Scholars in Virginia are not generally aware, that the classical Greek
pronunciation is thought to exist still in Greece; and that
(connecting this fact with the close resemblance of the ancient, to
some of the modern dialects _as written_) that rich and elegant
language is no longer to be regarded as _dead_. Thus confidently think
two intelligent and accomplished natives of Greece, now in
Connecticut, who are reputed (no doubt deservedly) to be thorough
masters of both the ancient and the modern tongue. In a gratifying
interview with one of them (Mr. _Perdicaris_ at New Haven), being
curious to hear Homer in his native melody, I prevailed on Mr. P. to
read me a few lines of the Illiad. They were by no means musical to my
ear--vitiated, doubtless, by the faulty pronunciation to which I had
been accustomed, and destitute of those associated ideas, which
conduce so largely to the beauty of poetry. He sounds _oi_ dipthong,
like _e_; _d_ like TH soft; _g_ like a mere aspiration, as our _h_.
The word _poluphloisboio_ ([Greek: poluphloisboio]) so expressively
sonorous to our ears when pronounced with the full, swelling _roll_ of
the dipthong, he would attenuate into _poluphleesbeeo_--to me much
more like the whistling of the wind through a key-hole, than the
hoarse, multitudinous roar of an agitated ocean. I spare you, here, a
speculation that is passing in my mind, as to how far this diversity
between different ears, proves the notion of the _sound's echoing to
the sense_ to be merely fanciful; and as to the influence of previous
association upon our relish of poetical, and of other beauty--how
much, for example, of the native Greek's rapture at Homer, is owing to
love of country, and how much of an American's ecstacies to classical
enthusiasm, the pride of learning, or the influence of names. Yes, I
spare you--partly, because I have not _much_ that is new to say upon
the subject; and partly because, if I had, it would be wholly out of
season.
By special invitation, I attended a lecture (one of a series)
delivered by Mr. Perdicaris, upon the literary and political history
of modern Greece. It was marked by a rich yet chaste imagination, a
generous glow of patriotic enthusiasm, and the eloquence which they
naturally inspire. You may feel a curiosity, as I did, to know
somewhat of the _outer man_ of a modern Greek. Mr. P. is about the
middle height, or five feet nine; shoulders broad, and a stout frame;
black hair, disposed to curl; large black whiskers, flanking a broad
oval face, the complexion whereof is a darkish olive--as dark, at
least, as Mr. Webster's. Having been eleven years in this country, he
speaks our language fluently and intelligibly: indeed, as is usual
with those who learn a foreign tongue from books, and from enlightened
native speakers, his _English_ is remarkably pure. A few rhetorical
and grammatical faults there were--for instance, "_he left Athens_"
was curtailed (_a la Yankee_) to "_he left_." This is a New
England-ism not confined to the vulgar: neither is the phrase "he
_conducted well_," for "he conducts _himself_ well;" nor "considerable
_of_ a place," for "a considerable place." We hear Yankees of
respectable literary pretensions, too, saying _shall_, where the
English idiom certainly requires _will_; as, "shall you visit Boston
during your tour?"[1]--and clipping the infinitive mood, in a way
equally contrary to the good customs of the realm--thus--"I have not
written yet, but to-day _I intend to_." But I am chasing game that is
hardly worth the powder.
[Footnote 1: If I mistake not, I have heard Mr. Webster himself use
_shall_ in this manner. It is an innovation, sustained by no eminent
authority or precedent in England; and is confined, in America, to the
north side of the Potomac, if not to the east of the Hudson. With that
still grosser affectation, "the house is _being built_," "a war is
_being waged_," it should be promptly arrested, before it shall have
become inseparably mingled in the "well of English undefiled." By the
way, this latter _refinement_ prevails more in the south than in the
north.]
