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K t i r \.% i t : ^ » ; * i • c * 'Ifg *'. OTJE BROTHERS AND COUSINS. ^w^I 3i: %. ■# •#. « ♦ ..% *'V-S V in ^:' ^#1 ■% ■■v^; / -*►* .^ ^* •^^ ■>* ■^ 4^ jdws ^« eJ^ *••*. Ili w ^■^ ♦ m f ■* >■ t' l|r m- OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS: a Summer Eour 1 IN >^' CANADA AND THE STATES. ■i*S- BY *, JOHN MACGREGOR, M.A. or THE INNER TEMPLE. SEELET, JACKSON, AND HALLIDAY, 54 TLEET STREET. LONDON. MDCCCLIX ^'^ lokvon: rftmnED bt j. wbhthbimbk and co., ClftCCI PLACB, riNBBUBT CIBCVS. CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION Page , viii CHAPTER I. ICEBERGS AND WHALES.— HALIFAX. — THE *8TIIfE8* STEAMER. — ^TOUNG MEN's CHRISTIAN ASSOCIATION — NEWFOUNDLAND DOOS.-'K^REENLAND GAME- COLONIAL HEROES 1 CHAPTER II. COLONIAL VOTERS. — GROCERS AND TELEGRAPHS. — POLITICAL BALI^OON. — CAPTAIN VICARS.— TALKATIVE WAITER. — FORKS AND RAKES. — PRATER MEETING. — SWEARING . . . . . . . .9 CHAPTER III. NEW BRUNSWICK. — IN A CANOE. — ^THB TAMARASKA. — A STORM— A SKUNK. — THE MIRAGE.— QUEBEC . 21 CHAPTER IV. EMIGRANTS. — RAILWAYS. — DRAGGED SCHOOL GIRLS. — boys' letters. — LONGEST BRIDGE IN THE WORLD. — SOLDIERS* READING ROOM. — OTTAWA. — ^ADVEN- TURE . . .• 28 VI CONTENTS. CHAPTER V. Page AMERICAN FASHIONABLES —SILENT YANKEES — TORONTO. — A RACE AT EATING. — AN ELECTION. — THE TELE- GKAPtl CABLE — GAOL BIRDS. — HOW TO SEE NIA- GARA. — SLAVERY 43 CHAPTEU VI. BROADWAY. — TELEGRAPH SERMON. — A DAY IN THE SLUMS — TATrOED SHOEBLACK. — BOY POLICE. — SUNDAY BAND. — LEE AVENUB SCHOOL.— A PIC-NIC . 64. CHAPTER VII. THE CABLE FEVER. — FIREMEN. — ODD MOTTOES. — A barrister's wig. — LUNATICS.— CALLIOPE. — " ISMS " HOUSE OF REFUGE. — BOY FACTORY. — REVIVAL PRAYER-MEETING 64 CHAPTER VIII. PHILADELPHIA — REVIVAL. — EUCHRE CLUB. — PHEACH- ING-TENT. — BLACK PRAYER-MEETING. — GIRARD COLLEGE — FLOWERING ALOE. — WASHINGTON. — KILLING MEN AND PIGS 80 CHAPTER IX. SLAVE SUNDAY SCHOOL — A REAL LADY.—" JIM HAMLY." —CINCINNATI PREACHING TENT. — FELLOW- DINERS. — CAPTAIN VICARS. — FAR WEST RAILWAYS . . 89 CHAPTER X. KANSAS. — SNAGS ON THE MISSOURI. — SLAVE-HOLDING MINISTER. — MUSIC. — THE CALIFORNIAN ROAD. — " DOLLAR." — '' THE BABY TOWN." — HOME THOUGHTS 100 CONTENTS. Vll CHAPTER XI. Pago MI&SI88IPPI.— NAUVOO AND MORMONS. — PAIRIKS.— 8NOW. — MINNESOTA. — MINNE- HA-HA. — CHICAOO. — COLOURED CHURCH. — INDIAN SCALPING . . .111 CHAPTER XII. CONVENTION AT IJi CROSSE. — FREE NEORO SETTLE- MENT. — TRENTON FALLS. — SLEEPING TRAINS. — LADIES. — THEODORE PARKER's CHURCH . . 121 AMERICAN VOTING 138 YANKEE NOTIONS 150 « INTRODUCTION. TF a huge volume taken at random from a new - Encyclopaedia were to be thrust before you, and, just as you get interested in one article, the pages were suddenly turned over to the middle of another, and then a second volume given to you next day, and a third the day after, and so on every day, with the same sud- den compulsory changes, for weeks together — if you were tossed on the wide Atlantic for a fortnight in a steamer to settle this confusion, and then asked, on your landing, to give a rational account of the best articles in the book, you would be very like a traveller who has been three months in America, and straightway sits down to indite his views at home. \\ INTRODUCTION. And, to make the matter worse, the most pressing inquiries are precisely about the very subjects that are most difficult to understand, most easy to blunder in, and most mystified by contradictory statements. Every Christian Englishman is eager to ask in a breath, " What about slavery? Is the American constitution to be admired? What is the true account of the Revival?" Perhaps it is better, then, to keep the following pages as they were written on the spot;* and it is more com- plimentary to the reader to give him the daily photographs unexplained, and thus invite him to draw his own conclusions. 'Tis like to a ramble amid new rocks and rivers. A finished oil-painting might be attempted on your easel at home; but, after all, the rough sketch made in the wood gives the best impression of what was seen at the time. Still there are some subjects on which a summer tour gives quite time enough to form reliable opinions. For instance, an Englishman who reads several American papers every day for a quarter of a * For the Record Ncwsj)apcr. km INTRODUCTION. XI "'■'■(^ '-: year may easily gauge the American press ; and he must be struck with the palpable inferiority of the American press to the American people. He is a bold man, indeed, who runs a tilt against the press of any country ; but he is a coward who dares not tell a nation that their daily papers are beneath their standard and their destiny. It is surely a wholesome restraint upon every paper and political party in England, to know that its friends may be in or out of office the day after to-morrow. On the other hand, in Ame- rica, once in the '^ Opposition," you are fixed there at least for four years — a time long enough to make your best friends tired of you, and short enough to keep your worst enemies certain of a change. On another point, the rapid traveller may remark, without being rash, hearing, as he does every day, bitter and constant complaints of mis- government urged by the best and the richest, and the most intelligent Americans; while, in England, we are used to hear such grumbling chiefly from the ignorant or the disappointed. If there is any revolution to be attempted in England, it is to put the masses uppermost; I xu INTRODUCTION. and if there can be a revolution in America, it will be to turn the pyramid upright, which now stands upon fts half-crushed apex. Let us suppose that these are the misjudged conclusions of rapid travelling through America, and what must be the amount of gross misap- prehension of England which the usual fleet run of an American traveller entails? You see America while you move, by rail, by river, on the lake steamer, or in the populous hotel. England is only seen by stopping. There is scarce a township in her little bounds that has not more to study, than whole States of prairie or forest, which have no antiquities to ar- rest, no lore of history to make the traveller muse. Utterly vain is the endeavour to make the an- cient Indian stories a fund for American poetry. It is to try to stereotype a race that is blotted out by every move of civilization. The best American instinctively reverts to Old England for his thoughts on the past. He turns from the Indian relics, which are near but alien, and dwells on the English past, which is remote but homely, and which we loo dwell upon as linked with our glorious present. .^ INTRODUCTION. • • • Xlll Neither of us, in mere touring, can see the real genius of the other by the homely hearth, in the country house, or the city mansion ; but the absence of this internal view of Englishmen must be a far greater blank to the American traveller, than what we feel when we pass their homes, and can only try to imagine the inside. It is easy to write of the American constitu- tion if you have never seen it in actual opera- tion, just as you may speedily describe a skeleton from a model on a diagram, while you can scarcely explain a body when you have lived in its flesh and blood. A few months of locomotive existence no doubt gives small experience of the political life of a great continent. Still, facts under the daily notice of a traveller, scanning with intense interest this great subject, may be truthfully recorded; and a timid effort to embody their impressions will be found at the end of this volume. This is no place, nor is there any place, for comparing America and England. To compare would be unjust to America as the child, and unfair to England as the parent. XIV INTRODUCTION. I' * If f' Can any one acquainted with both countries calmly sit down to compare a new continent, scarce a century under its own ruling, with an ancient islet gifted above all in natural advan- tages, and laboured, for a thousand years, by the noblest race that ever trod the earth? But, though America may be devoid of his- toric associations, though her social state may be inaccessible for rapid inspection, and her consti- tution yet too young to be justly brought to trial, there is still a point of view from which we may fairly regard her; and, looking from thence, even a passing glance will not fail to see truthful pictures. Standing there, then, it is with hearty con- fidence I affirm, that the effects of the religious movement in America are genuine, deep, and lasting. Men and women who leave cold apathy, or hot infidelity, in thousands; who acknowledge God, and live a changed life in thousands; and who wane not, nor waver, but grow fervent and more humble every day ; these, I say, must have something solid at the bottom, whatever fringe of circumstance may float around the substantial. INTRODUCTION. XV It would be thoroughly unfair to judge of any great movement by its frailties; by those oddi- ties and absurdities of even a real excitement, which are hoisted into prominence by its very reality, and are sure to be noticed most. But no keen eye is required to see the positive and less obtrusive change which has widely passed over this great people's national heart. The heart of the American people has been opened towards religion ; the hearts of individ- ual Americans have been thoroughly changed by the Revival. The American citizen is our cousin by nation- ality; but the American Christian is our bro- ther at once and for ever. The American is at least like us in language and locomotion; but the Christian there is a brother of us here, and will be a brother with us hereafter. All jealou- sies of earthly differences, ill-disguised under a trite enumeration of earthly similarities — "the same Shakspeare" — "the same liberties " and so forth — all these doubtful likenesses in profile are as nothing to the vital identity that exists in the very souls of American and English, when both are joined to Christ. ^ XVI INTRODUCTION. Clasp our hands, dear brothers, in this forever relationship ; your hearts are warmed with more than kindred blood ; with the sap of " the true vine " ; if you and we are grafted in together, and He can say to us " Ye are the branches." And what of slavery? can it consist with this revived religion? Well, as yet there is no Christian standard raised against it for the thou- sands of good men to rally round. A Christian cannot be pro-slavery. This, at least, needs no proof at all. But, alas ! he must either join the abolitionists, and bear their badge as a political party, or be content to live on idly, in a sad individual protest. . Let Christian men provide some plan how- ever tedious, some means however partial, for the abolition of slavery, and they will have millions of earnest helpers, who now but wish, in lonely knots, for what they well could will and carry, if they only knew their strength and numbers. Every plan that is proposed must, of course, have many objections; but none of these can be so great as the blame of sitting still. Grant it is a horrible subject; a cancer that you do not like to probe ; a family misfortune you do INTRODUCTION. XVI 1 not like to discuss; yet it is with you, good Americans^ as Popery is with us, not only a blight to make you humble, but a problem to evoke your most earnest efforts to solve. Nor is it any excuse for you that " the abolitionists are too noisy." " That if people would only be quiet, the slave party would give it up.'' The slavers are quite as active and aggressive as their opponents. No question since the world began was ever carried by silence; and the more harm is done by the irritating abolitionists, you are all the more bound to propose some feasible plan, which may soon become acceptable or necessary even to the slavers themselves. And, now, as to their Constitution; let the Americans try a Republican government. Only they and we could possibly succeed in this the most difficult of all forms. They may tolerate it till men get thick together, and elbow one another. But all America is not American. The possessions of the Queen of England upon that continent are much larger in mere area than the whole United States. There is ample scope for two gigantic experiments. And so young Canada looks smilingly upon b i < XVlll TNTRODUCTIOX. them. She is free, perfectly free; free enough to acknowledge herself a part of the grandest Empire that was ever ruled, and far too free to join with those whose every man is bound by law to follow the fugitive slave.* It is a mother's highest wish on earth to settle her sons and da\ighters worthily. When Canada is matured, it will be England's pride and policy to let her rule her house in friendly neighbourhood. Meantime, Canadian brothers, your wisdom is to grow in England's nursery of freemen ; to be sheltered by her powerful arm; guided by her ancient wisdom; and to look with her to the Almighty for His blessing. Stretch your young limbs widely and embrace the two great oceans; let your heart throb as now with loyalty, the real attribute of ripened independence; cover your land with railways and your lakes with steamers; hew down your woods and plant men; * The fugitive slave law has only one merit, and that is, it is broken every day vrith impunity. The President's mes- sage [TVmc*, Dec. 20, 1858) distinctly asserts, that every new- piece of ground peopled by the States is, prima facie, slave ground — so that freedom is the exception, not the rule; and every citizen is now declared an abettor of slavery. INTRODUCTION. XIX root out that Popery which is your worst weed, and has been our saddest blight; train up your brawny settlers; your polished statesmen; your brave soldiers; and your faithful preachers of the everlasting truth. Doubt not the love of England, or its power or will to help you. Fear not your cousins in America, or their power or will to hurt you. Your federated provinces will yet become a glo- rious country, allied to Britain by long years of sympathy, where the slave is free and the free- man serves his God. ( !| ic: ] Si c d r I OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. CHAPTER 1 •*» ICEBERGS AND WHALES — HALIFAX — THE 'STIKES' STEAMER — YOUNG men's christian ASSOCIATION — NEWFOUND- LAND DOGS — GREENLAND GAME — COLONIAL HEROES. ^HE ten days' voyage from England to America is an unceasing development of pictures of character. To those who are ** good sailors/* it is a rare intellectual treat, — such in- cessant discussions, and clashing of opinions, regulated in intensity by the gentlemanly con- duct of the ship's officers, and softened by the presence of pale, passive-looking ladies. It is a time, too, for many a word in season, much tact and wisdom, boldness, sincerity, and patience. We found a large iceberg drifted past Cape Kace at a more westerly point than any ice which M^ I OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. the captain recollected in past summers. Por- poises rolled about on the waves, and some whales spouted with manifest delight; but the shining ebony face of the negro I see opposite my window, warns me that it is better to write notes of what is seen and done on land, than to attempt a description of the pleasant voyage. • It is a novel and pleasant sensation to land on a new country where they talk our own old tongue, and to find new houses under our dear old flag. Halifax is different enough from England to make you feel abroad, and it is also like enough to make you feel at home. Britain never seems so wide as when some thousand miles of sea bring you to yet another England. This place reminds me immediately of Bergen, in Norway. The wooden houses cased with shingle, broad streets, harbour and islands full of timber, and kerb-stones made of wood. But many features are of quite another kind. Here are some blacks, there some Germans, then again Frenchmen, and even Indians squat- ting in the market-place. The carts, with high wheels and two boxes like dog-kennels, are filled with bakers' loaves. 1 HALIFAX. 3 The negro waiter looks as if lie had come from the States by the " underground railway," which issues no "return tickets;" and, as he gives me for a chamber candle the little glass lamp, it is plain we are near Newfoundland. A red-coated piquet marches past in the dusty street, with Crimean medals on their breasts; and the well-known bugle-call in the fort upon the hill proclaims it is the mess-hour for English officers to attack the roast beef of Old Eng- land. On the black palings there is a hand-bill, " Three hun 'red labourers wanted immediately. Good wages and work guaranteed for the sum- mer." And near to it another — "One night more of Jessie Brown, the Heroine of Lucknow,*^ whose romantic hearkening to the Highland bagpipes has been acted over and over in Canada and the States, as well as in France. Five sedate judges are sitting out a five days' cause in that court-house, and the eloquence of the Attorney-General and five other counsel is listened to with profound attention by the audience, consisting of one man. The good people of Halifax are too sensible to waste time JM i '■ t '. ) I 4 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. I in hearing arguments; and no doubt they will be content when the Chief Justice pronounces the decision next November. In the fine dock-yard lies the celebrated war- steamer Styx — the " Stikes," as the Yankees call it, when they come to buy ribbons from the sailors' hats which bear the name of the vessel that has so provoked them by acting like a naval policeman, searching the bundles carried by sus- picious craft, when it is likely they have a cargo of slaves. On the whole, it may be a clever as well as a just move on England's part to leave this traffic to be dealt with by the Americans ; for they are thus distinctly called upon themselves to put down a fearful scandal, too long winked at by their executive, although utterly illegal even by their own laws. Between the Canadians and Yankees there is ** no love lost." The state of the colonial politics is healthy; that is to say, each party seems to think it is entirely and alone right, and says what it thinks in the newspaper. The papers arc well printed, and can be bought from boys who blow long YOUNG men's christian ASSOCIATION. 