LETTER I.

WHAT THE WRITER HAS SEEN OF THIS WORLD FOR TWENTY-FOUR DAYS.—THE PASSENGERS OF THE BRITANNIA.—THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE AMERICAN AND ENGLISH CUSTOM-HOUSE OFFICERS.—THE WORKING CLASSES.—FEMALE DRESS.—BUSTLES.—WRITING AGAINST THE DOCTOR’S ORDERS, ETC.

My Dear Morris.—All I have seen of England for the last twelve days, has been the four walls of a bedroom, and, as all I saw of the world for the twelve days previous, was the interior of a packet’s state-room, I may fairly claim, like the razor-grinder, to have “no story to tell.” You shall have, however, what cobwebs I picked from the corners.

If the ‘Britannia’ had burnt on the passage, and a phœnix had arisen from its ashes, the phœnix would have been a well compounded cosmopolite, for—did you ever see such variety of nation in one ship’s company as this?

From	England,	16	From	Mexico,	1
	Scotland,	6		West Indies,	2
	Ireland,	3		East Indies,	3
	Wales,	1		British Guiana,	1
	Canada,	2		Guatamala,	2
	United States,	12		Denmark,	1
	France,	4		Poland,	1
	Spain,	1		Germany,	9

Of the Germans, 2 were from Hanover, 2 from Hamburgh, 1 from Baden, 1 from Lubec, 2 from Bremen, and 1 from Heinault. Mr. Robert Owen was one of the Scotchmen, and he was the only one on board, I fancy, for whom fame had made any great outlay of trumpeting. Six clergymen (!!) served as our protection against the icebergs. I doubt whether the Atlantic, had, ever before such a broadwake of divinity drawn across it. Probably, the true faith was in some one of their keepings!

I wish to ask a personal favor of all the friends of the Journal who are in the offices of the American Custom Houses, viz: that they would retaliate upon Englishmen in the most vexatious manner possible, the silly and useless impediments thrown in the way of passengers landing at Liverpool. We dropped anchor with a Custom House steamer alongside, and our baggage lay on deck two hours, (time enough to be examined twice over) before it was transferred to the government vessel. We and our baggage were then taken ashore and landed at a Custom House. But not to be examined there! Oh, no! It must be put into carts, and carried a mile and a half to another Custom House, and there it would be delivered to us if we were there to see it examined! We landed at ten o’clock in the morning, and with my utmost exertions, I did not get my baggage till three. The cost to me, of porterage, fees, etc., was three dollars and a half, besides the theft of two or three small articles belonging to my child. I was too ill to laugh, and I therefore passed the matter over to my resentments.