I owe to Mr. P. another intellectual treat: the inspection of an
Illiad, edited by Mr. Felton, Professor of Greek at Harvard. Of all
the editions that I have examined, this is by far the best adapted to
schools; and the most likely to gratify the taste, or to aid the
study, of a retired scholar. The _character_ is a _fac simile_ of
Porson's M.S. Greek--surpassingly neat, simple, and distinct. The text
seems to be given with exemplary fidelity. And it is interspersed with
_Flaxman's Illustrations_; engraved cuts, of all the principal scenes:
which, though mere hints of incidents, and too meager outlines of
persons, greatly heighten the interest of the work. But its crowning
merits, are the Editor's English Preface and Notes. I read the former,
and most of the latter--much more, I dare say, than is usually deemed
needful for a reviewer. They do Mr. F.'s learning, judgment, taste,
feeling, and eloquence, very high honor. He does not make much ado
about the trivialities of _dialect_, _quantity_, and _various
readings_, like the cumbersome annotators upon the classicks,
criticised in the Spectator; nor does he, like "piddling Tibbald,"
'celebrate himself for achieving the restoration of a comma,'[2] or
the correction of an accent. But beauties are pointed out and
commented on, with a critical taste and elegance, calculated to make
the learner's task a luxury; while difficulties are cleared up with a
fulness that leaves little need for oral instruction. The edition is
in one volume; and I hope soon to see it supersede the clumsy affair
of the too learned Samuel Clarke, which now has such fast foot-hold in
our schools.
[Footnote 2: Johnson's Preface to Shakspeare.]
You perhaps think it odd, that I have said nothing of the _judicial
systems_ of New England; and ascribe it either to my acting on Young
Rapid's maxim--"sink the shop, Dad!"--or to my being cloyed with
courts at home, and so, loathing them amid the countless attractions
of my journey. Neither, neither--be assured. 'Though last, not
least'--they have formed a leading subject of my inquiries: and to
judge speculatively, as well as from what is told me of their
practical operation (which I have had no opportunity to witness) they
have some points worth _considering_, if not _imitating_.
The judiciary power of Rhode Island is vested in a supreme court,
consisting of a chief and two associate justices; and a court of
common pleas (composed of five judges) for each of the five counties.
_All the judges are appointed annually by the legislature_. This
feature alone suffices to stamp the whole system with insignificance:
for what skill in jurisprudence--what independence of popular
excitements and party influences--could be expected from judges whom
the breath of a party leader can make and unmake, at each year's end?
When to this we add, that the chief justice of the supreme court
receives a salary of $650, and each associate $550, we need not wonder
that no decision of the Rhode Island bench is ever quoted in other
states. The governor's salary is $400; the lieutenant governor's,
$200. But if, in scantiness of territory and a corresponding
scantiness of means, this state is ordained by nature to be the San
Marino of America, yet it is purely her own fault if, by the
precarious tenure of her judicial offices, she reduces one of the most
important departments of _mind_ to the same diminutive scale, and goes
far to make herself morally and intellectually also, the insignificant
miniature of a commonwealth.
In Connecticut, justice is administered in causes of small amount by
county courts, whose judges are chosen annually: and in larger causes,
by superior courts. The latter are held semi-annually in each county
by one of five judges, who also form the supreme court. They hold
office during good behavior, or until seventy years of age: and have
both law and chancery jurisdiction. The supreme court sits once a year
_in each county_. I do not know what actual loss of valuable services
Connecticut has suffered, by her rule which drives judges from the
bench just at the juncture when their faculties are in many instances
the most happily ripe for its functions: but, that she has lost and
will lose, no one can doubt who remembers, that thirteen of the best
years of Mansfield's judicial life, and fourteen or fifteen of Wythe's
and Pendleton's, were after the age of seventy; and that such a rule
would have deprived the United States' judiciary, ten years ago, of
its present gigantic Coryphæus--confessedly one of the purest and most
powerful minds that ever filled any judgment seat. But what heightened
or adequate terms of censure can be found for the New York rule, which
displaces every judge at sixty? A rule which prematurely discarded
Spencer and Lansing; and which, for more than ten years, has made Kent
employ the full vigor and maturity of his intellect in writing
abstract treatises, and selling _chamber_ opinions, instead of going
on as he had begun, to build up for his state a system of
jurisprudence hardly inferior to that which Mansfield reared for
England?
