the lower Irish ruled the United
States, and he attempted to prove his assertion as follows:
The New York election is carried by the Irish; now the New York election
has great influence upon the other elections, and often carries the
State. The State of New York has great influence upon the elections of
other States, and therefore the Irish of New York govern the country.--
QED.
The Irish, in one point, appear to improve in the United States--they
become much more provident, and many of them hoard their money. They
put it into the Savings Banks, and when they have put in the sum allowed
by law to one person, they deposite in other names.
A captain of one of the steam-boats told me an anecdote or two relative
to the Irish emigrants, by which it would appear that they are more
saving of their money than is quite consistent with honesty.
He constantly received them on board, and said that sometimes, if they
were very few, they would declare at the end of the trip that they had
no money, although when detained they never failed to produce it; if
they were very numerous they would attempt to fight their way without
paying. In one instance, an Irishman declared that he had no money,
when the captain, to punish him, seized his old jacket, and insisted
upon retaining it for payment. The Irishman suffered it to be taken
off, expecting, it is to be presumed, that it would be returned to him
as valueless, when the captain jerked it overboard. "Oh! murder!--
captain, drop the boat," cried Paddy; "pick my jacket up, or I'm a
ruined man. _All_ my _money's_ in it." The jacket was fortunately
picked up before it sank, and, on ripping it up, it was found to
contain, sewed up in it, upwards of fifty sovereigns and gold eagles.
The same captain narrated to me the particulars of one instance in which
about one hundred Irish were on board, who when asked for payment,
commenced an attack upon the captain and crew with their bludgeons; but,
having before experienced such attempts, he was prepared for them, and
receiving assistance from the shore, the Irishmen were worsted, and then
every man paid his fare. The truth is that they are very turbulent, and
the lower orders of the Americans are very much enraged against them.
On the 4th of July there were several bodies of Americans, who were out
on the look-out for the Irish, after dark, and many of the latter were
severely beaten, if not murdered; the Irish, however, have to thank
themselves for it.
The spirit of the institutions of the States is so opposed to servitude,
that it is chiefly from the emigrants that the Americans obtain their
supply of domestics; the men servants in the private houses may be said
to be, with few exceptions, either emigrants or free people of colour.
Amongst other points upon which the Americans are to be pitied, and for
which the most perfect of theoretical governments could never
compensate, is the misery and annoyance to which they are exposed from
their domestics. They are absolutely slaves to them, especially in the
western free States; there are no regulations to control them. At any
fancied affront they leave the house without a moment's warning, putting
on their hats or bonnets, and walking out of the street-door, leaving
their masters and mistresses to get on how they can. I remember when I
was staying with a gentleman in the west, that, on the first day of my
arrival, he apologised to me for not having a man servant, the fellow
having then been drunk for a week; a woman had been hired to help for a
portion of the day, but most of the labour fell upon his wife, whom I
found one morning cleaning my room. The fellow remained ten days drunk,
and then (all his money being spent) sent to his master to say that he
would come back on condition that he would give him a little more
liquor. To this proposition the gentleman was compelled to assent, and
the man returned as if he had conferred a favour. The next day, at
dinner, there being no porter up, the lady said to her husband, "Don't
send for it, but go _yourself_, my dear; he is so very cross again that
I fear he will leave the house." A lady of my acquaintance in New York
told her coachman that she should give him warning; the reply from the
box was--"I reckon I have been too long in the woods to be scared with
an owl." Had she noticed this insolence, he would probably have got
down from the box, and have left her to drive her own cattle. The
coloured servants are, generally speaking, the most civil; after them
the Germans; the Irish and English are very bad. At the hotels,
etcetera, you very often find Americans in subordinate situations, and
it is remarkable that when they are so, they are much more civil than
the imported servants. Few of the American servants, even in the large
cities, understand their business, but it must be remembered that few of
them have ever learnt it, and, moreover, they are expected to do three
times as much as a servant would do in an English house. The American
houses are much too large for the number of servants employed, which is
another cause for service being so much disliked.
It is singular that I have not found in any one book, written by
English, French, or German travellers, any remarks made upon a custom
which the Americans have of almost entirely living, I may say, in the
basement of their houses; and which is occasioned by their difficulties
in housekeeping with their insufficient domestic establishments. I say
custom of the Americans, as it is the case in nine houses out of ten;
only the more wealthy travelled, and refined portion of the community in
their cities deviating from the general practice.
I have before observed that, from the wish of display, the American
houses are generally speaking, too large for the proprietors and for the
domestics which are employed. Vying with each other in appearance,
their receiving rooms are splendidly furnished, but they do not live in
them.
The basement in the front area, which with us is usually appropriated to
the housekeeper's-room and offices, is in most of their houses fitted up
as a dining-room; by no means a bad plan, as it is cool in summer, warm
in winter, and saves much trouble to the servants. The dinner is served
up in it, direct from the kitchen, with which it communicates. The
master of the house, unless he dines late, which is seldom the case in
American cities, does not often come home to dinner, and the
preparations for the family are of course not very troublesome. But
although they go on very well in their daily routine, to give a dinner
is to the majority of the Americans really an effort, not from the
disinclination to give one, but from the indifference and ignorance of
the servants; and they may be excused without being taxed with want of
hospitality. It is a very common custom, therefore, for the Americans
to invite you to come and "_take wine_" with them, that is to come after
dinner, when you will find cakes, ices, wine, and company, already
prepared. But there is something unpleasant in this arrangement; it is
too much like the bar of the tavern in the west, with--"Stranger, will
you drink?" It must, however, be recollected that there are many
exceptions to what I have above stated as the general practice. There
are houses in the principal cities of the States where you will sit down
to as well-arranged and elegant a dinner as you will find in the best
circles of London and Paris; but the proprietors are men of wealth, who
have in all probability been on the old continent, and have imbibed a
taste for luxury and refinement generally unknown and unfelt in the new
hemisphere.
