第12章

FROM THE HONOURABLE EDWARD ANTROBUS, M.P., IN BOSTON, TO THEHONOURABLE MRS.ANTROBUS.

October 17.

My Dear Susan--I sent you a post-card on the 13th and a native newspaper yesterday; I really have had no time to write.I sent you the newspaper partly because it contained a report--extremely incorrect--of some remarks I made at the meeting of the Association of the Teachers of New England; partly because it is so curious that I thought it would interest you and the children.I cut out some portions which I didn't think it would be well for the children to see; the parts remaining contain the most striking features.Please point out to the children the peculiar orthography, which probably will be adopted in England by the time they are grown up; the amusing oddities of expression, etc.Some of them are intentional;you will have heard of the celebrated American humour, etc.(remind me, by the way, on my return to Thistleton, to give you a few examples of it); others are unconscious, and are perhaps on that account the more diverting.Point out to the children the difference (in so far as you are sure that you yourself perceive it).You must excuse me if these lines are not very legible; I am writing them by the light of a railway lamp, which rattles above my left ear; it being only at odd moments that I can find time to look into everything that I wish to.You will say that this is a very odd moment, indeed, when I tell you that I am in bed in a sleeping-car.I occupy the upper berth (I will explain to you the arrangement when I return), while the lower forms the couch--the jolts are fearful--of an unknown female.You will be very anxious for my explanation; but I assure you that it is the custom of the country.I myself am assured that a lady may travel in this manner all over the Union (the Union of States) without a loss of consideration.In case of her occupying the upper berth I presume it would be different; but I must make inquiries on this point.

Whether it be the fact that a mysterious being of another sex has retired to rest behind the same curtains, or whether it be the swing of the train, which rushes through the air with very much the same movement as the tail of a kite, the situation is, at any rate, so anomalous that I am unable to sleep.A ventilator is open just over my head, and a lively draught, mingled with a drizzle of cinders, pours in through this ingenious orifice.(I will describe to you its form on my return.) If I had occupied the lower berth I should have had a whole window to myself, and by drawing back the blind (a safe proceeding at the dead of night), I should have been able, by the light of an extraordinary brilliant moon, to see a little better what I write.The question occurs to me, however,--Would the lady below me in that case have ascended to the upper berth? (You know my old taste for contingent inquiries.) I incline to think (from what I have seen) that she would simply have requested me to evacuate my own couch.(The ladies in this country ask for anything they want.) In this case, I suppose, I should have had an extensive view of the country, which, from what I saw of it before I turned in (while the lady beneath me was going to bed), offered a rather ragged expanse, dotted with little white wooden houses, which looked in the moonshine like pasteboard boxes.I have been unable to ascertain as precisely as I should wish by whom these modest residences are occupied; for they are too small to be the homes of country gentlemen, there is no peasantry here, and (in New England, for all the corn comes from the far West) there are no yeomen nor farmers.The information that one receives in this country is apt to be rather conflicting, but I am determined to sift the mystery to the bottom.I have already noted down a multitude of facts bearing upon the points that interest me most--the operation of the school-boards, the co-education of the sexes, the elevation of the tone of the lower classes, the participation of the latter in political life.Political life, indeed, is almost wholly confined to the lower middle class, and the upper section of the lower class.In some of the large towns, indeed, the lowest order of all participates considerably--a very interesting phrase, to which Ishall give more attention.It is very gratifying to see the taste for public affairs pervading so many social strata; but the indifference of the gentry is a fact not to be lightly considered.