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Mr. Fearon witnessed at the latter, is of a very extraordinary kind, and must be told in his own words; none that we could substitute would do it adequate justice.

As the latter (Ebenezer church) possessed all the characteristics of the former, with considerable additions of its own, to that only is it necessary that I should call your attention. I went at eight o'clock in the evening. The door was locked; but the windows being open, I placed myself at one of them, and saw that the church within was crowded almost to suffocation. The preacher indulged in long pauses, and occasional loud elevations of voice, which were always answered by the audience with deep groans. When the prayer which followed the sermon had ended, the minister descended from the pulpit, the doors were thrown open, and a considerable number of the audience departed. Understanding however that something was yet to follow, with considerable difficulty I obtained admission. The minister had departed, the doors were again closed, but about four hundred persons remained. One (apparently) of the leading members gave out a hymn, then a brother was called upon to pray: he roared and ranted like a maniac; the male part of the audience groaned, the female shrieked; a man sitting next to me shouted; a youth standing before me continued for half an hour bawling, "Oh Jesus! come down, come down, Jesus! my dear Jesus, I see you! bless me, Jesus! Oh! oh! oh! Come down, Jesus!" A small space farther on, a girl about eleven years of age was in convulsions: an old woman, who I concluded was her mother, stood on the seat, holding her up in her arms, that her extasies might be visible to the whole assembly. In another place there was a convocation of holy sisters, sending forth most awful yells. A brother now stood forward, stating, that "although numbers had gone, he trusted the Lord would that night work some signal favours among his dear lambs." Two sisters advanced towards him, refusing to be comforted, "for the Lord was with them :" another brother prayed-and another. "Brother Macfaddin" was now called upon, and he addressed them with a voice which might almost rival a peal of thunder, the whole congregation occasionally joining responsive to his notes. The madness now be came threefold increased, and such a scene presented itself as I could never have pictured to my imagination, and as I trust, for the honour of true religion and of human nature, I shall never see again. Had the inhabitants of Bedlam been let loose, they could not have exceeded it. From forty to fifty were praying aloud and extemporaneously at the same moment of time: some were kicking, many jumping, all clapping their hands and crying out in chorus, "Glory! glory! glory! Jesus Christ is a very good friend! Jesus Christ is a very good friend! Oh God! oh Jesus! come down! Glory! glory! glory! thank you Jesus! thank you God! Oh glory! glory! glory!!!" Mere exhaustion of bodily strength produced a cessation of madness for a few minutes. A hymn was given out and sung; praying then recommenced; the scene of madness was again acted, with, if possible, increased efforts on the part of the performers. One of the brothers prayed to be kept from enthusiasm! A girl of six years of age became the next object of atten

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tion. A reverend brother proclaimed that she "had just received a visit from the Lord, and was in awful convulsions-so hard was the working of the spirit!" This scene continued for some time; but the audience gradually lessened, so that by ten o'clock the field of active operations was considerably contracted. The women, however, forming a compact column at the most distant corner of the church, continued their shriekings with but little abatement. Feeling disposed to get a nearer sight of the beings who sent forth such terrifying yells, I endeavoured to approach them, but was stopped by several of the brethren, who would not allow of a near approach towards the holy sisterhood. The novelty of this exhibition had, at first sight, rendered it a subject of amusement and interest; but all such feelings soon gave way to an emotion of melancholy horror, when I considered the gloomy picture it represented of human nature, and called to mind that these maniacal fanatics were blaspheming the holy name of Christianity. Notwithstanding my warm love of liberty, I felt that, were I an absoJute lawgiver, I would certainly punish and restrain men who thus degraded their nature, who set so wicked an example of religious blasphemy, and so foully libelled the name and character of revelation.'p. 163-6.

