lord and master of myself and of 100 acres of land—­an improvable farm, little trouble to me, good society and a good market, and, I think, a fine climate, only a little too hot and dry in summer; the parson gets nothing from me; my state and road taxes and poor rates amount to Sec.25.00 per annum.  I can carry a gun if I choose; I leave my door unlocked at night; and I can get snuff for one cent an ounce or a little more[13].”

From the first days of the American colonial movement toward independence there had been, indeed, a British interest in American political principles.  Many Whigs sympathized with these principles for reasons of home political controversy.  Their sympathy continued after American independence and by its insistent expression brought out equally insistent opposition from Tory circles.  The British home movement toward a more representative Government had been temporarily checked by the extremes into which French Liberalism plunged in 1791, causing reaction in England.  By 1820 pressure was again being exerted by British Liberals of intelligence, and they found arguments in such reports as those just quoted.  From that date onward, and especially just before the passing of the Reform Bill of 1832, yet always a factor, the example of a prosperous American democracy was an element in British home politics, lauded or derided as the man in England desired or not an expansion of the British franchise.  In the earlier period, however, it is to be remembered that applause of American institutions did not mean acceptance of democracy to the extent of manhood franchise, for no such franchise at first existed in America itself.  The debate in England was simply whether the step forward in American democracy, was an argument for a similar step in Great Britain.

Books, reviews and newspapers in Great Britain as the political quarrel there grew in force, depicted America favourably or otherwise according to political sympathies at home.  Both before and after the Reform Bill of 1832 this type of effort to mould opinion, by citation of America, was widespread.  Hence there is in such writing, not so much the expression of public opinion, as of propaganda to affect that opinion.  Book upon book, review upon review, might be quoted to illustrate this, but a few notable examples will suffice.

The most widely read and reviewed book on the United States before 1840, except the humorous and flippant characterization of America by Mrs. Trollope, was Captain Basil Hall’s three-volume work, published in 1829[14].  Claiming an open mind, he expected for his adverse findings a readier credence.  For adverse to American political institutions these findings are in all their larger applications.  In every line Hall betrays himself as an old Tory of the ’twenties, fixed in his belief, and convinced of the perfection and unalterableness of the British Constitution.  Captain Hamilton, who wrote in 1833, was more frank in avowal of a purpose[15].  He states in his preface: