pasteboard now delivered to passengers are much more convenient
and useful along the road than the antique roll of parchment.
Whether they will be as readily received at the gate of the
Celestial City I decline giving an opinion.

A large number of passengers were already at the station-house
awaiting the departure of the cars. By the aspect and demeanor of
these persons it was easy to judge that the feelings of the
community had undergone a very favorable change in reference to
the celestial pilgrimage. It would have done Bunyan's heart good
to see it. Instead of a lonely and ragged man with a huge burden
on his back, plodding along sorrowfully on foot while the whole
city hooted after him, here were parties of the first gentry and
most respectable people in the neighborhood setting forth towards
the Celestial City as cheerfully as if the pilgrimage were merely
a summer tour. Among the gentlemen were characters of deserved
eminence--magistrates, politicians, and men of wealth, by whose
example religion could not but be greatly recommended to their
meaner brethren. In the ladies' apartment, too, I rejoiced to
distinguish some of those flowers of fashionable society who are
so well fitted to adorn the most elevated circles of the
Celestial City. There was much pleasant conversation about the
news of the day, topics of business and politics, or the lighter
matters of amusement; while religion, though indubitably the main
thing at heart, was thrown tastefully into the background. Even
an infidel would have heard little or nothing to shock his
sensibility.

One great convenience of the new method of going on pilgrimage I
must not forget to mention. Our enormous burdens, instead of