Just
Before We Reached Albany A Very Respectable-Looking Man Got Into The Car,
And, As His Manners Were Very Quiet And Civil, We Entered Into
Conversation About The Trade And Manufactures Of The Neighbourhood.
When
we got out of the cars on the east side of the river, he said he was going
no farther, but, as I was alone, he would go across with me, and see me
safe into the cars on the other side.
He also offered to carry my reticule
and umbrella, and look after my luggage. His civility so excited my
suspicions of his honesty, that I did not trust my luggage or reticule out
of my sight, mindful of a notice posted up at all the stations, "Beware of
swindlers, pickpockets, and luggage-thieves."
We emerged from the cars upon the side of the Hudson river, in a sea of
mud, where, had not my friend offered me his arm, as Americans of every
class invariably do to an "unprotected female" in a crowd, I should have
been borne down and crushed by the shoals of knapsack-carrying pedestrians
and truck-pushing porters who swarmed down upon the dirty wharf. The
transit across occupied fully ten minutes, in consequence of the numerous
times the engine had to be reversed, to avoid running over the small craft
which infest this stream. My volunteer escort took me through a crowd
through which I could not have found my way alone, and put me into the
cars which started from the side of a street in Albany, requesting the
conductor, whose countenance instantly prepossessed me in his favour, to
pay me every attention on the route.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 112 of 478
Words from 30389 to 30668
of 129941