In Massachusetts, are some very striking peculiarities. The _supreme
court_, consisting of four judges, sits once a year _in each county_,
to decide questions of law, in the last resort. Some one of these
judges, besides, holds annually a _Nisi Prius_ term in each county, to
try appeals from an inferior grade called "courts of common pleas,"
original suits in chancery, and upon the bonds of executors and
administrators. The appeals to them from the common pleas, are _as to
both law and fact_: a jury being empanneled, witnesses examined, &c.,
as if it were an original proceeding. The latter courts are held twice
a year in each county, by some one of four judges; who hold office
(like those of the supreme court) during good behavior. They have
cognizance of all causes, except what I shall designate as vested
elsewhere.
Presentments and indictments for all offences, are found only in the
_common pleas_; where, also, they are tried--_except in capital
cases_. These, after the indictment is found, are certified and
removed from the common pleas to the _supreme court_; at whose bar the
culprit is tried by a jury: a special term being held on purpose, in
any county where the judges are notified that a prisoner awaits trial
for life or death. _En passant_--though _eight crimes_ are, by the
laws of Massachusetts, punishable with death, _only twenty-six
persons_ in the whole state have been capitally convicted, _in thirty
years!_ The number of trials (I do not exactly remember it) bears an
immense disproportion to the number of convictions: so immense, as to
prove that either an undue severity in the laws, or the unreasonable
and too common lenity of juries, aided by the overwhelming superiority
of defending advocates--or (what is most probable) all three causes
together--have well nigh made those laws a dead letter. Prosecutions
are conducted by _district attorneys_, of whom there are four in the
state; each prosecuting within his allotted district. In the supreme
court, however, the attorney general is counsel for the commonwealth.
_Chancery_, or _equitable relief_, is rarely sought in the
Massachusetts courts. Indeed it was unknown, until, within a
comparatively recent period, two or three statutes empowered the
supreme court to administer it, in a very few specified
cases--_mortgages_, _trusts_, _accounts between partners and
co-executors_, _waste_, _nuisance_, and two or three others: omitting
the fruitful subjects of _fraud_, _accident_, _dower_, _et
cetera_--and especially the sweeping power to relieve _wherever there
is no remedy at law_--subjects which, by the multiplication of cases,
have made _our_ chancery, like that of England, the dormitory if not
the grave of justice. And even as to the few specified subjects of
jurisdiction, those statutes rigidly restrict the relief to cases in
which there is _not a plain and complete remedy at law_. Before these
enactments (and _since_, too, in cases without their scope,) the rigor
of the law was mitigated only by the sense of justice in juries; and
by sundry expedients--curious enough, to Virginian eyes--which seem to
have left few _wrongs_ unremedied. For instance--if I am unjustly cast
in a trial at law, by accident or surprise, or for want of testimony
which I did not know of till the term was over; not a bill of
injunction, but a petition to the judge in vacation, within a limited
time, will procure me a new trial. If my debtor fraudulently dispose
of his property; instead of a bill in chancery to ferret out the
fraud, I may have, along with my execution (if I have obtained
judgment) a _summons_ to the colluding purchaser as _garnishee_, to
disclose orally on oath, in open court, what effects he has, of the
debtor.
Roads are laid off by a board of commissioners, established for that
purpose in each county; and invested with judicial powers, in
controversies on the subject.
The probat of wills, the granting of administrations, the appointment
of guardians, and the supervision of the accounts and conduct of
guardians, executors, and administrators, are confided to an officer,
called the _Judge of Probat_, appointed in each county for those
purposes only; and holding his court monthly, in several convenient
places of the county, to hear motions and decide disputes on those
subjects. His records and proceedings are kept by a distinct clerk,
called the _Register of Probat_; and an appeal lies from his decisions
immediately to the supreme court. We, in Virginia, sorely need some
tribunal like this; specially charged with the interests of widows and
orphans.
