The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-06-24
AMERICA AS VIEWED BY AN
 ENGLISH TRAVELER IN 1880.

Eighty-ffve years ago today, June 24, 1890, the packet ship York, with Capt. Thompson in command, sailed away from Liverpool bound for New York The York had on board seven cabin passengers and the same num- Der in the steerage The voyage, which terminated in New York on the following July 31st, is important only because the cabin passengers included one John Fowler, an Englishman, who has in his diary given to pos terity- an unusually interesting de- scription of the America of that pe- riod.
 The York had no occasion to fear German submarines, but there were many disadvantages connected with transatlantic travel in those days which doubtless made the sea-sick
 passengers wish that some agency would send them to the bottom. MT. Fowler was especially critical of the sleeping arrangeme which he de- scrfbed as wooden frames placed one above another, with sacking stretched between. The odor of bilge water was almost into1erab1e. The fare for cabin passengers met with his full approval however, and included the following:
 ls ''Tea, coffee, boiled eggs and ham, pickled shad, cold tongue and other meats, bread of the finest American flour, Nbaked fresh every day, biscuits, I which furnishes an abundant supply of milk as we'll as sheep, pigs, geese,
 ducks and fowls. Wine and spirits ale and London porter were supplied
 unsparing1y.''
 Upon his arrival in New York Mr
 Fowler found the people complaining of the high cost of living, and he sets down in his dairy a number of quota ltions, including the following: Fresh
 beef, first rate cuts, 8 to 12 cents a
 pound; mutton, 6 to cents; pork, 5
 to cents; veal and lamb, 6 to 8 cents, eggs one cent each; better, g to IS
 cents pound; cheese, 6 to 12 cents;
 loaf or lump sugar, IA to 19 cents a pound; pe2Rtoes, 80 to 37 1-2 cents a | bushel; Java coffee, 13 to IS cents a
 pound; brandy, rum and gin, from $1 l to $1.50 a gallon; beer, $4 to $6 a 1 gallon
 New York, then as now, had its
 servant problem. Most of the ser wants were negroes, although they
 were not without competition from
 cient in their art commanded a monthly wage of from $6 to $S, while
 housenaids received from $4 to $6
 per month. Native men, he wrote,
 t'are averse to >servitude, but the wo- | men are always ready to help out. l But servants entertain such notions of leQuality and independence as fit, them | but poorly for this station in ife.' No visitor to America has ever
 neglected to comment upon Ameri- can women, and those of 1880 MT.
 Fowler found to possess figures not l wanting in elegance or their features | in animation and beauty He added l the high tribute that American re-
 sembIe our own,'' although he added l that their compIexions were inclined 1 to be salIow, circumstance which | he ga1IantIy attributed to the climate. l The men he found to be somewhat
 taller and somewhat less corpulent l than Englishmen, also inclined to sal
 lowness of slin,. and with noses more prominent than those affected by | EngIishrnen
 Americans in general he praised for 1 their genuine and disinterested hos 1 pitalfty,'' In the cities he found the people sfeasy, polite and ob1iging''- l except the servantsHbut in the coun- l try foftentines boorish in the ex-
 treme."
 MT. Fowler found much to praise I in America and very little to censure,
 except that disgusting habit of l smoking and chewing tobacco, and of nearly indiscrirninate spitting.'' This l ''odious national habit of free and
 easy expeotoration preyed on his
 mind and led to frequent references | in the diary.