I once had an instance of what has been repeatedly observed by other
travellers of the dislike to be considered as servants in this land of
equality.
I was on board of a steam-boat from Detroit to Buffalo, and entered into
conversation with a young woman who was leaning over the taffrail. She
had been in service, and was returning home.
"You say you lived with Mr W.?"
"No, I didn't," replied she, rather tartly; "I said I lived with _Mrs_.
W."
"Oh, I understand. In what situation did you live?"
"I lived in the house."
"Of course you did, but what as?"
"What as? As a _gal_ should live."
"I mean what did you do?"
"I helped Mrs W."
"And now you are tired of helping others?"
"Guess I am."
"Who is your father?"
"He's a doctor."
"A doctor! and he allows you to go out?"
"He said I might please myself."
"Will he be pleased at your coming home again?"
"I went out to please myself, and I come home to please myself. Cost
him nothing for four months; that's more than all gals can say."
"And now you're going home to spend your money?"
"Don't want to go home for that, it's all gone."
I have been much amused with the awkwardness and nonchalant manners of
the servants in America. Two American ladies who had just returned from
Europe, told me that shortly after their arrival at Boston, a young man
had been sent to them from Vermont to do the duty of footman. He had
been a day or two in the house, when they rang the bell and ordered him
to bring up two glasses of lemonade. He made his appearance with the
lemonade, which had been prepared and given to him on a tray by a female
servant, but the ladies, who were sitting one at each end of a sofa and
conversing, not being ready for it just then, said to him--"We'll take
it presently, John."--"Guess I can wait," replied the man, deliberately
taking his seat on the sofa between them, and placing the tray on his
knees.
When I was at Tremont House, I was very intimate with a family who were
staying there. One morning we had been pasting something, and the bell
was rung by one of the daughters, a very fair girl with flaxen hair, who
wanted some water to wash her hands. An Irish waiter answered the bell.
"Did you ring, ma'am?"--"Yes, Peter, I want a little warm water."--"Is
it to _shave with_, miss?" inquired Paddy, very gravely.
But the emigration from the old continent is of little importance
compared to the migration which takes place in the country itself.
As I have before observed, all America is working west. In the north,
the emigration by the lakes is calculated at 100,000 per annum, of which
about 30,000, are foreigners; the others are the natives of New England
and the other eastern States, who are exchanging from a sterile soil to
one "flowing with milk and honey." But those who migrate are not all of
them agriculturalists; the western States are supplied from the
north-eastern with their merchants, doctors, schoolmasters, lawyers,
and, I may add, with their members of congress, senators, and governors.
New England is a _school_, a sort of manufactory of various
professions, fitted for all purposes--a talent bazaar, where you have
every thing at choice; in fact, what Mr Tocqueville says is very true,
and the States fully deserve the compliment.
"The civilisation of New England has been like a beacon lit upon a hill,
which, after it has diffused its warmth around, tinges the distant
horizon with its glory."
From the great extent of this emigration to the west, it is said that
the female population in the New England states is greater than the
male. In the last returns of Massachusetts the total population was
given, but males and females were not given separately, an omission
which induces one to believe that such was the truth. [See note 3.]
But it is not only from the above States that the migration takes place;
the fondness for "shifting right away," the eagerness for speculation,
and the by no means exaggerated reports of the richness of the western
country, induce many who are really well settled in the States of New
York, Pennsylvania, and other fertile States, to sell all and turn to
the west. The State of Ohio alone is supposed to have added many more
than a million to her population since the last census. An extensive
migration of white population takes place from North and South Carolina
and the adjacent States, while from the eastern Slave States, there is
one continual stream of black population pouring in, frequently the
cavalcade headed by the masters of their families.
As the numerous tributary streams pour their waters into the
Mississippi, so do rivers of men from every direction continually and
unceasingly flow into the west. It is indeed the promised land, and
that the whites should have been detained in the eastern States so long
without a knowledge of the fertile soil beyond the Alleghanines, reminds
you of the tarrying of the Jewish nation in the wilderness before they
were permitted to take possession of their inheritance.
Here there is matter for deep reflection. I have already given my
opinion upon the chances of the separation of the northern and Southern
States upon the question of slavery; but it appears to me, that while
the eyes of their legislators have been directed with so much interest
to the prospects arising from the above question, that their backs have
been turned to a danger much more imminent, and which may be attended by
no less consequences than a convulsion of the whole Union.
The Southern and Northern States may separate on the question of
slavery, and yet be in reality better friends than they were before: but
what will be the consequence, when the Western States become, as they
assuredly will, so populous and powerful, as to control the Union; for
not only population, but power and wealth, are fast working their way to
the west. New Orleans will be the first maritime port in the universe,
and Cincinnati will not only be the Queen of the West, but Queen of the
Western World. Then will come the real clashing of interests, and the
Eastern States must be content to succumb and resign their present
power, or the Western will throw them off, as an useless appendage to
her might. This may at present appear chimerical to some, and would be
considered by many others as too far distant; but be it remembered, that
ten years in America, is as a century; and even allowing the prosperity
of the United States to be checked, as very probably it may soon be, by
any quarrel with a foreign nation, the Western States will not be those
who will suffer. Far removed from strife, the population hardly
interfered with, when the Eastern resources are draining, they will
continue to advance in population, and to increase in wealth. I refer
not to the Slave States bordering on the Mississippi, although I
consider that they would suffer little from a war, as neither England,
nor any other nation, will ever be so unwise in future as to attack in a
quarter, where she would have extended the olive branch, even if it were
not immediately accepted. Whether America is engaged in war, therefore,
or remains in peace, the Western States must, and will soon be the
arbiters, and dictate as they please to the Eastern.
