o be saddled with that
acquaintance as often as the traveller chooses to visit the American
Continent? Is not the very idea preposterous? No man in the world is
more ready to welcome the stranger than the American; but if the
stranger revisit the same places, the courtesy and hospitality he
receives must, in justice, depend upon the impression which his company
has left on those upon whom he inflicted it. No doubt the scanty number
of travellers enables Americans to exercise more universal hospitality
than they could do if the country were filled with strangers in the same
way as Great Britain is. The increased travelling of late years has
necessarily made a marked difference on that point among ourselves, and
doubtless it may hereafter act upon the United States; but the man who
does not admit hospitality to be a most distinctive feature of the
Republic, at the present time, must indeed be rotten in the brain or the
heart.

With regard to the political character of the Union, it is very much in
the same state as that of England. The two original parties were Whig
and Democrat, the former being synonymous with the Tory party in this
country--i.e., an honest body of men, who, in their earnest endeavours
to keep the coach straight, put the drag on so often that the horses get
restive sometimes, and start off at score when they feel the wheel
clogged. The Democrats are more nearly represented by a compound of
Whig and Radical--i.e., a body of men who, in their energetic
exertions to make the coach go, don't trouble themselves much about the
road, and look upon the drag as a piece of antiquated humbug. Sometimes
this carelessness also leads to the team-bolting; but in the States
there is so much open country that they may run away for miles without
an upset; whereas in England, when this difficulty occurs, the ribands
are generally handed over to the Jarvey of the opposite party. This old
state of affairs is entirely changed in both hemispheres; each party is
more or less broken up, and in neither country is there at present any
distinct body sufficiently numerous to form a strong government.

In consequence of these disruptions, it may be imagined how difficult it
would be to give any accurate description of the different pieces of
crockery that constitute the political "service." Formerly, the two
cries of "Protection to Home Manufacture" and "Free Trade" were the
distinct rallying points. At present there are Slaveholde