The Sun.
London, England, 1860-07-26 00:00:00

sugar plantation. He resisted, and was sent down 1
to another dealer (rather more strict with refractory
subjects) at New Orleans, where he managed to
communicate with the police, and gave himself up
for the murder rather than remain for life as a slave.
It was a wise choice, for he too, it is now certain,
will not be hanged, nor perhaps, eonsidering the
circumstances under which he killed the man, is it

altogether right he should be, though he is quite
undeserving of the pardon he will no doubt succeed
in getting. Near these was young Jeffers, who is
accused of shooting dead his stepfather and another
gentlemen, who strove to capture him after commit-
ting the act in the streets of New York, only a few
days back. He seemed a mild, quiet-looking lad,
apparently only intent on his morning paper, in
which he was perusing an account of his own arrest,
examination, and personal appearance and general
antecedents, given with all the reiterated headings,
italic emphasis, and minute detail so peculiar to the
American journals. Above these cells were the pri-
soners awaiting trial for manslaughter, arson, for-
gery, burglary, or smashing, all comfortable alike in
their cells, lolling, reading, and smoking, and better
taken care of apparently thati ever they were in their
lives before: On the women's side there were very
few criminals. The prison van—the " Black Maria,"
as it is termed—came in every now and then, dis-
gorging its 15 or 20 persons of both sexes and all
ages. All the wretched, outcast men, thus brought
to gaol were voters, it must be remembered, and,
as far as voting is concerned, have as much political
influence in New York as the President or Heenan
himself. The women, as might be expected, were

