[2] The two streets which face the Common.
[3] The United States Bank and the Sub-treasury system.
[4] These change at the different stopping-places of the boat.
CHAPTER II.
Cross-examination of Foreigners in the United States.—Definition of Common Sense—Its high value in America.—Aversion to Genius.—Sensible reply of a Boston Aristocrat with regard to a Parvenu from the country.—Ladies buying themselves a Professor.—Boys at school learning for Money.—A Boston fashionable Concert—Description of the Musicians and the Audience.—High value of Morality in a Cantatrice.—Dangers of differing in matters of taste from the leading Coteries.—Secret Police in Boston.—Reflections.
“Unhappy he, who from the first of joys—
Society—cut off, is left alone
Amid this world of death. Day after day
Sad on the jetting eminence he sits,
And views the main that ever toils below.”
Thomson’s Seasons.
The day after my arrival in Boston I delivered my letters of introduction. Some I merely sent with my card; others I carried in person, according to the custom of the country. My reception could not, of course, be equal to that of a well-recommended Englishman; the word “de” having, by my request, been suppressed in all my letters, and it not being known at that time that I was about to commit my impressions to paper. Yet was I received with politeness; subject, however, to a sort of cross-examination, of which, for the benefit of travellers, I will here furnish a short extract.
Question.—“How do you like this country?”