2 
LETTEES FROM ALABAMA. 
will be as to-daj. If the poor occupationless 
passenger endeavour to beguile his tedium, and 
indulge his literary propensities, by keeping a 
log,” so few are the facts that occur, that he is 
often reduced to debate with himself the propriety 
of recording such remarkable events ” as that 
^'the cook dropped a pewter spoon overboard,” or 
that ‘^the pig came upon the quarter-deck; ” and 
happy indeed is he when he has an opportunity of 
announcing, in the words of the north-country mate, 
Little wind and less weather ; caught a dolphin, 
and lost him ! ” If, therefore, you find in my 
letter a tendency to treat of small deer,” I trust 
you will make charitable allowances, and admit the 
truth of the Irish proverb, which sets forth the 
difficulty of extracting blood from a turnip. 
It would be needless to waste many words about 
Philadelphia. My impressions of it were agreeable ; 
there are not many splendid or imposing edifices, 
but the general character is that of a genteel and 
respectable middle-class. If there is little to as- 
tonish or dazzle, there is perhaps less to displeass : 
an air of chaste and sobered elegance pervades the 
whole. The streets are straight, wide, and clean, 
and are rendered peculiarly pleasant by rows of 
trees on each side, among which the stately plane 
or buttonwood is conspicuous. The people who 
walk in them are remarkably few in number for 
a large city, and their deportment is generally 
quiet and orderly. One cannot help feeling that 
William Penn has left the character of his sect 
strongly, indelibly, impressed on the city which he 
founded. 
The broad and beautiful river on which it stands 
—the silvery Delaware, with its gently sloping 
