Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1852, by In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New York. ト Preface. ABOUT thirty years ago, articles appeared “Quarterly” in a London Review, which filled the surrounding atmosphere with their evil odors, and whose venom was unhappily not spent when it had crossed three thousand miles of "blue water," so that they excited swellings and high disdain as they spread in the United States. Yet it is probable all the articles dropped from one pen, filled with gall. The ren, one may suppose, of some ancient Tory, whose ancestors had suffered in the War of Independence, or whose political creed admitted not of safety except in feudality and hereditary government, and who therefore was embittered by hearing of prosperity beyond it. These splenetic articles originated or prolonged animosities in their day, though they probably emanated from the pen of a person sufficiently insignificant. That day is past. But, if injurious impressions were made by one insignificant character, it is possible that contrary impressions may be produced by another. It was a little mouse, according to Esop, that gnawed the net which entangled the lion, and set the forest monarch free. The mouse would have missed a fine opportunity, had it at the moment refused to gnaw. It possessed industry and influence, and used them. Every one is possessed of some degree of influence; if it be met by energy, and leisure to put it forth, it must not lie inactive, though it be but small. The unpretending traces of what fell under every day experience, here offered to the public, come from one who visited America with cordial feeling and ardent expectation, and was not disappointed. Of course many subjects, such as literature and polities, run in parallel lines with such as ate treated here. But they have been plentifully delineated by others, and this affords a plea for their entire omission, which the incompetence of the writer willingly embraces, while religious and social habits fall naturally within the range of her remark. The diversities between America and Great Britain are only sufficient to add the raciness of novelty to the observer's enjoyment. America is the country in which to form rapid and cordial acquaintances, and from which to carry friendships against whose continuance even the last enemy has no power. Character comes forth natu |