At present, they may be considered as infants, not yet of age, and the
Eastern States are their guardians; the profits of their produce are
divided between them and the merchants of the Eastern cities, who
receive at least thirty per cent. as their share. This must be the case
at present, when the advances of the Eastern capitalists are required by
the cotton growers, who are precisely in the same position with the
Eastern States, as the West India planters used to be with the merchants
of London and Liverpool, to whom they consigned their cargoes for
advances received. But the Western States (to follow up the metaphor)
will soon be of age, and no longer under control: even last year,
vessels were freighted direct from England to Vicksburg, on the
Mississippi; in a few years, there will be large importing houses in the
Far West, who will have their goods direct from England at one half the
price which they now pay for them, when forwarded from New York, by
canal, and other conveyances. [See Note 4.] Indeed, a very little
inquiry will prove, that the prosperity of the Eastern free States
depends in a great measure upon the Western and Southern. The Eastern
States are the receivers and transporters of goods, and the carriers of
most of the produce of the Union. They advance money on the crops, and
charge high interest, commissions, etcetera. The transport and
travelling between the Eastern, Southern, and Western States, are one
great source of this prosperity, from the employment on the canals, rail
roads, and steam boats.
All these are heavy charges to the Western States, and can be avoided by
shipping direct from, and sending their produce direct to, the Old
Continent. As the Western States advance in wealth, so will they
advance in power, and in proportion as they so do, will the Eastern
States recede, until they will be left in a small minority, and will
eventually have little voice in the Union.
Here, then, is a risk of convulsion; for the clashing of interests, next
to a war, is the greatest danger to which a democracy can be exposed.
In a democracy, every one legislates, and every one legislates for his
own interests. The Eastern States will still be wealthy and formidable,
from their population; but the commerce of the principal Eastern cities
will decrease, and they will have little or no staple produce to return
to England, or elsewhere, whereas the Western States can produce every
thing that the heart of man can desire, and can be wholly independent of
them. They have, in the West, every variety of coal and mineral, to a
boundless extent; a rich alluvial soil, hardly to be exhausted by bad
cultivation, and wonderful facilities of transport; independent of the
staple produce of cotton, they might supply the whole world with grain;
sugar they already cultivate; the olive flourishes; wine is already
produced on the banks of the Ohio, and the prospect of raising silk is
beyond calculation. In a few days, the manufactures of the Old World
can find their way from the mouth of the Mississippi by its thousand
tributary streams, which run like veins through every portion of the
country, to the confines of Arkansas and Missouri, to the head of
navigation at St Peter's, on again to Wisconsin, Michigan, and to the
Northern lakes, at a _much cheaper rate_ than they are supplied at
present.
One really is lost in admiration when one surveys this great and
glorious Western country, and contemplates the splendour and riches to
which it must ultimately arrive.
As soon as the Eastern States are no longer permitted to remain the
factors of the Western, they must be content to become manufacturing
states, and probably will compete with England. The Western States,
providentially, I may say, are not likely to be manufacturers to any
great extent, since they have not _water_ powers; the valley of the
Mississippi is an alluvial flat, and although the Missouri and
Mississippi are swift streams, in general the rivers are sluggish, and,
at all events, they have not the precipitate falls of water necessary
for machinery, and which abound in the North-eastern States; indeed, if
the Western States were to attempt to manufacture, as well as to
produce, they would spoil the market for their own produce. Whatever
may be the result, whether the Eastern States submit quietly to be shorn
of their greatness, (a change which must take place,) or to contest the
point until it ends in a separation, this is certain, that the focus of
American wealth and power will eventually be firmly established in the
Free States on the other side of the Alleghany mountains.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. I was once conversing with one who was formerly very popular
with the democrats, but who was likely to be outset by another
demagogue, who "went the whole hog," down to the Agrarian system.
"Captain," said he, with his fist clenched, "I'm the very
personification of democracy, but I'm out-Heroded by this fellow. The
emigrants are a pack of visionaries, who don't know what they want. The
born Americans I can deal with, but with these newcomers democracy is
not sufficient; they want a mobocracy, and I suppose we must have
it."--"You have it now," replied I.--"Well, captain, I believe you're
right."
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 2. I don't know why, but there is no scrutiny of the votes in
American elections, or if there be, I never heard of one being made.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 3. "The young men of New England migrate in large numbers to the
west, leaving an over proportion of female population, the amount of
which I never could learn. Statements were made to me, but so
incredible that I withhold them. Suffice it, that there were more women
than men in from six to nine States in the Union."--Miss Martineau.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 4. To give the reader some idea of the price of European articles
in the Western country, I will mention cloth. A coat which costs 4
pounds in England, is charged 7 pounds 10 shillings at New York; and at
Cincinnati, in the West, upwards of 10 pounds.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER SIX.
NEWSPAPER PRESS.
Mr Tocqueville observes, "that not a single individual of the twelve
millions who inhabit the territory of the United States has as yet dared
to propose any restrictions upon the liberty of the press." This is
true, and all the respectable Americans acknowledge that this liberty
has degenerated into a licentiousness which threatens the most alarming
results; as it has assumed a power, which awes not only individuals, but
the government itself. A due liberty allowed to the press, may force a
government to do right, but a licentiousness may compel it into error.
The American author, Mr Cooper, very justly remarks: "It may be taken
as a rule, that _without_ the liberty of the press there can be no
_popular liberty_ in a nation, and without its licentiousness, neither
_public honesty, justice_, or a proper regard for _character_. Of the
two, perhaps, that people is the happiest which is deprived altogether
of a free press, as private honesty and a healthful tone of the public
mind are not incompatible with narrow institutions, though neither can
exist under the corrupting action of a licentiousness press."
