University of Virginia Library

THE AUTHOR.

In again taking pen in hand I would fain
make a few observations at the outset, by way
of bespeaking a right understanding. The volumes
which I have already published have met
with a reception far beyond my most sanguine
expectations. I would willingly attribute this to
their intrinsic merits; but, in spite of the vanity
of authorship, I cannot but be sensible that
their success has, in a great measure, been
owing to a less flattering cause. It has been a
matter of marvel, at least to the European part
of my readers, that a man from the wilds of
America should express himself in tolerable
English. I was looked upon as something new
and strange in literature; a kind of demi-savage,
with a feather in his hand instead of on his head,

and there was a curiosity to hear what such a
being had to say about civilized society.

This novelty is now at an end, and with it, in
all probability, the feeling of indulgence which
it produced. I must now expect to bear the scrutiny
of sterner criticism, and to be measured by
the same standard with contemporary writers;
and the very indulgence that has been shown to
my previous writings, will cause these to be
treated with the greater rigour.

I am aware that I often travel over a beaten
ground, and treat of subjects that have been already
discussed by abler pens. Indeed, various
authors have been mentioned as my models, to
whom I should feel flattered if I thought I bore
the slightest resemblance. I write after no model
that I am conscious of; and I write with no
idea of imitation or competition. In venturing
occasionally on subjects that have already been
almost exhausted by English authors, I do it,
not with the presumption of challenging a comparison,
but because I trust there will be some
new interest given to them, when discussed by

the pen of a stranger. If, therefore, I should
occasionally be found dwelling with fondness on
topics that are trite and commonplaced with
the reader, I beg the circumstances under which
I write may be kept in recollection. I have
been born and brought up in a new country;
yet educated from infancy in the literature of an
old one. My mind has gradually been filled
with historical and poetical associations, which
were connected with places, and manners, and
customs of Europe, but could rarely be applied
to those of my own country. With a mind thus
peculiarly prepared, the most trivial and commonplaced
objects and scenes, on first landing
in Europe, were full of interest and novelty.

Indeed, it is difficult to describe the whimsical
medley of ideas that rush at once upon a
stranger in such peculiar predicament. He
for the first time sees a world about which he
has been thinking in every stage of his existence.
The recollections of infancy, youth, and
manhood; of the nursery, the school, and the
study, come swarming upon him; distracting

his attention between great and little objects,
and each perhaps producing equal delight.

Such, for instance, was the odd confusion of
associations that kept breaking upon me as I
first approached London. One of my earliest
wishes had been to see it; I had heard so much
of it in childhood; I had read so much about
it in the earliest books that had been put in my
infant hands; I was familiar with the names of
its streets, and squares, and public places, before
I knew those of my native city. It was, to
me, the great centre of the world, round which
every thing seemed to revolve. I recollect contemplating
so wistfully, when a boy, a paltry
little print of the Thames, and London Bridge,
and St. Paul's, that was in front of a magazine;
even the venerable wood-cut of St. John's
gate, that has stood time out of mind on the
title page of the Gentleman's Magazine, was
not without its charms for me.

How my bosom thrilled when the towers of
Westminster Abbey were pointed out to me,
rising above the rich groves of St. James'

Park, with a thin blue haze about their gray
pinnacles.

I could not behold this great mausoleum of
what is most illustrious in our paternal history
without feeling all my enthusiasm in a glow;
nor can I forbear to mention, on the other hand,
the delightful, yet childish interest with which I
first peeped into Mr. Newberry's shop in St.
Paul's church yard; that fountain head of literature.
Mr. Newberry was the first that ever
filled my infant mind with the idea of a great
and good man. He published all the picture
books of the day, Tom Thumb's Folio, Giles
Gingerbread, and Jack the Giant Killer; and
out of his abundant love for children, he demanded
nothing for the paper and print, and
only a penny halfpenny for the binding!

But what have most especially attracted my
attention, and have afforded a continually recurring
source of pleasure, have been those
peculiarities which distinguish an old country
and an old state of society from a new one.
I have never yet grown so familiar with the

crumbling monuments of foregone ages, as to
blunt the intense interest with which I at first
beheld them. Accustomed always to scenes
where history was in a manner in anticipation;
where every thing in art was new and progressive,
and where the works of man gave no
ideas but those of young existence and prospective
improvement, there was something
inexpressibly touching in these enormous piles,
gray with antiquity, and sinking to decay. I
cannot describe the mute but deepfelt enjoyment
with which I have contemplated a vast
monastic ruin, like Fentern Abbey, buried in
the bosom of a quiet valley, as though it had
existed merely for itself. Or a warrior pile,
like Conway Castle, standing in stern loneliness
on its rocky promontory, a mere hollow,
yet threatening phantom of departed power.
They spread a grand and melancholy, and, to
me, an unusual charm over the landscape,
giving proofs of the transient and perishing
glories of art, among the ever springing and
reviving fertility of nature.

In like manner have I been affected by every
thing antique and obsolete in manners and customs;
and I mention these circumstances as an
apology for often recurring to such themes; and
betraying, occasionally, a provincial ignorance
and delight respecting them, which must provoke
a smile from my wiser and more experienced
reader. Having been brought up, also, in
the comparative simplicity of a republic, I am
apt to be struck with even the ordinary circumstances
attendant on an aristocratical state of
society. I have amused myself occasionally,
therefore, by pointing out some of the eccentricities,
and some of the poetical characteristics
of the latter, without pretending to decide on its
merits, compared with any other form of government.
My only aim is to paint manners and
characters, such as I see them. I am no politician.
The more I have considered politics,
the more I have found it full of perplexity; and
as in religion, I have contented myself with the
faith in which I have been brought up; regulating
my own conduct by its precepts; but

leaving to abler heads the task of making converts.

I shall continue on, therefore, in the course I
have hitherto pursued; looking at things poetically
rather than politically, describing them as
they are, rather than pretending to point out
how they should be, and endeavouring to see the
world in as pleasant a light, as circumstances
will permit.

I have always had an opinion that much good
might be done by keeping mankind in good
humour with one another. I may be wrong
in my philosophy, but I shall continue to practise
it until convinced of its fallacy. When I
discover the world to be all that it has been
represented by sneering cynics and whining
poets, I will turn to and abuse it also; in the
mean while, worthy reader, I hope you will not
think lightly of me, because I cannot believe
this to be so very bad a world as it is represented.