The low rate of taxation, too, unquestionably permits a more rapid accumulation of individual wealth than with us; but till I had travelled through America, I had no idea how much of the money collected in taxes returns among the people, not only in the purchase of what their industry furnishes, but in the actual enjoyment of what is furnished.  Were I an English legislator, instead of sending sedition to the Tower, I would send her to make a tour of the United States.  I had a little leaning towards sedition myself when I set out, but before I had half completed my tour I was quite cured.

I have read much of the “few and simple wants of rational man,” and I used to give a sort of dreamy acquiescence to the reasoning that went to prove each added want an added woe.  Those who reason in a comfortable London drawing-room know little about the matter.  Were the aliments which sustain life all that we wanted, the faculties of the hog might suffice us; but if we analyze an hour of enjoyment, we shall find that it is made up of agreeable sensations occasioned by a thousand delicate impressions on almost as many nerves; where these nerves are sluggish from never having been awakened, external objects are less important, for they are less perceived; but where the whole machine of the human frame is in full activity, where every sense brings home to consciousness its touch of pleasure or of pain, then every object that meets the senses is important as a vehicle of happiness or misery.  But let no frames so tempered visit the United States, or if they do, let it be with no longer pausing than will store the memory with images, which, by the force of contrast, shall sweeten the future.

“Guarda e passa (e poi) ragiam di lor.”

The “simple” manner of living in Western America was more distasteful to me from its levelling effects on the manners of the people, than from the personal privations that it rendered necessary; and yet, till I was without them, I was in no degree aware of the many pleasurable sensations derived from the little elegancies and refinements enjoyed by the middle classes in Europe.  There were many circumstances, too trifling even for my gossiping pages, which pressed themselves daily and hourly upon us, and which forced us to remember painfully that we were not at home.  It requires an abler pen than mine to trace the connection which I am persuaded exists between these deficiencies and the minds and manners of the people.  All animal wants are supplied profusely at Cincinnati, and at a very easy rate; but, alas! these go but a little way in the history of a day’s enjoyment.  The total and universal want of manners, both in males and females, is so remarkable, that I was constantly endeavouring to account for it.  It certainly does not proceed from want of intellect.  I have listened to much dull and heavy conversation in America, but rarely to any that I could strictly call silly, (if I except the every where privileged class of very