5 tin-pot horns, such as our grandfathers used to hear. There are twelve policemen for the town ; but a strong military force gives it a garrison air. The names on the best shops seem chiefly Scotch, yet the language one hears in the streets is far more usually Irish. And no doubt this indicates the respective positions assumed by the Scotch and Irish inhabitants when they have been shaken together by a little jostling. The Church of England has but few members, and the Presbyterians the largest number — about one-fifth of the population of 240,000 in the Province. There is a vigorous branch of the Young Men's Christian Association, with fifty members — a nice, cheerful reading-room, well supplied with books and papers, and with lectures well attended, besides a weekly Bible-class, where there were thirty-six present last week. The Newfoundland fishery causes many busi- ness men to pass through the hotel; and there is a peculiar air and conversation about these active people, who combine civility and frankness with a little Yankee smartness. \% ; J I m f OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Nothing appears more strange to the tra- veller than to hear his fellow-subjects speak- ing in capital English of an utterly unknown subject, with new names for people and places. " We have got the ships at Eichibuctoo and Miramici." ** Did the Attorney- General stop at Quicki Mash or Shediac ?" " Where is the Chief Justice? — can he talk Mic-mac?" To- morrow is the election-day at Windsor, and travellers come from Truro. The very men- tion of the last two names makes the others appear more odd. A number of fine black Newfoundland dogs are in the streets. The best breed of this noble species has webbed feet, and a tail curling round upon its back, with body and limbs unspotted by any single hair of white. As we passed the Greenland coast in the steamer, a tin box, with an extract of telegraph news from England, was cast into the sea, and bobbed about over the waves, carrying a little red flag, which enabled a fast-sailing schooner to pick it up, and thus transmit the intelligence by the electric telegraph all through America. The internal bays are full of game ; and one of i nti i.i nMiijgr;na{{a GREENLAND GAME. IT' our passengers is to start with canoes and In- dians to-morrow for a sporting tour on a river thickly wooded, and the favourite resort of rein- deer and moose. He will live in his boat, or in a rude hui of bark, and half his time will be employed in wading, as he pushes the canoe over shallows, while the other half will be spent in cutting a way through the tangled jungle of tree-branches that block up the stream. This preserve is free only on the condition that no book maybe written about it in England, which might attract less knowing cockneys to such pleasant sport. It is for this reason, that I may not give the precise latitude and longitude of the spot ! All this gossip, and a great deal more, one hears on board the noble Cunard steamer, in the place of nightly assembly called " the Fiddler," a covered space on deck. I had a long conversation with some little black children to-day. Only one could read, but they seemed to comprehend very readily the simplest truths of the Bible. The Roman Catholic Archbishop, with numerous priests, works hard to keep the Bible from all children. lil il . \i nV' I ■ . r :. ■) .1 if s OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Kt Romisli Influence is powerful here; and though the numbers of Romanists are small, they are swayed to and fro at a word, and easily turn the scales so evenly balanced between Whigs and Tories. The Protestant Alliance of Nova Scotia will, I hope, take some vigorous and decided step to enlighten, and then direct, public opinion in relation to Popish proceedings. A nunnery forms a prominent object in the environs of the town; and the Eomish Cathedral, with the Archbishop^s house, asserts a position that can- not be ignored. Another wooden house in the outskirts is remarkable from a better cause, as the birth- place of Sir J. Inglis, the hero of Lucknow. Sir W. Williams, of Kars, the witty judge, ** Sam Slick," and Mr. Cunard, of steamboat fame, are all from this part of the world. The fresh sea-air playing on the fir-clad hills, fragrant with pine- rosin, makes the neighbouring creeks most charming for a country walk; and one cannot but expect the time when these quiet bays will be studded with the villas of Halifax, then a city ten times its present size. TS?" COLONIAL VOTERS. 9 CHAPTER II. COLONIAL VOTERS — GROCERS AND TELEGRAPHS — POLITICAL BALLOON — CAPTAIN VICAKS — TALKATIVE WAITER — FORKS AND RAKES — PRAYER MEETING — SWEARING. O HOUTS and cheers assail the train as it rum- bles along the new-made line, opened in June, the first railway here ; and the moose-deer are scared in the thick forests as we pass, rousing the bears, and starting up the screaming water- fowl from a hundred lakes, tangled together by fresh streams, like silver network over the dark, rocky land. There is a pretty village, with white wooden houses, so neat and clean, and it. church with pointed spire. The woods are consumed with fire in patches for miles together, and only a few wet trunks stand after resisting the burning. Here come a throng of honest voters, tramp- ing their thick boots on the strong, rough plat- form of the station, " All aboard!" shouts the I 1 1 ^ I 3 . f! 10 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. conductor^ and the stalwart politicians rush into the long carriage, where the tallest can walk upright down the long gangway through the middle of it. They have first-class tickets, and you cannot see a finer set of manly fellows, young, handsome, browned, and bearded, with intelligence, civility, and earnest freedom of manner, as well as of opinion. Then begins the clattering of tongues and the munching of onions. Three babies tune up another kind of music, and assert their independence before they know their names. In vain the mothers try to pacify them, by saying, "Here's the nigger coming!" but that fine, ruddy, frieze-coated Presbyterian, though a perfect stranger, instantly catches up a squalling infant, and soon puts it asleep in his great, thick arms. These long open carnages are certainly not the place for quiet travelling. They would never do for business men in England. The electric telegraph joins a whole series of little villages, and you see the thing at work at the grocer's shop, where the lad who weighs you a pound of sugar speaks your messages along the wires. Then at Windsor a crowd buzzes TlWlilij(<«m Bpp|| POLITICAL BALLOON. u around the rura-shop, heartily discussing politics, and ready to hear an oration from the English stranger. This is a good opportunity for a word in season, and for the Scripture text-cards of the Open-air Mission and the British Workman^ papers of which I brought a large supply from London, though a hundred more might be given every day with a good result, as the people here are delighted with them. The youth of the town, including a sprinkling of ** rowdies," next crowd around a great fire- balloon, eighteen feet high, that is to carry into the clouds the name of the successful candidate for the office of M.P.P., Member of the Pro- vincial Parliament. Each member is paid £1 a-day during the session. This is what they do also in "^^he Greek Parliament; and I recollect a modern Solon at Athens, who told me the result was, that the session began on January 1st and ended on the 31st of December. It is very perplexing and amusing, to be cast suddenly into a mass of political imbroglio, with- out knowing anything of local interest; but there is one comfort, that this ignorance is not solitary, for I never found any of these valiant m ■: Vv IP .: 'i P I i 12 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. voters who could tell the difference between Liberal and Tory, except that the side he supported was all right, and the other quite in the wrong. The elegant name of "smashers" is applied to the Government; but though the Popish organ in New Brunswick applies the word " smasherism " to anything done by the Government there, the Komanists seem to be on different sides in the two provinces. How- ever, every person I speak to allows that the issue now is " Papist or Protestant,'* and the large Irish immigration of late years makes this a serious matter. Here and there, through the trees, the blue smoke curls from the trim little wooden cottages. The slips of shingle on their roofs soon get grey like slates, and the whole appearance of these thrifty-looking dwellings is very artistic and exceedingly attractive. About one-third of the population is of Scotch extraction, and not a few recollected with much pleasure the 93rd Highland Regiment, quartered in Halifax just twenty years ago, when every one of them used to march to Church with his Bible and Presbyterian Psalm-book, and where WINDSOR. 13 nearly seven hundred once partook of the Sacra- ment together. Captain Vicars of the 97th, and Captain Hammond of the Rifles, are also well remembered names, signalizing men who ran a short but bright career of sanctified soldier-life. The Rev. Dr. Twining, who has laboured so long and usefully among the military committed to his care in spiritual things, must be much en- couraged by the testimony such men have borne before the whole world to the truth of that Gospel which they were taught in his ministra- tion. The Union Jack floats from the Victoria Hotel at Windsor, and there is a panorama of India in the dining-room, where all travellers must take their meals at the same hours, or they have a poor chance of getting any. The gong, or a bell, is rung loudly among the bed-rooms to waken us at seven, and again at eight for breakfast, one o'clock to dinner, and six for tea. This sort of music is an advance on that at another place, where the waiter "called us" by slapping every door with a slipper, saying, *' Get up ! Get up !" Oatmeal porridge, or " hominy," as some call it, is on the table, with various meats .! i 'fl fl 14 OUE BROTHERS AND COUSINS. I and large dishes of mountain strawberries with cream. The waiter is very talkative, and gives his idea of anything you please. " Now, young gentleman," says he, '* what may I get for you? Mr. Johnson, it is quite clear you do not get on with that chop ; let me fetch you another better done." **Ale, Sir? Yes, Sir, that comes from England, the mistress of the world, but all allow that our brew here is better; not that I judge it so, though I really don't care for malt liquor." " Sundays, Sir ? Yes, I always get at least an hour for Divine service — couldn't think of an engagement, Sir, where I can't go to church — * no church' may be good to live by, but it is bad to die by.'' "Mr. Peters, here's a clean plate. There is no lack, Sir, of clean plates at this establishment, Sir; nor of clean knives, Sir." Very often the guests say " Sir " to the waiter. r i If any observant traveller who has scanned the usual routes through Europe, Syria, and Egypt, and got used to table d'hote life, wants an entirely new sensation, a new field for notice, and new ideas of locomotion and hotel in- AGRICULTURAL IMPLEMENTS. 15 i.\ tercourse, let him by all means lilo to the setting sun and visit Acadia, Westward ho! But far more valuable and interesting is the continuous and uifective means for good which he finds when journeying through a people con- stantly ready to converse, and whom he can al- ways address in his own language. The traveller is at once bound to become a missionary; and a hundred times a day he may easily find men glad to hear the best of all news, and often willing to converse at length on the highest of all topics. A great many implements much used here are imported from the United States; but they ought to be made in the Province. The large fields are often mowed by a machine drawn by two horses, which cuts and spreads the grass, that is afterwards turned over by very light rakes, far more easily handled than our heavy Englisb hay-raked. The forks, too, are strong, thin, cast-steel ; and these improved implements seem much more generally used than in Britain. Light, strong carts, sometimes drawn by bul- locks, take the hay, in a very green state, to covered sheds. Some of the land near Windsor I » li i \ I ^ 1 i'i.' M, 16 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. »i is sold for £75 an acre. In far-off Kansas, an acre was offered to me for 2^(1. 1 At this town, I went to a prayer-meeting on Friday evening, being attracted by the bell in the graceful wooden spire of a Methodist church. About forty women and twenty men attended, and the minister opened and closed the service ; but seven others of ]iis flock prayed at intervals between the hymns. Except one, these prayers were all excellent, and offered by plain working- men in rough coats. They informed me that a revival has begun here. I could not help calling their most serious attention to the dreadful sin of blasphemy, which is remarkably prevalent. I have heard more pro- fanity and swearing during a few days, than dur- ing years in London, even in the very ungodly company which one must encounter who fre- quents the infidel gatherings of the great metropolis. The vice here proceeds chiefly, I think, from thoughtlessness, and not from avowed unbelief; for a mild remonstrance, and even downright rebuke, is listened to respectfully, and its justice acknowledged. One of the worst swearers, in- SWEARING. 17 deed, assured me that he was a good Presby- terian, and attended church every week. I fear that proximity to "the States" may be the cause of much of this fearful blasphemy. A number of fine young men, and scores of boys, hang about the roads in the evenings; and both are of a class that we seldom see thus congregated in England. Here the hours of work are short, and leisure long; and very few men, indeed, have not good coats on their backs. A Young Men's Society could easily be formed with such materials. Every time I have pro- posed this in addressing these groups, the sug- gestion has been well received. A missionary from any society, that could statedly set to work in this matter, would soon see abundant reason for an extended and profitable tour. Finding five boys in one day who are not even learning to read, I told some good young men about the Eagged-schools. It is hoped that some of the Sunday-school teachers will open a class for ten poor lads, twice a week. A revival that leaves such opportunities untouched, may be- come a mere spiritual luxury. Every Scripture precept and example seems to point to active ^M I. 1 k 18 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. missionary work as the unfailing attendant upon religious impressions, if they are genuine and Christian. The loquacious waiter (already mentioned) tells me that everybody in the Province is loyal ; and then he runs along the table, saying to a meek-looking, silent traveller: " Come, Mr. Peters, you are not speaking at all there ; I fear you cannot be well." Outside, there is a black woman, with dress of the gayest hues, and most profound in gra- vity, as she lights her clay pipe. Behind her is a shop, with a ham hanging at the window, whitewashed and printed with these words, " I am very spicy," while around, there is a noisy group of strong men neatly dressed, smiling wo- men, laughing rosy children, and huge black dogs, under the tree where the beautiful fire- flies are dancing in fairy maze. The whole is a mixture of peaceful strength, with a charm of poetry that is quite new to one who has never heard the Saxon tongue in such romantic scenes. But just as I write these very words, a man calls, ** Hurrah for Benjamin Smith I" Another strikes him. Ten drunken " rowdies" rush to "WHITE EYE." 19 the fray. A loud dispute begins. Heads of women pop out of the windows, and blows and scuffling ensue, with fearful oaths. A man is down, with a bloody face; and all is begun, continued, and ended, without anybody pre- suming to keep order. There is not one single policeman or soldier for all these 2,000 people. Verily the Saxon race alone could keep within any bound whatever, with such licence allowed. And what has caused all this noise, quarrelling, blasphemy, and blood? Drink. In New Brunswick, within the last seven years, the quantity of spirits consumed has multiplied ten times. A description called " White Eye" is sent from the States, and the soldiers, who get intoxicated with it, have to go to the hospital for two or three days. In 6ight hours, the steamer carried us 140 miles to St. John, which is a bustling town with a noble river and a suspension bridge, just open, spanning a greater width than that of Hungerford. A small congregation in the morning heard an excellent sermon from the Kev. Mr. Ferry (Free Church), and a large con- i u iMtmwu I . 