ws of the
state forbid their working more than nine months in the year, and
require that they shall be educated during the other three. There is a
hospital or boarding-house for the sick, at 3 dollars per week: they do
not often require its assistance, for in 1841 they had 100,000 dollars
in the savings-bank. We visited the Mechanics' Reading-room--a large
building, with papers from all parts.

The population of Lowell is 25,000; one of the most rising towns in the
states. There are also Fall River, Taunton, Manchester, Great Falls,
Dover, New Hampshire--all rising manufacturing places. In New England
state there is no coal, which is a great drawback. I returned to Boston,
and spent the evening with some friends.

_Thursday._--Mr. Hanson drove me to Cambridge, to see the Universities.
This is a clean, well-built town, with 8000 or 9000 inhabitants. The
expense of education is 300 dollars; and if that cannot be paid, the
students are educated free, subject to instructing others a little.
There is no barrier here to the poorest man's son becoming the
President, as free-schools abound. We then drove to Mount Auburn, a
cemetery delightfully situated about five miles from Boston. They pay
4000 dollars for a lot for a family burying-place. Here some eminent men
are interred. There are some beautiful walks over this one-hundred-acres
plot of ground. We then drove round by Charlestown, a place of 10,000
inhabitants, where the Bostonians reside, well-situated; and so on to
Bunker-hill Monument, where the battle was fought in 1775, when General
James Warren fell: it is a very substantial mark of Jonathan conquering
John. Bull. I then visited the Massachusetts State-house: the
Congress-house and Representatives are very commodious. I ascended the
top, which gives a most commanding view of the whole city: it was very
clear, and the view was most extensive. Like New York, it is upon an
island, surrounded (except a few yards) with the River Charles and the
Ocean. Home to dinner, and gave my friends T. Cochrane and Mr. Schofield
two bottles of champagne, it being my last day in the States. We then
proceeded to Perkins's Institution for the Blind, managed by my
fellow-passenger, Dr. Howe. We saw the gifted Laura Bridgman, whose
biography I give elsewhere.[A] She is an interesting-looking girl,
fifteen years old, deaf, dumb, blind, and no smell: still Providence
makes her contented and happy: she can read and write, and understand
g