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LETTER NO. XXXI.

HOME AGAIN

WEST BATON ROUGE, LA., Dec., 1860.

EDITORS ADVOCATE :

sea,

"My home-my home-my happy home

Spot ever, ever dear to me:

Where'er I go, where'er I roam,
My heart still fondly clings to thee."

After a very long voyage across the "stormy "I am at last quietly and comfortably seated at my own hearth-stone, "taking mine ease in mine own inn." I hear the loud puff of the sugar-mill, and the cheerful song of the happy negroes at work in the cane-fields. All now is bustle and life on the sugar-coast, for the canes must now be saved or be forever lost. How different are my feelings now, from what they were one short month ago, in the city of London. I hope, my dear sirs, that neither you nor any of your kind readers may ever be sick from home. The Arabs have a parting

wish, a kind of benediction, which no one can properly appreciate, unless he has once been on a bed of sickness in the "stranger's land." It is this: "May you die at home among your friends." Now this matter of dying is not a very agreeable subject at any time to think about, and especially when seated upon that "pale horse," the aspect of death is any thing but inviting to a sensible man. But few that I know of have their "houses set in order," and none are ready to "cross that melancholy flood that poets write of." All dread the road which leads to that "undiscovered country" from whose bourne no traveller has ever yet returned. In a strange land, far away from home, from kindred, and from friends, the heart yearns for even one familiar kind face. If ever friendship's hand is wanted, it is then. If ever affection's smile is needed, then, oh! then is the time.

To Mr. Wm. Forsyth, of Temple Bar, Q. C., a distinguished lawyer of London, I am under lasting obligations. He was kind and attentive to me during my long and severe illness. Mr. Beverly Tucker, our worthy consul at Liverpool, I can never forget; for hearing of my illness, he wrote to friends in London to call and see me, and do every thing requisite for my cure and comfort. These friends paid me every attention, and offered every assistance, and in due course of time I recovered.

From Liverpool I shipped to Boston on board the Cunard steamer Canada, in the very midst of a storm. So great was the anticipated danger, that

four passengers who came down to the ship, refused to come on board, giving up their passage-money and their state-rooms, and bidding the captain good-bye, with the consoling remark (to us) that they "didn't care about getting drowned that trip." In going out of the Mersey it blew a perfect hurricane. All dreaded the terrible fate of the East Indiaman, which had gone on the rocks here only a few weeks before, drowning 500 passengers. Our good ship, however, weathered the storm full well, and in the course of 48 hours' hard steaming, we landed in the "Cove of Cork." Here we took in the royal mails, and set out again for the broad Atlantic. We had scarcely struck old Ocean, when the gale began afresh, and then for "twelve long stormy days and stormy nights, we were tossed upon the raging sea." The steamer shipped, as they call it, a great deal of water, generally carrying from eight to ten inches on deck. Of course we were all very sea-sick, and many suffered much. We had on board a Catholic priest from Boston. He was very much frightened during the whole trip, and as each big wave would strike the ship and jar the bulwarks, he would jump up out of his berth and cross himself. On a certain occasion he had gone up into the cabin, and before he could reach a chair, the ship gave a lurch, and threw him head foremost under the table. He rose as pale as death, crossed himself, and took his seat. The captain about that time came along, and he said to him, "Captain, how much longer do you think this

storm will last?" The captain replied he could not tell, but hoped it would be over in a few days!

"My Lord!" said he, "Captain, you don't think it will last several days longer, do you?" and then he crossed himself again.

"Yes," said the captain, "I think it will last at least a week!"

"Then," cried our poor priest, "there is no hope for me. I have an aged mother in Boston, 87 years old. If this storm does not cease very soon, she will live longer than I will!"

But "behind a frowning Providence" there was a smiling face. The good ship arrived safe, and our pious priest, I hope, may live full many a year, to tell his flock of the perils of the sea, and of the saving arm of Him who walks upon the waters of the deep.

I often, in my own mind, draw a comparison between our own country and the old world. True, we have no paintings here, for in the Pitti Palace at Florence, there are more good paintings than on the whole of the American continent. In statuary, also, we are far behind. In the manufactory of silks and satins, fine cloths, poplins, linens and laces, we cannot pretend to compete with the looms of Europe. But in all the articles of actual necessity, such as linseys and jeans, heavy cotton goods and calicoes, farming utensils, boots, shoes, and heavy cutlery, in steam-engines, saw-mills, and all sorts of useful machinery, we are, I am proud to

say, a long way ahead of any thing "across the

water."

Books are fully as well published with us, and just as well bound, as they are in London, and at least one-half cheaper. For instance, for a copy of the " "Idyls of the King," by Tennyson, I paid in Liverpool $2.50. In New York the same book can be had for $1. Taking New York as a fair sample of an American city, and London as a European, I find that Four houses are generally better built, and in a much more tasteful and elegant style. There is no such street in London as Fifth Avenue, nor any at all comparable to Broadway. Regent and Oxford Streets are the finest in that great city, but they have no buildings on either of them like the great hotels, or those splendid marble palaces on Broadway. In hotels, we beat the world.

An Englishman is not generally a social being. He prefers his club to a public hotel, and therefore you seldom see him in his native country about a hotel. He orders his mutton-chops, or his roastbeef and potatoes, and quietly by himself eats and drinks to his fill. With an American it is quite different. He puts up at a first-class hotel, for he wants to see his friends. He wants to talk with them, and drink with them, and perhaps to take a "little frolic " with them.

In the large dining-rooms of the St. Nicholas, the Metropolitan, and the Fifth Avenue, you will every day, at about 4 o'clock, P. M., see the most

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