Equally worthy to be copied, is the Massachusetts mode of constituting
_juries_. Lists of all persons qualified to serve, are kept by the
town-clerks; from which, just before a court, the town quota of jurors
is drawn by lot: and no one is compellable to serve oftener than once
in three years. _They are paid for their service._ Against juries thus
formed, I heard no complaints, of partiality, corruption, or undue
ignorance. They receive a compensation, which at least defrays their
reasonable expenses; and if there be still some burthen, it is borne
equally by all, and recurs at such long intervals, as to be absolutely
unfelt. How different is our plan, of sending out the sheriff just
before a trial, to gather in the sweepings of the court-yard! Suitors
and witnesses, attending perhaps for the tenth time, in hopes of
having their causes determined--strangers from other counties, nay,
travellers from other states--tipplers from the tavern porch--the
nearest merchants, mechanics, and farmers, torn suddenly and
capriciously from their employments--such is the medley, produced by a
system as oppressive to most of the jurors themselves, as it is
subversive of the important ends for which they are empanneled. One is
really tempted to believe, that in adhering so pertinaciously to a
system so obviously defective and so easily remedied, our statesmen
have been governed by a fixed design to bring jury-trial itself into
disrepute.
Wiser in another respect also than we, these "Bay folk" have no courts
(except for cases of twenty dollars or less) held by _men who have not
themselves studied the science they are to expound_: no parallel to
our county courts--those _crack_ tribunals of some great men, whose
admiration arises either from the want of intimate knowledge--they
having ranged generally in a higher sphere--or from their enjoying
over that bench an _influence_, flattering to their vanity, and
blinding to their judgments. How long will the public attention
sleep--how long will the hand of reform be palsied--when will an
attempt be made to cure the unfitness of these courts for the weighty,
multifarious, and difficult functions entrusted to them?--the
ludicrous, if it were a less mischievous, uncertainty of their
decisions, owing to their ignorance of any fixed rules by which to
decide?--the delays, so fatal to justice, that attend their unsteady
ministration?--the ruinous accumulation of costs, besides harassment
and loss of time in dancing attendance upon them through years of
litigation?
The Massachusetts and Connecticut plan, of an _itinerant supreme
court_, cannot be commended to imitation. The common arguments, of
_bringing justice home to the people_, and _enabling suitors to see in
person to their causes_, are not pertinent, where the whole case is
contained in the record; where no witnesses are to be summoned or
examined--no counsel to be instructed in the cause. Then, the loss of
time in travelling, and the want of so extensive a library and so able
a bar, as would be formed if the court sat always in one place, must
essentially impair the correctness of its decisions, and lower the
superiority of its intellect.
The common-law of England is made the basis of Massachusetts law, not,
as in Virginia, by a legislative declaration that it shall be so, but
by adjudications of the courts, recognizing and adopting it as such.
By a still bolder stretch, the courts have acknowledged as generally
binding, English statutes made in amendment of the common-law--not
only before, but _since_ the foundation of the colony: nay, the terms
of the decision do not exclude English statutes subsequent to the
American revolution. This comprehensive grafting of a foreign code
upon the domestic, not by professed and authorised law-givers, but by
mere judges, is perhaps one of the most remarkable instances of
judicial legislation, any where to be found: and must have arisen from
a licentious spirit of _construction_, which, when it acts upon
written laws, may naturally be expected to make them mean almost any
thing that the interpreters choose.[3] The admirers of an _unwritten
law, reposited in the breasts of judges and to be sought only in
precedents and decisions_, may vaunt, if they will, its happy
_elasticity_, dilating and contracting to fit every conceivable
emergency: but I doubt if (among other evils) it does not nurture
habits of latitudinous interpretation, destined to be well nigh fatal
to one of the great boasts of modern times--written forms of
government. Minds accustomed always to make the law adapt itself to
the particular occasion; to regard that _as law_, which the immediate
case requires; naturally fritter away constitutions with as little
ceremony, as children demolish or alter their sand houses and dirt
pies.