20 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. gregation attended the Church of England ser- vice, where the Rev. Dr. Gray preached in the evening. Every kind of business seemed entirely at rest on Sunday, I i % ' * ■ CHAPTER HI. NEW BRUNSWICK — IN A CANOE — THE TAMARASKA — A STORM — A SKUNK — A WISE DOG — THE MIRAGE— QUEBEC. rpHE Church of England Young Men's Chris- -*• tian Society of St. John, New Brunswick, seems to be very flourishing and useful. The members I met comprised exactly those classes which may give and derive profit by frequent association; and by a closer affiliation to the London Society, we may hope for many benefits between the bustling town of "lumber" and and the " old country," as they always call it. With two Canadian friends, I journeyed up the St. John River and crossed the province for three or four hundred miles, chiefly through thick woods in country waggons, jolting hor- ribly over the rough roads. This is the route to be taken by the railway lately so much ap- proved by the English papers. Once, when I was 22 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. driving alone, a negro hailed me, " Give me a drive, Sir, please;" so we had a long ride to- gether; and he told me as much in a short time as showed that a woolly skull can hold good sense and accurate information. Still the people do not speak well of poor Sambo. As the Americans are often styled Yankees in England, the Nova Scotians are called " Blue- noses" here, while the Canadians are all " Beavers/' and " Buckeyes " come from Ohio. Fredericton, the capital of New Brunswick, has a neat little cathedral, filled with sweet music, as the evening sun warmed the windows of painted glass, and gave an hour of resting from the hard day's work in the heat. Here we visited Judge Wilmot, who seems scarcely to forget his political days in the beau- tiful country-seat he has planted and carpentered with his own hands. His colony of bees buzzing about their delicious honey as we feed on the comb, his roses and pinks, and cedar summer- house, his daughter's music^ and his keen but benevolent eye, give to us a pleasant picture of colonial judicial domestic life. AH reasonable men here seem thoroughly CANOE IN A STORM. 23 ■J alive to the necessity of the Keformatory action, so lately but so widely in operation at home. A large Reformatory has been commenced at Montreal, and it seems there are plenty of bad boys to fill it. We had to paddle over Lake Tameasquota in a canoe, which is a very bad sort of boat when there is the least wind. The true Indian canoe is made of bark; and I soon found it easy to manage when alone. But the Frenchmen cut . their boat out of a solid log; and in this four of us paddled up a beautiful stream, the Tama- raska, at a rapid pace. The wind on the lake soon rose and nearly filled the canoe, so that all our efforts to bale it out were useless; and we landed three times to right our little craft. Swarms of fish leap about in the streamlets near the lake, and I caught four trout in one pool with a twig for a rod, extemporised on the moment. Our sleeping-places were at settlers' houses, French our language, and eggs our food. But the brave little horses hurry along even a springless cart on a moonless night. In all the finer sagacity of the horse, that universal 24 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. animal seems to degenerate as it is kept wltli civilised man. The Arab steed, the I^orwegian pony, the Spanish barb, and the Syrian horse are worth, in times of difficulty, far more than any well-housed hunter, or the best racer of the stud. As I had come away without preparation for this forest journey, and with only a knapsack as my luggage, it was necessary to refit at a little village; and it was very amusing to find that the principal " store" could furnish only a shirt- collar made of paper ^ but so neatly stamped as with a hem, that it is little wonder if the Ame- rican dandies keep up a brisk demand for this curious article, which costs less than the price of washing a linen one ** bond fide ^ An Indian set- tlement on the river had a great red cross planted before it, with the emblems of the Crucifixion, so often seen in Romish countries. Most of the Indians are Romanists, and so, indeed, are the white people in that forest district, where we found the priests ever diligent, and did not meet with or hear of any Protestant missionaries. The woods are silent; very few birds, but the kingfisher and bat, seemed to tenant them. A WISE DOG. 25 The polecat, or skunk, left its strange scent to taint the fresh breez^ xiere and there. A farmer told me that one killed half a mile from his hut had been so offensive for a month, that he could scarcely eat his breakfast. Bears also abound; and the priest of one village asserts he has the power to turn the recusant sheep of his flock into bears. One man had a dog, which would take written messages to any house he named, and return with the article required; or if you gave him a penny, he would trot off and buy his dinner. Timber — or "lumber,*' as I must learn to call it — is the centre-point of all the interest, and hopes, and fears of these brawny settlers. It is too much their depend- ence, for a little slackening of the demand throws hundreds on half- work ; and the steadier duties of farming are thus neglected for the more fitful gains of wood-chopping. Judge Wilmot has done much to enlighten these people on many subjects, and gives lec- tures to crowded audiences, who are delighted with the diagrams, painted on calico, and pub- lished in London. A lecture by somebody else, of the Bible Society, seemed to have made a Ml I 26 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. decided impression on some with whom I con- versed ; and there certainly is a large field open in this direction for one who desires to improve the evenings of a pleasant holiday tour. The telegraph wires are carried even through these remote forests; and it was in one of these places we heard first of the successful laying of the Atlantic cable. The telegraphist could scarcely believe it; but in less than one minute he had asked and got an answer to his question through 500 miles of wire, which gave the as- surance that it was even so, "all right;" and everyone appeared to have unmixed joy at the pleasant annihilation of the distance between their adopted land and their English " home.'' A little beerhouse in such places elevates itself to an hotel, and paints " Gents* Parlour '* over one door, while two doors off there is "The Commercial Bank," a hut with only one window, and the whole of which would go into a bed- room. We came out on the St. Lawrence at River de Loup, where on Sunday a priest played polkas and waltzes on the seraphine in a huge Romish church. For the last four days I have not seen one negro; but the last we met. THE MIRAGE. 27 was a splendid specimen of a Handsome man, and his wages were one dollar a day. The Pilgrim Islands on the St. Lawrence are famed for the frequent mirage which glows around them, and causes an inverted image to be seen faithfully depicted in the sky above. So accurate is this image, that ships may be observed upon an upturned sea long before they are visible upon the natural horizon. We speed over this in a fast steamer, with deck piled over deck; and new faces and new subjects for talk amply fill up the time, until Quebec's narrow streets and lofty citadel seem to assure us, that now at length we have reached old Europe again; but the British flag and red-coated soldiers with French- speaking shopkeepers again confound our ideas, and, finally, the mind is made up that it is neither England nor the "Continent," but Canada that can produce such an anomaly. Yes; we are in Canada, not England. The streets with plank pavement and always up-hill ; houses with bright tin roofs; reading-room with Kentucky papers and the Record; policemen with caps and blue batons; caliches with driver on the footboard, whom you call *' Captain ; " ■* I « — ^m iiiU-. 28 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Steamers with engines on the upper deck; Indians with Christian hats even on their '^squaws"; horses with numbers on their fore- heads; shops with French and English sign- boards; — all these are features that tell of a mixed race, a new people, and a foreign clime. Let us read the characters a little nearer. But lo ! the American visitors rush out of the hotel at the first bugle blast, to see " regular soldiers " mount guard. The others go off to the races, and nobody is left but me to look over the beautiful river. f ^ ( CHAPTER IV. EMIGRANTS — RAILWAYS — RAOOED SCHOOL GIRLS — BOYS' LETTERS— -LONGEST BRIDGE IN THE "WORLD — SOLDIERS' READING-ROOM — OTTAWA — ADVENTURE. THHE captain of the water police, at Quebec, became communicative in the dark as I waited for the steamer. His trusty boats patrol, night and day to keep boy-beating sailors in order. Each of the crew has 7s. per diem, and the coxswain of each boat 9s. pay. Last year, common labourers had 10s. a-day, and even boys received 7s. This season, everything is depressed, and the pay of labourers is 3s. 6d., and that only for the summer. The winter of six months is nearly idle. Men who emigrate to Canada, and expect good pay without hard work, get disheartened, and often go back to Britain. Many of these disappointed emigrants are Irish, who do better i i 1 \ ;; i 1 I i H 30 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. in thc^'r own country. Bone and sinew, com- mon sense, and ability to weather the first year, are the requisites for the emigrants most needful and most likely to succeed. Skilled labourers, mechanics, clerks, and young men " ready to do anything," are by no means bet- tered by rushing out to the Colonies. Soldiers often enlist in Britain with the intention of deserting her. The worthy captain had been a private in the Guards, then took land at Quebec, and finally ruled the police there, while he brought up three sons as medical men, sending each of them to Edinburgh for education. The disturbances in the population are usually among the Irish ; but the high penalty of 5L terrifies the brawler from street drunkenness. When an emigrant settles on the " concession," of land, and sets to work to clear it, his neigh- bours generally help him freely. They come together when a " bee " is called. Some bring horses, or oxen, or carts, most of them tools, and all bring willing hands, whose work for their new friend is always hearty and unani- mous, so that his log-house may be raised even in a day. STEAMBOATS. 31 Passing through tribes of black-looking priests, carrying books and dressed in long robes, we descend the " break-neck stairs," very like those in Malta, and a fast little sailing-boat skims along, the tide bearing us to the Isle of Orleans. Here are fleets of stately vessels, sometimes sixty new ones in a day, sailing hundreds of miles inland, and there floats by a raft of deals, with huts like large dog-kennels upon it, to house the men who navigate the mass of tim- ber for weeks; and it is worth 10,000/. The steamboats are after the Yankee build, with the huge engine on deck, and two decks built high up in the air, with long eaved bal- conies, all painted white, and very sure to labour tremendously if not driven to port by a strong breeze. Then the deep tone of the railway whistle is not like our English engine shriek, with the drivers and firemen enclosed in a little room by the furnace, and a great bell booming as the train passes a road-crossing, the railway scarcely fenced at all. Behind it come half-a-dozen very long " cars," resting on wheeled framework at each end, and with the 1j M , ■ i t I'l 32 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. [I first-class full of second-class folks, ** and even blacks," while the second-class is filled with tobacco-smoke, curling out as the door slams at the end, to let in the guard dressed without >3iVv„ i, .t GREAT-WE<3TERN RAILWAY OUARD. uniform. A washing-room is in the first-class carriage, and a tub of drinking-water in the second-class. Round the first-class are some pegs, but few places for hats, umbrellas, parcels, and the etceteras that make an English railway seem your furnished home for the time being. Great MONTMORENCY. *,» noise, bottles applied to thirsty mouths, gusts of dusty wind, and scorching darts of sunshine, with a rumbling, a shaking, and clamour of voices, make these conveyances far better for observing character, or getting headaches and colds, than for chatting with fellow-travellers, or reading the paper. But you may travel first-class for 12s. 6d., over 170 miles, and enter the Hotel with full purse, calling out "Colonel" to the landlord, as he passes the other door, b died " Ladies' Entrance" to the " House" or Hall," as the veriest inn is called. , The falls of Montmorency are nearly oppo- site the pretty cottage where we find Mr. Buchanan, who, for many years, has done ex- cellent service as the Government Emigration Agent, and has very kindly helped and advised many a poor lad sent from the English Reform- atories, and Ragged-schools. The report of these emigrants* success is very encouraging. Boys well-taught, respectful, healthy, and fur- nished with a little money to "go west," may still come out in thousands with the certainty of good wages. As for girls, they are in such high request for domestic service, that even i f! ■fc i 34 OUll BROTHERS AND COUSINS. 11 untaught workhouse women come in hundreds at a time, and find places. The girls lately sent from St. Giles' Refuge, London, could scarcely get to their intended destination, they were so readily hired. . . Yet a little more method may be used with advantage in this matter, on both sides of the Atlantic. Hardly an instance occurs in which a boy follows out here the trade he has been taught, or half taught, at home. His indus- trial education, therefore, should be ordered as a discipline for promoting labour-notions, and strengthening mind, body, and morals, and not designed to perfect artizanship. His shoe- making, tailoring, and carpentering may be brought constantly into frequent use; but his trade is to be a farmer's lad, and work at any- thing and every tiling that a rough, steady boy can be trusted to do. The boy should not be directed irrevocably in England to go definitively to any one place in Canada, unless an actual vacancy, worth his acceptance, is settled for him; but the Emigra- tion agents in Quebec, Toronto, Hamilton, and elsewhere, may be safely trusted to direct the I EMIGRANT BOYS. 35 lad where to seek for employment, with the best chance of success. Many situations seem tempting from their high wages, when, in fact, the boy who engages himself to them, will be infallibly turned adrift in the winter. It seems quite clear, that nothing is wanted here in the nature of an institution or association to secure good places for these young emigrants, who appear already to receive all the help and advice which could be offered with advantage. The clergy, in the further country settlements, may, however, be more systematically interested in these boys, so as to secure friends to whom they may apply in times of doubt or difficulty, as well as guides, always more or less useful to the young. A girl can readily get 12s. 6d. a month, besides her board; and, as she can be brought to her place from England at the expense of 6/., it is really incumbent on all our British philanthropists, to urge and help Emigration far more extensively, seeing, that for less than a year's expense at an institution, in England, many of its inmates may be permanently located in comfortable situations in Canada. )l ii 36 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. ' Many of these emigrants appear to have writ- ten often to England without any reply from the kind teachers who were anxious to correspond with them. The miscarriage of letters both to and from the old country is an important matter; but from all that I can learn it is always the fault of the emigrants, who address their letters incorrectly and change their situations without proper notification here or in England of their new quarters. The large number of ill-defined and harassing applications made on this subject to Mr. Buchanan do not seem to have abated his benevolent readiness to render every help; and he has kindly offered to forward letters as well as possible, if addressed to his care. Some of the addresses must be rather puzzling to the "blind man" at the post-ofiice, such, for exam- ple, as " My son James Canada with one eye," which is nearly as bad as one that was written on a letter addressed to *' Jim Sykes in England him as was at Field-lane." Letters need not be pre-paid either here or in England. 1 hope to learn from the boys and girls tliem selves some more particulars as to their difficulties with re- spect to letters; but meantime it is well to know LONGEST BRIDGE IN TUE WORLD. 37 that the authorities are not in fault, and that help, rather than obstacles, may always be ex- pected from them. Let us continue to send out boys and girls in small batches, but far more frequently despatch- ing them J ^ o arrive here ' ; ^he months of May and June, and giving a little money and much power to the kind discretion of the agent, who will certainly do far better in appointing the emigrant's route than anybody at home. . The great tubular bridge at Montreal will be nearly two miles long, and by far the largest in the world. Good lithographic drawings of it are seen in many London shops ; and it will be a work of science and art of which Canada may be proud. Among the energetic and able men who urge such useful undertakings with perse- verance is the Hon. J. Young, who is as hospitable as he is clever. Hundreds of country gentlemen in England might envy Rosemount, the beautiful mansion of Mr. Young; and many a father would be glad to have such children as sport themselves in his sunny garden on a sum- mer's eve. I dined at the mess of the 17th Regiment, where Colonel Cole mentioned that !.f til I :« 38 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. since he liad established a reading-room for his men, the crime of the regiment had steadily decreased to one-half of its former amount. Surely such a means of good, which costs less than £20, might be tried with similar success in other regiments. Every good example may be noted for encouragement ; and we find nearly 100 soldiers attending the Soldiers' Institute in London for the Guards. 