dragged by the unanimous voice of my fellow-travellers to a Temperance hotel.

I now discovered that I had been stowed away in the wrong coach; but as I knew the name of the hotel where my friends intended to put up, and as I love my virtue to be proved, as I have just told you, I got a guide and started for the Congress Hall hotel in the Grand Place; where I found my friends and my baggage, and got a good supper and a splendid sleeping apart

ment.

I wonder when I am to be asked to bundle; as yet I have always had the luxury of a bed-room to myself. Those good old days of bundling seem out of fashion; but I am told that I shall have to make the experiment before long.

Adieu!

LETTER XIII.

Albany American attachment to Royal Names — Basin of the Erie Canal-Multitude of Steamboats-Travelling Companions-TROY-Mount Ida Residence of an ex-blind Gentleman -- His strange Estimate of Beauty-Advice to the Ladies -Deficiency of Classic Names - Politics -- Origin of the Harrisonian Symbols - Ballston Springs— SARATOGA General Scott-General MacombFriends from Canada-Kind Reception from General Scott.

Saratoga, Sept. 8, 1840.

MY DEAR S

Dating a letter from Saratoga naturally brings Robert Burns' lines to my memory—

"Burgoyne gaed up, wae spur and whip,

Till Fraser brave did fa', man;

Then lost his way, ae misty day,
In Saratoga shaw, man."

This place calls forth somewhat melancholy associations. But of this anon; and

before I expatiate on Saratoga and its scenery, I must make I must make you travel with me from Albany to Troy; convey you, on a covered bridge sixteen thousand feet long, across the Hudson; take you near the Cohoes falls on the Mohawk; carry you across three different branches of that river ; place you on the Schenectedy and Saratoga railroad; shew you Ballston springs, and, finally, land you here; and if you keep a good look-out when about the village of Waterford in the upper line of the Hudson, you will see the place where poor Burgoyne surrendered.

Albany contains, I believe, about 35,000 inhabitants. The census to be laid before Congress this year will be particularly interesting, as it will shew the surprising progress of population during the last ten years.

This is one of the oldest settlements; it dates from about 1610, and is next in age

to Jamestown in Virginia. In 1664 its fort

PUBLIC BUILDINGS.

149

and garrison surrendered to Colonel Carteret, who named it Albany, after the Duke of York. I would not have gone out of my way to mention this, were it not to shew what I have often observed and what has often been remarked to me, that a feeling of veneration for the mother country has always existed here; for when the daughter threw off her allegiance and became an undutiful republican gipsy, she never erased or changed the names of her towns, streets, or localities, however royal sounding they might be. The instances of this are numerous, but I will not try your patience by going over them.

After a substantial breakfast I viewed the Capitol, the States House now building, and many other noble edifices. The Americans know how to build towns as they ought to be built. They will have nothing to do with your unwholesome narrow streets; we walked down that noble one, called State Street, and passed over a bridge of the same

name, which is thrown across the basin of the great Erie canal, and which bridge they were at this time repairing, it having given way a few days before, when several carriages and public conveyances were upon it. A great many persons were precipitated into the water, and five-and-twenty were drowned.

I counted sixty small steamers in this reservoir, and when we reached the Hudson we beheld numerous large and splendid ones. We embarked on board of onc, about to start for Troy. Two or three Irish waiters or porters convoyed us and conveyed our luggage from the Congress Hall, and by their language and gestures let us know that they had not been long enough from the ould country to have forgotten what they considered a good old custom, but which I deem an execrable one-that of being TIPPED!

As soon as the vessel moved from the wharf we had a fine view of Albany; its golden