And again--"As the press of this country now exists, it would seem to be
expressly devised by the great agent of mischief, to depress and destroy
all that is good, and to elevate and advance all that is evil in the
nation. The little truth which is urged, is usually urged coarsely,
weakened and rendered vicious by personalities, while those who live by
falsehoods, fallacies, enmities, partialities, and the schemes of the
designing, find the press the very instrument that devils would invent
to effect their designs."
A witty, but unprincipled statesman of our own times, has said, that
"speech was bestowed on man to conceal his thoughts;" judging from its
present condition, he might have added--"the press, in America, to
_pervert truth_."
But were I to quote the volumes of authority from American and English
writers, they would tire the reader. The above are for the present
quite sufficient to establish the fact, that the press in the United
States is licentious to the highest possible degree, and defies control;
my object is to point out the effect of this despotism upon society, and
to show how injurious it is in every way to the cause of morality and
virtue.
Of course, the newspaper press is the most mischievous, in consequence
of its daily circulation, the violence of political animosity, and the
want of respectability in a large proportion of the editors. The number
of papers published and circulated in Great Britain, among a population
of twenty-six millions, is calculated at about three hundred and
seventy. The number published in the United States, among thirteen
millions, are supposed to vary between _nine and ten thousand_. Now the
value of newspapers may be fairly calculated by the capital expended
upon them; and not only is not one-quarter of the sum expended in
England, upon three hundred and seventy newspapers, expended upon the
nine or ten thousand in America; but I really believe that the expense
of the `_Times_' newspaper alone, is equal to at least five _thousand_
of the _minor_ papers in the United States, which are edited by people
of no literary pretension, and at an expense so trifling as would appear
to us not only ridiculous, but impossible. As to the capabilities of
the majority of the editors, let the Americans speak for themselves.
"Every wretch who can write an English paragraph (and many who cannot,)
every pettifogger without practice, every one whose poverty or crimes
have just left him cash or credit enough to procure a press and types,
sets up a newspaper."
Again--"If you be puzzled what to do with your son, if he be a born
dunce, if reading and writing be all the accomplishments he can acquire,
if he be horribly ignorant and depraved, if he be indolent and an
incorrigible liar, lost to all shame and decency, and incurably
dishonest, make a newspaper editor of him. Look around you, and see a
thousand successful proofs that no excellence or acquirement, moral or
intellectual, is requisite to conduct a press. The more defective an
editor is, the better he succeeds. We could give a thousand
instances."--_Boston News_.
These are the assertions of the Americans, not my own; that in many
instances they are true, I have no doubt. In a country so chequered as
the United States, such must be expected; but I can also assert, that
there are many very highly respectable and clever editors in the United
States. The New York papers are most of them very well conducted, and
very well written. The New York Courier and Enquirer, Colonel Webb; the
Evening Star, by Noah; the Albion, by Doctor Birtlett; Spirit of the
Times, and many others, which are too numerous to quote, are equal to
many of the English newspapers. The best written paper in the States,
and the happiest in its sarcasm and wit, is the Louisville Gazette,
conducted by Mr Prentice of Kentucky; indeed, the western papers, are,
generally speaking, more amusing and witty than the eastern; the New
Orleans Picayune, by Kendall, is perhaps, after Prentice's, the most
amusing; but there are many more, which are too numerous to mention,
which do great credit to American talent. Still the majority are
disgraceful not only from their vulgarity, but from their odious
personalities and disregard to truth. The bombast and ignorance shown
in some of these is very amusing. Here is an extract or two from the
small newspapers published in the less populous countries. An editor
down East, speaking of his own merits, thus concludes--"I'm a real
catastrophe--a small creation; Mount Vesuvius at the top, with red hot
lava pouring out of the crater, and routing nations--my fists are rocky
mountains--arms, whig liberty poles, with iron springs. Every step I
take is an earthquake--every blow I strike is a clap of thunder--and
every breath I breathe is a tornado. My disposition is Dupont's best,
and goes off at a flash--when I blast there'll be nothing left but a
hole three feet in circumference and no end to its depth."
Another writes the account of a storm as follows:--
"On Monday afternoon, while the haymakers were all out gathering in the
hay, in anticipation of a shower from the small cloud that was seen
hanging over the hilly regions towards the south-east, a tremendous
storm suddenly burst upon them, and forced them to seek shelter from its
violence. The wind whistled outrageously through the old elms,
scattering the beautiful foliage, and then going down into the meadow,
where the men had just abruptly left their work unfinished, and
overturning the half-made ricks, whisked them into the air, and filled
the _whole afternoon_ full of hay."
I copied the following from a western paper:--
"Yes, my countrymen, a dawn begins to open upon us; the crepusculous
rays of returning republicanism are fast extending over the darkness of
our political horizon, and before their brightness, those myrmidons
shall slink away to the abode of the demons who have generated them, in
the hollow caves of darkness."
Again--"Many who have acquired great fame and celebrity in the world,
began their career as printers. Sir William Blackstone, the learned
English commentator of laws, was a printer by trade. _King Charles the
Third_ was a printer, and not unfrequently worked at the trade after he
ascended the throne of England."
Who Charles the Third of England was I do not know, as he is not yet
mentioned in any of our histories.
The most remarkable newspaper for its obscenity, and total disregard for
all decency and truth in its personal attacks, is the Morning Herald of
New York, published by a person of the name of Bennett, and being
published in so large a city, it affords a convincing proof with what
impunity the most licentious attacks upon private characters are
permitted. But Mr Bennett is _sui generis_; and demands particular
notice. He is indeed a remarkable man, a species of philosopher, who
acts up to his tenets with a moral courage not often to be met with in
the United States. His maxim appears to be this--"Money will find me
every thing in this world, and money I will have, at any risk, except
that of my life, as, if I lost that, the money would be useless."