1 called on several leading members of the Church of England Young Men's Society of Montreal, which has about 300 in its ranks, and provides them an excellent room, far better than most of those of similar Societies in Lon- don. I promised also to address a Meeting of the Young Men's Christian Association in a day or two, and on Sunday I had the pleasure of addressing the schools of the Free Church of Scotland and Zion Chapel Congregationalists. The papers brought from England are eagerly received on such occasions, especially those of the Shoeblack Society, the Protestant Alliance, the Open-air Mission, and the Pure Literature Society, which last I have given to book-shops in country villages. OTTAWA. 39 Ottawa is the little town fixed upon for the future seat of united Government, though it is not yet accepted as such in Canada. The rail- way runs to it, through 160 miles of forest, and the grass grows luxuriantly between the rails. The place has 10,000 inhabitants, whose neat houses dot the tree-clad rocks around the mag- nificent falls, and gushing water pours along the mill-races, where I found it rather a delicate matter to urge my little bark canoe alone. I know not in any country a prettier site for a capital city. Even in this place there are six newspapers published, and no policemen. Some time since, the Society of Arts in London offered a prize of £20, for the best writing- case for soldiers and emigrants. Well, in this tiny capital I find a Scotch woman keep- ing a book shop, and selling " The York Shilling (7Jd.) Papeterie, containing 12 sheets of writing paper, 12 adhesive envelopes, 3 steel pens, a pen-holder, blotting-paper, and a bottle of ink." You could not get these articles for twice the money in Rome, Naples, Florence, or Madrid. I set off in the early fog of morning by steamer, with a picnic given by D*2 i ! <- I I 40 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. three Volunteer Corps, British Rifles and French Canadian Rifles in green uniform, and Artillery clothed like our own. With these a host of mothers, sisters, wives, and cousins, and more than a proportion of sweethearts, who soon began to dance on the upper deck before breakfast. The crowd was too much for the boat, and as it swayed her to and fro, the captain got alarmed and lost his head, while the ofiicers of the Vo- lunteers forgot all discipline and gave all sorta of contradictory orders. "Keep steady in the middle," said one; *' This side, come to thii side," cried another; ** Hallo there, come to the main galleries," shouted a third bearded colonist, with his steel scabbard rattling on the chain cable. All this made matters so much worse tliat the boat heeled over very deeply, and the water gushed in by the cabin windows till it filled the hold and reached the engine fires. Although we had not gone twenty miles, and the pic-nic was arranged for a place several miles distant, there was nothing for it but to run the great vessel ashore on a sandy beach beside a little hut, whose occupants ran out in amaze^ meut at the sight of 300 visitors. A canoe and PIC-NIC IN DANGER. 41 some boats began to land the ladies. The gallant militaires jumped into the water and extemporized a pier out of logs, casks, and a waggon seized in a field. I never saw so great confusion, though the danger being now over the excitement rebounded to a sort of frenzied hilarity. Scores of tall Volunteers waded, carry- ing crates of provisions and hampers of pies ; one man bore the big drum on his head, while others thumped it. Guns firing, women shrieking, men tumbling about with laughter in the shallow water, trumpets clanging, and children squalling, while a long line of rescued passengers filed through the wood to some shady rendezvous, where no doubt the party were as happy as if they had all gone safely to their proper landing. All this was a strange preparation for the address I gave in the evening to a large meeting in Zion Church, the scene of the Gavazzi riots, a very commodious building, as indeed most of the well built public edifices seem to be. The churches have exquisitely formed spires all gleaming with bright tin covering which preserves its brilliancy for twenty years. The clanging^ of shop-shutters resounds as the sun goes down, and the reddened [| I <■ 1 I" li re 42 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. west is reflected coolly on the noble river stud- ded with fishing-boats or Indian canoes slowly paddling to their bark huts yonder, where the blue smoke curls by the water's brink, and the fish leap freely in the glassy pools. Adieu, good brothers in Canada, you are near our English hearts. , j i r . aK , 1 l»iii , ,i.. I , jB i ' i tfjui .j tw >». *i -i.ii* w aMit 1\ CHAPTER V. AMERICAN FASIIIONAHLES — SILENT YANKEES — AN EATIXO RACE — now TO SEE NIAGARA — SAMfiO AND A CRISIS — TOIKJNTO — AN ELECTION — THE TELEGUAFII CABLE —GAOL BIRDS. A ND SO this id Saratoga, United States, tl o well-known fashionable watering-place vith American society in its most startling form. Huge hotels stretch piazzas along the trees in the streets, and a buzz of smoking, wide- awaked men and ladies, with alarming circum- ferences, but without any bonnets, move about as if the whole town were the grounds of a private house. Even in Spain (not to say France), I defy you to find sach an upturning of all our conventional notions of woman's out- door life. And yet all is managed with propriety, how- ever little good taste there may be in parading the streets with bare arms, thin gauze-like ball dresses, and nothing on your head. h • ■■^. 44 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. A great deal of money, time, and energy, must be expended here; and wliile a merry party may joyously recruit themselves at this, as at other spas, it is a very melancholy affair for a poor lonely bachelor to go on drinking the odorous water, and observing all around without one word. I do not find the Americans, by any means, so communicative as they are represented. In the ** cars,'' the din of the railway stops all con- versation that is not very emphatic. At their meals, there is an impressive silence until the clatter of plates is finished by one guest or another drawing away his chair, to get up, with a hoarse, unsocial, grating sound on the boards of the great hall, that contrasts most painfully with the genial pose of John Bull when he turns half round after dinner, and unlocks his taciturn soul to all comers. In the steamboat, again, the various groups are so dissevered, that a stranger has very little opportunity of entering into down- right conversation, as in England, on the Rhine, or throughout the Mediterranean. A quiet half-hour after every meal, would be a specific for much of that restlessness which A MIGHTY QUICK DINNER. 45 y IS a e t every American seems born to ; and hence, per- haps, the thin -limbed men and pale women of the great republic. One of those voracious citi- zens said, "1 tell you what it is, Sir, 1 guess 1 have a good appetite, and can finish my dinner any day in seven minutes." " Oh, that 's no- thing !'' answered a sarcastic Briton; " I have a hound that can bolt his dinner in three ! " In another place two Yankees tried a race at din- ner; but one pushed the pepper-castor under the other's nose — he gave one cougli, and lost the race. The new building for the University at Toronto, when finished, will be a remarkable edifice, unique in appearance. There is a col- lege for almost every religious denomination; but that for the Church of England — Trinity College — is separate from the rest, for reasons which are far too intricate for me to begin a discussion about, without very soon commit- ting numerous mistakes. I have met only four Episcopal clergy of the States, and they all seemed to be decidedly High Church; and, no doubt, were startled by the Open-air Mission Reports that I ventured to give tliem. But, in f i. v 46 OUU BROTHERS AND COUSINS. I s Toronto, clergy and ministers of all the Evan- gelical bodies, readily gave a hearing to an account of London work; and a meeting in their largest church, listened with interest to " Christian news from England." 1 saw Niagara to very great advantage in magnificent weather, with a full moon at night and the water higher than it has been for forty years. This is one of the few sights that can- not disappoint the most elevated anticipations. The beauty of the scene is not sufficiently in- sisted upon, when it is continually described, in relation to its sublimity. From the first view of it, you discard the idea of a waterfall, and look upon the great thing before you as a totally new event, sight and sound giving new impres- sions, and assuming to itself at once an air of personality, by which every part becomes a liv- ing member of an overpowering whole. You cannot help feeling a sympathy for the waters of the river before they fall. Hurried down the rapids, they secin to cling with desperate tenacity to the islets, and eddy round the rocks to escape their doom. But all these efforts are vain j and there is a resigned calm of despair just before the HOW TO SEE NIAGARA. 47 ran- an in to awful leap, and after it, again, the writhing of foam in agony, leaping from the pool below, and moving once more sullenly onwards, with an humbled, heartbroken look. The best part of the ftills, and the best views, are all on the Canadian side; but everybody who wishes to see it all thoroughly gets into a little steamboat, to go right into the foam of the falls. For this everybody puts on an oilskin cloak, and everybody looks like a hooded monk, and everybody becomes aware that you can't see the waterfall for the water. Still it is the only view of Niagara not seen in every album, and so you will find it over leaf.^ Below the falls, the banks approach so near that one may see the " darkies " on the American rocks, who would be free for ever, if they could cross this river. And they do cross it constantly. Only a few days ago, two runaway slaves made good their liberty ; and, as they left the other side, no doubt they hummed the tune of*' the land of the brave and the free," as it is foolishly called by our good friends, whose flag has * The tower above is reached by a craggy bridge. Termi- nation Rock has since boon carried away (December, 1858). '■\^ I I i ■ 48 OUU B110THE118 AND COUSINS. '* Stars" for the white, and "stripes" for the bhick. MA«iAl; A, The most reliable information I can obtain i'vom all sources, a<;rees in the statement, that SAMBO AND A CRISIS. 49 he |.vv, free blacks appear far less frequently in police cases, or other indications of bad behaviour, than the proportion of their numbers might warrant. This is more than ought to be expected of a race downtrodden for generations ; for how low should we white folk sink, if we had been treated like the negroes ! These men have two churches in Hamilton, and their interest is sufficiently im- portant in Toronto, to cause electioneering cal- culations always to estimate the " coloured vote." Indeed, they had the walls of the town covered with placards, summoning a political meeting of their tribe ; and thus, while they are peaceable, they are also not forgetful of their political privi- leges as British subjects. " Sambo " is usually a very staunch Tory. He votes for the Tory, even if the candidate is not a friend of the negro, lie excels in light handiwork, and is very clever at the important business of whitewashing the interior of houses, a feat he can perform without requiring any of the drawing-room furniture to be removed. There is a " crisis " here just now. By-the-bye were you ever at any place where there was not a ** crisis" just at that moment? The great political crisis in Canada may best be E ^ I ; 50 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. If understood at a distance. It is utterly beyond me to make anything of it, looking at all sides from within. If the Komanists all took one side, as they usually do, I should know, of course, that the other side was the right one to wish well for. But even the Romanists are divided in this case. I got a sketch of the hustings on nomination day, when the two candidate? ?poke in dumb show to 3,000 very remarkable-looking mobs- men, whose various types of dress, feature, speech, colour, and manner, it would be difficult to describe. The cable -joy, or telegraph-ecstasy, of our American cousins, seems boundless, though it is only beginning. It has all the absurdities that fringe many solid sentiments here. A Chicago paper says, " The world is finished, its spinal cord is laid, and now it begins to think T Another : " A cable it is, indeed ! To it is attached the best bovver anchor let down deep in the hearts of two great nations, and its flukes are embedded among their living fibres." The Buffalo Republic writes: " How shall the heart of Buffalo contain its immeasurable felicity? How shall the Queen FAT MEN AND THE CABLE. 51 city find vent for her surcharged feelings? " A Philadelphia paper says: '^ Obviously the sun and moon are now effete; and leaving the small system called solar, we must mark our time and take our guides among eternal suns/' Another announces: " Unless we have a national jubilee, the pressurt will burst the boiler of the American Eepublic, and lay out the American Eagle * dead as a wedge.' " Among the various great public bodies who have already celebrated the cable, there was a procession in Massachusets of " fat men," who marched to the top of the Hog*s Backhill, ** no person under 210 pounds being allowed to join." The following was the pro- gramme: — The Deacon. ^ Fat men weighing 280 pounds. Fat men weighing 250 pounds. Common fat men weighing but 220 pounds. Mortified fat men weighing but 210 pounds. But our fat friends, and lean ones, too, seem prone to forget, that the cable was not laid by them alone; that five out of six of the vessels employed were British ; that the cable was made in England, and carried from British soil to British soil, chiefly by British capital. 52 OUR BUOTIIEKS AND COUSINS. i fii Among the tombstones in the Saratoga ceme- tery, I noticed one which had a photograph of the deceased person conspicuously set in the top of the marble slab. " The young Lords " from England, now visiting America, are said to be " the rage of the season;" and a story is in print, of the amazement with which a democratic belle heard that the father of one of these noble youths actually sometimes calls him " Freddy." I had much satisfaction in renewing acquain- tance with several professed thieves and '* gaol birds," who had emigrated to Canada from one or other of our English reformatories. Out of about fourteen thus visited, I think only one is not doing well. Some of these interesting younsr people were, of course, not criminals, but merely destitute in England. One is in a post of trust in a public office. Of another, once a shoe-black, we had lost intelligence for some years; but I acci- dentally recognised him driving a carriage, and this fine, tall young artilleryman jumped down from his box, with all the feelings revived of his daily stand, in a red jacket, at the Royal Ex- change. Another politely offered to drive me HAPPY GIRLS. 53 round the country in his master's gig; and two were actually married to partners of their pros- perity. Seven girls, sent out some months ago from St. Giles's Refuge, were well placed in Hamilton by the worthy Matron, who came over from London twice with her pupils. These young servants I met in a body, and the difference be- tween their blue frocks in St. Giles's, and their somewhat showy dresses in Canada, was fully borne out by their happy faces full of gratitude. One of them sends back a present to her London pastor, in the shape of a butterfly long preserved; another sends an Indian peacock's feathe". All the girls are kindly supervised by a good lady, who allows them to visit her on Sunday even- ings. Emigration, when thus properly conducted, is an enormous benefit. The Government agent at Hamilton strongly recommends, that fifty boys should be sent from England to a far-off backwood settlement, where they could be trained to hardy farm labour, which is precisely the training they get least of at home, and are most desired to have here. I ii 64 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. i I . I CHAPTER VI. BKOADWAT — TELEGRAPH SERMON — A DAT IN THE SLUMS — TATTOOED SHOEBLACKS— BOY POLICE — SUNDAY BAND — LEK AVENUE SCHOOL — A PIC-NIC. TI/TANY parts styled fine scenery in the States, seem to comprise much that is worth no- tice, without any decidedly overpowering points except those like Niagara that are world-wide in notability. The voyage down the Hudson is thus full of interest, and like the Norwegian scenery pleases continuously without ever carry- ing you away in rapture. The entire omission of old castles and ivy-coloured battlements is as much felt by the European traveller here, as the constant addition of these features must be an extraordinary luxury to the American tourist in Europe. And now, having left Canada behind, I shall resist the temptation to moralise about it at length. It is a land deeply impressive, because BliOADWAY. 