[Footnote 3: Hardly less startling an exercise of legislative power by
the judiciary, was in the abolition of slavery. The Bill of Rights
prefixed to the constitution of Massachusetts, adopted in 1780,
asserts, as most of our state constitutions do--substantially copying
the Declaration of Independence--"_that all men are born free and
equal_, and have certain natural and unalienable rights;" namely, the
right of enjoying their lives and liberties, &c. On this, some masters
spontaneously yielded freedom to their slaves; others, on its being
demanded of them. In 1781, a master who refused, was sued by his slave
for a trespass, assault and battery, and false imprisonment; and
pleaded, that the plaintiff, being his slave, had no right to sue him.
The court held, that slavery was contrary to the first article of the
Bill of Rights; and that therefore the plea was bad, and the plaintiff
was free. This decision virtually abolished slavery in Massachusetts,
without any legislative act for doing so. Some other suits were
brought; but in most cases, masters yielded at once. There were then
not quite five thousand slaves in the state. Abolition was similarly
effected in New Hampshire. It was by legislation in New York, where
there were twenty-one thousand slaves, in a whole population of three
hundred and forty thousand.]
The chief court of Massachusetts has tasked the readers of law-books,
as heavily as our's has done. Its decisions fill twenty-seven or
twenty-eight octavo volumes--about our number. The supreme court of
New York has issued more than thirty; the supreme court at Washington
eighteen or twenty; Pennsylvania, Connecticut, South Carolina--but I
forbear the appalling list. Every good law library, however, should
have at least the five sets first named; and they are as yet but just
begun. If the monstrous increase be not checked, what purse can buy,
what head can read (much less remember,) nay what room can hold them,
a century hence? Already, indeed, we are grievously over-tasked: for
besides the thousands of tomes, English and American, now
accumulated,[4] it is impossible to keep pace with the daily
accessions, poured forth from a hundred manufactories of legal
oracles. Some powerful condenser, or another Caliph Omar, is our only
hope. The oppressive bulkiness of law-reports is owing partly to the
reporters; but more, to the judges--who, apparently more intent on the
display of learning and ingenuity, than upon adjusting the rights of
the parties, often swell the simple and clear page or two, which the
case requires, into a rambling and voluminous disquisition of twenty
pages. Nay, not content with _one_ such disquisition in each case,
each judge presents his own; and the reporter spreads them all at
length in his next volume. I wish that both judges and reporters could
be obliged to study, as models of lucid brevity, Yelverton's Reports,
and the still more admirable decisions of Chief Justice Tindal, of the
English Common-Pleas[5]--who frequently compresses into half a page or
less, what our American judges would wire-draw into half a dozen
pages.
[Footnote 4: "Immenso aliarum super alias acervatarum legum cumulo."]
[Footnote 5: In the late "English Common-Law Reports."]
Lawyers are very numerous in Massachusetts--somewhere about seven
hundred; of whom one hundred and sixty or one hundred and eighty are
in Boston. Their intercourse appears to be marked by the same
fraternal spirit, which strews the toilsome path of the profession in
the south with so many sweets and flowers. Admission to the bar is
procured, not by examination, but by leave of court, on recommendation
of those who are already practising there; provided the candidate have
studied five years in some lawyer's office; or have so studied three
years, and be a graduate of some college. He has, besides, to pay for
admission into the supreme court, a fee of thirty dollars, and for the
common-pleas, twenty dollars; to be expended towards a joint library,
for the use of the bar in each county. These libraries are sometimes
large, and well selected. The emoluments of practice, except to the
very leaders of the profession, seem far inferior to those of
practisers occupying correspondent grades of talent and fame in
Virginia: indeed, I doubt whether any but Mr. Webster receives an
amount comparable to the incomes of several there, whom I could name.
Yet the life of a lawyer is probably more pleasant in Massachusetts.
