Next morning I got up early, and took a lounge about Saratoga. The nominal attraction to this place is its water, which is much in vogue, and may be procured all over the States, being bottled and sold under the name of Congress water; as in all such places however, pleasure, not health, is the end pursued by the majority of visitors.
The day was again close and hot: the street was a foot deep in light dust, so that every carriage moved in a cloud, and not a breath of air could rise without bearing this nuisance on its wing. I could not but think, considering the abundance of water, that there was a lack of charity in thus withholding a sprinkling from the road, especially as the resident invalids would, I am sure, have as much benefited by this mode of application as by any other; since to breathe for any length of time an atmosphere constantly impregnated with impalpable powder, must be anything but salutary.
The chief attraction presented to my eyes was the piazza of the hotel where myself and friend had our quarters. This was of immense extent, full twenty feet wide, boarded throughout, and covered by the roof of the house, which was supported by lofty pillars of pine. About these columns grew, in the greatest luxuriance, the wild vine of the country, or some other Clematis, covering them from ground to roof, and forming a continuous rich drapery throughout the whole extent of the long piazza.
This forms a promenade for the residents of the house and their visitors; and, were it out of reach of the dust, it would be difficult to create one more elegant and agreeable. There are several hotels here, whose exteriors present all the attractions of cleanliness and great size, both exceeding good points in so hot a climate as this now was. Of their internal arrangements I know nothing; for after partaking of a breakfast, in common with some hundred and fifty elaborately well-dressed ladies and gentlemen, in a room every way proportioned to the number of the convives, with the thermometer at about 88 degrees, I declared off, and made up my mind to decamp by the next train to seek quiet and coolness on the summit of the Catskill mountains.
On our way we halted for a few hours at Ballston, the quality of whose water is, I believe, similar to that of the Saratoga springs: the place itself I liked better, simply, I suppose, because it had less of bustle and pretension. At the hotel, whose pillared piazza, was, like that I had just quitted, clothed with the freshest and most luxuriant clematis, I met a gay young belle of New York, who was resident here with her family, recruiting a sufficient stock of health to carry her through the fatigues of a winter campaign. By this lady I had my prepossessions in favour of Ballston confirmed; she assured me that the society here, though exceedingly small by comparison, was infinitely more pleasant; that there was less of dress or ceremony, and consequently more real comfort and sociability. I left this place with a strong inclination to remain for a few days at least: but my time of relâche was short; and my misery was that I had much to see, and many points to visit lying far asunder, therefore was bound to hasten on, leaving agreeable realities as soon as found, to seek for something better, which too often proved a shadow when overtaken.
Arrived at Albany, however, I found a right substantial welcome awaiting me from "mine host o' th' Eagle," in the shape of a six o'clock dinner of trout and woodcock, which would have recommended itself even without the aid of a hot day's journey and a ten hours' fast.
Passed the evening with the K——s, one of those families of women which, if I did not value their delicacy more than my own inclination, I should like to describe, in contradiction to those who, viewing only the surface of American society, have so flippantly passed judgment upon its members.
And how many of these little circles have I encountered, and been admitted into, in various parts of these States, composed of women who have seen little of what is called the world; but whose information, intelligence, and spirit would have made them the ornaments of any country; and whose manners, refined, feminine, and naturally graceful, might with infinite advantage be studied by some of the ungentle censors whose tone of criticism is so prononcé.