Yet
There Are Many External Features Of Uniformity Which The Traveller Cannot
Fail To Lay Hold Of, And Which Go
Under the general name of Americanisms.
These are peculiarities of dress, manners, and phraseology, and, to some
extent, of opinion,
And may be partly produced by the locomotive life
which the American leads, and the way in which all classes are brought
into contact in travelling. These peculiarities are not to be found among
the highest or the highly-educated classes, but they force themselves upon
the tourist to a remarkable, and frequently to a repulsive, extent; and it
is safer for him to narrate facts and comment upon externals, though in
doing so he presents a very partial and superficial view of the people,
than to present his readers with general inferences drawn from partial
premises, or with conclusions based upon imperfect, and often erroneous,
data.
An entire revolution had been effected in my way of looking at things
since I landed on the shores of the New World. I had ceased to look for
vestiges of the past, or for relics of ancient magnificence, and, in place
of these, I now contemplated vast resources in a state of progressive and
almost feverish development, and, having become accustomed to a general
absence of the picturesque, had learned to look at the practical and the
utilitarian with a high degree of interest and pleasure. The change from
the lethargy and feudalism of Lower Canada and the gaiety of Quebec, to
the activity of the New England population, was very startling.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 333 of 478
Words from 90568 to 90827
of 129941