55 :i3 even more in the future than these States, which have ahnost caught up the present age. When they have quite overtaken the jog-trot of Europe, the Yankees will cease to think themselves always a-head. The best informed of them are ever the most moderate and reason- able in judging themselves. An American, be- fore and after he has visited Europe, is like two different persons. New York resembles, in form, a turbot, with its head to the south, a river on each side in which lie its fins, the wooden wharves ser- rated with sliipping. The backbone of the fish represents Broadway, ad the ribs are the nu- merous streets across, while the eye is a green spot of trees and badly kept grass, the mouth is a fort, and in the tail are the northern suburbs. Broadway is as long and broad as Oxford- street, but far more imposing. The houses are like those on the Boulevards of Paris, but with- out so many balconies. At each end is the spire of a fine church, and the street is slightly curved, both in level and direction, so as very much to increase its beauty. Few things appear to I i 'i i I \- .1" I 5G OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. r I more disadvantage than a long, level, straight street, unless it has very great width. The white marble, brick, brown stone, painted iron, and various coloured houses are brilliant in tints, lofty in proportions, very much set off by a bright atmosphere, streamers flying, painted signboards, white omnibuses, and well-dressed people. Almost the whole length of the street has shops on the ground-floor, and many are good, while about twenty seem of the highest class. At this season of the year one expects to find few private carriages or ladies in this street, and the expectation is fulfilled. There are also very few heavy waggons, and no great-teamed vehicles to denote commercial traffic, for all this is carried on in other parallel streets. But the foot-pavement of Broadway is very inferior to its shops and stores, much more so than in any street I can recollect in any town. As far as shops go and general promenades, Broadway is New York, — once leave it and you are in a totally different style. The Fifth Avenue and other fine streets are a little further off. The roadway in most of the other streets adjoining is very disgraceful, with huge blocks in some. TELEGRAPH PREACIIEU. 57 I great puddles in others, while deep holes in the ample foot pavement keep you always looking downwards picking your steps. It seems as if the cost of one of these fine *' stores " with fifty windows and walls of carved marble would pay for a proper pavement for the whole street. Probably this incongruity is a symbol of the difference between private enterprise and public official negligence. The public buildings of New York are inferior to the character of the town, while the private buildings and their fur- niture seem beyond the other features of the people. Equipages and dress in general assume the French style ; and, perhaps, what is required by the English eye, is not a fair standard to judge by. Take it as a whole, Broadway seems to comprise as much of beauty in colour, bustle, liLxe^ business, and cheerful variety combined, as any single street in the Old World. I heard a ** Telegraph Sermon" at Trinity Church, where good music and a large and very attentive congregation constituted the circum- stances of a very useless discourse. But it was indeed refreshing to dive into tlie Five Points district, and visit the Mission-schools, and sec **i ;. i ".I it J m |:.| ■!■ 53 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. there the same lively zeal in teaching the mise- rable that brightens even the darkest spots in English towns. The filth and disorder of the New York '' slums '' look worse than anything in London or Dublin, chiefly because they are within a few yards, nay, even inches, of the marble palaces, and because the people are not ragged, nor their lanes narrow, nor their houses of that hopeless, dull colour, that begets utter despair when you reach such localities in South- wark or the Liberties, In London, the vastness and the consistency of the whole panorama of poverty give an air of settled firmness which makes you wonder how it can ever be improved. Here the poor localities are so small in area, so out of keeping with houses still quite new, and apparently so manageable, by their prox- imity to opulence, that the wonder is how these wretched scenes can stand for a day unbettered. The bad smells and abundant dirt are certainly worse than in any part of London. The schools are better ventilated, furnished, and cleaned than any in London designed for the poorest class. There is, in the Five Points, answering to our Seven Dials, the Wesleyan School for the TATTOOED SHOEBLACKS. 59 ragged cliildren, and another, within a few yards, crowded with well-dressed visitors, a sight that is not to be seen in Britain. The children are nearly all American. I could sit for hours examining the indescribable but very evident difference between their looks, manners, dress, and whole bearing, and the corresponding fea- tures in any English ragged-school. I don't think that the real Irish ragged boy here has as yet been detached from the priest; and, though many may be in certain schools, I found every little Paddy I spoke to went to a Popish one. The first three of this genus I came upon were all shoeblacks. One showed the badge of his order, in the shape of some cabalistic marks tattooed in his skin, which he said cost one shilling, and was executed by some master of the art. He said nobody was allowed in their society who could not open his shirt sleeve and show this mark; but I found plenty other freebooters who plied their craft without the trade-mark. In one excellent school there are twenty-five Monitor boys elected by the others. These have four captains and lieuten- ants, and form a little body of juvenile police, I hi ,, 60 OUR BllOTHERS AND COUSINS. i \ who are bound to keep order outside and in the school. Each has a bright metal star on his breast, with a chain to his jacket-collar, exactly resembling the New York police introduced (by considerable disturbance) last year. These bo}'- police have fixed hours, and posts of duty in school; and, if the admirable order preserved is due to this regulation, thou I must say it is a desirable institution, an^ i 111 64 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. CHAPTER VII. THE CABLE FEVER — FIREMEN — ODD MOTTOES— -A BARKIS TER's wig — LUNATICS REFUGE — REVIVAL PRAYER-MEETING. CALLIOPE — "iSMb" — HOUSE OF T HOPE that John Bull will hear m a proper spirit a full account, and from some better pen than mine, of the violent ecstasies of Cousin Jonathan when he found the thin quick wire had joined their hearts again. Even Americans aver that this cable-celebration exceeds any of their former exhibitions of feeling. It was a difficult thing to do well, but it was right well done in New York. They say, everybody but the babies was in Broadway; but I saw many babies there, and hear I them too. No one street anywhere was better suited f r this show; and the performances lasted full twelve hours of unwearied rejoicing. The people were on their good behaviour, so there were no rows nor rowdies (except, by MOB LAW. 65 the way, a hundred respectable men, who went and burned down all the Quarantine houses, led on by an ex-judge, who fired the first torch). The poor dying patients were left on the grass to bear Thursday's fierce sun ; and, if they sur- vived, to be blasted by a hurricane on Friday, or drowned next day in a terrible storm of rain."^ The street was densely packed all day by a well-dressed host, beside some thousand women and servant-girls, who sat for hours in long rows upon the kerbstone. The people were too glad to cheer or to ** chaff," except when a policeman got wrathful or somebody struck up " God save the Queen," which was always ap- plauded. Not many banners were hung out, and very few carpets or hangings graced the beautiful windows; but rows of smiling (and some) pretty faces peered from the sixth story of every house. Cyrus Field was the popular favourite, and a * The conduct of the authorities in this matter was scan- dalous; every American protests against it, but sanctions it hy inaction. The rioters were ac(iuitted in November, be- cause they had destroyed only what was proclaimed to be a nuisance. Here, then, is the law: " A.'s house is a nuisance; therefore, B. may burn it." .;i I ■ 13 {. S . • I ^ i i V i ii III I 1 1 ee OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. I iii nice-looking modest young man he is. Next to him, Captain Hudson — that Christian sailor — and the British tars. The soldiers were in force ; such new multifarious uniforms — red, blue, green, yellow, grey, indeed every colour that even London shoeblacks can put on — horse, foot, and artillery — Germans, and kilted Highlanders, with clanging bands and ranks well kept, shoulder to shoulder, by stalwart broad-backed citizens. The United States' army is not to be despised, and the people seem in- tensely fond of soldiering. Then came the trades, and innumerable societies of " Odd Fel- lows," " ^lasons,'' " Bummers,^' and other queer sets, marshalled behind huge cars, like moving houses, full of gay-dressed mimers of every sort. The Crystal Palace received its ten thousand; but the affair there was poorly managed. The building is about twice the size of the Surrey Gardens' Music Hall, and exquisitely adapted for not hearing. It was a sad mistake for Jona- than to call this edifice a Crystal Palace !"^ As evening fails, the firemen begin their long- drawn march, with a hundred engines, brilliant * Never mind he has burned it down since this was written. fire! fire I 67 with brass, and hauled along by sturdy firemen, all clad in red Jerseys. They need those fine fellows, too; for there has been a fire every night since I came. Each engine had its de- vices illuminated; and many bore as a badge a stuffed bear, a living eagle, or an elephant of oil-silk inflated like a balloon, that tumbled about in most amusing gambols. Each fireman car- ried a Roman candle, pouring forth a lurid glare, and ever and anon shooting aloft a shower of sparkling shells; while guns fired, crackers fizzed, squibs burst, and the people screamed with delight. The houses were not generally illuminated, but several were lit up in every pane ; and this wall of fire was higher than in any of our London illuminations, though the excitement and bright glare were not like that which the Strand and Regent-street display on such occasions. Good temper and unwonted quiet prevailed everywhere. The devices and mottoes were all puzzled out by the wondering citizens, and by many thousands from other States, who poured in by the steamers, the rail- roads, and those nice roomy, cheap and cool omnibuses, that run on railway-tracks along the \i 'ii I '\ri ^tfc;-^ MISSOURI STEAMBOAT. a dim, close atmosphere, reeking with tobacco and rum all day and all night, crowded with dirty, vulgar, swearing men, who are all civil when the ice is broken, but then the ice is so very thick. With these companions I slept on the floor, which quivers under the tremen- 102 OUR BBOTHEBS AND COUSINS. If dous power of a high-pressure engine, liable at any moment to blow you into the clouds. The heat from the sun permeates the thin planking of the flimsy vessel ; and, what with the ring- ing of engine bells, jingling of chains, slamming of doors, and exit of passengers at all times of the night, I think there is scarcely any means of travelling made so abominable, or that might be made so pleasant. ' * ^ The Missouri is a noble-looking river, plung- ing along at a furious pace, and cutting away miles of forest bank one year, or diving into a prairie the next, with sudden and im- petuous waywardness. The banks for hun- dreds of miles are covered with thick forests; and, as the earth is swept away, the trees fall in, turn round, get fastened by the roots at the bottom, then each becomes a " snag." Sometimes a hundred of these snags may be seen at one time, all pointing their sharp ends down the stream, and able, and looking willing, too, any of them, to smite the strongest vessel, not to say a frail *hin steamer like the Hesperia. We passed a steamer that had sunk ; and another went down the day I arrived here. SNAGS AND SANDBANKS. 103 Besides being dangerous, the navigation of the river is very uncertain, from the shift- ing of sandbanks. We got aground about fifty times, and were delayed at one bank eighteen hours, struggling to push the boat over it by huge spars, worked by powerful tackle. This delay caused us to continue the journey during part of Sunday, which is always a very unpleasant thing, however necessary it may be on an occasion like this, where no town intervened for stopping at. The pilots manage most artistically. I never saw more nautical skill displayed in handling a craft, where stream, banks, snags, and wind have all to be considered at every moment. This mighty river is navigable for about 3,000 miles, that is, 1,500 miles beyond this spot. The deck hands of nearly all the steamers are Irishmen, and their work is very severe day and night, week-day and holiday, eating and sleeping while they may, and drinking always. For this, they get thirty shillings a -week ; but the price of articles seems to make these wages go no further than half the sum would do in England. I am told, that hardly one English- 104 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. t* 1 man or American will work in this capacity, and I do not wonder at it. After two days I got a cabin, with four people crammed, in this hot weather, into a very little place, and for the whole 150 persons, there were only three basins for washing. But I do not think that the Americans are a dirty people. They provide these for the usual run of travellers, who, on this river, are just what would come to London-bridge in a third-class train. At dinner, the gong sounds. Every man stands behind a chair. The ladies march on, and drive as many men back, who will have to come to another dinner. When all the ladies are provided, bang goes the gong again, and, in an instant, every man has sat down, and finished the soup that has been toned dc vn to a genial coolness, during the long preliminaries. On my right, I find a backwoodsman, with a hungry look, that soon tells on the desperately tough meat; and on my left, a man without stockings, and covered with rags and dirt, in- deed, exactly, and without any exaggera- tion, in the costume of a man that passes along the Strand with a cinder-cart, calling out Dust-ho ! SALT8P00NS AND BUTTERKNIVES. 105 Now I do not object j " roughing it.'* Few people like more than I do to consort with all classes; but I do object to forcing those people to an apparent equality, whose habits and tastes are different, and who clearly indicate they are not at ease, by preserving a dead silence, and then rushing away as soon as possible from one another. It must never be forgotten that there are some people who do use saltspoons, and butterknives, nailbrushes and pocket-handker- chiefs. I had many long talks with these hardy settlers. In one case an infidel went so far as to propose a discussion; and the calibre of the controversy may be discerned from the way in which the questions were spelled when written, " God made all things from desine, God forenew all things." ^ ' ' ' ' ' • The weary idle passengers who do not read or even pace the deck, but consume the whole day in spitting, gathered in a mass round the argument, and a great deal of good was done by this regular and temperate discussion. I found the British Workman, and the Shoe- black Reports just as popular on the Missouri '■: ; 106 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. as on the Thames. The passengers seemed all to be on business. I have met no American travelling for pleasure. One of the men in my cabin was a Pole, from California; another, an Irishman, from the French army in Algeria; another, an Irishman who went to the Kev. J. Gregg's church, in Dublin. The first man I met in Kansas was a Macdonald, of Glengarry; and the grocer's shop is kept by a Campbell, from Argyleshire. One of the mates was a Dane; and a Manchester lad came to me this morning, saying, " I think you are an English- man, you are very like one of our shop clerks in Macclesfield." An old lady who heard that a Mr. Macgregor has died in Glasgow, leaving her some thousands of pounds, is to give me half the money, if I get her the remain- der; at least, that was the proposal on her side ! On Sunday, I found a minister from the south, who was going to the Conference of his Church at Kansas, and he soon entered into conver- sation as a full, strong, determined slaveholder. Imagine our being taught the freedom of the Gospel by one who buys and sells men and COOL ROBBERY. Tor fe. women ! Another passenger I f < nd rea«Siig Bogatzky, and he joined in the proposal that we should try to have a short service on Sunday, in the ladies' cabin, which was managed very agreeably, and much to our edification. How perfect and immediate is the mutuality of Chris- tians the moment they meet. Everybody knows that Kansas is still a subject of dispute between the Slavery party and Free-soil party of America. A short time ago, no man who opposed slavery was safe if he seemed to be coming here. Free-soil passengers were turned out of the boat, and cannon were used to effect this. The reaction is powerful; and now it is scarcely safe for a slavery man to settle in Kansas. They appear to be determined, that when admitted