American Notes for General Circulation

by Dickens, Chales

  courtesy, and good breeding. The ladies are unquestionably very

  beautiful - in face: but there I am compelled to stop. Their

  education is much as with us; neither better nor worse. I had

  heard some very marvellous stories in this respect; but not

  believing them, was not disappointed. Blue ladies there are, in

  Boston; but like philosophers of that colour and sex in most other

  latitudes, they rather desire to be thought superior than to be so.

  Evangelical ladies there are, likewise, whose attachment to the

  forms of religion, and horror of theatrical entertainments, are

  most exemplary. Ladies who have a passion for attending lectures

  are to be found among all classes and all conditions. In the kind

  of provincial life which prevails in cities such as this, the

  Pulpit has great influence. The peculiar province of the Pulpit in

  New England (always excepting the Unitarian Ministry) would appear

  to be the denouncement of all innocent and rational amusements.

  The church, the chapel, and the lecture-room, are the only means of

  excitement excepted; and to the church, the chapel, and the

  lecture-room, the ladies resort in crowds.

  Wherever religion is resorted to, as a strong drink, and as an

  escape from the dull monotonous round of home, those of its

  ministers who pepper the highest will be the surest to please.

  They who strew the Eternal Path with the greatest amount of

  brimstone, and who most ruthlessly tread down the flowers and

  leaves that grow by the wayside, will be voted the most righteous;

  and they who enlarge with the greatest pertinacity on the

  difficulty of getting into heaven, will be considered by all true

  believers certain of going there: though it would be hard to say

  by what process of reasoning this conclusion is arrived at. It is

  so at home, and it is so abroad. With regard to the other means of

  excitement, the Lecture, it has at least the merit of being always

  new. One lecture treads so quickly on the heels of another, that

  none are remembered; and the course of this month may be safely

  repeated next, with its charm of novelty unbroken, and its interest

  unabated.

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  The fruits of the earth have their growth in corruption. Out of

  the rottenness of these things, there has sprung up in Boston a

  sect of philosophers known as Transcendentalists. On inquiring

  what this appellation might be supposed to signify, I was given to

  understand that whatever was unintelligible would be certainly

  transcendental. Not deriving much comfort from this elucidation, I

  pursued the inquiry still further, and found that the

  Transcendentalists are followers of my friend Mr. Carlyle, or I

  should rather say, of a follower of his, Mr. Ralph Waldo Emerson.

  This gentleman has written a volume of Essays, in which, among much

  that is dreamy and fanciful (if he will pardon me for saying so),

  there is much more that is true and manly, honest and bold.

  Transcendentalism has its occasional vagaries (what school has

  not?), but it has good healthful qualities in spite of them; not

  least among the number a hearty disgust of Cant, and an aptitude to

  detect her in all the million varieties of her everlasting

  wardrobe. And therefore if I were a Bostonian, I think I would be

  a Transcendentalist.

  The only preacher I heard in Boston was Mr. Taylor, who addresses

  himself peculiarly to seamen, and who was once a mariner himself.

  I found his chapel down among the shipping, in one of the narrow,

  old, water-side streets, with a gay blue flag waving freely from

  its roof. In the gallery opposite to the pulpit were a little

  choir of male and female singers, a violoncello, and a violin. The

  preacher already sat in the pulpit, which was raised on pillars,

  and ornamented behind him with painted drapery of a lively and

  somewhat theatrical appearance. He looked a weather-beaten hardfeatured

  man, of about six or eight and fifty; with deep lines

  graven as it were into his face, dark hair, and a stern, keen eye.

  Yet the general character of his countenance was pleasant and

  agreeable. The service commenced with a hymn, to which succeeded

  an extemporary prayer. It had the fault of frequent repetition,

  incidental to all such prayers; but it was plain and comprehensive

  in its doctrines, and breathed a tone of general sympathy and

  charity, which is not so commonly a characteristic of this form of

  address to the Deity as it might be. That done he opened his

  discourse, taking for his text a passage from the Song of Solomon,

  laid upon the desk before the commencement of the service by some

  unknown member of the congregation: 'Who is this coming up from

  the wilderness, leaning on the arm of her beloved!'

  He handled his text in all kinds of ways, and twisted it into all

  manner of shapes; but always ingeniously, and with a rude

  eloquence, well adapted to the comprehension of his hearers.

