Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/245

 simple in their manners and on the whole they form perhaps the most pleasing and happy society in the world.”

“What is the temper of the people of New England?”

“They are frank and open, not easily irritated but easily pacified. They are at the same time bold and enterprising. The women are educated to housewifery, excellent companions and housekeepers, spending their leisure time in reading books of useful information and rendering themselves not only useful but amiable and pleasing.”

“What is the state of science in New England?”

“It is greatly cultivated and more generally diffused among the inhabitants than in any other part of the world.”

“What is the character of the Pennsylvanians?”

“Pennsylvania is inhabited by a great variety of people. . . . Many of the yeomanry in some parts of this state differ greatly from the New Englanders, for the former are impatient of good government, order and regularity, and the latter are orderly, regular and loyal.”

The lessons thus early taught have been well learned. I remember, that some two or three years ago one of the eloquent and witty gentlemen who respond upon these festive occasions was called up to reply to a toast which met the approval and received the applause of the assembled members—“Benjamin Franklin, the Discoverer of Philadelphia.”

In a certain sense I admit the fact that lies concealed in that witticism, and in that sense concede that Benjamin Franklin was the discoverer of Philadelphia. When the cumulative forces of civilization, which had been gathering for fifteen centuries had made their way across the Atlantic and several centuries later had extended beyond the Mississippi and reached the base of the Rocky Mountains—then the potato bug discovered the potato. In 1723 a young man of seventeen years walked from the Delaware up Market Street to Fourth. He was a youth of scanty means and I may say of less morals. He saw the accumulated shipping at the wharves, he saw the State House and warehouses of a prosperous and growing community, and in the market house which ran along the center of the street he saw the rich products which had come down from the farms of Lancaster and Chester counties. It was a spectacle the like of which never before had met his gaze and—Benjamin Franklin discovered Philadelphia. For sixty years he walked the streets of this great city, beaming benevolence and beneficence upon men of substance and influence, and casting cheerful glances upon lustful young women. He lived to a good Rh