try, under better information or motives, to come at a truer picture of the condition and prospects of the American people.

The United States, to begin at the beginning, John, are a league or confederation, of thirty-one separate and independent republics. They cover a territory which extends from the 26th degree of latitude south, to the 47th degree north, and, in the other direction, from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. Consequently, they enjoy every variety of climate, from the freezing to the torrid zones, though the greater part of them lie in the temperate regions; they possess every kind of valuable soil, capable of the diversified productions of every kind; and they are exposed, on hill-sides and valleys, to all the genial heats of the sun, and to all the fertilizing influences of the gentle summer rains. The public lands, belonging to the central government alone, amount to more than (12,000,000,000) twelve thousand millions of acres, which, according to the present estimates of the population of the world, is more than an acre a piece for every man, woman, and child on the globe. Adding to this the land belonging to the separate States, and that in the possession of private individuals, and you have an area of three millions, two hundred and twenty-one thousand, five hundred and ninety-five square miles (3,221,595) in extent. Now Great Britain, exclusive of Ireland, contains 34,000 square miles. The extent of the United States is therefore 95 times as great as that of the Island of Great Britain. France contains an area of 197,400 square miles-a territory less than one fifteenth the size of that of the United States. Austria, including Hungary and the Italian dependencies, contains but 300,000 square miles. Russia is the only

nation which exceeds the United States in extent of territory. She has, including her immense Asiatic possessions, a territory of about 4,000,000 square miles. The whole of Europe contains only 3,807,195 square miles, which exceeds by less than one-fifth, or 545,600 square miles, the territory of the United States. The greater part of these immense tracts is almost spontaneously fertile; wherever you strike in the spade or the plough, the corn springs and waves; mines of iron, more extensive than those of Sweden, and of coal, as inexhaustible as those of England, to say nothing of the gold of California, are deposited in its bowels; rivers, which, with one exception, are the largest in the world, and inland lakes like seas, connect and lace its fields; its immeasurable forests stand thick with oak, hickory, locust, fir, and woods of the finest fibre; while the great watery highways of the nations, stand

ready to roll its products to Europe on the one side, and on the other to India, and the farthest East.

Such is the theatre on which the Americans are called to play their parts, and you see that Providence has placed no physical obstacle, at least, in the way of the freest action. Never, indeed, was a more rich, varied, or magnificent residence prepared for any portion of our race. Europe is ten thousand fold more splendid in the accumulations of art; in grand historical monuments; in the treasures of libraries; in the means and appliances of luxurious living; in the numbers of its people; but in all that nature can do to make a dwelling-place for men, the New World is beautiful and blessed beyond

measure.

But who are the actors who are placed on this new theatre? Are they worthy of the great drama in which their parts are cast? and will they conduct it to a catastrophe or a triumph ?

The American people are almost as varied in character as the origins from which they sprung, or the climates under which they live. That stereotyped Yankee, in a long-tailed blue coat, and short striped pantaloons, with a nasal twang to his voice, and a prodigious fondness for exaggerated stories; who appears periodically upon your stage, and who furnishes the staple of stale wit to Nova Scotia bookmakers, is an amusing fellow enough, and he would be nowhere more amusing and wonderful than in nearly every part of the United States. He is the type of a class unknown to all, save diligent antiquarians, or those who sedulously explore the curiosities of natural history. Some remote and scarcely decipherable antitype of him, might be found in the nooks of New England, but at the West and the South, he would seem to every body about as much like an American, as a dodo resembles an eagle, or the hippopotamus a cart-horse.

The American, John, with some odd variations here and there-don't start!— is an Englishman, without his caution, his reserve, his fixed habits, his cant, and his stolidity. He has all the independence of the original stock, all the pluck and determination, with more of quick and restless enterprise. At the East, he displays some of the canniness or cunning of the Scot; at the South, the vivacity and light, graceful air of the Frank, and at the West, the humor of the Irish crossed with German enthusiasm. But every where practical energy predominates in his composition. He is facile, changeable, ever open to adventure, taking up a business in the morning which he discards at night,

and sleeping in his boots, that he may be ready for a fresh start the next day. Yet if success beckons him to the end of any race, he will persist in it for years, will pursue doggedly for a lifetime what others despise, and if he fails at last, unbroken by care or old age, he will "pick up his traps," and move onward with his children to a new settlement. His weary bones are never laid until he is quite dead, when some successor, indefatigable and elastic as himself, resumes and continues his projects. The house of his prosperity and comfort is always a building, and never built. It is no part of his life plan to retire on a plum; he eats his plum as he makes it; then makes and eats it again. In short, then, the American is an inventive, intelligent, driving, and invincible man, with an unexampled adaptability to circumstances, and a sense of personal freedom, so strong, that if I wished to overturn the firmest empire, I would rather turn into it a score of uneasy inquisitive Yankees, than a considerable army of others.

