ing the
table, her husband was always stationed close to it to hand her
to her place; and when he accompanied her again to the door, he
always lingered for a moment or two on the forbidden threshold,
nor left his station, till the last female had passed through.
Once or twice he ventured, when all but his wife were on the
balcony, to sit down beside her for a moment in our cabin, but
the instant either of us entered, he started like a guilty thing
and vanished.

While mentioning the peculiar arrangements which are thought
necessary to the delicacy of the American ladies, or the comfort
of the American gentlemen, I am tempted to allude to a story
which I saw in the papers respecting the visits which it was
stated Captain Basil Hall persisted in making to his wife and
child on board a Mississippi steam-boat, after bring informed
that doing so was contrary to law. Now I happen to know that
neither himself or Mrs. Hall ever entered the ladies' cabin
during the whole voyage, as they occupied a state-room which
Captain Hall had secured for his party. The veracity of
newspaper statements is, perhaps, nowhere quite unimpeachable,
but if I am not greatly mistaken, there are more direct
falsehoods circulated by the American newspapers than by all the
others in the world, and the one great and never-failing source
of these voluminous works of imagination is England and the
English. How differently would such a voyage be managed on the
other side of the Atlantic, were such a mode of travelling
possible there. Such long calm river excursions would be
perfectly delightful, and parties would be perpetually formed to
enjoy them. Even were all the parties strangers to each other,
the knowledge that they were to eat, drink, and steam away
together for a week or fortnight, would induce something like a
social feeling in any other country.

It is true that the men became sufficiently acquainted to game
together, and we were told that the opportunity was considered as
so favourable, that no boat left New Orleans without having as
cabin passengers one or two gentlemen from that city whose
profession it was to drill the fifty-two elements of a pack of
cards to profitable duty. This doubtless is an additional reason
for the strict exclusion of the ladies from their society. The
constant drinking of spirits is another, for though they do not
scruple to chew tobacco and to spit incessantly in the presence
of women, they generally pr