PITHY LETTER. tion for the first step your fathers made when they landed here, from the other side of the great waters. Brothers, It is said that our fathers were in great fear of one another, when they first saw each other; but now we, their children, see one another with friendship, love, and kindness. Brothers, If our fathers have been enemies to each other, and have had many wars between them, we sincerely hope that we their children will never be so, but that we may live in peace with one another in this world, and for ever in the other. Brothers, If we should say that your coming to America has been a great evil to us, it would be no other than speaking against the orders of the Great Spirit. The wisdom of His thoughts we cannot see with eye of our minds. He alone was the cause of America being discovered by white men; seeing that there would have been no room for you all on the small island called England. He is kind to all his children. Your coming to our country is a general blessing to you, and we believe it is for our good too. Brothers, We have been travelling four years among the whites in Europe, and in this country, and we have been treated very kindly indeed. Brothers, May you and we always enjoy bright and happy days. Brothers, I present this picture to the Pilgrim Society, a representation of our dress before you this evening. Presented by Maungundases, drawn by his son Wanbudick, Chippe ways. [There is another specimen of the native royal literature of our country, of which the original hangs up in the Pilgrim Hall, and it is pithy enough to be re-copied in connexion with the above:] KING PHILIP TO GOVERNOR PRINCE. To the much honored Governor Thomas Prince, dwelling at Plymouth Honored Sir: King Philip desires to let you understand that he could not come to the Court, for tom his interpreter has a pain in his back that he could not travel so far, and Philip's sister is very sick. Philip would entreat that favor of you, and any of the Magistrates, if oney English or ingeins speak about aney land, he prays you to give them no answer at all. The last summer he maid that promise with you, that he would sell no land in seven years time, for that he would have no English trouble him before that time. he has not forgot that you promise him. he will come as soon as possible he can speak with you, and so I rest your verey loving friend, Philip, dwelling at Mount Hope neck. (1663.) [I must vary these prose extracts with one specimen of American poetry "two hundred years ago." Miles Standish was the gallant Bayard, the fearless soldier of the Mayflower company, and a piece of his daughter's embroidery hangs up in the Pilgrim Hall, at the bottom of which her needle has stitched the following lines:] "Lorra Standish is my name Lord guide my hart that I may doe thy will; LETTER FROM NEW BEDFORD. Effect of Steamer Starting from the Wharf--Piece of a Town afloatThe Phenixed Boat-Cost of Empire State-Vocation of CaptainSpectacle of Supper in a Cabin Two Hundred and Fifty Feet LongEffect on Manners--Sumptuous Entertainment for Fifty CentsExcuse for Statistics-New Bedford and its Wealth-Climate and Industry-Geographic Peculiarities-"Placer" for Beauty - The Acushnet--Old Fashioned Prejudices and Modern Luxury-Statesmanlike Remedy for Decline of Local Trade and Industry-Proposed Visit to the Raised Leg of New England, etc., etc. MY DEAR MORRIS:- -If you have any recollection of what the boys call "running kittledys"-prying off and jumping upon cakes of ice and navigating them, when the frozen river is breaking up into floating islands, in the Spring-you can understand what I mean when I say that one of these vast steam-boats, leaving the wharf, seems to me like a whole street cake-ing off into the river. I walked the length of the "Empire State," yesterday, before starting, and, when she glided away from the pier alongside of the Battery, it struck me like the lower end of the town going adrift-like “Ward No. 1" getting under weigh. And, really, this great flotilla comprises almost as much of a town as one wants-quite as much, at least, as one wishes to take into the country in August-drawing-rooms, sleeping-rooms, and kitchens, stables and baggage-rooms, barber's shop and refectory, lounging places and promenades, ladies to wait upon and servants to wait on us, goods and merchandise of every description, supper, society, and something to see. If we could pack up a portion of the city, as we do a portion of our wardrobe, and take it travelling with us as baggage," we should hardly want more. 66 The "Empire State" is the boat that phenixed, last year-- A STEAMBOAT CAPTAIN. 11 was burnt to the water's edge, that is to say, and rebuilt→→ and, superb as was the former boat, this is an improvement on her. The tremulous jar which we used to feel at either end of the old boat, is remedied by extension of the bracing portions of this, and she goes through the water now, at eighteen miles an hour, as steadily as a swan. The cost of one of these floating palaces may help you to an idea of their magnitude and magnificence-one hundred and eighty thousand dollars! The Fall River Company have another such boat, a little larger than this, and a smaller one; and their outlay, altogether, I was told-for craft, warehouses, wharves, etc.,—amounts to half a million! This, as the investment of capital in only one of several lines of conveyance in the same direction, shows the energy of Yankee enterprise very forcibly. The burnt upper works of the boat that was destroyed, I should mention, were replaced at a cost of one hundred and twenty thousand dollars. The captain of one of these boats exercises an office of very responsible control. The daily municipality (subject to his mayoralty from wharf to wharf,) often comprises upwards of five hundred souls, including fifty or so of permanent subordinates; and the demands on his tact, judgment, personal character and authority, besides the