Every year adds more than a quarter of a million of the population of the old world to the new. The sedate and prudent Englishman, the impulsive Irishman, the volatile Frenchman, and the plodding German, all rush to our "fresh fields and pastures new;" but they are soon caught up and absorbed by the influences around them, and long before the second generation, they are dashed forward with the prevailing activity. They forget the stale habits of thought, and of manner, which they left behind them, and they soon exhibit as much eagerness, courage, and enterprise, as the "oldest inhabitant." Thus, an incessant bustle and tumult comes to characterize our society; a noise of awakening life and busy preparation; of vast industrial hosts going forth to battle the stormy elements, and stubborn glebe; of a young, hardy, glowing nation, putting in order and embellishing the homes of uncounted millions yet to come. In comparison with this universal mobility, the slow advances of Europe seem like the decrepit and tottering steps of an old man, whose life, rich though it be, is hidden in the dim past; while we are the suple and smart youth, radiant with the flushes of undisciplined vigor, and rushing impulsively on to a future filled with images of increasing splendor and power. The most favored portions of Europe grow only at the rate of 1 per cent. per annum, while we grow at the rate of 3-say the figures.

Figures are unhandsome things to introduce into polite writing-and very dull too-but they are unfortunately often ne

Supposing population to double every twenty-five years, which is less than the actual rate of increase. Thus, you find, that the child is living who will see one hundred millions of brother freemen on this side of the Atlantic!

Well, having before you the scene and the actor-an open broad theatre, and a free energetic people in the possession of it-the next point that interests us, is how the play is going forward. We are democrats, operating unobstructedly under mere democratic impulses, with an almost unlimited space to operate in-what, thus far, are the results?

I will begin the answer, where every thing human begins, with our physical and external relations to the earth and man. Our gross annual product in 1851, was $2,445,300,000; that of Great Britain, as given by Spachman in 1846, was $1,182,221,236. Other statisticians have made the amount much larger than this, but, as I think, without sufficient grounds.

Here also is a table, corrected from the Belfast Mercantile Journal, which shows the amount of the shipping and tonnage, entered and cleared by the leading nations of the world.

in five years will be greater than yours; our means of internal communication by railroad equal yours, with the Continent thrown in; our telegraphic lines exceed you, by nearly the same measure; and in every other physical element of national superiority we cannot well consent to hold the candle to you.

Let your neighbors the despots know this, will you? and tell them, too, not to be so shallow as to try to account for this vast and increasing prosperity, as they have hitherto done, by ascribing it to the extent of our landed possessions. Russia has land enough in all conscience; is a young nation, moreover; yet Russia cannot compare with us, in solid and swift development. Your Colony of Lower Canada has plenty of land; but how far it lags behind the States, which are only separated by a river! There is a whole continent of fertile land in South America, but where is the population, the trade, the thrift, the peace? No! this land theory will not suffice; it cannot hold water; and it were better for your aforesaid neighbors to concede at once, that we are what we are, because of those free institutions, which give the reins without a curb, to the native enterprise of the people. We are prosperous because we are free, as every nation is prosperous just to the extent of its freedom, which is so abundantly evinced by your own history.

It must be confessed, however, that a nation's, like a man's life, "consisteth not in the abundance of the things that it possesses." All the wealth of the world would do us no good, if it were unaccompanied by the richer treasures of intelligence, virtue, and religion. It is a part of my task, therefore, to show the effects which democracy has had upon these; and, I think, in pursuance of it, I shall be able to make it clear that we are about as well-educated, moral and orderly a people as you can find; or in other words, that our intellectual, social, and religious progress has kept pace with our physical development.

Reading and writing is a fair test of popular intelligence, or, which amounts to the same thing, the number of children who go to school, and the number of adults who take newspapers, periodicals, and books. Now, the people of this republic esteem it one of their first duties to make ample provision for the gratuitous instruction of youth. Their public schools are open every day, except Sundays, to every class of citizens, are furnished with competent teachers and libraries, and have an immense average attendance of pupils. Adding to these the private and grammar schools, the young ladies' seminaries and

colleges, and the theological and medical institutes, in all just 100,000, and the number of pupils will reach 4,000,000; which you will see, according to the usual proportion of persons under twenty years of age, comprises nine-tenths of our adolescence, or one out of every five persons. I have seen it stated that less than 2,000,000 of your youths go to any school, and that the amount of your government grants in aid of primary instruction falls short of £100,000, while only half your men and one-third of your women can read! Why, the State of New-York alone, with only 3,000,000 of inhabitants has a school-fund of 6,641,930 dollars, and spends $2,249,814 annually, on 11,537 different free schools, in which 862,507 children are recipients of their bounties, besides 36,183 at the private academies. Thus, more than one quarter of the whole population of the State receives education in the district schools. It is true, that Mr. Combe says that much of the instruction in these common schools is exceedingly defective; and certainly it is not equal to that of the colleges; but it is better than none; it begets the habit of learning, and lays the foundation for future superior attainments.

