The Press.
London, England, 1856-05-10 00:00:00

448

I have most felt the

infinite.

rhat eternal, if not

And her sketches of Indian life and scenery
are tame after the brilliant writings of Wash-
ington Irving, Cooper, and Audubon. In
England, France, and Italy her provincialism
of mind is shown tediously in her diary ;
but on the Indian life we expected
more from her, as that subject is fresh. The
following is curious, and is worth setting down
in the commonplace-book of a professional
wit, as it suggests a variety of ingenious
similitudes :

Still, in travelling through this conntry, I could not but
be struck with the force of a symbol. Wherever the hog
comes the rattlesnake disappears; the omnivorous tra-
veller, safe in its stupidity, willingly and easily makes a
meal of the most dangerous of reptiles, and one which the
Indian looks on with a mystic awe. Even so the white
settler pursues the Indian, and is victor in the chase.

To the feeling between the savage and civilised
races Mme. Ossoli thus testifies :
I have spoken of the hatred felt by the white man for
the Indian ; with white women it seems to amount to
disgust, to loathing. How I could endure the dirt, the
peculiar smell of the Indians, and their dwellings, was a
great marvel in the eyes of my lady acquaintance ; indeed,
I wonder why they did not quite give me up, as they cer-
tainly looked on me with great distaste for it. "Get you
gone, you Indian dog " was the felt, if not the breathed,
expression towards the hapless owners of the soil—all
their claims, all their sorrows quite forgot in abhorrence
of their dirt, their tawny skins, and the vices the whites
have taught them.
A person who hail seen them during great part of a life
expressed his prejudices to me with such violence that I
was no longer surprised that the Indian children threw
sticks at him as he passed. A lady said, " Ile what you
will for them they will be ungrateful; the savage cannot
be washed out of them. Bring up an Indian child, and
see it' you can attach it to yuu."
Mine. Ossoli was a sort of female
transcendentalist, educated under American
influences. Her mind loved to dwell
upon paper constitutions, with visionary
views of human perfectibility. We cannot
discern practical sense in her reflections. Miss
Martineau may often have been too vehement,
and may have caused offence by the freedom
of her utterances, but there wits often keen
and close argument in her hardheaded views
of reality. Political ladies are not liked
amongst us. except as high-bred (lames of
fashion legislating for Almacks. We rather
recoil from strongly-pronounced female cha-
racters; but several of our English lady
philanthropists, like Mrs. Fry and others,
have been eminently pntctical. We need not
mention one in oar own time, bright with every
intellectual accomplishment, Ana animated
with the loftiest ardour, who has applied rare
practical talents to the good of her fellow
creatures.

It is evident that Mine. Ossoli's mind was
visionary without being distinctively original,
and that the fertility of her ideas was not in
proportion to the facility of her expression.
We are often amused with her numerous
Americanisms. Lord and Lady Falkland
come in for the following burst of democracy:—

At Halifax we took in the Governor of Nova Scotia, re-
turning from his very unpopular administration. His
lady was with him, a daughter of William the Fourth and
the celebrated Mrs. Jordan. The English on board, and
the Americans, following their lead, as usual, see.ned to
attach much importance to her left-handed alliance with
one of the dullest families that ever sat upon a throne
(and that is a bold word, too). none to her descent from
one whom Natore had endowed with her most splendid re-
galia— genius that fascinated the attention of all kinds and
classes of men, grace and winning qualities that no heart
could resist. Was the cesttis buried with her, that no
sense of its preeminent value lingered, as fir as I could
perceive, in the thoughts cfany except myself?

That is simply a ridiculous way of looking at
things. Imagine the people on the steam
boat thinking of " the cestua " of the late Mrs.
Jordan ! Yet we are glad to find this Ameri-
can lady testifying to some of our superiorities.
The following is worth notice :

At the first sight of the famous Liverpool Docks, ez•
tending miles on each side of our lsnding, we felt our-
selves in a slower, solider, and not on that account less
truly active, state of things than at home. That impres-
sion is confirmed. There is not as we travel that rushing,
tearing, and swearing, that snatching of baggage, that
prodigality of shoe•leather and lungs, which attend the
course of the traveller in the United States; but we do not
lose our " goods," we do not miss our car. The dinner, if
ordered in time, is cooked properly, and served punctually,
and at the end of the day more that is permanent seems to
have come of it than on the full•drive system.
The manner in which Americans devour their
food is doubtless a main cause of " the
dyspcpsy" which torments them all.

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