Acting upon this creed, he has lent his paper to the basest and most
malignant purposes, to the hatred of all that is respectable and good,
defaming and inventing lies against every honest man, attacking the
peace and happiness of private families by the most injurious and base
calumny. As may be supposed, he has been horse-whipped, kicked, trodden
under foot, and spat upon, and degraded in every possible way; but all
this he courts, because it brings money. Horse-whip him, and he will
bend his back to the lash, and thank you, as every blow is worth so many
dollars. Kick him, and he will remove his coat tails, that you may have
a better mark, and he courts the application of the toe, while he counts
the total of the damages which he may obtain. Spit upon him, and he
prizes it as precious ointment, for it brings him the sovereign remedy
for his disease, a fever for specie.
The day after the punishment, he publishes a full and particular account
of how many kicks, tweaks of the nose, or lashes he may have received.
He prostitutes his pen, his talent, every thing for money. His glory
is, that he has passed the rubicon of shame; and all he regrets is, that
the public is at last coming to the unanimous opinion, that he is too
contemptible, too degraded, to be even touched. The other, and more
respectable editors of newspapers, avoid him, on account of the filth
which he pours forth; like a polecat, he may be hunted down; but no dog
will ever attempt to worry him, as soon as he pours out the contents of
his foetid bag.
It is a convincing proof of the ardent love of defamation in this
country, that this modern Thersites, who throws the former of that name
so immeasurably into the background, has still great sway over men in
office; every one almost, who has a character, is afraid of him, and
will purchase his silence, if they cannot his good will.
During the crash at New York, when even the suspicion of insolvency was
fatal, this miscreant published some of the most respectable persons of
New York as bankrupts, and yet received no punishment. His paper is
clever, that is certain; but I very much doubt if Bennett is the clever
man--and my reason is this, Bennett was for some time in England, and
during that time the paper, so far from falling off, was better written
than before. I myself, before I had been six weeks in the country, was
attacked by this wretch, and, at the same time, the paper was sent to me
with this small note on the margin:--"Send twenty dollars, and it shall
be stopped."--"I only wish you may get it," said I to myself. [See Note
1.]
Captain Hamilton, speaking of the newspaper press in America, says--
"In order to form a fair estimate of their merit, I read newspapers from
all parts of the union, and found them utterly contemptible, in point of
talent, and dealing in abuse so virulent, as to excite a feeling of
disgust,--not only with the writers, but with the public which afforded
them support. Tried by this standard--and I know not how it can be
objected to--the moral feeling of this people must be estimated lower
than in any deductions from other circumstances I have ventured to rate
it."
In the following remarks, also, I most cordially agree with him. "Our
newspaper and periodical press is bad enough. Its sins against
propriety cannot be justified, and ought not to be defended. But its
violence is meekness, its liberty restraint, and even its atrocities are
virtues, when compared with that system of _brutal and ferocious
outrage_ which distinguishes the press in America. In England, even an
insinuation against personal honour is intolerable. A hint--a breath--
the contemplation even of a possibility of tarnish--such things are
sufficient to poison the tranquillity, and, unless met by prompt
vindication, to ruin the character of a public man; but in America, it
is thought necessary to have recourse to other weapons. The strongest
epithets of a ruffian vocabulary are put in requisition."
It may be asked, how is it possible that an "enlightened nation" can
permit such atrocity. It must be remembered, that newspapers are vended
at a very low price throughout the States, and that the support of the
major portion of them is derived from the ignorant and lower classes.
Every man in America reads his newspaper, and hardly any thing else; and
while he considers that he is assisting to govern the nation, he is in
fact, the dupe of those who pull the strings in secret, and by
flattering his vanity, and exciting his worst feelings, make him a poor
tool in their hands. People are too apt to imagine that the newspapers
echo their own feelings; when the fact is, that by taking in a paper,
which upholds certain opinions, the readers are, by daily repetition,
become so impressed with these opinions, that they have become slaves to
them. I have before observed, that learning to read and write is not
education, and but too often is the occasion of the demoralisation of
those, who might have been more virtuous and more happy in their
ignorance. The other day when I was in a steam-vessel, going down to
Gravesend, I observed a foot-boy sitting on one of the benches--he was
probably ten or eleven years old, and was deeply engaged in reading a
cheap periodical, mostly confined to the lower orders of this country
called the Penny Paul Pry. Surely it had been a blessing to the lad, if
he had never learnt to read or write, if he confined his studies, as
probably too many do, from want of farther leisure, to such an immoral
and disgusting publication.
In a country where every man is a politician, and flatters himself that
he is assisting to govern the country, political animosities must of
course be carried to the greatest lengths, and the press is the vehicle
for party violence; but Captain Hamilton's remarks are so forcible, and
so correct, that I prefer them to any I could make myself.
"The opponents of a candidate for office, are generally not content with
denouncing his principles, or deducing from the tenor of his political
life, grounds for questioning the purity of his motives. They accuse
him boldly of _burglary_ or _arson_, or at the very least, of petty
larceny. _Time, place and circumstances_, are all stated. The
candidate for Congress or the Presidency, is broadly asserted to have
_picked pockets_, or pocketed silver spoons, or to have been guilty of
something equally mean and contemptible. Two instances of this, occur
at this moment to my memory. In one newspaper, a member of Congress was
denounced as having feloniously broken open a scrutoire, and having
thence stolen certain bills and banknotes; another was charged with
selling franks at twopence a piece, and thus coppering his pockets at
the expense of the public."