  Indeed if I be not mistaken, he studied their sympathies and

  understandings much more than the display of his own powers. His

  imagery was all drawn from the sea, and from the incidents of a

  seaman's life; and was often remarkably good. He spoke to them of

  'that glorious man, Lord Nelson,' and of Collingwood; and drew

  nothing in, as the saying is, by the head and shoulders, but

  brought it to bear upon his purpose, naturally, and with a sharp

  mind to its effect. Sometimes, when much excited with his subject,

  he had an odd way - compounded of John Bunyan, and Balfour of

  Burley - of taking his great quarto Bible under his arm and pacing

  up and down the pulpit with it; looking steadily down, meantime,

  into the midst of the congregation. Thus, when he applied his text

  to the first assemblage of his hearers, and pictured the wonder of

  the church at their presumption in forming a congregation among

  themselves, he stopped short with his Bible under his arm in the

  manner I have described, and pursued his discourse after this

  manner:

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  'Who are these - who are they - who are these fellows? where do

  they come from? Where are they going to? - Come from! What's the

  answer?' - leaning out of the pulpit, and pointing downward with

  his right hand: 'From below!' - starting back again, and looking

  at the sailors before him: 'From below, my brethren. From under

  the hatches of sin, battened down above you by the evil one.

  That's where you came from!' - a walk up and down the pulpit: 'and

  where are you going' - stopping abruptly: 'where are you going?

  Aloft!' - very softly, and pointing upward: 'Aloft!' - louder:

  'aloft!' - louder still: 'That's where you are going - with a fair

  wind, - all taut and trim, steering direct for Heaven in its glory,

  where there are no storms or foul weather, and where the wicked

  cease from troubling, and the weary are at rest.' - Another walk:

  'That's where you're going to, my friends. That
's it. That's the

  place. That's the port. That's the haven. It's a blessed harbour

  - still water there, in all changes of the winds and tides; no

  driving ashore upon the rocks, or slipping your cables and running

  out to sea, there: Peace - Peace - Peace - all peace!' - Another

  walk, and patting the Bible under his left arm: 'What! These

  fellows are coming from the wilderness, are they? Yes. From the

  dreary, blighted wilderness of Iniquity, whose only crop is Death.

  But do they lean upon anything - do they lean upon nothing, these

  poor seamen?' - Three raps upon the Bible: 'Oh yes. - Yes. - They

  lean upon the arm of their Beloved' - three more raps: 'upon the

  arm of their Beloved' - three more, and a walk: 'Pilot, guidingstar,

  and compass, all in one, to all hands - here it is' - three

  more: 'Here it is. They can do their seaman's duty manfully, and

  be easy in their minds in the utmost peril and danger, with this' -

  two more: 'They can come, even these poor fellows can come, from

  the wilderness leaning on the arm of their Beloved, and go up - up

  - up!' - raising his hand higher, and higher, at every repetition

  of the word, so that he stood with it at last stretched above his

  head, regarding them in a strange, rapt manner, and pressing the

  book triumphantly to his breast, until he gradually subsided into

  some other portion of his discourse.

  I have cited this, rather as an instance of the preacher's

  eccentricities than his merits, though taken in connection with his

  look and manner, and the character of his audience, even this was

  striking. It is possible, however, that my favourable impression

  of him may have been greatly influenced and strengthened, firstly,

  by his impressing upon his hearers that the true observance of

  religion was not inconsistent with a cheerful deportment and an

  exact discharge of the duties of their station, which, indeed, it

  scrupulously required of them; and secondly, by his cautioning them

  not to set up any monopoly in Paradise and its mercies. I never

  heard these two points so wisely touched (if indeed I have ever

  heard them touched at all), by any preacher of that kind before.

  Having passed the time I spent in Boston, in making myself

  acquainted with these things, in settling the course I should take

  in my future travels, and in mixing constantly with its society, I

  am not aware that I have any occasion to prolong this chapter.

  Such of its social customs as I have not mentioned, however, may be

  told in a very few words.

  The usual dinner-hour is two o'clock. A dinner party takes place

  at five; and at an evening party, they seldom sup later than

  eleven; so that it goes hard but one gets home, even from a rout,

  by midnight. I never could find out any difference between a party

  at Boston and a party in London, saving that at the former place

  all assemblies are held at more rational hours; that the

  conversation may possibly be a little louder and more cheerful; and

  a guest is usually expected to ascend to the very top of the house

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  to take his cloak off; that he is certain to see, at every dinner,

  an unusual amount of poultry on the table; and at every supper, at

  least two mighty bowls of hot stewed oysters, in any one of which a

  half-grown Duke of Clarence might be smothered easily.

  There are two theatres in Boston, of good size and construction,

  but sadly in want of patronage. The few ladies who resort to them,

  sit, as of right, in the front rows of the boxes.

  The bar is a large room with a stone floor, and there people stand

  and smoke, and lounge about, all the evening: dropping in and out

  as the humour takes them. There too the stranger is initiated into

  the mysteries of Gin-sling, Cock-tail, Sangaree, Mint Julep,

  Sherry-cobbler, Timber Doodle, and other rare drinks. The house is

  full of boarders, both married and single, many of whom sleep upon

  the premises, and contract by the week for their board and lodging:

  the charge for which diminishes as they go nearer the sky to roost.