as a State they shall have no slaves. But law will be a long time before it rules here properly. We had two robbers on the boat, who stole money and clothes from seven or eight people, and I saw them decamp by jumping ashore and stealing a boat, in which they rowed quietly down the river. At Jefferson City I heard an amateur band ii 108 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. serenade a young lady, who was going to leave the place, and their negro melody music sounded most sweetly by the bright moonlight at one o'clock in a fine night. This is the only music I have heard in America, where I had expected to hear so much. I have never heard any Ame- rican sing or whistle at his work ; not even a woman whispers a lullaby to her child. All this is, of course, because I have not gone to the music; but certainly if there is any it has not come to me. Dollar, dollar, dollar! This is the ringing music of the West. Oh, how tired I am of the very word ! To-day, I went over tlie river to a quiet grove and sat down, thinking there might be peace; but, no, I heard an auctioneer on the other bank selling horses, and every gust of the breeze brought over the words, " Going for ten dollars!" - On the Kansas side, I inspected, with great interest, the regular old route to California, the way-worn track through the forest, along which so many hopeful feet have marched, and so many limped back wearily or laden with gold. Large trains of waggons continually pass through this CALIFORNIA ROAD. 109 place upon that long journey, it is a work of months, and the toil, danger, eickness, Indians, famine, thirst, cold, heat, expense, and anxiety .that must be encountered, show how much will be endured for money. I saw whole families slowly dragged along in long, light waggons, by four oxen. The affair looks exceedingly unro- mantic, and altogether different from tlie ex- ploration of some ancient land, where the grand works of ages may be disclosed to tlie aspiring explorer. I think 'the journey would be the very last I should have any desire to attempt even in an adventurous mood. But the chief excitement about gold in this part of the world, is that of the new diggings at Pike*s Peak, about 700 miles west from this, and many people have gone there without enough provisions, so as to be almost starving while their hands are full of gold. I found the little town of Elwood, Kansas, built in the forest. It is only just one year since the first house was put up, and here there is a newspaper — the Kansas Weekly Press, many shops, 1,000 inhabitants, a saw- mill, a church, and an liotel. The timber is left standing in the streets, and the scene i'i 110 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. altogether was the most interesting specimen of rapid colonization that could be seen. It is called the " yearling town/' and is said to be a very ** big baby." ^ The whole town will be washed away by the Missouri in one of its stormy freaks ; and the place I am writing from is also falling into the river as I write. I saw part of a house this morning of which half had just tumbled into the yellow torrent. Here I read an English book about a pretty village in Somersetshire, and the violent sudden desire that seized me to get back to our neat, pleasant homes, has come just in time to speed me over the prairies to the East — to the East! i. li * A grand coloured prospectus was gravely supplied to me, with a map delineating Ellwood and three railways to it (none of which exist); the description, however, begins: *' This is the most flourishing city in Northern Kansas." Englishmen, caught by a similar falsehood some time ago, founded the town of Cairo on the Mississippi; and when heaps of gold had been blindly buried, they discovered that the site of their intended town was actually below the level of the river ! V lH I CHAPTER XL MISSISSIPri— NAUVOO AND MORMONS — MINNESOTA — SNOW — MINNEHAHA — CHICAGO — COLOURED CHURCH — INDIAN SCALPING. TTERE we are 2,000 miles up the Mississippi, and the mighty ** father of waters " is still navigable 200 miles more above the rapids. What a changed climate one sees on this river ! A few weeks ago, too hot to stir out in the sun ; and now wrapped in a buffalo skin be- side a stove, with ice around, and snow falling. Nevertheless, I took a long drive by the falls of St. Anthony, where the Mississsppi tumbles over some pretty rocks, and then to the Minnesota River, with its sparkling cascade " Minne-ha-ha." There never was a more beautiful name for a waterfall. It is Indian, and means '* laughing water," as Minnesota means " sky-blue water.'* A book was written lately upon this new State of the Union, by my friend Mr. L. Oli- phant, who is now with Lord Elgin in China, III \ i K I- 1 112 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. and will doubtless tell the public of the falls on the Yang-tse-kiang. I found that by the wonderful accommodation of railroads and fast steamers, it was possible to NAUVOO OF THE MORMONS. add another thousand miles to my tour before going eastward towards Europe; and, certainly, the scenery on the Upper Mississippi is well worth visiting, though it is strongly marked ROLLING PRAIRIES. 113 With the characteristic of pleasant mediocrity, which is so universal here, except at Niagara. The little sketch of Nauvoo was made from between the two great '' smoke pipes " of our Mississippi steamer. Here the notorious *' Joe Smith " founded his Mormon settlement. His temple is seen on the hill ; his half- finished hotel is by the river; and his widow (wife No. 1) still resides in that little house at the end of the road. The Americans always speak of Mor monism as a thing gone by. It is only in London and Wales that it continues to deceive. The flourishing state of Illinois has its rolling prairies* pierced by the never weary rail, straight as an arrow, for miles and miles. There is won- derful similarity between all the American rail- roads, as far as regards system. You rumble along in the great airy " cars," with a stove in the centre, and a pail of iced water at the end. The whistle sounds a peculiar groan (for it speaks deep-toned here, not shrilly), and every head pops up to see the cows run along, until the * A prairie is a field of rank grass, 200 miles between the fences. When the surface undulates, it is called a ** rolling prairie." It has not the sublimity of a desert of sand. 4 i«i ih 114 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Vi ■: engineer dismounts to pelt them with stones. By the card of stations given to each person, you see that " this train stops for refreshment at Paris/' or London, or Cairo (the old towns are all reduplicated) ; and Paris comes in sight — about fifty wooden houses painted white, with large signboards in black letters, labelled ** Dry Goods " (the term for hosiery) , " Iron Store," " Everything Store," " World's Fair/' and the inns named " Washington House/' '* Madison House." As the great bell tolls on the engine, you pass right through the principal street without any fence whatever, and the ragged boys cling to the '' cars '^ for a " ride/' selling apples, newspapers, and " candy." At the three doors of the three eating-houses of Paris, are three women, ringing three bells, to invite you to three dinners at twelve o'clock; but the regu- lar dinner is on the other side, and it is more officially announced by a black man beating a gong. Here we find beef, mutton, chicken, and pork, all very tough ; and as many kinds of bread and vegetables, all very nice, with sweet things and puddings truly delectable. Kothing but water CLANK, CLANK. 115 is drunk at dinner. You pay your two shillings, and the prairie, and rumbling, and whistling, go on again till supper-time at six o'clock, when you find you have gone one hundred miles whizzing over those shaking bridges, swinging round those sharp corners, and clank, clank, on the rough " track/* where each wheel thumps the unfastened end of every rail. Before you reach the terminus, a porter inquires what hotel you will stop at, and takes your baggage cheques, that he may fetch up your valise, which is thence- forth absolutely committed to his charge. With twenty others, you get out of the omnibus, and appear at the bar of the ** Tremont House," Chicago, a sort of office, large and bustling, covered with advertisements, maps, and bills, and embedded in tobacco smoke. You enter your name and residence, and wait patiently (or other- wise) until your baggage arrives, and a room is assigned, which you greatly rejoice to and has only one bed. For second-class travellers, the locomotion and hotels of America are superior to those of England; while, in both third-class and first-class accommodation, their inferiority is evident and universal. 1 ■ ih ' . I I I !M 116 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Cliicago has sprung into existence with more rapidity than any other town in America. In a few years, it has attained a population of 150,000. Most of the houses are of wood; and many of the broad streets are actually planked with tim- ber throughout their entire length. The prepa- ration of a good roadway, except on the railroad, seems aways the last thing thought of here. I was not able to examine the Christian efforts of Chicago; but I see that the Union prayer- meeting is thinly attended there. , > , ^ ** These are the Rules for the Firemen's Union Frayer Meetings, at Philadelphia. "1. Hymn. (Not over four stanzas.) *' 2. Prayer, by request. ** 3. Reading Scriptures. (Not over eight or ten verses.) ; , . t "These three exercises not to occupy more than 15 minutes, then the meeting to be left open for prayer or exhortation. "No person to pray or exhort over five minutes, or to do both at the same meeting. " Not more than two prayers or exhortations consecutively. , . * " Those who take part in the exercises firemen's peayers. 117 should face the larger portion of the audience, and speak in clear, distinct tones, ** Toun^ Men are expected to participate. ** No controverted points or denominational differences to be discussed. ** The leader will strike the bells whenever the rules are disregarded, or when he wishes to gain the floor in order to direct the exercises." The Rev. Dr. Howard, a Baptist minister in Chicago, preached a most excellent sermon on the deadly touch of Uzzah, and the healing touch of the hem of Christ's garment. The ser- mon was ,read from manuscript, and admirably delivered. I regret to find that the " Universalists " num- ber in their cold, dead body, many well-taught men, and most able preachers. In the afternoon, I listened, with very great delight, to a black preacher, in a " coloured man's church," where almost all the congrega- tion were fugitive slaves. The whole service was well-conducted, and without a particle of that over-wrought excitement which may be noticed as a blemish in several negro churches. The choir numbered several singers, of so white ; 118 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. m il^ -! a skin that no one but a slave-driver would dare to call them black. The rough blasts of travel- ling have made me far more "weather-browned'* than many of those whose skin is thought dark enough to warrant its being sold with a human being in it. One man played the flute very tastefully as the choir sung, and the sable con- gregation joined, all standing up, and turning round with their backs to (he pulpit. It was with the heartiest goodwill that I par- took of the Lord's Supper with these poor fugi- tives, and gave a liberal contribution from a kind lady in London, where this black minister might occupy many pulpits without disparage- ment. In the evening, the church was crowded to hear an account of open-air preaching in England, illustrated by some simple anecdotes. Afterwards I went home with one of the Church elders, and had a long and useful con- versation in his family circle, where a neat, comfortable home showed how a black man escaped from slavery can live. He gave me a copy of Fred. Douglas* Paper, a journal edited by a runaway slave ; and I would boldly ask the whole American nation to point to any news- paper in the States that has better writing or MISSISSIPPI PILOTS. 119 more tact. I think that the negro is much '•wujer to the white man than many white men allow. In the matter of gentle bearing and true politeness, I would deliberately place him on an equality with any class I have seen here. From Chicago I went back again to the great highway of waters — the noble Mississippi. The class of travellers was a great improvement on those steaming up the Missouri; indeed, many of them washed their hands before dinner, and the beautiful steamers paddled along with dig- nity and comfort. The water of the river is lower just now than for many years. On two oc- casions we were stuck fast for twelve hours in the shoals, while a fearful thunder-storm raged over- head, and the loud screams of myriads of wild geese sounded through the blasts of rain. The pilots of these boats are each paid more than a thousand pounds a-year; and well they earn their pay, steering the vast floating edifice, with two hun- dred sleepers on board, through the most in- . tricate shoals on the darkest nights. These river pilots are certainly "first-rate"; they are exceptions to the uniform mediocrity. As we steamed day and night steadily northward, the I 'I'i .i : i 81. .' ^3 1 120 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. cold grew more intense, the comet showed more brilliantly, and the aurora gleamed at eventide. The Indians in Minnesota have been fighting a good deal lately; and a fellow-traveller told mc, that at one of the dances of the Chippewas, there were six scalps suspended over the fire. The American army have a hard struggle with these brave wild men, at this moment, in a more western State. One of the officers affirmed, that the force of ten thousand men was scarcely enough to keep them in check. Sir G. Simpson, Dr. Rae, the Arctic traveller, and Mr. Ellis, M.P., passed through this town last week, to make arrangements for the trade of the Hudson bay Company. Lord F. Cavendish, Lord R. Grosvenor, Hon. Mr. Ashley, and Mr. Seymour, M.P., have gone still further northward; but this stormy weather, which, however, usually precedes th(i second, or " Indian summer,'' will probably drive them back. Murders, robberies, and Vigilance Committees are quite common in this w^estern country; but a stranger seems to be quite safe, if he keeps from the ** Bar " for drink. CHAPTER XII. convention at la crosse — free negro settlement — trenton falls — sleeping trains — ladies — theodore Parker's church. O FEEDING down the Mississippi, I had to ^ stop during Sunday at La Crosse; and the passengers said, " You will have to walk ten miles to church"; but I found a very different sort of Sunday in store. From nine in the morning until ten o'clock at night, it was one continued pleasure. There was a convention of four hundred Independent ministers meeting at this place; and I happened to find among them one who had been connected with the Boys* Refuge in London. The Wisconsin ministers were much pleased to hear at some length an account of the open-air preaching in England; and the children of the schools assembled to listen to a Shoeblack lecture, for this topic seems to have 122 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. extraordinary interest, when illustrated by pho- tographs of the boys, and anecdotes of their lives. Professor Emerson preached before the Convention. His sermon was a learned expo- sition. The doctrine of doctrines, the sacrificial atonement by blood, was most fully set forth afterwards in a powerful address, by the Mo- derator of the Convention, preparatory to the celebration of the Lord's Supper. It was surely a pleasant and suggestive occasion, to find the grand truths of the Gospel so purely preached on the banks of the Mississippi. At a Home Mission Meeting in the evening, the subject of lay agency in England excited very deep in- terest; and the worthy ministers and elders were so hospitable, that it was hard to leave them after so short a visit. At Cincinnati I attended a great political Convention, where 2,000 people kept a noisy order in their entanglement of politics. The presiding genius w^as a long Yankee, who took oflP his coat, and appeared in his shirt sleeves, without any apology. The v/hole affair would be an utter impossibility away from America. Every gentleman and well-educated man (and, POLITICS IN 8HIUT SLEEVES. 123 by the way, they are marvellously few) abjures politics; and, in proportion to his sense, appears BECRBTART OF THE CINCINNATI CONVENTION, CTNCIXNATI. anxious to assure you he is not a politician. The land is ruled by a very indifferent set of men, raised to a brief power by hired under- lings, who make it their daily calling. No one thing forbodes worse for these great people than 124 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. ^*f the absence of men of probity and talent from their politics.* -^^ Crossing by a rough railway, just opened through Wisconsin, and by a dangerous boat over Lake Michigan, and then by another new rail through Michigan State, you compass the five hundred miles comfortably in two days. Lake Michigan is generally very stormy, the most irritable of the northern lakes. Three wrecks occurred on it last week ;t but it was beautifully calm during our passage. From Detroit, the meeting-place of so many routes of travel, I crossed the water once more to the Canadian shore; and it really felt as if one was half at home again, to get a portmanteau ex- amined by "Her Majesty's Custom-house officer." Here, on the '* Thames," I stopped to see Chat- ham, where half the population of four thousand are escaped negroes. The slavery folks call it " miserable," but a personal inspection convinced me that the blacks are far better off in Chatham, than many of the white people in Kentucky. The town was in great commotion about an * Se e chapter on American voting, post. f Tiie steamer ou tiie preceding uight had foundered. ex- A QUACK DOCTOR. 