But let me add the authority of Americans. Mr Webster, in his
celebrated speech on the public lands, observes in that powerful and
nervous language for which he is so celebrated:--"It is one of the
thousand calumnies with which the press teemed, during an excited
political canvass. It was a charge, of which there was not only no
proof or probability, but which was, in itself, wholly impossible to be
true. No man of common information ever believed a syllable of it. Yet
it was of that class of falsehoods, which by continued repetition,
through all the organs of detraction and abuse, are capable of
misleading those who are already far misled, and of farther fanning
passion, already kindled into flame. Doubtless, it served in its day,
and, in greater or less degree, the end designed by it. Having done
that, it has sunk into the general mass of stale and loathed calumnies.
It is the very cast-off slough of a _polluted_ and _shameless_ press."
And Mr Cooper observes--"Every honest man appears to admit that the
press in America is fast getting to be _intolerable_. In escaping from
the tyranny of foreign aristocrats, we have created in our bosoms a
_tyranny of a character_ so _insupportable_, that a change of some sort
is getting indispensable to peace."
Indeed, the spirit of defamation, so rife in America, is so intimately
connected with its principal channel, the press, that it is impossible
to mention one, without the other, and I shall, therefore, at once enter
into the question.
Defamation is the greatest curse in the United States, and its effects
upon society I shall presently point out. It appears to be inseparable
from a democratic form of government, and must continue to flourish in
it, until it pleases the Supreme to change the hearts of men. When
Aristides inquired of the countryman, who requested him to write down
his own name on the oyster-shell, what cause of complaint he had against
Aristides; the reply given was, "I have none; except, that I do not like
to hear him always called the _Just_." So it is with the free and
enlightened citizens of America. Let any man rise above his fellows by
superior talent, let him hold a consistent, honest career, and he is
exalted only into a pillory, to be pelted at, and be defiled with
ordure. False accusations, the basest insinuations, are industriously
circulated, his public and private character are equally aspersed, truth
is wholly disregarded: even those who have assisted to raise him to his
pedestal, as soon as they perceive that he has risen too high above
them, are equally industrious and eager to drag him down again.
Defamation exists all over the world, but it is incredible to what an
extent this vice is carried in America. It is a disease which pervades
the land; which renders every man suspicious and cautious of his
neighbour, creates eye-service and hypocrisy, fosters the bitterest and
most malignant passions, and unceasingly irritates the morbid
sensibility, so remarkable among all classes of the American people.
Captain Hamilton, speaking of the political contests, says, "From one
extremity of the Union to the other, the political war slogan is
sounded. No quarter is given on either side; every printing press in
the United States is engaged in the conflict. Reason, justice, and
charity; the claims of age and of past services, of high talents and
unspotted integrity, are forgotten. No lie is too malignant to be
employed in this unhallowed contest, if it can but serve the purpose of
deluding, even for a moment, the most ignorant of mankind. No
insinuation is too base, no equivocation too mean, no artifice too
paltry. The world affords no parallel to the scene of political
depravity exhibited periodically in this free country."
Governor Clinton, in his address to the legislature in 1828,
says--"Party spirit has entered the recesses of retirement, violated the
sanctity of female character, invaded the tranquillity of private life,
and visited with severe inflictions the peace of families. Neither
elevation nor humility has been spared, nor the charities of life, nor
distinguished public services,--nor the fire-side, nor the altar, been
left free from attack; but a licentious and destroying spirit has gone
forth, regardless of everything, but the gratification of malignant
feelings and unworthy aspirations." And in the New York Annual
Register, quoted by Captain Hamilton, we have the following remarks: "In
conducting the political discussions which followed the adjournment of
Congress, both truth and propriety were set at defiance. The decencies
of private life were disregarded; conversations and correspondence which
should have been confidential, were brought before the public eye; the
ruthless warfare was carried into the bosom of private life; neither age
nor sex were spared, the daily press teemed with ribaldry and falsehood;
and even the tomb was not held sacred from the rancorous hostility which
distinguished the presidential election of 1828."
I have considered it necessary thus to heap authority upon authority, as
the subject is one of the most vital importance; and I must first prove
the extent of this vice, without the chance of the shadow of
contradiction, before I point out its fatal consequences.
That the political animosities arising from a free and enlightened
people governing themselves, have principally engendered and fostered
this vice, is most certain; and it would be some satisfaction, if, after
the hostile feelings had subsided, the hydra also sank to repose.
But this cannot be the case. A vice, like detraction, so congenial to
our imperfect natures, is not to be confined to one channel, and only
resorted to, as a political weapon, when required. It is a vice which
when once called into action, and unchecked by the fear of punishment or
shame, must exist and be fed. It becomes a confirmed habit, and the
effect upon society is dreadful. If it cannot aim its shafts at those
who are in high places, if there is no noble quarry for its weapons, it
will seek its food amongst smaller game, for it never tires. The
consequence is, that it pervades and feeds upon society--private life is
embittered; and, as Mr Cooper most justly observes, "_rendering men
indifferent to character, and indeed rendering character of little
avail_."
Indeed, from the prevalence of this vice, society in America appears to
be in a state of constant warfare--Indian warfare, as every one is
crouched, concealed, watching for an opportunity to scalp the reputation
of his neighbour! They exist in fear and trembling, afraid to speak,
afraid to act, or follow their own will, for in America there is no free
will. When I have asked why they do not this or that, the reply has
invariably been, that they dare not. In fact, to keep their station in
society, they must be slaves--not merely slaves, for we are all so far
slaves, that if we do that which is not right, we must be expelled from
it; but abject and cowardly slaves, who dare not do that which is
innocent, lest they should be misrepresented. This is the cause by
there is such an attention to the _outward_ forms of religion in the
United States, and which has induced some travellers to suppose them a
religious people, as if it were possible that any real religion could
exist, where morality is at so low an ebb. When I first went to Boston,
I did not go to church on the following day. An elderly gentleman
called upon and pointed out to me that I had omitted this duty; "but,"
continued he, "I have had it put into one of the newspapers that you
attended divine service at such a church, so all is right." All was
right; yes, all was right, according to the American's ideas of "all was
right." But I thought at the time, that my sin of omission was much
more venial than his of commission.
