forms and expressions of civility. He pays fewer empty compliments; seldom acts the amiable or the courteous, makes no unmeaning or overstrained professions, but he takes you by the hand with a cordiality that at once intimates he is disposed to regard you as a friend.

Of that higher grace of manners, inseparable perhaps from the artificial distinctions of European society, and of which those conscious of its hollowness cannot always resist the attraction, few specimens are to be found in the United States. Able to distinguish between politeness, or graciousness of manner, and obsequiousness, the citizens in general exhibit dignity without servility. The haughtiness of rank is unknown, while the more opulent classes manifest a fit sense of their own position, with a proper respect for what is due to the people, to the civil power, and to society at large. If they are deficient in some of the polite observances of Europe, they are less encumbered with the formalities of an inexorable etiquette. The manners of an American gentleman are pleasing, and are more gratifying to a stranger than the farce of ceremony, however gracefully it may be performed. Nor are the gentlemen-merchants and literary and professional men of the principal cities-inferior to any in the world in extent of practical information, liberality of sentiment, or generosity of character.

In the United States, also, you may see the development of a purer and less arbitrary social life than where men are more the devotees of art and helots of fashion; retaining more of the primitive simplicity of the children of nature. "Plain and frugal in their domestic habits," says the Marquess de Chastellux, they at the same time exhibit little of that artificial polish which, like varnish, frequently disguises very worthless materials; and a stranger is not mortified by professions without services, and show without substance. Their good qualities are of a sterling kind.. Good wives,-good mothers,-prudent housekeepers, they may bid defiance to the satirist until they quit the hallowed circle of domestic virtues to flutter heavily on the light airs of vanity. Through their affectation only they are vulnerable." Credulity, vanity, and display, are their foibles; and these have been represented as prominent traits of the national character.

"In all public establishments of America," says Mr. Dickens, "the utmost courtesy prevailed; not so in England. There is a boorish incivility about our men alike disgusting to all persons

who fall into their hands, and discreditable to the nation that keeps such ill-conditioned curs snarling about its gates. When I landed in America I could not help being strongly impressed with the contrast their custom-house presented, and the attention, politeness, and good humour with which its officers discharged their duties."

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The manners of the people of the United States," says the North American Review, of 1828-29, "are not generally refined, but they are very generally civil. The portion living in cities, and who travel and enjoy social intercourse, are polished and courteous. The body of our farmers and people of the interior are indeed rough in their manners, though not boorish. They have all the friendly, benevolent, and hospitable feelings; they are independent in their approaches and address to strangers; they serve you for the pleasure it affords themselves, not from the idea of gain; they everywhere respect and favour the female character.'

Much has been said by transient visitors in the United States of the indecorous conduct of the people in general at meals. This may probably be seen to some extent on steamboats by travellers, and at ordinaries by men of business; but it seems a misrepresentation and a satire to say that this is characteristic of the American people. Many travellers, to whose testimony the writer can add his own, have asserted, that though they were presented with numerous opportunities for observation, they failed to see the scrambling and voracity with which they are charged.

Although customs in the United States are generally such as are found in Europe, there are some trifling deviations; and these of a kind that in the old country would appear a little singular. Hence in some of the States both married and single women are called Miss, the latter distinguished by their christian names. Very few married women wear a ring as a token of their condition, thus rendering it difficult for strangers to distinguish a married from a single female.

Weddings are often celebrated by gaslight on bright sunny mornings, but most frequently in private dwellings at eventide. It is a rare occurrence that any marriage ceremony is conducted at noonday, as in England. A female child is in general treated with more consideration than a boy,—is allowed more privileges, -dresses better,-has better food. The partiality as to dress is sometimes carried to excess. Some little girls are decked out

like people of matured growth, and become old before their time. They are thus taken out of their childhood to the destruction of their whole future.

Comparatively few of the bad social customs that prevail among the aristocracy of England, however, are seen here; such as the customs of going to bed at daybreak,—rising at noon,-taking what are called morning rides towards evening, and dining after sunset.

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CHAPTER X.

བ་།

PREVAILING CharacteristiCS OF SOCIAL LIFE.- Personal appearance. Dress and habits of both sexes. Houses. Cemeteries. Domestic servants, their moral character, how regarded and treated. Character and circumstances of first European settlers. Moral and social state of present inhabitants. Language, comparative absence of dialects, provincialisms, &c.

Most of the original or earliest European inhabitants being descendants from English families, not only do the present race resemble their progenitors in their manners and customs, in all the general features of social life, as well as in their habits and modes of employment, but also in personal appearance and dress. There are amalgamated with the present population, however, natives both of the European and African continents, sufficiently indicating to the transatlantic visitor that the breadth of the ocean divides him from Great Britain. But although Americans have thus been formed from so many various elements, not only as to old customs, but as to climate, productions, and races, and thus to a considerable degree bear, as may be supposed, a portion of the features that distinguish each of the nations from which they have sprung (which it may also be inferred would give them in the mass a physiognomy difficult to be seized by the pencil of the writer), there is, notwithstanding, much nationality in their appearance,--an appearance marked and peculiar in many even of its physical and moral features, manifestly distinguishable from those of the same class in England, and likely to assume a still more definite character notwithstanding vast and increasing accessions of territory and population.

The men are mostly tall, straight, penetrating, and reflective; their complexion pale or saffron, of an immovable expression of countenance, and wiry in muscle; withal, active and vigorous; their external aspect accompanied by an independent carriage and bearing. They make excellent officers for every department of the state, and of the naval and military professions; eminent lawyers, good political economists, and industrious, practical men of all classes and occupations; but Americans are seldom Utopians or theorists.

In their mental character they are more independent than their transatlantic brethren; less disposed to yield to custom or fashion; they not only think, but act for themselves; they manifest less disposition than an Englishman to ask what their neighbours will say or think of them; they are less trammelled by etiquette and a fastidious refinement, which sometimes lead the latter to compromise their convictions out of complaisance to others. They are, however, extremely sensitive; not like the French, as to breaches of etiquette towards the person,for to these they are comparatively indifferent, but in relation to public satires on their manners and customs. Much elated by praise, they are in a corresponding degree annoyed by blame. They freely satirise themselves, but are considered weakly impatient of any even triflingly disparaging criticism from strangers; apparently forgetful that it is possible to condemn or censure many things in a nation while holding the nation itself in high esteem; and that a desire to put down free discussion, and to curtail the largest liberty of criticism, is inconsistent with their own avowed principles.

The females are generally of slender form, but of paler, less riant countenance than the European; though not less beautiful in form and contour of physiognomy. Some of the ladies are represented as having more exquisitely chiseled features, and more classical heads, than their fair sisters of Albion; but their figure is less perfect, being more angular, attenuated, and fragile. There are some among them, however, who in point of physical perfection are surpassed by none in any part of the world. But it is remarkable that owing, as is supposed, to some peculiarity of climate, in concert with other causes, their beauty is not durable.

In England, a woman is in the prime of her attractions at thirty-five, and she frequently remains almost stationary till fifty, or else declines gradually and gracefully like a beautiful day melting into a lovely evening. In America, twenty-five is the farewell line of beauty in woman. At this age, and sometimes earlier, the bloom of an American belle is gone; and the more substantial materials of beauty almost as quickly follow. At thirty, the whole fabric is on the decline. At the same time, the development of females is more rapid than in Europe. Girls are women at fifteen or sixteen, which may account in some degree for their premature decay.

"The ladies of America," says Dr. Latham, "early lose their

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