The Express.
London, England, 1851-05-17 00:00:00

LITERATURE.

True ,s in the Vall4 States, 4r., kering 1319 al4 1950.
By the lady Enssmasr. Breast WOMET. ltvntley.
No 'within of our literature of travel has under-
gone a more beneficial change than that which
undertake. to inform us of the moral and Ors-sic-al
development of the people of the United States.
Twenty years ago Al ashington Irving could say
"It hits been the peculiar lot of our country to he
visited ity the worst kind of English travellers.
While men of philosophical spirit and cultivated
inind have been vent from England to ransack
the poles, to penetrate deserts, and study the
tmninet,4 and customs of barbarians, it has been
let to th..' broken-down rr„d.sman, the schem-
ing adventurer, the wandering mechanic, the
ldanchester and Itiruintrhain agent, to be her
ornelcs respecting Ameriea." 'limes arc indeed
chanzd. The di,appointed. the arrogant. or the re-
judiceil. are no longer permitted to form the popular
ant lowities up at Amerman institutions and character.
Dickens, Lyall. NLekav, Johnstone, have studied the
manner, watched the institutions, or summed up the
tap thilitica of the country; while a little army of
writer.. remote from all illiberal influence. have com-
pleted the tilling up of the picture. At the present
utome:st there exists no country in the world of which
we have so precise. full, and authentic information as
of the United States of America.
_

This information is not likely to be gently ex-
tem2ed by the volumes with which Lady Shrift
NVort.'cy now presents the public. Their author
gimp 1. ware of this, and is careful to explain that
they ronilin the substance of lette:s writ,en without
view to 1)110h:its, and originally designs'd to convey
her travelling Impressions to friends ut home. 11cr
Mork. to do her ju-tice, is written in a spirit ex-
tremely liberal towards America. This child of the
aristner.wy secs rhinos in American society which
hare romp, d the notice of more popular travellers
and write r+. Thus she says of the

AYERIC.OI•.

fir•at iojustiee has las u done to the Amerieur,, and we
►are !wen t1..1.1.1.t0111{4 too implicitly to Is:neve the often un-
fair as I oafountled reports of prejudieed travellers. In-
at.•ad of 41,courteutts and d;soblielow to r, we hod them
all that is civil and oldiring. Amongst the les. educated,
so dol.'''. ore edonally some of the fault• so unsparingly
Cu at may h.• fouiel ; hut th,y apla•ar to Ole,
fua. as I have had an opport.anity of yudgin4 as yet, a
thoroudaly hospitable, kindhearted, and geuerous-minded
peopb..
Andi again :

I ilk; toe Atnerieans nun: and more ; either they hare
wundequity honoured Lit. ly, or rho• the critici•ms on tlont
have wmolerfally ea:at:termed. They arc particularly
awn. ous and o!digiag, and .rem I think anxious that
ors learn should carry away a favourd,h, imps•=-inn of
theta. I h tvr nines-el hut very few i-olited Mee. Of the
am lined lialdts wotolly attrilmato .1 to them, and thine
ca.-. decidedly riot among the onko4 of people, for
there 1.4.1q114 just ,ro murk ditf2reneo in Auterira a. any.
111.3.1, else m •Onn. respects. Th, ,np,,jur clai.es hire
base oenoe.t Away. eseetittit 11121:111,er, and a treat deal of
'ones! 4.• well a, required refinement% and arc often, he-
o sir arty distinguished looking.
The author was much struck by a trait which
Many eel her predecessors have dwelt upon—s Lie in-
difference to adverse events which seems to be nom-
hinution of Indian impassiveness and Saxw: phlegm.'
Lady tVortley often qe us uots some illtration's of this
cast or character, without referring them, however,
to 'lnv generic principle. She noticed it at New,
York on the oce.ision of the death of twenty-
five citizens in the miscrable Forrest riots, a
Cill:1.1:*•plie which Seelll4ll fit excite neither
horror nor regret. Going up the Hudson, she passed
the wreck of the Empire steamer, which went down
two nights before, when scores of liver' were lost.
lady Worthy Imes that iu r fellow pamengers looked
indifferently ut tite mournful spectacle us they would
at any other sight. The only person who betrayed
any concern was a lady whosc sympathies were re-
oerved for u cousin, captain of the ill-stormd vessel,
but who was above and safe, though quite sick, from
the annoyance he had since undergone. Practically.
this alownee or passion is often found uaful,
espe-ielly in a young world where 'People daily find
themselves out of the reach of oh! Lind sur-
rounded by einlaustanees in which they must
either act with promptitude and self-relianee or
suffer. Our author witnesses to this view when she
disserihes her .tmerican car-driver deseendbe, front
his box upon the fracture of his vehicle, whipping
down the tied likely tree by the rosulside, renewing
the broken team with a little rough-and-ready craft,
mid strailluway jolting along as merrily as ever.
The high connexionim of our traveller procured fur
her easy iniroduet hat to the most clistintruh'hed
men in America. Aseordingly we have frequent
notiees of the late General Taylor, Webster, Prco-
eoc,Willi4.ltx. The historian of the conquest of Peru
is di...crawl! us looking quite a young man. even
by t:a, si of la:s grown-up .daughter. There was
not a p.trtic 4. of poutpo-ity about him. and his style
of comersulion in of the most fre•oh' origin ti, agree-
able. mid striking kind; and, with ail his stores of
leur tt itt there is the most compile a'v'arice of
cm:silting approaching to pedantry. The LAloitioi7
is an 'lemma of