life and property entrusted to his skill, are enough to entitle his office (and all offices should be graded by their power and responsibility) to the consideration and dignity of a prefect. We should be better off, if large cities could be as well disciplined and governed as are these floating towns of temporary population. The "Empire State" is a beautiful model of system, elegance, and comfort. The quiet decision, and good-humoured mastership and authority of Comstock, her captain, who is a fine specimen of his class, form a controlling power that works like his boat's rudder. It seems to affect even the manners at the supper-table, for, chance-met and promiscuous as is the company, never twice the same, it is as orderly a show, in its general effect, as any entertainment in the world. This sort of thing, mind you, is found in no other country, and when first seen, it is very impressive to a stranger. The room in which it is served, the lower cabin, is two hundred and fifty feet long, richly and continuously draped on both sides with curtains of costly material and brilliant colours; and the two immensely long tables are fur nished in a style of most sumptuous luxury. Vases of flowers, elegant china, bouquets at every third or fourth plate, and a profusion of chandeliers and candles, are the ornamental portion. The well-drilled negro waiters in their uniform white jackets are apparently selected for their good looks as well as for their capability. The supper consists of game, fish, oysters, steaks of all kinds, every variety of bread and sweetmeats, and tea and coffee, with an after-course of ices and jellies-all well cooked and all served as quietly and expeditiously as it could be done in a palace-and, that this could be afforded at fifty cents a head, would astonish a European. Now, every-day matter as this is, it is a brilliant spectacle of gregarious economy, worth travelling some distance to see, and as creditable to our country as it is peculiarly American. Let us recognize good things as they go along, familiar though they be! New Bedford, (the place of my present writing,) is two hundred and twenty-five miles from New York-twenty-five miles by railroad from Fall River, to which these steamers ply. One gets here by a capital supper, a night's sleep on the water, and an hour's ride in the morning-cost (for feed and freight) four dollars ten cents. If I am a little dry with my statistics, by the way, you will remember that it is easy to skip a fact, if you knew it before-vexatious to miss one if you want and do not find it. How ignorant are you, on the whole, my dear General? It is not always safe, I have found, to presume on people's knowing everything, and, in the remainder of this letter, particularly, I shall address you as if you knew nothing. What do you think of a town, in which, if the property taxed in it were equally divided, every man, woman, and child, in its population, would have over one thousand dollars? This makes a rich town, (they would say in Ireland,) and, in fact, New Bedford is as rich, for its population, as any town in this country. The taxed property this year is 17,237,400 dollars, and the whole number of inhabitants is but about sixteen thousand. The use of capital by which the place is best known, is its whaling business-a hundred ships, averaging each thirty thousand dollars in value, belonging to this port alone. Twenty or thirty years ago, this was the engrossing interest of the town, and the arrival of a ship from sea drew everybody to the wharves; but now they come and go, CLIMATE OF NEW BEDFORD. 13 unnoticed except by owners and the relatives of the crew. The sexagenarians tell how the railroad and the theatre have displaced the old excitements, and, with this history of change comes a long chapter upon novelties in dress and religion, nearly the entire population having once been Quakers. Luxurious as the town is, now, however, and few and far between as are the lead-coloured bonnets and drab cut-away coats, there is a strong tincture of Quaker precision and simplicity in the manners of the wealthier class in New Bedford, and, among the nautical class, it mixes up very curiously with the tarpaulin carelessness and ease. The railroad, which has brought Boston within two hours' distance, is fast cosmopolizing away the local pecularities, and though at present, I think, I could detect the New Bedford relish, in almost any constant inhabitant whom I might meet elsewhere, they will soon be undistinguishable, probably, from other New Englanders. As to the geography of the place, you may, if you please, imagine Massachusetts sitting down with her feet in the waters of the Acushnet, where that river opens upon Buzzard's Bay, and looking off towards the Gulf of Mexico-New Bedford occupying, meantime, the slope of her instep. The southern shore of the Granite State, is fringed with islands which break the ocean horizon; but the warm and moist air of the gulf comes unchecked hither, with every continuous south wind, affecting very much, (and very delightfully, to my sense,) the climate of the place. The eighty miles' stretch of land which extends back, between it and Massachusetts Bay, uses up, at the same time, the bilious acid of the Boston east winds; and, but for its greater clearness, the weather, here, would resemble, in most of its temperate seasons and phases, that of the south of England. thermometer, on an average, is five degrees higher than in Boston, though the breezy exposure to the sea makes the extreme heat of summer more endurable here than there. A southern propinquity to the ocean is very favorable to complexion, and this is a "placer" for bright lips and rosy cheeks accordingly. The The Acushnet is more an arm of the .sea than a river proper, and, as the harbor is in the hollow of this arm, the old maritime town takes a very close hug from it-some of the best of the old houses being but a biscuit pitch from the |