FIRST JOURNEY IN AMERICA. 409 



first impressions of the scientific men as well 

 as the scientific societies and collections of the 

 United States, is given in the following letter. 

 It is addressed to his mother, and with her to 

 a social club of intimate friends and neighbors 

 in Neuchatel, at whose meetings he had been 

 for years an honored guest. 



Boston, December, 1846. 



. . . Having no time to write out a com- 

 plete account of my journey of last month, 

 I will only transcribe for you some fugitive 

 notes scribbled along the road in stages or 

 railroad carriages. They bear the stamp of 

 hurry and constant interruption. 



Leaving Boston the 16th of October, I 

 went by railroad to New Haven, passing 

 through Springfield. The rapidity of the 

 locomotion is frightful to those who are un- 

 used to it, but you adapt yourself to the 

 speed, and soon become, like all the rest of 

 the world, impatient of the slightest delay. 

 I well understand that an antipathy for this 

 mode of travel is possible. There is some- 

 thing infernal in the irresistible power of 

 steam, carrying such heavy masses along with 

 the swiftness of lightning. The habits grow- 

 ing out of continued contact with railroads, 



