Every One Reads The
Newspapers And 'Harper's Magazine,' And Every One Buys Bad Novels, On
Worse Paper, In The Cars And Steamboats.
The States, although amply
supplied with English literature, have many popular authors of their own,
among whom may be named Prescott, Bancroft, Washington Irving, Stowe,
Stephens, Wetherall, Emerson, Longfellow, Lowell, and Bryant.
Books are
very cheap wherever the editions of English works are concerned, and a
library is considered an essential part of the fitting up of a house. In
many of the States there are public libraries supported by a rate. In the
State of New York, in the year ending 1854, the Commissioners of Education
received 90,579 dollars for libraries.
Perhaps the greatest advantage offered to emigrants is the opportunity
everywhere afforded of investing small sums of money advantageously. In
England, in most branches of trade, the low rate of wages renders it
impossible for the operative to save any portion of his earnings; and even
when he is able to do so, he can rarely obtain a higher rate of interest
for his money than that which the savings-banks offer. Economise as he
may, his hard-won savings seldom are sufficient to afford him a provision
in old age. In America, on the contrary, the man who possesses 5l. or
10l. has every hope of securing a competence. He may buy land in newly-
settled districts, which sometimes can be obtained at 7s. an acre, and
hold it till it becomes valuable, or he may obtain a few shares in any
thriving corporate concern. A hundred ways present themselves to the man
of intelligence and industry by which he may improve and increase his
little fortune. The necessaries of life are abundant and cheap, and, aided
by a free education, he has the satisfaction of a well-grounded hope that
his children will rise to positions of respectability and affluence, while
his old age will be far removed from the pressure of want. The knowledge
that each shilling saved may produce ten or twenty by judicious investment
is a constant stimulus to his industry.
Yet, from all that I have seen and heard, I should think that Canada West
offers a more advantageous field for emigrants. Equally free and
unburdened by taxation, with the same social and educational advantages,
with an increasing demand for labour of every kind, with a rich soil,
extraordinary facilities of communication, and a healthy climate,
pauperism is unknown; fluctuations in commercial affairs are comparatively
small, and, above all, the emigrant is not exposed to the loss of
everything which he possesses as soon as he lands.
An infamous class of swindlers, called "emigrant-runners," meet the poor
adventurer on his arrival at New York. They sell him second-class tickets
at the price of first-class, forged passes, and tickets to take him 1000
miles, which are only available at the outside for 200 or 300. If he holds
out against their extortions, he is beaten, abused, loses his luggage for
a time, or is transferred to the tender mercies of the boarding-house
keeper, who speedily deprives him of his hard-earned savings.
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