of every grade of misery and infamy, some so young
as to be mere children, some so old as to be all but
helpless, drunk and sober, magnificently dressed or
with scarcely enough to cover them ; but all were
brazen and unsubdued, and passed into a common
yard, where they basked in the sun, or, quietly de-
nuding themselves of their upper garments, pro-
ceeded to pin up the tawdry finery which had been
rent off their backs in some midnight brawl. On
the whole, the " Tombs," though curious and well
worth a visit from a stranger, is, after all, a fearful
place, and it is with a feeling of positive relief that
one emerges from its massive. walls into the bright
sunshine, and tries to forget the load of guilt and
misery which it encloses.
The beauties of American scenery are but too
little known among Europeans. English tourists
" do" the Nile or the Rhine, and imagine they have
visited the two rivers best worth seeing of their kind
in the world. It is an exception to find an English
tourist who knows the Hudson River, though. as far
as my somewhat large experience goes, there is none
to compare with it. The Rhine is as nothing, and
even the Bosphorus yields to its grand and stately
magnificence. Going on board one of those large
river steamboats which ply between New York and
Albany at the rate of 20 miles an hour, and which
in all other respects are among the luxuries of
American travel, the tourist passes through such
scenes of primval beauty as can never be effaced
from his memory. The mighty river at first
is hemmed in by lofty cliffs called the Palisades,
which, striped with thin red and black strata, look
like coloured palings erected by nature to keep
within bounds the stream which pours so grandly
down beneath. These Palisades are, somehow, con-
sidered the great beauty of the river, though really
far inferior in grandeur to the scenes above, where
the spur of the Alleghany Mountains closes in upon
the flood. Occasionally glimpses of rich merchants'
villas are caught here and there, but they are few
and far between, and gradually disappear as the
boat progresses with a stride that jerks everything
in the saloons, and the wild mountain regions are
gained, where the eagles still linger, and where the
face of the country is not changed from the time
when the first New England settlers drove the
Mohicans before them. At every turn you think
the very source of the Hudson is reached, as the
mountains close in fast. But still the river pours
between, under gigantic cliffs, as bare at the water's
edge as the bones of a dead world, and clothed
above in such a mass of verdure as only the Hud-
son shows. Ravens start up at every turn, and
hawks and buzzards wheel high in the air in circles,
as the beat of the paddles breaks on the deep
silence of the hills. It is a wild, but not a solitude.
Crags and rocks keep opening out ; here an island
rising in terraces of massive granite, and next a
little chain of aits, clad in the richest green, and
seeming a connecting link between the river and
lofty woodlands at either side. At West Point, the
scene of Arnold's meditated treason, where the
great Military Academy of the United States rises,
near Crouest mountain, 1,400 feet above the water,
the grand beauties of the Hudson culminate, and, as
the steamer winds between the Narrows and under
crags that so proudly tower over the stream, every
turn discloses fresh glimpses between the heights, so
bright, so rich in their deep verdure, that one has
scarcely time to notice one before another presents
its silent claim to admiration. Froth. West Point
the river widens to about three times' the width of
the Thames at Gravesend, and continues, with vary-
ing breadth, though always wide, up to Albany,
some 150 miles from New York. Sometimes, as at
Tarrytown (where poor Major Andre was captured
and hung), at Yonkers, or at 4'eckshill, the views
are charming beyond all description, but after pass-
ing the Catskill Mountains, which rise blue, cool,
and misty-looking on the shore, the scenery gra-
dually settles down into rich woodland and cul-
tivated meadows, more varied in their extent,
though scarcely so well cultivated, as those of Eng-
land. lam not going to attempt a guide-book of
the Hudson, and will merely say that from these
points the traveller will have enough to occupy
his attention on the hot steamboat in looking
at Poughkeepsie, at Sunnyside, where Washington
Irving lived, or the place which is shown as the
Sleepy Hollow, where he builds the story of his
headless man. At last the tourist will get gra-
dually tired even of these ever-recurring nooks,
and hail with delight the aspect of the tall ware-
houses which, sweltering in the hot sun, rise over the
offensive, narrow, ill-paved streets of Albany, which
for filth and wretchedness of path and roadway are
more like the Grande Rue of Constantinople or
Cairo than the seat of Government of the New York
State. From this hot, dirty town, the discomforts
of American travelling commence. The Ameri-
cans are essentially gregarious. They live in
crowds, travel in crowds, sleep in crowds, and for
the present think in crowds, though, if signs
are to be depended on, a better time is coming for
the middle class, who make no secret now of their
aversion to the merciless domination of the mob in
the large cities. Their hotels are palaces, which
accommodate thousands, though in which, with one
or two exceptions, no more quiet is to be found
than under a roof in Cheapside. Their railway
cars are monstrous waggons on four wheels, where
a hundred passengers sit together (all at the same
fare, for there is no distinction of classes), and share
the dust and heat alike. There is much the same
feeling of recklessness and danger about the rail-
way travelling as attaches to :lively party driv-
ing home from the Derby, and the visitor must not
be much surprised if he sees on arriving at a junc-
tion that the points of the rails are shut and the
train has to wait while the conductor alights to
open them. Why the Americans like large cars
and large hotels, and generally take such pains to
congregate together, it is hard to say. Certainly
it is not from any enjoyment of each other's
society, for a more silent people when travelling, or
one generally less given to mirth and fun, in the
English acceptation of the term, it would be hard
to name. Breakfast, even at the large hotels, is a
solemn and impressive ceremonial; while dinner,
especially on board the steamboats, is enough to
bring tears into your eyes. Running from Albany
the train crosses a high viaduct in front of the falls
of the Cohoes, where a river a hundred yards wide
ttuggles over a cliff, and, dashed into a steaming
mass of spray, looks like a fall of clouds. The rest
of the country to Saratoga is uninteresting enough.
Occasionally the line winds through the primitive
forest, with little clearings here and there in bright
green patches, where the charred stumps of the
trees are almost hidden by the mass of Indian corn,
but, as a rule, is dull and dirty. Saratoga, as a
place of fashionable resort, is, in the season, one of
the most extraordinary places of its kind, perhaps,
in the world. The village is a mere accident of the
situation; the hotels are Saratoga, and they are
such hotels as only America can show. After liv-
ing at those magnificent palaces at New York, the
St. Nicholas, the Fifth Avenue, the New York, or
the Clarendon, in each of which a thousand guests
(and in the St. Nicholas often double that number)
are constantly stopping, one is apt to imagine that
there is nothing further to be learnt of these " in-
stitutions" of America. But at Saratoga your ideas
on such subjects receive an immense development.
The hotels are as grand, though totally different
from all others. Two of them, the United States
and Union Hall, occupy five acres of ground ! Their
dining saloons are bigger than the Floral-hall, and
are laid with tables to dine 1,000 people ; the danc-
ing rooms are larger, loftier, and handsomer than
any two public rooms of the kind we have in all
London. The grounds attached to these are almost
litte parks, where between the trees are detached
cottages, all belonging to the hotel, and occupied
by wealthy Southerners, and others willing to par
any price for that inestimable luxury in America—
a hale privacy. To these hotels, and to Saratoga
generally, some 25,000 people come in the season to
drink the waters, to dress, drive, lounge, gamble, and
go away again, after a six weeks' stay, to Newport,
Niagara, or any other place where American citizens
in a holiday can enjoy that idle and luxurious life to
which they seem particularly given. The waters at
Saratoga, unlike the nauseous doses so mercilessly
crammed down visitors at other places, are not only
really good, but, what is more, are really nice, some-
thing like Seltzer water and Johannisberg. Visitors