When at Detroit, I was attacked in the papers because I returned a few
calls on a Sunday. I mention this, not because I was justified in so
doing, but because I wish to show the censorship exercised in this very
moral country.
The prevalence of this evil acts most unfortunately upon society in
other ways. It is the occasion of your hardly ever knowing whom you
may, or whom you may not, be on terms of intimacy with, and of the
introduction of many people into society, who ought to be wholly
excluded. Where slander is so general, when in the space of five
minutes you will be informed by one party, that Mr So and So is an
excellent person, and by another that he is a great scoundrel, just as
he may happen to be on their side or the opposite, in politics, or from
any other cause, it is certain that you must be embarrassed as to the
person's real character; and as a really good man may be vituperated, so
the reports against one who is unworthy, are as little credited: the
fact is, you never know who you are in company with.
Almost all the duels which are so frequent in America, and I may add all
the assassinations in the western country, arise principally from
defamation. The law gives no redress, and there is no other way of
checking slander, than calling the parties to account for it. Every man
is therefore ready and armed against his fellow.
Inadvertently affront any party, wound his self-love, and he will
immediately coin some malignant report, which is sure to be
industriously circulated. You are at the mercy of the meanest wretch in
the country; for although praise is received with due caution, slander
is everywhere welcomed. An instance occurred with respect to myself. I
was at Lexington, and received great kindness and civility from Mr
Clay. One day I dined at his table; there was a large party, and at the
further end, at a distance where he could not possibly have heard what
passed between Mr Clay and me, there sat a young man, whose name is not
worth mentioning. When he returned to Louisville, he spread a report
that I had grossly insulted Mr Clay at his own table. Now the
catalogue of enormities circulated against me was already so extensive,
that I was not in very good odour; but Mr Clay is so deservedly the
idol of this State, and indeed of almost the whole Union, that there
could not be a more serious charge against me--even those who were most
friendly avoided me, saying, they could forgive me what I had formerly
done, but to insult Mr Clay was too bad. So high was the feeling, and
so industriously was the calumny circulated, that at last I was
compelled to write to Mr Clay on the subject, and I received in return
a most handsome letter, acquitting me of the malicious charge. This I
showed to some, and they were satisfied; and they advised me to print
it, that it might be better known. This was a compliment I did not
choose to pay them; and the impression of the majority still is that I
insulted Mr Clay. The affair being one of the many connected with
myself, I should not have mentioned it, except to prove how lightly such
a practice is estimated.
Whatever society permits, people will do, and moreover, will not think
that they are wrong in so doing. In England, had a person been guilty
of a deliberate and odious lie, he would have been scouted from society,
his best friends would have cut him; but how was this person treated for
his conduct? When I showed Mr Clay's letter, one said, "Well now, that
was very wrong of A."--Another, "I did not believe that A would have
done so."--A third, "that A ought to be ashamed of himself;" but they
did not one of them, on account of this falsehood, think it necessary to
avoid him. On the contrary, he was walking arm-in-arm with the men,
dancing and flirting with the women just as before, although his
slander, and the refutation of it, were both well known.
The reader will now perceive the great moral evil arising from this
vice, which is, that it habituates people to falsehood. The lie of
slander is the basest of all lies; and the practice of it, the most
demoralising to the human heart. Those who will descend to such
deliberate and malignant falsehood, will not scruple at any other
description. The consequence is, that what the Americans have been so
often taxed with, is but too prevalent, "a disregard to _truth_."
To what must we ascribe the great prevalence of this demoralising habit
in the United States? That the licentiousness of the press feeds it, it
is true; but I am rather inclined to imagine that the real source of it
is to be found in the peculiarity of their institutions. Under a
democracy, there are but two means by which a man can rise above his
fellows--wealth and character; and when all are equal, and each is
struggling to rise above the other, it is to the principle that if you
cannot rise above another by your own merit, you can at least so far
equalise your condition by pulling him down to your own level, that this
inordinate appetite for defamation must be ascribed. It is a state of
ungenerous warfare, arising from there being no gradation, no scale, no
discipline, if I may use the term, in society. Every one asserts his
equality, and at the same time wishes to rise above his fellows; and
society is in a state of perpetual and disgraceful scuffle. Mr
Tocqueville says, "There exists in the human heart a depraved taste for
equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to
their own level, and induces men to prefer equality in slavery to
inequality with freedom."
In politics, especially, character becomes of much more importance than
wealth, and if a man in public life can once be rendered odious, or be
made suspected, he loses his supporters, and there is one antagonist
removed in the race for pre-eminence. Such is one of the lamentable
defects arising from a democratical form of Government. How different
from England, and the settled nations of the old world, where it may be
said that everything and everybody is, comparatively speaking, in his
place!
Although many will, and may justifiably, attempt to rise beyond his
circumstances and birth, still there is order and regularity; each party
knows the precise round in the ladder on which he stands, and the
majority are content with their position.
It is lamentable to observe how many bad feelings, how many evil
passions, are constantly in a state of activity from this unfortunate
chaotical want of gradation and discipline, where all would be first,
and every one considers himself as good as his neighbour.
The above-mentioned author observes--"The surface of American society
is, if I may use the expression, covered with a layer of democracy, from
beneath which the aristocratic colours sometimes peep."
