65 CANANDAIGUA. 



particular attention. Many a person with whom 

 I have held conversations, has undoubtedly for- 

 gotten the subject, as well as the company. In 

 the desultory and rapid manner in which such 

 conferences are generally managed, a stranger is 

 liable to mistake names and titles of office. 1 

 have no doubt but this has been my case frequent- 

 ly : I may have styled a major a colonel, and a 

 sherifl' a judge, and if so, I assure you without 

 the most distant idea of giving offence. 



" Curs'd be the verse however sweet it flow, 

 Which tends to make one worthy man my foe ', 

 Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear, 

 Or from the meek ey'd virgin draw a tear." 



Volney told me in Paris, that he travelled all 

 over the west on foot. My countrymen Dr, 

 M'Nevin and Dr. Goldsmith, perambulated a 

 great portion of Europe ; and Wilson, the father 

 of American Ornithology, was almost always a 

 pedestrian traveller. How cautious ought peo- 

 ple to be when in company with strangers. 1 

 have heard folly from the mouths of lawgivers, 

 and ribaldry in the conversations of the notables 

 of the land. Unnoticed, unobserved, reclining on 

 my chair in the bar room, I have seen human na- 

 ture without disguise — the artificial great man 

 exhibiting his importance — the humble under- 

 strapper listening like a blacksmith to a tailor's 



