foreigners by the patrician
class of Americans.

_Gentlemen_, in the old world sense of the term, are the same
every where; and an American gentleman and his family know how to
do the honours of their country to strangers of every nation, as
well as any people on earth. But this class, though it decidedly
exists, is a very small one, and cannot, in justice, be
represented as affording a specimen of the whole.

Most of the houses in New York are painted on the outside, but in
a manner carefully to avoid disfiguring the material which it
preserves: on the contrary, nothing can be neater. They are now
using a great deal of a beautiful stone called Jersey freestone;
it is of a warm rich brown, and extremely ornamental to the city
wherever it has been employed. They have also a grey granite of
great beauty. The trottoir paving, in most of the streets, is
extremely good, being of large flag stones, very superior to the
bricks of Philadelphia.

At night the shops, which are open till very late, are
brilliantly illuminated with gas, and all the population seem as
much alive as in London or Paris. This makes the solemn
stillness of the evening hours in Philadelphia still more
remarkable.

There are a few trees in different parts of the city, and I
observed young ones planted, and guarded with much care; were
they more abundant it would be extremely agreeable, for the
reflected light of their fierce summer sheds intolerable day.

Ice is in profuse abundance; I do not imagine that there is a
house in the city without the luxury of a piece of ice to cool
the water, and harden the butter.

The hackney coaches are the best in the world, but abominably
dear, and it is necessary to be on the _qui vive_ in making your
bargain with the driver; if you do not, he has the power of
charging immoderately. On my first experiment I neglected this,
and was asked two dollars and a half for an excursion of twenty
minutes. When I referred to the waiter of the hotel, he asked if
I had made a bargain. "No." "Then I expect" (with the usual look
of triumph) "that the Yankee has been too smart for you."

The private carriages of New York are infinitely handsomer and
better appointed than any I saw elsewhere; the want of smart
liveries destroys much of the gay effect, but, on the whole, a
New York summer equipage, with the pretty women and beautiful
children it contains, look extremely well in Broadway, and would
not be much amiss