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108
REMARKS.
Chap. VI.

small craft which infest this stream. My volunteer escort took me through a crowd through which I could not have found my way alone, and put me into the cars which started from the side of a street in Albany, requesting the conductor, whose countenance instantly prepossessed me in his favour, to pay me every attention on the route. He remained with me until the cars started, and told me that when he saw ladies travelling alone he always made a point of assisting them. I shook hands with him at parting, feeling real regret at losing so kind and intelligent a companion. This man was a working engineer.

Some time afterwards, while travelling for two successive days and nights in an unsettled district in the west, on the second night, fairly overcome with fatigue, and unable, from the crowded state of the car, to rest my feet on the seat in front, I tried unsuccessfully to make a pillow for my bead by rolling up my cloak, which attempts being perceived by a working mechanic, he accosted me thus: "Stranger, I guess you're almost used up? Maybe you'd be more comfortable if you could rest your head." Without further parley he spoke to his companion, a man in a similar grade in society; they both gave up their seats, and rolled a coat round the arm of the chair, which formed a very comfortable sofa; and these two inen stood for an hour and a half, to give me the advantage of it, apparently without any idea that they were performing a deed of kindness. I met continually with these acts of hearty unostentatious good nature. I mention these in justice to the lower classes of the United States, whose