From the pre-requisites to admission, you may infer that well-stored
minds abound more with the fraternity: at least it was so, till our
university, and our several excellent law-schools, began to give a
clearer and more expanded ken to the mental optics of our young
lawyers. Then, in society at large--certainly in the towns and
villages--there is more literature afloat in Massachusetts: amusements
are of a more rational cast. Where _we_ have a horse-race, a barbecue,
a whist-party, or a _pool_ at back-gammon, our Yankee brethren have a
meeting of some lyceum, or other society for mutual improvement, at
which a lecture is given or a debate held, upon some interesting
subject, of economy or morals: or an unceremonious evening visit is
dedicated to conversation, in which politics engross no unreasonable
share. The newspapers--even the most violent political ones--at once
attest and foster the prevalent taste for general knowledge, by
devoting a considerable part of their sheets to literary and useful
matter: unlike the two giants of the press in Virginia, that can
hardly ever spare a column, and never a page, from the
embittering--aye, the brutalizing--themes of party strife, to topics
which might exalt, enlighten, purify, innocently amuse, and humanize
the public mind. There is less locomotion in the practice of a
Massachusetts lawyer: he rarely attends more than two counties; for
the most part, only one. This, if he loves domestic life, is a great
point for him. And in the ordering of a New England home-stead, there
is a quiet, smooth despatch--a neatness--a happy fitting of means to
ends--a nicety of contrivances for comfort--an economy of trouble in
every thing--all calculated doubly to endear it to a home-loving man.
When to all this we add, that though the prime necessaries of life are
cheaper with us, those elegancies and luxuries which as the world goes
have become necessaries, are so much more accessible in New England,
as to make a smaller income yield a larger store of comfort; it will
not seem wonderful, that the balance of enjoyment is on the
Massachusetts lawyer's side. I take for granted, you see, that he is
not insensible to intellectual pleasures; and that _they_ conduce the
most of all to happiness.
This is probably the last time you will hear from me before we meet;
as my tour is drawing near its close. The six weeks it has occupied,
have been crowded with more mind-stirring incident, than any six
months of my previous life. Vivid indeed is the contrast, between the
plodding, eventless tenor of the preceding eight years, and the
exciting, the feverish interest of these six weeks. Yet they have
afforded scarcely a describable adventure; nothing, at all calculated
to make an auditor's eyes stretch wide, or his hair stand on end. In
truth, the interest is explicable in great part by the simple case of
a plough-horse, turned loose to kick up his heels for an hour. He
enjoys the recreation (if his spirit is not broken by excessive work,)
five fold more than a daily roamer of the pasture could do. Judge how
the sport has kept my faculties aroused, by the fact, that though
habitually a great sleeper, requiring seven or eight hours in the
twenty-four, my sleep, since leaving Virginia, would hardly average
five hours. Even while on foot--walking from twenty to thirty miles a
day--my nightly allowance was sometimes less than five, never more
than six hours.
Let me commend to tourists, _foot-travelling_--if they wish to see a
country thoroughly: I do not mean its rivers and mountains, cities,
forests, and churches, but its MEN and WOMEN. _These_ "constitute a
State." Whoever would see _them_ in their truest, every-day garb--of
dress and manners--upon occasions and amid scenes, where refined
disguises are laid aside, and life appears with the least
sophistication possible in our state of society; should walk among
them without equipage and in very plain clothes; call in at their
houses--partake of their meals--nay, find some excuse for tarrying a
day or two at one place--enter their schools, and their public
meetings--see them at their work--and hold "various talk" with them.
In two or three weeks thus employed, he will obtain a deeper insight
into their customs, character and institutions, than from months spent
in whirling along the highways, and attending formal dinner parties.
Unless he is a hardened pedestrian, he should take care to begin by
short journies, of only eight, ten, or fifteen miles a day; and not
till after five or six days, stretch away at thirty miles daily.
Otherwise he may cripple himself, so as greatly to mar the pleasure of
his jaunt. I speak from sore experience on this point.
