travelling after all. I was very civilly treated. Passengers go on board by a tug steamer, and find the large steamer lying out in the Liverpool river. We got to Queenstown the next day, and started again with the mails at 4 P.M. The length of the voyage from Queenstown to Sandy Hook, the entrance to New York, is 2,800 nautical miles, and with good weather the White Star steamers do the distance in eight days; but we must expect to meet some share of bad weather in the Atlantic pretty often. That was my experi-. ence. For three days we had a heavy sea, which much retarded the vessel. Then it calmed down, and finally we had two or three fine days, during which the vessel made from 360 to 380 miles per diem; that is, from 15 to 16 miles per hour on an average. She did that easily, without apparent effort, and in some voyages she has not unfrequently done 400 miles in a day. I had never been in so fast a steamer before, and was surprised to find the ease with which these vessels go that pace. I thought the Germanic a very fine vessel, and the arrangements regarding meals and attendance were excellent. The food was quite good. Things were mostly arranged upon the American plan. Passenger accommodation is principally in the middle and forward part of the ship; there is a good smoking-room, and a ladies' cabin, but no general drawing-room or writing-room. The ship was quite full. Almost all the passengers were Americans or else people going on business to America. I was fortunate enough to make acquaintance with some very agreeable people, several of whom I afterwards met in the States. After a voyage of eight days and some hours from Queenstown we reached the Bar at the mouth of the river at Sandy Hook, and found we had to wait several hours to get over it-there is not enough water at all times of the tide. Then after we were over we were again stopped at the Quarantine Station. They seem to be particular about sanitary inspection in America. Thence to New York is a very short distance. We arrived there, and went straight alongside the wharf, being a little more than 8 days from Queenstown and 9 from Liverpool. It was a fine day, and the sight approaching New York very pretty. There is comparatively little tide on the American coast, the ordinary rise being only five or six feet--just enough to keep the harbour sweet and clean, and not so much as to give all the

trouble that our tides give us. There is deep water all alongside New York, and ships lie close in, without the necessity for wet docks or other expensive arrangements. We landed without delay, and found the Custom House not by any means troublesome, everything being done in a quiet and orderly way. There was nothing to be seen in the way of cabs except great two-horse hackney coaches, exceedingly expensive; but the hotel omnibus presently turned up, and we were beset by 'expresses'-that means in America light carts for forwarding luggage. After a little delay I reached the Windsor Hotel, where I stayed while in New York. It is a very good hotel-perhaps the best specimen of an hotel conducted on the American principle; that is, of charging so much per diem for board and lodging. For a residence for a little time in New York I should certainly recommend the Windsor; but for a passing traveller it is a little far off, in the fashionable quarter, the New York Belgravia; and the well-known Fifth Avenue Hotel might be more central and convenient. The charge at the Windsor is $4 (say 16s.) per diem; and, considering the character of the food and the accommodation, I thought the charge quite moderate. Some of the hotels at New York and Boston charge a little more and others less; the hotels in the interior of the country generally $25 or $3. About $3 to $4 a day may be taken as the average cost of board and lodging at first-class hotels. You may have a room with a bath-room attached, but that is always charged a dollar a day extra. With this exception, there are very few extras, especially if you fall into the custom of the country and do not drink wine; if you do you will have to pay high for it. If a man is content to find his way about by the aid of tramways and other native methods, he may live very well at a pound a day, all expenses included. Then say ten shillings a day for travelling that would make about thirty shillings a day for obligatory expenses. Of course he may spend money beyond this, but really there is not so much temptation to do so as in Europe. I should say that for 150l. a man may make an extreinely good three months' tour to America. Besides the hotels on the American plan which I have mentioned, there are a few in the large cities which are conducted on the European principle-charging for what you have; and I believe that if people do not want to be overfed, and manage economically, they may live

in such hotels almost as cheaply as in those conducted on the American plan; but they will have more trouble; and if they want private rooms and such special accommodation, they have to pay very heavily indeed at such hotels as the Brunswick and Brevoort, at New York. At the Windsor the waiters are white men, which is contrary to the usual practice, most hotels having black waiters. I found the food really very good indeed a great deal better than that which I afterwards obtained at most American hotels. My only complaint was that feeding was rather overdone: you were expected to eat too much; and the waiters did not seem to have any mercy on you if you did not comply.

Most of the beds in America have mosquito-curtains, and I was terrified by the fear of encountering those old Indian enemies. Happily at the season when I was in America I did not suffer much; but at some seasons, I believe, the mosquitos are very bad there.

