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Chap. XIX.
ERROR OF ENGLISH TRAVELLERS.
449

namely, herself. There are, however, certain salient points which present themselves to the interested observer, and I have endeavoured to approach these in as candid a spirit as possible, not exaggerating obvious faults, where there is so much to commend and admire.

The following remarks were lately made to me by a liberal and enlightened American on the misapprehensions of British observers:—"The great fault of English travellers in this land very often is that they see all things through spectacles which have been graduated to the age and narrow local dimensions of things in England; and because things here are new, and all that is good, instead of being concentrated into a narrow space so as to be seen at one glance, is widely diffused so as not to be easily gauged—because, in other words, it is the spring here and not the autumn, and our advance has the step of youth instead of the measured walk of age; and because our refinements have not the precise customs to which they have been accustomed at home, they turn away in mighty dissatisfaction. There are excellences in varieties, and things which differ may both be good."