Though I have been obliged to concede to the Yankees, a superiority in
some respects over ourselves, you will not suspect me of having
over-colored my limnings, or of having wantonly--much less
ill-naturedly--disparaged our good old commonwealth. Without wishing
to lower the generally just and salutary, (though sometimes amusing)
pride her children feel at the bare mention of her honored name, I
have aimed to draw their attention to some traits of Yankee life and
character, which we may advantageously copy--nay, the _want of which_
is the main cause of our lagging march in the numberless improvements,
that distinguish this age, and appear so fruitful of blessings to
mankind. My aim too has been, to disabuse them of a few of the
prejudices, which ignorance and misrepresentation have fostered
against our Northern brethren. Let any one who thinks I have
exaggerated their excellencies, only come among them, and see for
himself; bringing to the scrutiny _a candid mind_, prepared to _allow_
for unavoidable differences.--Indeed our people ought to travel
northward oftener. It would be a good thing, if exploring parties were
frequently sent hither, (as to a moral _terra incognita_,) to observe
and report the particulars deserving of our imitation. Our independent
planters, and shrewd, notable housewives, could not make such an
excursion, without carrying home a hundred _notions_, for which they
and their neighbors would be the richer and better all their days. Nor
might they profit less, by sending their statesmen and law-givers, to
take lessons in civil polity. There are admirable things of every
magnitude; from TOWNSHIP GOVERNMENTS, COMMON SCHOOLS, and COURTS OF
PROBAT, down to _closed doors_, _splayed_ and _rumfordized_
fire-places,[6] _seasoned wood_,[7] and _cold light-bread_.[8] Some
things, too, they would see, to be shunned: I need only name excessive
_banking_,--enormously multiplied _corporations_, for manufacturing,
and other purposes--and, what strikes yet more fatally at the
foundation of popular government, the _caucus_ system. But the
strongest reason for a more frequent intercourse, is the liberalizing
of mind that would result; the unlearning of our long cherished
prejudices, from seeing the Yankees _at home_--that place, where human
character may always be the most accurately judged. They too, have
some (though fewer and less bitter,) reciprocal prejudices, to be
cured by a more intimate acquaintance. No mind but must see the
unspeakable importance of weeding away these mutual and groundless
dislikes. The perpetuity of our union--and the liberty, the peace, the
happiness of its members--in a great degree depend upon the
accomplishment of that expurgation. There cannot be a simpler
_recipe_. _The North and the South need only know each other better,
to love each other more._
[Footnote 6: When the sides of a fire-place are slanting, instead of
being square with the back, they are said to be _splayed_. When the
back leans forward at top, approaching the inner side of the arch or
front top, so as to make the flue only six or eight inches wide, it is
said to be _Rumford-ized_, If my readers pardon me for being thus
elementary, I will presume further upon it, and add, that the latter
term comes from Count _Rumford_, who invented that improvement. The
sides of a New England fire-place often slope at an angle of 120 or
130 degrees with the back; so as to make the width _behind_, not more
than half the width in front. The wood is usually sawed, to fit the
hinder part of the fire-place.]
[Footnote 7: The wood is cut 12, sometimes 15 or 18 months, before it
is burned. If cut in the summer, it is suffered to lie out for a few
months, and then put away till the second winter, in the _wood-house_;
a constant and close appendage to every dwelling. Southrons have no
idea, though Yankees have experimental knowledge, of the saving and
comfort there is in using this, instead of green wood--how vastly
further any given quantity of the former will go, in producing heat.
It has been satisfactorily shewn, that in a cord of green wood, there
are about 140 or 150 gallons of _water_; all of which must be changed
to steam--that is, _evaporated_--before the particles of the wood in
which it is lodged can burn: and in doing this, just so much _heat_ is
expended, which would otherwise be employed in warming the room. The
time spent in this process, makes our people fancy that green wood
actually _burns_ longer than dry: and because a dozen billets of
green, when the water is entirely evaporated, give out more heat than
four dry ones, they think that hotter fires can be made of green
wood!]
[Footnote 8: The bread should not be eaten till it is _cured_, or
stale; i.e., at least twenty-four hours old; and it is _good_, for
several days more. The superior wholesomeness of _cured_ bread is
explained by the fact, that on coming out of the oven, it has an
over-proportion of carbonic acid gas--well known to be poisonous when
unmixed; but by lying in the open air, the bread parts with most of
this noxious gas, and imbibes instead of it, oxygen gas--the
wholesome, vital _principle_ in the atmosphere.]
For the Southern Literary Messenger.