country, comparatively few avail themselves of this finishing course. It
is not strange that this should have been so with a people who are
separated from the rest of the world by such wide oceans as we are, which
could, up to a comparatively recent period, only have been crossed at a
sacrifice of much time and money, and at the risk of loosing either life
or health. These difficulties have been greatly reduced by the application
of steam-power to navigation, and the time has come when an American can
make the tour of Europe with but little more expenditure of time and money
than it costs even a native of Europe to do it.

One of my principal objects in writing this book is to encourage others to
make similar tours. We would have plenty of books no traveling, if some of
them did represent the readers in the humbler spheres of life, but the
general impression in America is that no one can see Europe to any
satisfaction in less than a year or two and with an outlay of from a
thousand to two thousand dollars. This is a great mistake. If one travels
for pleasure mainly, it will certainly require a great deal of time and
money, but a hard-working student can do much in a few months. Permit me
to say, that one will see and experience more in two weeks abroad, than
many a learned man in America expects could be seen in a year. I sometimes
give the particulars of sights and adventures in detail, that the reader
may take an example of my experience, for any tour he may propose to make.
The times devoted to different places are given that he may form an
estimate of the comparative importance of different places.

Statistics form a leading feature of this work, and these have been
gathered and compiled with special reference to the wants of the student.
Many an American scholar studies the geography and history of foreign
countries at a great disadvantage, because he can not obtain a general
idea of the institutions of Europe, unless he reads half a dozen works on