Alas! alas! it was the want of religious liberty' which drove Mr. Fearon from the land of his fathers; and he is no sooner arrived in the only place where it is to be found in full perfection, than he quarrels with it! It is happy for mankind that our new Solon is not possessed of absolute power. He knows not of what manner of spirit he is; and his judgment unluckily is as deficient as his experience. He would make woeful work with his restraints and his punishments; and would act more wisely for himself, and far more safely for others, by trusting to the rational piety and practical knowledge of the great founders of the institutes of his country, than by promulgating, in the confidence of blind ignorance, theories, which check him at every step, and attempts to define the boundaries of that liberty of which he comprehends neither the nature nor the extent in a single instance.

On the whole, religion appears to be at a lower ebb in Philadelphia than at New York-and it threatened no inundation there. 'Whatever degree of religious information exists,' Mr. Fearon says, is confined to the clergy, who perhaps have lost nothing by the abolition of a state religion.'-p. 168. Such is the triumphant conclusion of this wretched reasoner on the spectacle before him. He sees religion made a jest, and the churches filled by fanatics, hypocrites and buffoons; and yet persists to exult in the thought that, amidst the general defection, the clergy still acknowledge some fealty to their Creator, and have perhaps lost nothing by the abolition of a state religion. This is the phantom that haunts the brain of our traveller, and frights him from his propriety.*

propriety. The clergy have lost nothing!-but what have the laity gained? We could answer from a full heart;-did not every page of Mr. Fearon's book, successively, anticipate us.

After what he has seen, the reader must be fully prepared for our traveller's conclusion. Philadelphia,' he says, ' has done much towards raising America in my estimation.' It did not however enable him to make even an approach towards a decision on the main question of emigration. He found all the comforts and many of the necessaries of life to be exorbitantly dear; articles of wearing apparel, and almost every thing used in domestic economy, were of British manufacture, and from 25 to 100 per cent. dearer than in London. The prices and wages are given in ample detail for the information of those who are interested in such matters; but neither of them are such as to induce, for their sake alone, any description of men to emigrate, though he seems to think that a brewer and a London shopkeeper with good capitals might succeed. Lawyers, doctors, clerks, shopmen, literary men, artists and schoolmasters, would, to use an American phrase, come to a bad market.'

The Fifth Report' is dated from Shawnee town in the Illinois territory; and embraces observations and occurrences along the line between that place and Philadelphia. Passengers on foot, on horseback, and in waggons, crowded the road in their way to the Western country. They travelled generally in companies, in order to assist one another in getting the waggons over the rugged and steep mountains; and the progress was so slow and painful, that Mr. Fearon says he generally preferred walking; this too afforded him an opportunity of entering into the views and little histories of his fellow-travellers. He found the women the most communicative. The first I conversed with was

sitting upon a log, which served for the double purpose of a seat and a fire; their waggon had broken down the day before; her husband was with it at a distant blacksmith's: she had been seated there all night: (thermometer from 26° to 22° below the freezing point!) her last words went to my heart: "Ah! Sir, I wish to God we had never left home." (p. 193.)

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In these elevated regions of the Alleghany chain, log houses are the only habitations; and the character of the mountaineers, contrary to that of the same description and condition in the countries of Europe, appears cold, friendless, unfeeling, callous and selfish.' Mr. Fearon says all the emigrants complain of the enormous charges of the log-taverns; from the following extract we should suppose they have something more serious to complain of. 'At five o'clock in the Our stage was far behind.

evening we reached the top of the Alleganies. This day I had walked abou' sixteen miles';

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and, as was the case the day before, we were not allowed to stop for dinner, there being no coach proprietor upon the road. "The Fountain Inn" is a miserable log-house, or what you would call a dog-hole: it was crowded with emigrants. I asked for something to eat, but could only obtain for answer, I guess whiskey is all the feed we have on sale." I have met with several similar instances, when I have asked, "Have you any meat?" "No."-"Either cold or hot will make no difference to me." " I guess I don't know.”- "Have you any fowls?" "No."-" Fish?" "No."- "Ham ?" "No."-" Bread?" "No.""Cheese?" "No."-" Crackers (biscuits)?" "No."-" I will pay you any price you please." "I guess we have only rum and whiskey feed."