125 event of which it is difficult to speak with ac- curacy, though the matter is of some importance, and will undergo judicial investigation within a few days. An itinerant quack medicine vendor appeared on the railway platform, a few days ago, with a coloured boy as his servant. A great crowd of black men from the town at once seized the boy and forcibly took him away. The boy cried, and desired to stop with his master; but the negroes say that the master was about to sell the boy in the Southern States, although he was born free. Thus this horrid slavery leers at you with its grim black face of shame wherever you go in America. The beautiful autumnal foliage of Canada skirted the " track " until I reached Niagara once more. The second visit to this wonder of wonders, only r-aises your admiration higher, when before you thought it was at the highest point. Trenton Falls may be reached easily in a day from Niagara. The remarkable beauty of these far-famed cataracts amply justifies a detour; but the description of scenery is scarcely profitable, unless it is written by a poet's pen. A drive of ' 111 i 126 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. some hours through the country near these falls revealed to me, as in other places, the wretched roads and poor tumble-down houses of many oi the lands in the older parts of the States. Public works are far behind private efforts in this country; but it is amazing to observe what enormous tracts have been cultivated, what houses built, what towns, what railroads, what bridges, tunnels, canals, and docks have been constructed in two hundred years by Anglo- Saxon energy. In one of the coloured churches, a blacL preacher told us the danger of relying on public bodies to do individual work, and instanced his own experience. When first he joined his re- ligious body, he was full of zeal and void of prudence. Relying on the vote of the ** Asso- ciation," *' that a saddle be bought for the missionary's horse," he bought one, and then bought a new horse with the like authority, giving his own promissory note to pay for them. ** Well, the note became due, brethren, but when I looked for the 'Association' I couldn't find it, nor see it, nor hear on it, my brethren; so I was a near ruined, look ye thar." KISSING A DOG. 127 The yearning feeling towards " home," as England is often endearingly called, seems to abide with the distant settler for many a long day. One of them said he had been thirty years away, but he would embrace a dog if he only knew it was from old England. The Scotch plaid is very commonly worn by all nations in the West, by Germans, and Ameri- cans and Norwegians, even more than by Scotchmen. The boots of many are outside their trousers, or '' pants," as they always call them, and this is a very neat and sensible mode of dress, as it seems to me, and is even ornamental when the boots have bright red tops with gilded patterns. But the American business traveller invaria- bly wears a good long cloth dark coat, and very often a new hat. The idea of a " gent '* wear- ing a light-coloured easy shooting-jacket, is evidently preposterous to their notions; as for the ladies, the finest silk (and the largest ex- pansion of it) that a Woman can wear is fre- quently put on to sail into breakfast by early candle-light, in a cold, wet morning, before a rough journey of two hundred miles. 1 recol- u \ \ 128 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. lect an American who travelled with me through Syria in a dress-coat and a black hat. These are oddities that will correct themselves when many trunks, brilliant satins, and glossy hats are less required to mark good breeding, than a quiet common-sense simplicity, which selects for wear the raiment really suited for the occasion. On a few railways, you meet a very excellent addition to comfort in travelling by night. The " sleeping cars" are made to hold as many per- sons as the usual long car, which contains seventy travellers, and each one is stretched on a nicely-padded shelf, in three tiers, one over another. I '* guess" (how many thousand times have I heard that word!) that this will only add to the intensity of locomotion which wears out this people, often needlessly, and will in- crease the frequency of accidents by promoting night journeys. The trains are generally quite full; and when- ever a lady enters on such an occasion, the con- ductor causes a " gent" to give her his seat. I had great pleasure lately in resigning my place to a black woman, and, with more than a dozen ARTESIAN WELL. 129 Others, finished a long journey in the baggage - waggon. Often as I have seen this supplanting of the lords of the creation, and other numerous acts of courtesy readily done or allowed by men in favour of women, I never on any one occasion observed any thanks given in return. It is very bold, nay, it may be ungallant, to tell this ; but it is true, and it is often spoken of by the gentlemen, and even publicly noticed in the newspapers. Ladies, we yield to you; but pray do pay us by a smile. I stopped at Louisville to see the great Arte- sian Well, which is two thousand feet deep. A rushing stream pours hot water forth in a cease- less current; but the very strong sulphureous insrredients of the water have made it unfit for the purpose the well was sunk to attain; so, in- stead of supplying a paper-mill, the spring will be used as a mineral water, from which, per- haps, a fortune may be made, if it is well puffed! r The administration of justice is here invested with much to make it suspected. The magis- trate finds his electors before him as counsel, K i ! IdO OUK BROTHERS ANO COUSINS. witnesses, or criminals. His election depends on that accused man; or his hopes for the future rest on that accuser. How is it possible that the judge thus situated can escape from improper LOUISVILLE COURT-HOUSE. motives? I saw a murder case tried in Louis- ville, where the barrister had his quid of tobacco, and the judge had a quaff from a great white jug — not from tumbler, glass, or any such thing, BOSTON KINDNESS. 131 X-^s but from the jug itself, '^held aloft with two hands before the Court. At Springfield, I visited the United States' Arsenal, where some neat workshops are used by the clever gunsmiths, hammering away at the rifles tha' -"•« to be used — I hope, never against England. The town is very English in appearance, except the signboards such as this : " Clam Chowder to-night, at Howe's lunch" ; which invites you to Mr. Howe's nocturnal shell- fish dainties; for the term " lunch" is not con- fined to an afternoon " snack." As you approach Boston, the country becomes more English still; and, shall I say it? more . comfortable, and habitable, and pleasant. But in no part of England, nay, nor in Europe, are there those splendid autumn foliage tints, that paint the most common-place hill- side here until it glows before you as a radiant picture, which the artist would scarcely dare to put on canvass, lest you might mistake it for his palette. I have not now time to describe Boston, with its numerous attractions, its historical associa- tions, its public institutions, and its intense 132 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. ! hospitality to an unworthy English stranger; and yet this letter must be the last of my present fleeting records of a delightful tour, improving to body, mind, and soul. ^ ' I tried to hear the Kev. Theodore Parker, so as at least to make one effort more to ascertain his views (if, indeed, he knows them himself), and thus be prepared the better to combat his followers in England. A Mr. Higginson, of Worcester, preached in his place in the Music Hall, to a congregation of about 1,500, which half filled it. Many came in or went out during the service; and many read the newspapers all the time, even during singing and prayer. The preacher prayed in a strange mysterious manner, as if he approached the Almighty with his hand over his face, and complained he could not see Him even dimly. He read from the Book of Wisdom. The choir sung two hymns, standing by a statue of Beet- hoven ; while the people sat entirely mute, only three or four using hymn-books, and no one singing. Oh! it was a freezing service, that made one wrap the mind in a moral great-coat, to keep from the infection of a heart-chill. A. PARKERITE PREACHER. 133 The preacher, dressed in a civilian's usual costume, read the text from Acts xxviii. 10: — ** They laded us with such things as were neces- sary;" and putting the Bible carefully aside, forthwith left it and the text as a starting-post to run away from. The whole address was an investigation into the question, ** What are the necessaries of life?" and the folio winff are some of the Yankee notions that were served up as spiritual food : — ** An Irishman would say, a feather-bed is a necessary. If a fire takes place, you see one man saving a bag of money, another his books; some throwing the mirrors out of the windows, while they carry the mattresses carefully down- stairs. A little boy saves his pipe to blow bub- bles, a great boy his pipe to blow tobacco, and a politician his bubbles without any pipe. The four necessaries are subsistence, employment, love, and faith. In every assembly of divines, dyspepsia sits enthroned, more despotic than any Pope. Mr. Astor (a great millionaire) said, * A man with £50,000 was as well off as if he were rich.' The miser is a man who spends his life in buying tickets, and never goes to the enter- f ti I 1 ■1 f I 134 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. tainment after all. Emigrants could live at home as well as in new countries, if they put up with half the evils they submit to abroad. Em- ployment would cure many evils; and it would be a real kindness to force many an idle rich man to work on the treadmill, or the govern- ment of his town. Benevolence is like cold water, which all like to dabble in a little, but most shun to bathe in; and yet, like a dally bath, the habit of benevolence becomes soon a necessary, if properly used, for moral health. As ships sail best with the wind not entirely favourable, so moderate prosperity is better than complete good fortune. Some souls are like clipper-ships, that sail as fast on a wind close- hauled as when the favouring gale is directly aft." The sermon was full of quotations from poets and sages and heathen philosophy, without one particle of Christianity, or a glimpse of the Gospel. At a special meeting of the " Friends," I heard two Quakers announce much truth in an exceedingly ungrateful form, with the most soporific effect. ^ ^ ' The Warren Chapel Schools have been in THE SHAKERS. 135 operation here nearly thirty years; a philan- thropic effort, including Sunday-schools and dancing-classes, greenhouse-plants and knitting, statues and savings'-banks, Popish pictures and pic-nics — all which you are assured is anti-sec- tarian. The first glance of an understanding eye is not mistaken in observing that the tendency of all this is most intensely sectarian, and is a struggle to get proselytes to that large and dan- gerous sect, that cuts off fervid Christianity, on the one hand, and mere ignorance, on the other. If I have wronged this large Institution, I am not convinced by hearing that the Popish priest readily allows its managers to have his children. — Timeo Danaos et donaferentes. Near this, at Lebanon, is the colony of the Shakers Mrs. Hutchinson founded seventy years ago. They are very industrious, and wear long, ugly, grey dresses. They worship by dancing to a dirge like Ip-la-ly-la, r^nd never marry, but adopt poor children. The environs of Boston are not surpassed in beauty by those of any large town I know. In this particular, it is far superior to New York and Philadelphia. I heard the half-yearly re- i 136 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. citations of students at the Harvard University of Cambridge, which, I am sorry to say, is under Unitarian influence. In one of the Boston Museums there are some books of George Wash- ington, scribbled over by his hand when a boy. Several of them are on Christian subjects, and particularly upon slavery. Perhaps it is unfair to sketch the general cha- racter of the American people on so slight an acquaintance as a three months' residence; espe- cially as salient bad features, more readily than prominent good ones, are likely to be caught by the hasty glance; and many a fault would be forgotten ci softened down by more mature ac- quaintance, just as the long nose of one's friend looks shorter every day you meet him. But, talking of noses, I never met a real American with a real pug nose. Their features are usually very regular, neatly marked in one or other type of two classes of profile that are also noticed among the Indians — one with high cheek- bones, black eyes, and square forehead; the other (the older Indian face) with very sharp aquiline nose and long eyebrow. Men's voices are gentle; every woman's is somewhat harsh. *n PARTING REGRKTS. 137 ac- TKe men look mild, with a pleasing expression when at ease, and very little working of linea- ments or change of features when excited. But I have seen no quarrels here ; not one blow in a rage ; no grufFness, such as John Bull emi- nently possesses; and I have not met one single ** dolt/' How is it one hears every day of thefts, murders, and all kinds of crime (to-day, a Senator killed in a duel occupies four lines of the paper), yet you travel thousa./ls of miles safely among a meek and courteou3 people? Christianity impro^^es every tribe of the hu- man race, but no one more than the genuine American. American Christians often acquire the energy and repose, the heartiness and so- lidity, which it is easy to imagine, but so diffi- cult to find. I take leave of this country with my estimate of it much elevated, and my interest in it quicken el intensely, with deep affection for hundreds of its citizens ; gratitude, admiration, and surprise, mingling as I review our inter- course. Verily, this is a great nation, and a great country, and I leave it with great regret. 138 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. AMERICAN VOTING. ^HE true relation of political parties, even in the village of Stoke Pogis, could not be understood except by long residence. How pre- sumptuous, then, would it be for a mere traveller to dogmatize upon the intricate and interesting politics of thirty millions of people ! But there are certain points in the American political system which are peculiarly important to Englishmen just now; for many of us urge this country to imitate America in these, and some will even insist that the American plan of elections is successful in the States, while a few jump at once to the conclusion that there- fore it would answer here. No Conservative amongst us, be he ever so high a Tory, would refuse to adopt " useful reforms ; " and no Whig, be he ever so strong a Radical, proposes to destroy '* just rights." AMERICAN VOTING. 139 We all desire to diminish poverty and igno- rance, to encourage industry and virtue^ to restrain corruption and favouritism, and to give due weight to every element in the common- wealth. The only question in this connection that I shall touch upon, is this, How far these desirable objects are attained in America by giving every man a vote and permitting him to use the ballot. To ascertain the real estimate formed of the American system by the men who live under it, I discussed the subject in constant conversation nearly every day for three months, and always with the most intelligent Americans I could select. Anxiously seeking for evidence on both sides of the question, I found, with regret, that it was impossible to hear the advantages of the American plan pro- perly advocated. Every body seemed to com- plain of it except two persons, of whom one was an Irish Eomanist, who had never been in England, and who advocated slavery. Almost in proportion to each man's intelli- gence, was his earnest protest, that " he was far too wise to meddle with politics," tliat he was *' thankful to say that he had never cast a vote"; 140 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. Si |w>!; that being an Englishman I might be excused ; but that from any other '* it would be almost an insult to suppose that he^ a respectable Yankee, had anything to do with elections." Now this particular result of the American system is undoubted, the distaste for political work expressed by a very large body of the best men you meet. Indeed, there are, perhaps, as many Americans who are deterred from the use of their own system by its defects, as there are Englishmen (worth anything in judgment) who are debarred from the use of ours by its limita- tions."^ Let us hearken to a d'.scussion about " The Ballot," between an American, who lives under Its operations, and a British Reformer, who ad- vocates it without any practical experience. The American we shall call A., and B, shall be the Briton. I if m ♦ The Duke of Argyle said lately at Dundee, " Turning to the United States, it was the testimony of the best and most intelligent American citizens he had met with in this country that .... there was less and less possibility of get- ting the highest characters to take an interest in public affairs."