APPEAL TO THE PUBLIC.

Having, by a train of fortunate circumstances, accomplished a voyage, of which the history of mankind affords no example; having, moreover, exerted every faculty of body and mind, to make my adventures useful to my countrymen, and even to mankind, by imparting to them the acquisition of secrets in physics and morals, of which they had not formed the faintest conception,—­I flattered myself that both in the character of traveller and public benefactor, I had earned for myself an immortal name.  But how these fond, these justifiable hopes have been answered, the following narrative will show.

On my return to this my native State, as soon as it was noised abroad that I had met with extraordinary adventures, and made a most wonderful voyage, crowds of people pressed eagerly to see me.  I at first met their inquiries with a cautious silence, which, however, but sharpened their curiosity.  At length I was visited by a near relation, with whom I felt less disposed to reserve.  With friendly solicitude he inquired “how much I had made by my voyage;” and when he was informed that, although I had added to my knowledge, I had not improved my fortune, he stared at me a while, and remarking that he had business at the Bank, as well as an appointment on ’Change, suddenly took his leave.  After this, I was not much interrupted by the tribe of inquisitive idlers, but was visited principally by a few men of science, who wished to learn what I could add to their knowledge of nature.  To this class I was more communicative; and when I severally informed them that I had actually been to the Moon, some of them shrugged their shoulders, others laughed in my face, and some were angry at my supposed attempt to deceive them; but all, with a single exception, were incredulous.

It was to no purpose that I appealed to my former character for veracity.  I was answered, that travelling had changed my morals, as it had changed other people’s.  I asked what motives I could have for attempting to deceive them.  They replied, the love of distinction—­the vanity of being thought to have seen what had been seen by no other mortal; and they triumphantly asked me in turn, what motives Raleigh, and Riley, and Hunter, and a hundred other travellers, had for their misrepresentations.  Finding argument thus unavailing, I produced visible and tangible proofs of the truth of my narrative.  I showed them a specimen of moonstone.  They asserted that it was of the same character as those meteoric stones which had been found in every part of the world, and that I had merely procured a piece of one of these for the purpose of deception.  I then exhibited some of what I considered my most curious Lunar plants:  but this made the matter worse; for it so happened, that similar ones were then cultivated in Mr. Prince’s garden at Flushing.  I next produced some rare insects, and feathers of singular birds:  but persons