On the afternoon of my arrival I 'did' the Central Park of New York-an immense place, ever so many miles long, and very well kept; called Central' because it is a long way off. Parks are very much the fashion in America; now almost every great town has a fine park. A long stream of carriages of all kinds was going towards the park, but they tailed off and became rare in the further parts. I noticed even on Sunday a large number of vehicles going out there; but I am told that these are chiefly filled by the foreign population of New York, which is very large. I should say that the park is a kind of cross between Regent's Park and the Bois de Boulogne. In the evening everything seemed very dull. There are no books in the hotels; the streets are but indifferently lighted, and nothing seemed to be going on. There was none of the liveliness of a great European city in the evening. The following day I looked about the town, and delivered some letters of introduction, being very kindly received by some very agreeable people. That evening I dined with a very pleasant and hospitable old banker, who struck me as wonderfully English in his manners and conversation as well as in his table and arrangements. I was much surprised to find that he had never been in Europe-which is a rare thing -but he had been very much in contact with Englishmen.

The appearance of the city of New York did not strike me as being very different from European cities. There are

some fine buildings, but I should not say that the place impresses one very much. Upon the whole it is less un-Englishlooking than I expected.

The principal points in New York ways which struck me were the following:-The way of serving the dishes, the cookery, the food, and the arrangements altogether at the hotels. The rectangular streets, which one soon learns to find a great convenience, the number of the street giving you at once the clue to its whereabouts. Then the vehicles used, which are different from ours. The ladies' carriages are not very different; they are not particularly smart nor well set up -the fine ladies are generally content with coachmen, without footmen. But the light traps and everything that goes under the name of 'buggy' in America are very smart and fast vehicles indeed, with a great many fast-trotting horses. was taken by surprise to find that the spider-like vehicles which we rather suppose to be an American eccentricity are in every-day use, not only in the towns but still more in the country and over the unmade country roads. They are made of hickory-wood, are wonderfully light, and seem to be exceedingly strong, judging by the work which they endure. They last quite as well as our heavy vehicles, and I cannot imagine why we do not follow the example in getting suchlike traps.

I

The tramways puzzle one rather at first; they seem slow, and difficult to understand; but before one has been very long in America one becomes quite accustomed to them, and uses them continually. My only wonder is that such a highpressure people as the Americans can stand such a slow mode of conveyance, for they are very slow. Really people in America do not give you the idea of being in a hurry.

One of the newest things to me was the Elevated Railway which has recently been started in New York. It seemed a most admirable arrangement. New York is a very long cityeight or ten miles long-avenues running the whole length of it. The plan is to establish, on two or three of these avenues, selected for the purpose, these elevated railways, which run upon iron girders above the heads of the people and the ordinary traffic, and are an enormous convenience to those who have to go the long distances that New York people go between their homes and their places of business. The astonishing thing is, how they could have got on to the year

1878 without having anything of the kind. They must have spent a large portion of their lives travelling five or six miles backwards and forwards in the trams. The Elevated Railway is, I think, infinitely cheaper and easier, and it is certainly very much lighter and more airy than our underground railways; and the facilities for travelling are quite as great, the only difference being that passengers go upstairs to the railway where we go down. There is no difficulty in carrying the lines along the long straight avenues; but when you get into the older parts of New York (which are built more like European towns, and where the avenues are not continuous) there is much more difficulty. I was astounded to see how the difficulty of going round corners is overcome. The makers of the Elevated Railway have not gone to the expense of taking up large blocks of houses to make the way for their line; they go sharp round rightangled corners, taking up, perhaps, only part of one house at the corner, and going round that in a way marvellous to behold; but they do it without accident. The great outcry against the Elevated Railways was the damage to the amenity of the houses in the streets through which they pass. The Americans do things in a more energetic manner than we do; and having got the sanction of the New York Legislature for the railway, they made it first and thought about compensation for the owners of property afterwards. No doubt it is not a pleasant thing some day to find that a railway is running before your drawing-room windows, but it will probably be found in the end that the character of the houses on the line is changed, not their value; they will become places of business rather than residences; but for business purposes the railway may add to their value. So perhaps the Americans are wiser than if they had given enormous compensation first, according to our plan. When I arrived the only experience of the elevated railways having been in summer, when they were not so much needed, the cry of the aggrieved householders seemed to be more heard than the praises of the passengers by the line; but when I came back, in winter, the immense advantage and convenience to the general public of the railway had been so much appreciated that praise altogether predominated over complaints. I am very much impressed with the belief that elevated railways of this kind in Oxford Street and Piccadilly and such-like thoroughfares