CHAP. XXXVIII.] AFRICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 241 



house, stands a statue of Franklin, holding a lightning conductor 

 in his hand. A company of firemen were exercising their en 

 gines in the great square, throwing up powerful jets of water 

 high enough to wash the statue. 



From Chambersburg we went on by railway at the rate of 

 fourteen miles an hour, only slackening our pace when we passed 

 through the middle of towns, such as Shippensburg and Carlisle, 

 where we had the amusement of looking from the cars into the 

 shop windows. 



On reaching the Susquehanna we came in sight of Harrisburg, 

 the seat of Legislature of Pennsylvania, a cheerful town, which 

 makes a handsome appearance at a distance, with its numerous 

 spires and domes. The railway bridge over the river had been, 

 burnt down, and the old bridge carried away by a recent freshet, 

 when large fragments of ice were borne down against the piers. 



Among the passengers in the railway to Philadelphia, was an 

 American naval officer, who had just returned from service on 

 the coast of Africa, fully persuaded that the efforts made by the 

 English and United States fleets to put down the slave-trade, 

 had increased the misery and loss of life of the negroes, without 

 tending to check the traffic, which might, he thought, have been 

 nearly put an end to before now, if England and other countries 

 had spent an equally enormous sum of money in forming settle 

 ments such as Liberia ; although he admitted that negroes from 

 the United States, whose families had been acclimatized in Amer 

 ica for several generations, and who settled in Liberia, were cut 

 off by fever almost as rapidly as Europeans. 



Returning to Philadelphia, after an absence of six months, we 

 were as much pleased as ever with the air of refinement of the 

 principal streets, and the well-dressed people walking on the neat 

 pavements, under the shade of a double row of green trees, or 

 gazing, in a bright, clear atmosphere, at the tastefully arranged 

 shop windows ; nor could we agree with those critics who com 

 plain of the prim and quakerish air, and the monotonous same 

 ness, of so regularly built a city. 



During our stay, a large meeting was held to promote a scheme 

 for a new railway to Pittsburg, through Harrisburg, the interest 



VOL. II. L 



