Preface.



In one respect, this book is a parallel to Franklin's well-known apologue
of the hatter and his sign. It was commenced with a sole view to exhibit
the present state of society in the United States, through the agency, in
part, of a set of characters with different peculiarities, who had freshly
arrived from Europe, and to whom the distinctive features of the country
would be apt to present themselves with greater force, than to those who
had never lived beyond the influence of the things portrayed. By the
original plan, the work was to open at the threshold of the country, or
with the arrival of the travellers at Sandy Hook, from which point the
tale was to have been carried regularly forward to its conclusion. But a
consultation with others has left little more of this plan than the
hatter's friends left of his sign. As a vessel was introduced in the first
chapter, the cry was for "more ship," until the work has become "all
ship;" it actually closing at, or near, the spot where it was originally
intended it should commence. Owing to this diversion from the author's
design--a design that lay at the bottom of all his projects--a necessity
has been created of running the tale through two separate works, or of
making a hurried and insufficient conclusion. The former scheme has,
consequently, been adopted.

It is hoped that the interest of the narrative will not be essentially
diminished by this arrangement.

There will be, very likely, certain imaginative persons, who will feel
disposed to deny that every minute event mentioned in these volumes ever