its own
exertions, created an aristocracy within its own bosom. All the
aristocracies of the Middle Ages were founded by military conquest: the
conqueror was the noble, the vanquished became the serf. Inequality was
then imposed by force; and after it had been introduced into the manners
of the country, it maintained its own authority, and was sanctioned by
the legislation. Communities have existed which were aristocratic from
their earliest origin, owing to circumstances anterior to that event,
and which became more democratic in each succeeding age. Such was the
destiny of the Romans, and of the barbarians after them. But a people,
having taken its rise in civilisation and democracy, which should
gradually establish an inequality of conditions, until it arrived at
inviolable privileges and exclusive castes, would be a novelty in the
world and nothing intimates that America is likely to furnish so
singular an example."

I grant that no single people has by its own free-will created an
aristocracy, but circumstances will make one in spite of the people; and
if there is no aristocracy who have power to check, a despotism may be
the evil arising from the want of it. At present America is thinly
peopled, but let them look forward to the time when the population shall
become denser; what will then be the effect? why a division between the
rich and the poor will naturally take place; and what is that but the
foundation if not the formation of an aristocracy. An American cannot
entail his estate, but he can leave the whole of it to his eldest son if
he pleases; and in a few years, the lands which have been purchased for
a trifle, will become the foundation of noble fortunes [see Note 2] but
even now their law of non-entail does not work as they would wish.

M. Tocqueville says--"The laws of the United States are extremely
favourable to the division of property; but a cause which is more
powerful than the laws prevents property from being divided to excess.
[See Note 3.] This is very perceptible in the States which are beginning
to be thickly peopled; Massachusetts is the most populous part of the
Union, but it contains only eighty inhabitants to the square mile, which
is much less than in France, where a hundred and sixty-two are reckoned
to the same extent of country. But in Massachusetts estates are very
rarely divided; the eldest son takes the land, and the others go to seek
their fortune in the desert. The law