That it is not wholly inefficient is evident, in that so many of our children grow up to be readers. Here is a little statement, for instance, of the issues of our periodical and newspaper press, which speaks much:

That is, nearly seventeen copies a year, of some publication or other, to every man, woman, and child in the nation; or, excluding infants, aged and diseased persons, and those who can't read, at least a newspaper each week to every family. Accordingly I do not believe that there is an American family in the land which does not take in some newspaper or magazine. I am not now arguing as to the character of these publications, which, by the way, are as good generally as those of other nations, but only as to the fact of their almost universal circulation. In the United Kingdom there is not a daily paper printed out of London: of those that are printed in London, all are too costly to be taken by the poorer classes; which is true also of the quarterlies and monthlies; and of the weekly or local

prints, only a few obtain any considerable circulation.

The statistics of the book-trade unfortunately are not at hand, but I have no doubt that the circulation of books is on a level with that of periodicals. No really valuable work is published in England which is not reprinted here: the works of our own authors are widely read; the trade of book-making is lucrative, and that of book publishing more so. One publishing house, the HARPERS', issue on the average a book a day, the sales of which vary from five to fifty thousand copies. It is also a happy sign which I get from the publishers, that the best books generally sell best,-by which I mean, solid, well-written, instructive books, not your Reynolds' and Ainsworth's romances, but the works of Macaulay, Carlyle, De Quincey, Alison, Bulwer, Dickens, Thackeray, Bancroft, Prescott, Irving, &c. Mind, I say not that we are a learned, but only an intelligent people; we read variously, and much; for as every man is thrown by the peculiar structure of our society on his own energies, one of the first wants that he perceives and supplies is that of a respectable degree of knowledge. Profundity and learning will come by and by, to such as have need of them, when we have more leisure.

Then, as to our moral and religious acquirements,-ah! what visions of lynchlaw, bowie-knives, filibusterers, and the "half-horse, half-alligator" species, must float before your after-dinner sleep! What shrieks of poor tortured Africans, with chains on their wrists, supplicating piteously "Am I not a man and a brother," startle you into indignant wakefulness? What streams of tobacco-juice roll like another muddy Mississippi across your cleanly sensibilities, while you stand aghast to survey us as a nation of blacklegs, sharpers and bullies? It is a strong case against us; one you think scarcely admitting a defence; and yet look at some curious facts on the other side.

Nearly every man among us is occupied in some useful pursuit: the statisticians say 335 out of a thousand, which, rejecting infants, minors and women, is nearly allthe consequence is, that there is little pauperism, the prolific source of vice, and not much crime. The whole number of poor in the several States was, at the time of taking the last census, 134,972, of whom 68,538, or more than half, were of foreign birth-(friends mostly that you have sent us, honest cousin): and the entire cost of their support, during the year, was $2,954,806.

The number of paupers in England

and Wales, from 1840 to 1848, was 1,649,178 per annum, and the total expenditure for the poor in England and Ireland, during the year 1848, amounted to $42,750,000. The whole number of persons convicted of crime in the United States for the year ending June 1, 1850, was about 27,000. Of these, 13,000 were native and 14,000 foreign born. The whole number in prison on the first day of June was about 6,700, of whom 4,300 were native, and 2,460 foreign. These are astonishingly small figures! Minor offences, of which we have no returns, are undoubtedly more numerous, especially personal assaults,-seeing that an American does not allow himself to be smitten more than a dozen times before he smites back; and yet Lord Carlisle says, that in all his travels in America he never saw an affront given, and Mr. Fidler, Mr. Stuart, Mr. Buckingham, Mr. Power, and Miss Martineau, in the midst of much that displeases them, declare that our laboring people are the most orderly, peaceable, industrious, good-natured fellows that could be conceived. Certainly! For why should they kick up a row, or fall to, upon society or their neighbors. They have enough to eat and drink, and wherewithal to be clothed; they have no unjust taxes to despoil them of their earnings; no insolent officials to goad them into insurrection; in a word, they are satisfied with themselves and their government, and have no occasion for tumult. It is therefore only in the larger cities, receptacles of outcasts, and among the foreigners on the canals, that we know of Astor-Place riots, or Corkonian shindies.

Consider, too, the amount of religious teaching vouchsafed in every year. Heaven knows there is enough of it; no nation in the world gets so much, and if we do not profit by it, we must be hard sinners indeed! There are, according to the last census returns, in the United States, 8,791 Baptist churches, 812 Christian, 1,674 Congregational, 324 Dutch Reformed, 1,422 Episcopal, 361 Free, 714 Friends, 327 German Reformed, 31 Jewish, 1,208 Lutheran, 110 Mennonist, 12,467 Methodist, 331 Moravian, 4,584 Presbyterian, 1,112 Roman Catholic, 15 Swedenborgian, 52 Tunker, 619 Union, 243 Unitarian, 490 Universalist, and 325 of minor sects; making a total of 49,011, furnishing accommodation for 13,849,896 persons, or one church for every 600 inhabitants, and covering church property to the amount of $86,416,636.

Now, these are not State establishments, churches forced upon us by the government whether we will or no, and which we attend only because the law