In a moral sense, this is also true, the nobler virtues which are
chiefly produced in the fertile field of aristocracy do occasionally
appear; but the whole surface is covered with a layer of democracy,
which like the lava which the volcano continually belches forth, has
gradually poured down, and reduced the country round it to barrenness
and sterility. [See Note 2.]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 1. _Some_ of the _invented calumnies_ against me found their way
to this country. I consider the contents of this chapter to be a
sufficient refutation, not only of what has been, but of what will in
all probability be hereafter asserted against me by the American press.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note 2. This chapter was in the press, when a paragraph, cut out of the
Baltimore Chronicle, was received from an anonymous hand at New York.
Whether with a friendly intention or otherwise, I am equally obliged to
the party, as it enables me to further prove, if it were necessary, the
vituperation of the American press.
"Many persons in our country had an opportunity of becoming acquainted
with the Captain. The fast-anchored isle never gave birth to a _more
unmitigated blackguard_. His awkward, unwieldy misshapen body, was but
a fair lodging for a low, depraved, licentious soul. Although liberally
educated, he seemed insensible to any other enjoyments than those of
sense. No human being could in his desires or habits approach more near
to the animal than him. No gentleman ever sat down with him an hour
without a sensation of loathing and disgust. `What kind of man is
Captain Marryat?' was once asked in our presence of a distinguished
member of Congress, who had sojourned with him at the White Sulphur
Springs. `He is no man at all,' was the reply, `he is a beast.'"
This is really "going the whole hog" himself, and making me go it too.
Now, if I receive such abuse for my first three volumes, in which I went
into little or no analysis, what am I to expect for those which are
about to appear? To the editor of the Baltimore Chronicle I feel
indebted: but I suspect that the _respectable_ portion of the American
community will be very much annoyed at my thus giving his remarks more
extensive circulation than he anticipated.
VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER SEVEN.
AUTHORS, ETC.
The best specimens of American writing are to be found in their
political articles, which are, generally speaking, clear, argumentative,
and well arranged. The President's annual message is always masterly in
composition, although disgraced by its servile adulation of the
majority. If we were to judge of the degrees of enlightenment of the
two countries, America and England, by the President's message and the
King's speech, we should be left immeasurably in the back-ground--the
message, generally speaking, being a model of composition, while the
speech is but too often a farrago of bad English. This is very strange,
as those who concoct the speech are of usually much higher classical
attainments than those who write the message. The only way to account
for it, is, that in the attempt to condense the speech, they pare and
pare away till the sense of it is almost gone; his Majesty's ministers
perfectly understanding what they mean themselves, but forgetting that
it is necessary that others should do the same. But in almost all
branches of literature the Americans have no cause to be displeased with
the labours of their writers, considering that they have the
disadvantage of America looking almost entirely to the teeming press of
England for their regular supply, and nowhere in that country can be
said at present to be men of leisure and able to devote themselves to
the pursuit. An author by profession would gain but a sorry livelihood
in the United States, unless he happened to be as deservedly successful
as Washington Irving or Cooper. He not only has to compete against the
best English authors, but as almost all the English works are published
without any sum being paid for the copyright, it is evident that he must
sell his work at a higher price if he is to obtain any profit. An
English work of fiction, for instance, is sold at a dollar and a
quarter, while an American one costs two dollars.
This circumstance would alone break down the American literature if it
were not for the generosity of England in granting their authors a
copyright in this country; indeed, the American public pay that tacit
compliment to us that they will hardly look at a work by one of their
own citizens, until it has first been published in England, and received
the stamp of approbation. Those American authors who have obtained a
reputation, look, therefore chiefly to the English copyright for
remuneration; and if it were not for this liberality on our part, the
American literature would not receive sufficient support from its own
country to make it worth the while of any one to engage in it. The
number of English works republished in America is very great, but the
number of each work sold is much smaller than people here imagined.
The periodical literature of the United States is highly creditable.
The American Quarterly Review; the New York Mirror, by George P Morris;
the Knickerbocker, by Clarke; and the Monthly Magazine; all published at
New York, are very good; so, indeed, are the magazines published at
Philadelphia, and many others. It may be said that, upon the whole, the
periodical press of America is pretty well on a par with that of this
country. Periodical literature suits the genius of the Americans, and
it is better supported by them than any other description.
The Americans are jealous of our literature, as they are, indeed, of
everything connected with this country; but they do themselves injustice
in this respect, as I consider that they have a very fair proportion of
good writers. In history, and the heavier branches of literature, they
have the names of Sparks, Prescott, Bancroft, Schoolcraft, Butler,
Carey, Pitkin, etcetera. In general literature, they have Washington
Irving, Fay, Hall, Willis, Sanderson, Sedgwick, Leslie, Stephens, Child
and Neal. In fiction, they have Cooper, Paulding, Bird, Kennedy,
Thomas, Ingraham, and many others. They have, notwithstanding the
mosquitoes, produced some very good poets: Bryant, Halleck, Sigourney,
Drake, etcetera; and have they not, with a host of polemical writers,
Dr Channing, one of their greatest men, and from his moral courage in
pointing out their errors, the best friend to his country that America
has ever produced! Indeed, to these names we might fairly add their
legal writers--Chancellor Kent and Judge Story, as well as Webster,
Clay, Everett, Cass, and others, who are better known from their great
political reputations than from their writings. Considering that they
have but half our population, and not a quarter of the time to spare
that we have in this country, the Americans have no want of good
writers, although there are few of them well known to the British
public. It must be pointed out that the American writers are under
another disadvantage which we are not subject to in this country, which
is, that freedom of opinion is not permitted to them; the majority will
not allow it, except on points of religion, and in them they may
speculate as much as they please, and publish their opinions, whether
Deistical, Atheistical, or worse, if they can find worse out. It is
true than an author may, and some will, p
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