LETTER I
Lexington, June 25, 1819.
MY DEAR FRIEND,
It is natural you should have made those enquiries of me which you did in your last, and which it shall be my business to answer in their respective order.
1st.—How I like America in general, and Lexington in particular?
2nd.—Whether I have been disgusted with the American character and habits, as many have been? or whether I dare invite others to follow the course I have taken? but above all, how I, whose notions of liberty run so high, can endure to reside in a state where personal slavery exists.
{6} Your first enquiry I am yet incompetent to answer to the extent you make it; for, although I have travelled from New York to Pittsburgh,—down the Ohio to this place,—I have only had a sample of this extensive country; and as you, my dear Sir, are in the habit of purchasing your goods by sample, and to my knowledge are often disappointed in the bulk, so you may not, perhaps, have a fair sample of entire America by the information I send you.
As to the great cities, they have no charms for me. You know, great cities in England, as places of residence, were the objects of my aversion; and if there is any thing in those of New York and Philadelphia which I dislike, it is because they approximate so much to similar cities of England, without those rare shows which please both infants and children of larger growth, in London.
Here are few public buildings worthy of notice. No kings going to open Parliament with gilded coaches and cream-coloured horses, with a train of dragoons at their heels.—No Lord Mayor's show.—No Towers filled with royal tigers and lions.—No old castles which beautify the rural scenes of the country, whose melancholy history informs the curious traveller, that their foundation was bedded in {7} tyranny, and their superstructure the retainers of weeping prisoners, often of rank, as well as oppressed plebeians. No cathedrals or old churches to ornament the cities as well as the counties of England,—monuments of superstition when erected, and of injustice and oppression even to this day, having for their support tithe-proctors, and surveyors, continually obstructing the progress of agriculture, and exciting contentions and law suits to an extent for which all the preaching of the clergy of England cannot present an equivalent, or balance the evil produced by a worldly and avaricious priesthood.
America has none of these costly ornaments or beautiful monuments of oppression. I thank God she has not; and hope she may be exempt from them, although strange to tell, I have found amongst both clergy and laity some few who wish for these degradations, and am even informed there are those who sigh after a religious establishment, and revenues besides those collected by the voluntary donations which flow from affectionate and religious hearers.
The episcopalian clergy in this country, have an enjoyment seldom known in England, that is, being chosen by the people, and supported {8} according to their respective merits; and it is my duty to add that episcopalians, as well as the ministers of most other sects, are in general "labourers worthy of their hire," virtuous in their conduct, exemplary in their deportment, exhibiting christianity in their every day conduct and intercourse with mankind, and enjoying the esteem of their congregations. There are none of those divines in the busy hive of America, which you know by the name of dignified clergy, partaking of the largest revenues, and doing the least possible service,—conduct which one would think must make their hearts shudder at the thoughts of a judgment day!
As to the travelling in America, you are already informed of its conveniences and inconveniences; you dine at a fixed hour, as at our ordinaries in England; and you have abundance of provision of every kind the country affords. Poultry in every shape, with the standing dish, ham or bacon: but you must be aware, that in a country so extensive as I have already traversed, there must be as much difference in accommodations, as there is between the best inns on the great roads of England, and those in the remote villages. The beds generally cleanly; but although I have {9} not suffered the inconveniences so magnified in England from musquitoes, the often-brought charge of being infested with that ugly and sleep-destroying insect the bug, is indeed too true. Also, the many-bedded rooms found in most taverns, as you travel westward, is more than an inconvenience, as often being the sleeping-place of those who fall sick, as of those who are in health; and, in this respect, the Americans are criminal, and instrumental in spreading infection, which might be avoided by a little expense in the division of sleeping-rooms; but there are many happy exceptions; and, as civilization advances, this evil will be cured.
As to the general character of the Americans, it is sober, industrious, and hospitable; although drunkenness, idleness, and gambling, are vices in existence, they are kept in the back ground, and are by no means so conspicuous as amongst what are called the lower class in England.
It is remarkable, that in the houses of the wealthy, as well as in store or shop-keepers back-rooms, it is the common practice to ask you to take a glass of water, cool fresh water, as a refreshment; at which offer no one is offended; and when wine or liquors are on the {10} salver, water is often preferred; but our countrymen would think it a sad insult to be invited to so simple a refreshment.
I have, my dear sir, met with no instances of a rude ruffian-like character, that will apply to Americans generally; and, I believe, much less than I should have met with in England, had I travelled her roads and rivers to the extent I have done in this country.
The American notion of liberty and equality is highly gratifying to me. The master or employer is kept within the bounds of reason and decency towards his labourer. No curses or oaths towards their servants, or HELPS as they choose to call themselves; (for every one who takes money or wages, is, after all, a servant;) he obeys all reasonable orders for his remuneration; and when this obedience ceases, the contract of service is at an end. I have often been surprised at the highmindedness of American labourers, who are offended at the name of servant.
