"The true state of every nation is the state of common life." brown EDINBURGH: PRINTED FOR ROBERT CADELL, EDINBURGH; AND WHITTAKER AND CO. LONDON. MDCCCXXXIII. PREFACE. IF the following pages have any merit, it consists merely in their conveying, in plain language, a faithful and candid representation of the facts which the Author observed and noted in the places where they presented themselves. He has not been accustomed to write for the press, and makes no pretensions to literary attainments. The observations which he made in America are now given to the public, public, solely from a conviction that they furnish a greater variety of minute details regarding the every-day habits, and the social condition of the people, in those parts of the United States which he visited, than can be found in any similar publication 245002 of recent date. The statements and docu ments with which the reader is here presented will also tend, it is to be hoped, to expose the mistakes of some late writers, who seem to have visited these States under the influence of strong prejudices and preconceived opinions. Though the Author travelled wholly free, as he thinks, from any such biases, and with an earnest desire to inform himself aright as to the matters to which he directed his attention, he cannot but be sensible that a stranger must occasionally fall into errors, when writing of a country of such vast extent, where the customs of the people, and many of the institutions, not only differ essentially from those with which he has previously been acquainted, but are in fact very different in the United States themselves. The Author farther hopes that his Notes will be found to contain such information, geographical and historical, as travellers generally wish to possess respecting a country |