IN AMERICA. LETTER I. General character of the north-eastern States of America:-of the middle States:-the southern. Town of Pittsburg. Alleghany mountains. Lancaster. The Susquehanna. Harrisburg. Shippensburg, and Strasburg. Interesting account of a tavern and its occupiers. Bedford. Sublimity and horrors of a night passed in a forest. Thoughts on natural history:-St. Pierre. DEAR SIR, Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, October, 18c6. I THOUGHT that you knew my heart too well, to attribute my silence to a decay of affection; and I had hopes that you entertained too just an opinion of my head, to expect from me extraordinary discoveries in philosophy or politics. At the same time, I hope to convince you that my supposed neglect has operated to the advantage of my correspondence. The American states through which I have passed, are unworthy of your observation. Those to the north-east are indebted to nature for but few gifts: they are better adapted for the business of grazing than for corn. The climate is equally subject to the two extremes of burning heat and excessive cold; and bigotry, pride, and a malignant hatred to the mother-country, characterize the inhabitants. The middle States are less contemptible: they produce grain for exportation; but wheat requires much labour, and is liable to blast on the sea-shore. The national features here are not strong, and those of different emigrants have not yet composed a face of local deformity: we still see the liberal English, the ostenta tious Scotch, the warm-hearted Irish, the penurious Dutch, the proud German, the solemn Spaniard, the gaudy Italian, and the profligate French. What kind of character is hereafter to rise from an amalgamation of such discordant materials, I am at a loss to conjecture. For the southern States, nature has done much, but man little. Society is here in a shameful degeneracy: an additional proof of the pernicious tendency of those detestable principles of political licentiousness, which are not only adverse to the enjoyment of practical liberty, and to the existence of regular authority, but destructive also of comfort and security in every class of society; doctrines here found by experience, to make men turbulent citizens, abandoned Christians, inconstant husbands, unnatural fathers, and treacherous friends. I shun the humilia ting delineation, and turn my thoughts to happier regions which afford contemplation without disgust; and where mankind, scattered in small associations, are not totally depraved or finally corrupt. Under such impressions, I shall write to you with pleasure and regularity; trusting to your belief, that my propensity to the cultivation of literature has not been encouraged in a country where sordid speculators alone succeed, where classic fame is held in derision, where grace and taste are unknown, and where the ornaments of style are condemned or forgotten. Thus guarding you against expectations that I should fear to disappoint, I proceed to endeavour at gratifying the curiosity which my ramblings excite in your mind. The town of Pittsburg* is distant * Situated in latitude 40° 26' north, and longitude 79° 48' west from London. rather more than 300 miles from Philadelphia of which space, 150 miles are a continued succession of mountains, serving as a barrier against contending seas; and as a pregnant source of many waters, which take opposite directions, and after fertilizing endless tracts, and enriching various countries, are lost in the immensity of the Mexican Gulf and the Atlantic Ocean. Knowing the road to be mountainous and stony, I preferred travelling on horseback to going in a stage-coach, that is seven or eight days on the road; and the fare in which, for the whole journey, is twenty-four dollars. The first sixty miles were a turnpike road; and my horse, which cost me only eighty dollars, arrived tolerably fresh at the end of them in twelve hours. The place at which I stopped was Lancaster, the county-town of Pennsylvania. The inhabitants are chictly Dutch and Irish, or of Dutch and Irish |