The Americans are a singularly good-natured people, and probably submit to more impositions, that are presented as appeals to the spirit of accommodation, than any other people on earth. The writer has frequently ridden miles in torture to accommodate a trunk, and the steam-boats manage matters so to accommodate everybody, that everybody is put to inconvenience. All this is done, with the most indomitable kindness and good nature, on all sides, the people daily, nay hourly exhibiting, in all their public relations, the truth of the axiom, "that what is everybody's business, is nobody's business."
It is not easy for the writer to speak of many personal incidents, lest the motive might be mistaken, in a country where there are so many always disposed to attach a base one if they can; but, it is so creditable to the advanced state of European civilization and intelligence, that, at any hazard, he will here say, that even his small pretensions to literary reputation frequently were of great service to him, and, in no instance, even in those countries whose prejudices be had openly opposed, had he any reason to believe it was of any personal disadvantage. This feeling prevailed at the English custom-houses, at the bureaux all over the Continent, and frequently even at the inns. In one instance, in Italy, an apartment that had been denied, was subsequently offered to him on his own terms, on this account; and, on the present occasion, the proprietor of the Chateau de Piel, who resided at Geneva, sent a handsome expression of his regret that his agent should have thought it necessary to deny the application of a gentleman of his pursuits. Even the cow-chaser paid a similar homage to letters. In short, let the truth be said, the only country in which the writer has found his pursuits a disadvantage, is his own.
The manner in which the English language is becoming corrupted in America, as well as in England, is a matter of serious regret. Some accidental circumstance induced the Manhattanese to call a certain enclosure the Park. This name, probably, at first was appropriate enough, as there might have been an intention really to form a park, though the enclosure is now scarcely large enough to be termed a paddock. This name, however, has extended to the enclosures in other areas, and we have already, in vulgar parlance, St. John's Park, Washington Park, and least though not last, Duane-street Park, an enclosure of the shape of, and not much larger than, a cocked-hat. The site of an ancient fort on the water has been converted into a promenade, and has well enough been called the Battery. But other similar promenades are projected, and the name is extended to them! Thus in the Manhattanese dialect, any enclosure in a town, off the water, that is a park, and any similar enclosure, on the water, a battery! The worthy aldermen may call this English, but it will not be easy to persuade any but their constituents to believe them.