My stay in New York being limited by previous arrangements, I was anxious to get back to the city, although a day might well be taken up in ruralizing, and exploring the Arcadian beauties of Hoboken, the favourite resort of the citizens of New York.  So, after a pretty general though cursory survey of its attractions, I recrossed, as I had come, in a ferry propelled by steam.  The construction of this boat, a whole fleet of which description were busily plying to and fro, being unique, and unlike any I had seen before, I must not pass it over without remark.  In principle it consisted of two barge-like vessels placed side by side, a platform being laid on the top, for the engine, passengers, and steersman; the latter, as in all American steam-vessels, of whatever size, being perched in an elevated round-house on deck.  The stem and stern of this vessel were alike, the necessity of turning being thus altogether obviated, as in some of the steam-boats on the Thames.

A practice prevails amongst newspaper publishers in America, which is, I believe, only resorted to in England in cases of public emergency or unusual excitement, and that but seldom; I mean that of posting on large placards the latest arrival of news, home or foreign:  thus, whenever you return home after a sojourn in the city, the eager inquiry is sure to be, “Any news up town?” This custom keeps up a lively interest in passing events, and disseminates amongst the citizens at large, the current news of the day, and if it has no other beneficial effects, prevents rumours, that commonly circulate in times of public excitement to the detriment often of many individuals in crowded communities.  I noticed the walls of New York thickly posted with placards chiefly of an inflammatory political character.  Many of these breathed agrarian principles, that would in Europe have been inadmissible, and would, without doubt, have led to the immediate arrest and imprisonment of the authors.  Here, however, they are but little noticed by the populace, and not at all, I believe, by the authorities.  Cheap newspapers are pushed into the face of the passer-by, at the corner of every principal thoroughfare, the prices varying from two to six cents.  These, as may be supposed, contain, together with the current news, every description of scandal and trash imaginable, their personality being highly offensive, injurious, and reprehensible.  Thus the freedom of the press is abused in every part of America, and this powerful engine of “good or ill” converted from a benefit (as it is if managed with propriety) into a public nuisance.