  A public table is laid in a very handsome hall for breakfast, and

  for dinner, and for supper. The party sitting down together to

  these meals will vary in number from one to two hundred: sometimes

  more. The advent of each of these epochs in the day is proclaimed

  by an awful gong, which shakes the very window-frames as it

  reverberates through the house, and horribly disturbs nervous

  foreigners. There is an ordinary for ladies, and an ordinary for

  gentlemen.

  In our private room the cloth could not, for any earthly

  consideration, have been laid for dinner without a huge glass dish

  of cranberries in the middle of the table; and breakfast would have

  been no breakfast unless the principal dish were a deformed beefsteak

  with a great flat bone in the centre, swimming in hot butter,

  and sprinkled with the very blackest of all possible pepper. Our

  bedroom was spacious and airy, but (like every bedroom on this side

  of the Atlantic) very bare of furniture, having no curtains to the

  French bedstead or to the window. It had one unusual luxury,

  however, in the shape of a wardrobe of painted wood, something

  smaller than an English watch-box; or if this comparison should be

  insufficient to convey a just idea of its dimensions, they may be

  estimated from the fact of my having lived for fourteen days and

  nights in the firm belief that it was a shower-bath.

  CHAPTER IV - AN AMERICAN RAILROAD. LOWELL AND ITS FACTORY SYSTEM

  BEFORE leaving Boston, I devoted one day to an excursion to Lowell.

  I assign a separate chapter to this visit; not because I am about

  to describe it at any great length, but because I remember it as a

  thing by itself, and am desirous that my readers should do the

  same.

  I made acquaintance with an American railroad, on this occasion,

  for the first time. As these works are pretty much alike all

  through the States, their general characteristics are easily

  described.

  There are no first and second class carriages as with us; but there

  is a gentleman's car and a ladies' car: the main distinction

  between which is that in the first, everybody smokes; and in the

  second, nobody does. As a black man never travels with a white

  one, there is also a negro car; which is a great, blundering,

  clumsy chest, such as Gulliver put to sea in, from the kingdom of

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  Brobdingnag. There is a great deal of jolting, a great deal of

  noise, a great deal of wall, not much window, a locomotive engine,

  a shriek, and a bell.

  The cars are like shabby omnibuses, but larger: holding thirty,

  forty, fifty, people. The seats, instead of stretching from end to

  end, are placed crosswise. Each seat holds two persons. There is

  a long row of them on each side of the caravan, a narrow passage up

  the middle, and a door at both ends. In the centre of the carriage
>
  there is usually a stove, fed with charcoal or anthracite coal;

  which is for the most part red-hot. It is insufferably close; and

  you see the hot air fluttering between yourself and any other

  object you may happen to look at, like the ghost of smoke.

  In the ladies' car, there are a great many gentlemen who have

  ladies with them. There are also a great many ladies who have

  nobody with them: for any lady may travel alone, from one end of

  the United States to the other, and be certain of the most

  courteous and considerate treatment everywhere. The conductor or

  check-taker, or guard, or whatever he may be, wears no uniform. He

  walks up and down the car, and in and out of it, as his fancy

  dictates; leans against the door with his hands in his pockets and

  stares at you, if you chance to be a stranger; or enters into

  conversation with the passengers about him. A great many

  newspapers are pulled out, and a few of them are read. Everybody

  talks to you, or to anybody else who hits his fancy. If you are an

  Englishman, he expects that that railroad is pretty much like an

  English railroad. If you say 'No,' he says 'Yes?'

  (interrogatively), and asks in what respect they differ. You

  enumerate the heads of difference, one by one, and he says 'Yes?'

  (still interrogatively) to each. Then he guesses that you don't

  travel faster in England; and on your replying that you do, says

  'Yes?' again (still interrogatively), and it is quite evident,

  don't believe it. After a long pause he remarks, partly to you,

  and partly to the knob on the top of his stick, that 'Yankees are

  reckoned to be considerable of a go-ahead people too;' upon which

  YOU say 'Yes,' and then HE says 'Yes' again (affirmatively this

  time); and upon your looking out of window, tells you that behind

  that hill, and some three miles from the next station, there is a

  clever town in a smart lo-ca-tion, where he expects you have

  concluded to stop. Your answer in the negative naturally leads to

  more questions in reference to your intended route (always

  pronounced rout); and wherever you are going, you invariably learn

  that you can't get there without immense difficulty and danger, and

  that all the great sights are somewhere else.

  If a lady take a fancy to any male passenger's seat, the gentleman

  who accompanies her gives him notice of the fact, and he