With respect to this place, I have, in former letters, stated it to be a phenomenon in the history of the world; twenty-five years since it was trodden only by the foot of the savage; now it contains about three thousand inhabitants. A college, at which are already one {11} hundred and forty students; its professors, chosen purely for their talents, without any requirement of unanimity of religious opinions, as in the colleges with you: professors so chosen, not being confined to any particular sect, are likely to fill their stations with ability; and, as far as I am capable of judging, are eminently calculated for their respective situations to which they are chosen. This institution promises to be in the moral world, what the sun is in the natural world, and is calculated to illuminate, civilize, and bless mankind.
To the inhabitants of Lexington, wherever I may reside in future, I shall ever feel grateful: their hospitality, their kindness to me, as a stranger, and their sympathy in the hour of affliction, are never to be effaced from my memory.
Their politeness and liberality are perhaps, unequalled. Balls, at which the fair sex are never allowed to share any expence,—an Atheneum and a considerable museum, the benefits of which the stranger is invited to partake gratis,—may be mentioned as not being very customary in England. Tea-parties are a continual festival from the time you enter to the time of your departure, which however, are too much like our routs in England; and in time, I should fear would, as they have in England, become {12} a substitute for hospitality. I have known collected at these parties from one to two hundred persons. Thus, my dear Sir, you see, instead of being in continual broils, and exposed to the affronts and insults of rude Americans, I have received nothing but civility and hospitality. It will hardly be credited when I assure you I have not yet met with a single annoyance in the whole of my journey from New York to Pittsburgh by land; nor from thence down the Ohio to Louisville,—a distance of six hundred miles by water, and five hundred miles by land: thus you see, my dear friend, I am in no danger at present, of being disgusted by American rudeness, irreligion, or fanaticism.
To your last question,—How can you reside in a state where personal slavery is in existence? I, with regret, reply, this is the spot which clouds the American sun of liberty; and I confess I know not which are most excited in me, the risible or the sorrowful feelings, when I hear a Kentuckyan boasting, in lofty terms, of the liberty of his country, when that country is divided into two classes, and two classes only—the master and the slave! The term of master implies the willing servitude of free men: the term slave, includes in it the admission {13} of tyrants or tyranny; and a Kentuckyan has no more right to talk of freedom than the legitimates, whose determined purpose it is to blot liberty and happiness from the face of the earth. The one talks of liberty and social order, and it appears that by it is meant the increasing trappings of monarchy; the other does the same of liberty, and the rights of men.
The legitimates, who have high notions of regal authority, attempting to subjugate the minds of men, is perfectly consistent with their notions of power, their education and habits; but to hear the republicans of slave states point to the Declaration of Rights, who inform the coming traveller that they are now blazoned forth on satin and velvet;—an American republican pointing to the Rights of Men with his left hand, while his right is obliged to hold the whip, and with watchful eye to subjugate the minds and bodies of a large share of the population of his state:—this, indeed is worthy the taunts and derision of kings. It is this that keeps the wealth of Europe from pouring its treasures into the fertile region of Kentucky, and the industry of thousands from approaching the state. It would be painful to relate all the horrors I have beheld in slavery under {14} its mildest form. Whites full of whiskey, flogging their slaves for drinking even a single glass! Women, heavy with young, smarting under the angry blow, or the lash, and with babes at the breast, which one of our writers calls "Nature's passport through the world," lacking food in the midst of abundance, and cloathing insufficient to satisfy the demands even of common decency. Avarice, which our Poet Young calls "Earth's greatest blunder—Hell's loudest laugh;"—avarice, which seems to be the source of all this mischief, now comes to the relief of the ragged lingering wretch. If they are miserable, they must not die, for a mother and infant are worth from six hundred to a thousand dollars: but in a slave state, avarice has preserved life, clothed the wretched, and fed the hungry; it has fattened and made fine, the slave that he or she may fetch at the hammer, one or two hundred dollars more. "Lord, what is man!" Was it for this that your heroes fought, bled, and died ? Was it for this, that the brave and virtuous Washington, to whom so many memorials in the way of oration and praise are delivered on each succeeding anniversary of his birth, spent his long and glorious course ? Oh! youth of Kentucky, when you speak of his {15} fame with the enthusiasm of a republican, speak of his humanity, read his will; see his ardent desire to let the captive go free: imitate his virtues, and fall not into the errors of tyrants, who suppose military glory to be the glory of a christian.
It is worthy of enquiry, whether it is likely that Americans will escape the judgments with which God has afflicted other nations, while their land is infected with personal slavery, and whether the liberties of America are not endangered by the increase of its black population. Perhaps some ambitious military chief may take the work from the hands of republicans, and "proclaim liberty to the captives," and make them the instruments of political slavery: let it be the work of crowned despots to subjugate the minds and bodies of men, but let not republicans assist in such a work.
Whenever you take Freedom's sacred name into your lips—whenever you unfurl the standard of partial liberty—you stand self-condemned. Despots keep men's minds in ignorance, that the voice of slavery and abject dependance may not be heard even in its defence. Do ye not the same: both your efforts will be in vain; the minds of men are in progressive march, and your united efforts will not stop their destination.
{16} "No, bless'd with freedom, unconfin'd,
Dungeons can ne'er contain the soul;
No one can chain th' immortal mind,
No one but Him who spans the pole."
I remain, yours, sincerely,
R. F.