Page:Early western travels, 1748-1846 (1907 Volume 11).djvu/15



The curiosity of Englishmen in regard to social conditions in the United States had been but mildly active during the generation following the Revolution; but it was quickened by the occurrences of the War of 1812-15, and by the tide of emigration that at its close set thitherward from the British Isles. This sudden revival of interest in American transplantation was the result of a chain of more or less related events in the mother country. Chief among these were the termination of the Napoleonic wars and the consequent agricultural distress, resulting in widespread political dissatisfaction. So extensive was the emigration movement to the United States that English publicists were much concerned, and newspapers and magazines teemed with information regarding our country and warnings designed for prospective colonists. Every English traveller hither, whether his journey was that of a serious investigator or merely of a tourist eager to behold strange lands and new conditions, felt impelled to give his personal impressions in volumes of varying merit, evincing every shade of admiration and dislike. In articles, pamphlets, and books, intending emigrants were alternately cajoled and terrified. Americans were described either as a race of enlightened freemen or as retrograded to the level of savages; American political institutions were either the best or the worst possible; and life in America was painted either as a paradise or a purgatory, according to the whim of the author or his personal predilections.

In these descriptions, which appear to have been