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tunately never happened to hear either the whippoor-will or the nightingale, though both haunt those sunny glades and beautifully indented shores, so replete with all that charms the senses. They have also the humming-bird, though I never met with one except under a glass shade.

These were the beautiful and sylvan delights of the lands nearer the sea-shore. But the mountain region, with which I began my chapter, had in store for us a scene, grand as well as beautiful, giving an impression of a snow-storm, which left any experiences of heavy falls of snow in the Lammermoors far behind. When it rains in the States, it does rain, and "no mistake." No Scotch mist, or hesitating shower. And when "frost has turned the rain to snow," it comes down in the same fashionit is quite in earnest.

We arose under a beaming winter sun among the hills of the Mohawk. But, as swift as sudden, misfortune rolled the black clouds over the distant mountains, gathered over our dwelling, and burst in a whirlwind of flakes, which wrapped earth's green bosom in her shroud in ten minutes. Between gusts, when we could penetrate the hurtling air, it was strange to see the whirling pillars, at small removes, which seemed to descend for many feet, apart from each other, and reminded one of the description of dreary pillars of sand in the Arabian Desert. Then a fresh swell of the gale jumbled all together again, and the thickness could not be penetrated

beyond a few inches. After two or three hours of this, the clouds rolled off, and we looked forth on a wonder of tranquil, cold beauty. Every tree, fence, and house in sight was clothed minutely with a hard battered-on covering of snow on the windward side, while the side unexposed to the blast seemed quite unconscious of the storm. I thought if half of this had happened in the slower, duller snow-storms of my country, the shepherds, and all the men around, folded in plaids, with straw ropes about their legs, and hats or blue bonnets tied down, would have been labouring to drive the "silly sheep" to the windy side of the hill, to preserve them from being buried up in snow-wreaths. And so it might be, there and then. But every one took it so easily, that there seemed no alarm about it.

One of the richest sunsets I ever saw, except amongst the Alps, succeeded this sudden bluster of elements, when a wide expanse of lovely clouds, rosy themselves, tinged every tree and hill-top in their own beautiful dyes.

Next morning it seemed as if a necromancer must have busied himself, during our sleeping hours, in unshrouding the extensive country within our view. The snow was gone, and, except a patch here and there in a northern hollow, had left no sign.

When we descended to the valley of the Mohawk, however, we found traces wide and deep, in the flowing waters which rushed down, not only in their proper beds, but in what many a farmer must have

for miles.

thought very improper ones. Fields were flooded Houses which yesterday had solid roads leading to them, were standing damp and dreary islands in the waste. Clumps of trees were kneedeep in water. Here stood a patient cow in close and unwonted company of a pair of wild colts. There a lonely horse, holding up its limbs, turnabout, on an island of grass. Men with carts were trying their way to reach the haystacks, and boys, more bravely, were sculling about broad, awkwardlooking boats, among the sheaves of Indian corn, picking up the floating pumpkins-the only things in the landscape which, with their large golden disks, did not seem annoyed and discomforted.

The Mohawk itself poured down; that part of its waters which made its way under the bridges threatening to bear them off in triumph on its buoyant flood. The bridges are of wood, substantially built, and many covered in like those of Switzerland, but without the pictures of saints which adorn their more ancient and Popish prototypes.

The railroad held its way on a causeway, which in various places is not high enough to escape being overflowed.

Like

Thus was swept off our hurricane of snow. many a storm in the moral world-which is dark and disturbing-in two days, the subsiding waters had carried it all away.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS.

AMERICANS tell ridiculous stories of tricks of liberty that were played when the republic was young, which could not last after they settled down into business-like sobriety, and can be only accounted for on the supposition that brother Jonathan felt as giddy as sailors do after a long voyage; resembling a few merry fellows, whom I saw, on first treading the shore again at Holy Island, advance up to the town by a game of leap-frog-a school-boy prank, which they would soon get tired of.

A gentleman told me that he was leaning on the rail of a piazza, at Saratoga, when President Jefferson, I think, with the Countess of Westmoreland leaning on his arm, was walking in the saloon. Two dizzy democrats offered a dollar to a dirty ragged fellow, if he would go in, say, How do ye do? and shake hands with the President. The fellow being desirous of the money, proposed to go wash and make himself a little decent, but the idle wags said the dollar would only be forthcoming if he

won.

shook the hand of the President with that same unwashed paw of his. My informant saw the dollar Mr Jefferson, with perfect courtesy, turned aside for a moment, returned the hail of his assailant pleasantly, and quietly resumed his walk with the lady.

Such freaks are but the effervescence of success and good spirits, and subside of themselves. It was not unnatural that the "States" should, immediately after winning their independence, couple taxation and vexations with royalty and titles, and imagine unbounded freedom in knowing all men as Tom, Dick, and Harry. It was happy that they escaped all Utopianism with regard to Socialist levelling, and have been even more in danger of hero-worship than the men of other countries. nation more gratefully showers honours on its benefactors. It does not give dukedoms in reward of brave generalship, nor ribbons and stars in return for limbs lost in the public service; but the hero is enshrined in their heart of hearts. His face is to be seen in their print-shops, his name is bestowed on their streets, and hotels, and reading-rooms, and his arrivals are hailed with a brother's wel

come.

No

The prejudice against titles runs high, and sometimes exhibits itself absurdly enough. I heard a gentleman seeming to congratulate himself on having made a point to address the Earl of Durham as Mr Durham, during his visit to New York. I sug

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