— TAc Press Newspaper, Nov 20, 1858. AMERICAN VOTING. 141 B. The Ballot would at least ensure security in voting, for you could vote as you pleased. A. We cannot. A man's vote maybe divined by seeing the newspaper he reads, or the politi- cal party he consorts with, or the meetings he frequents. Your only " secure voter" must have no distinct politics and read no particular paper. Can you tell me of any case where there ever was any difficulty in knowing the vote of any man of decided politics in America ? B. The Ballot would prevent bribery. A. No; it enables us to buy men in bundles, and cheaply too, for we don^t pay them unless the side we purchase is victorious.* B. At any rate there could be intimidation. A, ^Ye have quite as much intimidation of voters as you have in England. It is constantly the practice for a master to require his workmen to vote as he pleases; if they do not affirm * In the Times, of December 18th, 1858, mention is made of" a letter from the President of the United Stiites, alluding to bribery, in which he says : " Should this practice increase, until the voters in the state and national legislatures shall become infected, the fountain of free government will then be poisoned at its source; and we must end, as history proves, in a military despotism." 142 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. they have done so, and prove it, he turns them off by hundreds. The only safety from intimidation consists in telling and proving a falsehood. B. The Ballot would certainly do well in Ire- land, where the priests are now the real electors. A, That's because of the confessional — but the ballot won't change it. Nearly all our Irish votes are held by the priests, and the priests wield them for Archbishop Hughes, who is by far the most powerful man for patronage in the States. If I wanted an appointment and could not buy it, I should go to the Archbishop rather than to the President; for the last goes out in four years, but Dr. Hughes is always in power. B. Still, the Government officials could not openly compel our voters. A. Nor can they do so with you at present. But then we numbei 16,000 postmasters and offi- cials who can be turned off at a moment's notice without reason assigned; and they are pretty clearly made to know that a votq against their masters would be a very good reason for dis- missal. B, Surely, the system of Ballot properly worked, would enable a man to vote as he liked, without letting his master know how he voted. AMERICAN VDTING. 143 A, "Properly worked!" Why any system properly worked would leave the voter free ; but the abuse of it has to be provided for, and this abuse is as hard to prevent in our system as in yours — take Jonathan's saw -mills, for instance. He had 180 hands; of these, sixty were for his party, and they went to his meetings, cheered their party colours, and voted a double-dyed blue ticket. Every man who did not do this was prima facie on the other side; and unless he could prove he voted blue, he was held to have cast a yellow vote. A simple process you see when you come to work it ! A. The Ballot would give us the people's candidate. J5. The " election-agent's man," you mean. What has any single voter to do with the can- didate ultimately proposed. Recollect, you will have to arrange the matter thus: — Each parish will meet to vote a parish delegate. Your parish chooses the man who pro- mises to vote for John Smith for the county. The parish delegates meet to elect a district delegate; but John Smith of your parish is 144 OUR BROTHERS AXD COUSINS. ^"sf-< f! nothing to them. A majority of them prefer Tom Jones, who promises the most to the most parishes ; and so they elect a district delegate wlio will vote for him. When all the district delegates meet to select the Member for the county, the other districts ignore poor Jones; for they must have Jack Eobinsou, who will propose a canal from Linsey- Ga to Wolsey-ra, that runs through twelve dis- tricts, and a few " cashy -looking" winks at your delegate will pacify him, and where are you ? B. That is not the Ballot; that is a compli- cated abuse of the simple plan. A. Have you got any law ready to prevent this manner of working it? 'Tis by no means complicated; but the most natural mode of se- lecting a candidate when they who choose him are all supposed to vote secretly, and none can exclaim against the nominee without at once disclosing how he has voted! B, But, my dear cousin, we make constant use of the Ballot in our best clubs. A. Yes, where you have to vote for or against individuals for continual personal contact, where it would not do to explain your reasons, where li: AMERICAN VOTING. 145 personal animosity would be the result of open opposition, where you often allow it works badly and where, all the time — whatever you say — you feel you are voting in a manner you are half ashamed of. B, I think the Ballot and universal suffrage would give us upright legislators, who would not waste our money. A. Just the reverse. Our men try to please the most voters ; most voters pay the least taxes individually, so the more the mera])ers spend, the more money flows to the poorest and from the more industrious ! What does each of 1000 voters care about £1000 mis-spent, when every pound will pay him and each of his nine friends 2s. a piece for (useless) labour, although not one of the ten men has given one shilling in taxes to the squandered sum ? JS. But we must get really good men into Parliament, and they will not do thus badly. They will represent the wishes of the com- munity. A. I hope ours don't. If they do, the wishes of the community must be mighty bad ! Why, in * ■■_ ill A) f ! 146 OUR BROTHEKS AND COUSINS. our general run of members arc the laughing- stock of all sober-minded people. You know the old story, I dare say. 'T is far too true to be forgotten because it is old : — " Poor Johnson ! You k.aow what became of Johnson. Ah ! poor fellow, he went down hill sadly, till, from bad to worse, he got at last so low he was elected a member of Congress." Our elections are abjured by the good men; and they are managed by a set of regular paid partisans, who make it their daily business. The proved corruption and bribery in every depar- ment of the state exceeds what you can even imagine. Legislative, municipal, and judicial functionaries openly promise bribes, or are elected by violence. One candidate for a "judgeship" said lately, '' If you elect me I will open all the liquor-shops on Sunday" (by perverting the law, be it remembered). Another said, "I will be strict in punishing every shop thus open." The candidates were called, during the canvass, the " liquor judge" and ** non-liquor judge." I saw myself a rum-seller sit as a judge, and try sixty cases in an hour and a half, nodding to prisoners who may have been his customers or AMERICAN VOTING. 147 »» hi3 electors. The system of elections here is the most ridiculous caricature of proper represen- tation ever tolerated by any civilised nation ; and Americans, in proportion to their good sense, denounce this system. I saw an advertisement asking 300 labourers to come to a new railway. The steam vessel took 150 labourers 300 miles to '^ the new railway/' which was not even con- tracted for. These men were to land, and vote at some election ; but the people repelled their invasion, and caused them to re-embark. I heard that half of them arrived in another town in time to be hired to vote there. B. All these objections are American frailties incident to a new people, which we in England might overcome ? . A, Yes; but the ballot tolerates them all: nay, it produces them ; and it steadily sanctions every one. Did you ever hear of a man being 'ected by ballot and universal suffrage, to protest against these flagrant wrongs? B. We could soon get them elected, if we paid our members as you do. A, Men who can't make money enough to live on by their own business, ought not to be 148 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. m ? r it ti M n paid, as members, to manage the business of the public. B. But that rule would prevent many good men from getting scats. A. Have you ever met anybody who said that his representative would not be elected unless he had a salary? Seems odd we have 10,000 volunteer firemen in one city alone, and yet we can't get 600 volunteer statesmen in all the Union ! B. Anything more, cousin, in the grumbling line? A. Yes, we've made another blunder in com- mitting power to mere numbers, forgetting that, whilst all have equal rights to protection of life, property, and reputation, the amount o( our pri- vileges in every department of trade, of politics, and of social life, never can be equal. Is there one single occupation or business, in which you give the lowest and the highest an equal share of direction? Why should you give the same share to everybody, then, in the greatest of all works — the direction of the destinies of a state? If you build a house, do you listen equally to the hodman and the architect for a AMERICAN VOTING. U9 plan? If you steer a ship, is the cabin-boy consulted with the mate? If you treat a disease, has the doctor only the same voice as the druggist's lad? And yet here we give the very same weight to the vote of the Irish emigrant, who knows neither his alphabet nor the number of our States, as we do to that of the American citizen, who has lived all his life in our midst, and has proved his capacity for understanding the affairs of his country by successfully managing his own. The value of a vote is always that of the lowest that can be given. By making some shillings half of brass you may multiply your pieces, but you will not add to your wealth, for you will soon make the best shilling pass only for the value of the basest you have coined. You may easily see, therefore, why good men won*t vote if they count only with the most worthless. All the grumbling for the ballot in England, is a mere whisper compared with our earnest abuse of what it produces in America. 150 OUR BROTHERS ANI COUSINS. YANKEE NOTIONS. J ill ■pVERYBODY who travels with any interest, and has a desire to prolong it when he comes home, is sure to collect a parcel of odds and ends, of waifs and strays, from the tide of busy life floating by him daily. Jt would be as easy to classify the "things'' in a school boy's pocket, as to index these contents of the tourist's bag; and yet they are far more suggestive notes than those penned in his diary, or pencilled in his sketch-book. Here is a handful of such things. The first is a gentleman's card given to me. Below a noble stag's head (the crest duly assigned by the Herald's College for 6s. 6d. !), you read: — "Col. Octavius Morris, No. 1979, Spruce Street, Philadelphia." Another, wo/ left with me, and thus inscribed : — " Mrs. Ex-Commissioner of Sewers." Next, there is a long bill headed: — "Philanthro- YANKEE NOTIONS. 151 pic Convention — to overcome evil with good the cause and cure of evil — Uticu — Oneida Co., N. Y/' And the committee of arrantre- ment includes, — **Calvin Hall — Emily Rogers — Caroline Brown, M.D." Look at this newspaper called ''Daily Capital City Fact, Columbus, Ohio/' " Spiritualism lec- tures may be expected at the City Hall to- morrow — Mrs. H. F. M. Brown, editress of the Investigator, Cleveland, 0., will speak in the morning at 11, and afternoon at .3." Then fol- low six advertisements of astrologers. Here is a long strip of paper put into my hand, with the following telegraphic message beauti- fully printed on it by the instrument itself, — "N. Y. Pa. cccxlviii. B.w.y. (i.e. From Philadel- phia to No. 348, Broadway, New York). Send Macgregor by two o'clock, boat four at furthest — adjourned meeting — hold newspaper in his hand, coming off boat, so we may know him, G. S." Next comes a paper with a woodcut of ele- phants in terrific excitement — '* A work for the library, farmer, clergy, and masses, 180,000 copies ordered in advance; order early if you L ■ ■■■;■■ 152 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. i • m I i \ m m want a copy, as there is a great rush to get this valuable work. Now ready, Dr Livingstone's 17 years. Explorations and Adventures in the Wilds of Africa; the most thrillingly interesting book issued since Robinson Crusoe. — Lost 17 years in the jungles of Africa. 100 splendid en- gravings; price 50 cents" (2s. sterling). — Various newspapers turn up next — ''The Grumbler/' from Toronto — '* The Spiritual Telegraph," printed in New York, but edited in the nether world— *' The Daily Hawk-Eye" — "The Ca- tholic Herald and Visitor/' which visits me direfully with its wrath, out-poured upon a Pro- testant speech by "a Cockney maw- worm." Lots of scraps from the "New York Herald," includ- ing a whole column of close print, containing nothing, but these words (over and over again) " Take it home — 'Harper's Weekly,' price five cents." — And this " Harper's Weekly," wh^n you do take it home, you find has plenty of old pic- tures from the British Punch, not one acknow- ledged. — A yellow envelope, enclosing a letter from a black Church, addressed to me as a Re- verend Divine. — A programme of the annual public proceedings at Cambridge, Massachusetts; YANKEE NOTIONS. 153 entitled " Harvard College — Order of Perform- ances for Exhibition — University Chapel be- ginning at eleven o'clock — The performers will speak in the order of their names — The music will be performed by the Pierian Sodality;" and, in the list of twenty-four " performers/' there are only three that have not each three names. Here is a pleasant scene in a court of justice : — " During the recent term of the District Court in Lake Charles, a tragedy of some description was confidently expected. Le Bleu had threatened the Judge and several other persons; and, in con- sequence, they and their friends prepared them- selves for a desperate encounter. The court room and the hotel, it is said, presented some- thing the appearance of badly arranged arsenals. One morning, bright and early, Le Bleu rode his mule into town, dismounted and proceeded to the hotel, with a long dragoon pistol in each hand, and a belt about his waist containing a revolver and a knife. He was evidently bent on mischief, but his enemies were on the watch, and before he could set his foot on the porch, he was saluted by a charge of buckshot from a gun in the hands of Mr. Fox, whose wife he had stolen. 154 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. i i'- I Three or four more shots were fired by other persons, and Le Bleu fell dead with more than fifty buckshot in different parts of his body. Fox and two others were arrested as the persons who did the shooting." Next there is an account, in November 3, of the anniversary of the Young Men's Christian Association. — " The fourth year of the active life of the Young Men's Christian Association, was celebrated last night, in Jayne*s commodious Hall, which was crowded to the superlative jammed-up degree of density. The people came as the waves come, when, etc., amiably elbowed each other up stairs, and seethed sociably to- gether in the saloon. If Concert Hall had not been packed from end to end, and the Musical Fund Hall well populated, and the theatres and minor shows in a state of cheerful repletion, and if there had not been several individuals out in the streets, and a few more in the houses at home, it is probable that every body would have been there. The assemblage probably numbered five thousand souls, and from the stage had a majestic mien. A gentle majesty, be it observed, because of much millinery, and the roses and sunshine of pretty-girls' faces." u II: ft?,. YANKEE NOTIONS. 155 - Programme of the very latest Retigious Sect. — (It is a testimony to the acknowledged value of real religion, that so many counterfeits all try to ape the sterling coin.) — *' Locality, Monona County, near the Missouri. Head, Charles Thompson. Journal, * the newspaper.^ Mystery, * the voice of Baneemy.* Object, to sell land. Progress, fifty to eight hundred members first year" (December, 1858). Notes of a Political Meeting , in Faneuil Hall, Boston, — " Everybody present but the educated classes. Speakers eloquent in the abuse of the government, and logical in proving bribery and corruption, intimidation and peculation." Sketch of a Hansom Cab, imported to Boston by Capt. , of the Canard Steamer C . It was on the stand ? cr months, but the worthy Briton was the only man who dare get into it; for everybodv elpe W';s afraid till *'the majority" should Tide therein. The cab was brought back to England, and Boston still revels in its two- horsed " expensives." Water-colour Drawings of Equality. — Two travellers at dinner; one without coat, other without shoes; while a dapper darkie, with 156 OUR BROTHERS AND COUSINS. !i| ; 'U 1 i ''I ■^ 1 1 r I both shoes and coat, fans the flies off with a flapper. Children of a banker and of a baker in a common school, each in a nice little arm-chair, and with a desk before him. Such are some of the little, but not unim- portant, touches of the great picture that un- rolls, as a panorama, before the traveller every day. And it is well to seize everything as it passes, for the scene shifts swiftly. Even since this volume was begun, the New York Crystal Palace has been burned down, the Citv Hall has been burned up, and the Quarantine has been burned out. The walls of the State- Arsenal at New York have burst open, and the rocks of the nook under Niagara have closed up. Is this progress, or only movement ? Is it going ahead, or only spinning round? .■ ffe THE END. f' WEETIIEIMEK AM) CO., PUlNTEnS, FINSBURY CIHCL'S. '.■\ ith a in a shair, mim- t un- every as it since 'rystal Hall e has State- i, and closed Is it