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At the foot of Turtle-creek-hill where our traveller alighted from his waggon knee-deep in mud, he came up with a woman and girl with two infants in their arms, who came, to use their own language, "vrom Zomerzetshire in Hingland." They spoke of their own country with heartfelt attachment; were sorry they had ever been persuaded to leave it; they had been told that America was the first country in the world, but they had experienced nothing but difficulties since they had set their foot upon it. The husband was dragging on their little all, having been forty-five days from Philadelphia.' p. 197. It is such instances as these which afflict us. The expatriation of a thousand such' essential admirers of civil and religious liberty' as Mr. Fearon's consistent and conscientious' employers, might be contemplated with perfect composure; but the departure of one honest and credulous family like this must excite pity and regret. The former have many consolations to which the latter cannot look: these poor people bear no hatred to their country, nor hope, by taking their little all abroad, to inflict a wound on her prosperity; they feel no instinctive horror at the name of a king, nor look for credit among strangers by traducing his character, and reviling his servants. At home, they are condemned to labour, it is true;—they cannot live without labour in America: but here they labour with the companions of their youth, and grow old in the society which waxes gray around them. If they are in absolute want, they are relieved; if they are sick and infirm, they find medicine: in health, they partake in the public worship of their Creator; on the bed of death, they enjoy the soothing consolations of the religion which they love; and they repose at last by the side of their forefathers, whose graves they dug in the pious and cheering hope that they should one day sleep with them, and wake together with them to a joyful resurrection. What of all this can they hope to find in the land to which the artifices and persuasions of the Birkbecks and the Fearons are eagerly propelling them? An advance in the scale of being,' (if they understand such jargon) and food for

their labour,' amidst loneliness, dejection, and despair, with the certainty of receiving, at last, the burial of a dog, and the memorial of a ditch or puddle!

Pittsburgh, situated at the confluence of two rivers, whose united streams form a third, which affords it a direct communication with the Atlantic, though at the distance of 2500 miles, is perhaps the most interesting place in the United States; and, though not a second Birmingham, as the natives call it by that figure of speech which Morris Birkbeck has named 'anticipation; yet from its advantageous situation, as the connecting link between New and Old America,' may prove one day as important to the Western States, as Birmingham is to England. 'The published accounts,' says Mr. Fearon, of this city are so exaggerated and out of all reason, that strangers are usually disappointed on visiting it. This, however, was not my case. I have been in some

measure tutored in American gasconade. When I am told that at a particular hotel there is handsome accommodation, I expect that they are one remove from very bad; if "elegant entertainment,” I anticipate tolerable; if a person is " a clever man," that he is not absolutely a fool; and if a manufactory is the "first in the world," I expect, and have generally found, about six men, and three boys employed. With all its advantages for the establishment of manufactories, the shops (he adds) are literally stuffed with goods of English manufacture, consisting of articles of the most varied kind, from a man's coat, or lady's gown, down to a whip or an oyster knife.'—p. 208.

If trade, as our traveller subsequently assures us, be at a stand here, it is evidently from no want of rath-ripe calculating heads. On the evening of his arrival, Mr. Fearon attended the theatre; 'the play (he says) was Hamlet, and the acting was, perhaps, superior to the audience.' As the representative of the philosophical Horatio was dead drunk and extremely dirty,' the compliment to the latter need not put their modesty to the blush: but Mr. Fearon found entertainment not specified in the bills.

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'Between the acts, two boys, not fourteen years of age, were very solemnly discussing what the profits of the house would be monthly, if that night could be taken as an average. From this they took a view of what interest the house paid to its owner. Their calculations were made with the precision of state financiers, and their conclusions drawn with the gravity of sages. After a long dispute, whether the interest were 83, or 83 per cent., they determined that the theatre was good property.'-p. 212.

'This occurrence,' he adds,' is in perfect accordance with national character. Gain is the education-the morals, the politics, the theology, and stands in the stead of the domestic comfort of all ages and classes of Americans; it is the centre of their system, from which they derive both light and heat.'. We will not dis

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