the banister with a cautious tenacity quite
exemplary. It was really a very bad case of the
potation disease.

The politicians in Transatlantica are the
greatest talkers or speakers; for even in
conversation they deliver set speeches, which woe
betide you if you interrupt. The day after I
landed in the great republic, a Maine-iac (or
inhabitant of the State of Maine) was "posting"
me "up" in contemporaneous politics, and
charitably attempting to enlighten the more than
heathen darkness of my English ignorance, when
I ventured, at a favourable opportunity, to ask
a question or raise an objection, I forget which.
"I shall feel obliged, sir," said my Gamaliel,
"if you will not interrupt me; but allow me to
get through with what I have to say; and when
am through, I shall be happy to hear what
you have to say, sir. Yes, sir." I acquiesced
with a nervous nod of the head, and he
proceeded with his long oration, at the conclusion
of which I made a short oration, and then he
rejoined with another long one, and upon this
system was the remainder of our dialogue
conducted. He was a chemist and druggist, a strong
democrat (not in the general, but in the special
part sense of the word), and was bitterly severe
upon the sentimentality of abolitionists. Among
other things, he said, "I guess that if your
George Thompson should come out here agin
interfering about those cussed good-for-nothing
niggers, he will be egged and stoned and ridden
on a rail. He is no better than an infernal
'town charge;' he is." What a "town charge"
means, I, by some mischance, never discovered
on good authority. It was evidently meant as
a term of obloquy, and is probably a pauper,
dependent on the town for his support. It
happens strangely that the English ex-M.P. and
lecturer, who was thus indirectly menaced, is at
the present moment addressing immense
audiences at Boston, and in the capital itself.

Another peculiarity of those among Our
Cousins who are loquacious is their laboured attempt
to be excessively accurate and nice in their
distinctions. A friend in New England used to
amuse me beyond measure by his exquisitely
careful essays at description. " Lucas S. Simpkins,
sir, is, perhaps, take him for all in all, one
of the seven very acutest intellects in all New
Hampshire. I will admit that Senator Snooks
has a higher analytical faculty, and the Honourable
Peter Slocum is gifted with a nobler imagination
and finer fancy; but my friend Simpkins,
for absolute mental acuteness, has only six
rivals in the whole state, and perhaps few in
the whole continent."

The lavish use of the parenthesis is a frequent
fault in writers and speakers of all nations and
all ages. It is fortunately, however, vanishing
from all good style everywhere; but I never
heard it used with such common recurrence as
in the conversation of two or three Northerners
of my acquaintance—men of good talent and
good culture. One of them was so determined
a dealer in it, that I nicknamed him "Paren-
thesis" Palmer.

The use of set speeches is not confined to the
politician alone. A literary lawyer I knew was
in the habit of delivering a short harangue in
conversation about an English author's recent
publication. If I heard it once, I heard it
twenty times. I could "trot him out" whenever
I liked, and for the amusement of others
frequently did. He never varied a word, a
syllable, an emphasis, or an accent. Even the
nasal twang was always the same. I should be
very sorry to wound the feelings of that
estimable old gentleman by mentioning in print the
real name of the English writer, or the phraseology
of his viva voce critique; but the following,
without occasioning any offence, will give
the reader a sufficient idea of my friend's style.
If I made some remark about Mr. Kinglake's
History of the Crimean Invasion, off would go
the orator of private life: "When I read the
first volume of Kinglake, I said, 'Kinglake had
evidently concluded to crucify Louis Napoleon,
and, by thunder, he has crucified him; but is it
not extraordinary that while this acute and
brilliant writer has teetotally dried up that cuss of a
despot, he has not written one line about this
land of freedom or our immortal George
Washington?'"

As conversation obviously and not unreasonably
consists of words, I think that I shall not
be irrelevant in making a few observations on
the peculiar phrases, idioms, and vocabulary in
constant use on the other side of the water, but
some of them almost unknown here, and calculated
to instantly excite the attention and surprise
of an English traveller. Some of these
words and phrases are good old classical English,
to be found in Shakespeare, and in the translation
of the Bible, and words which the old
colonists took with them from their old home,
and which, though fallen into desuetude here,
have been retained in daily use by our more
conservative Cousins. Among them is the word
"sick" which we apply now solely to nausea,
while in America it is used as an exact equivalent
for our word " ill," which I never heard used
with them. It is almost superfluous to point
out that it is old English. "Sick unto death"
is a phrase used in the translation of the New
Testament, where we are also told that "Peter's
wife's mother lay sick of a fever."

The Americans do not use the word "stranger"
to anything like the extent we imagine Irom
hearing it incontinently repeated by every
English act or impersonating a Yankee on the stage.
"My friend" is a more frequent form of address.
You ask your way in the streets, and the reply
will often be, "My friend, if you go up Sixth
Avenue, and turn down Seventeenth-street, I
guess you will find B-street right opposite."

The two words repeated most frequently,
and to which the foreign ear gets at last almost
accustomed, are "air" for are, and "benn"
for been. "We have benn talking to-day about
your letters, my friend, to the London Daily
—, and we opine that you air not as friendly
to this country as you might be, were you not
prejudiced by your European ideas."  When