CONTENTS.
xix
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| CHAPTER XIX. | |
| Harrisburg to Pittsburg by night—Among soldiers—Deficiencies in our civilization—Aristocratic privileges in favour of the rich, of all aristocracies the most absurd—What I demand—'Ladies' cars'—Trollope—Insolence of employés—Conductors in the West—Would it not be better to correct ourselves?—Pittsburg the Birmingham of the United States—Petroleum wells—The young Englishman—The German tailor—Great gains—Mr. M., music publisher—Cleveland (Ohio)—Always found it dull—Cleveland devoted to bad hotels—Bill of fare ostentatious, food not eatable—Chicago—Has material civilization of New York—Splendid concert—Astonished at development of musical taste in United States—Before me no piano concerts, except in peculiar cases—American taste becoming purer—The playing of a generation of young girls—Cleveland ought to have a better hotel—Aptitude of Americans for commerce marvellous—What Benvenuto Cellini, if born in the United States, would not have done—Lamartine poor—United States only country where a sort of public recognition given to a rich man—Understanding civilization after the Chinese manner—Sandusky—Concert quite good—Tickets for 'the show' and 'panorama!'—Johnson's Island—Twenty-five hundred Southern prisoner's confined there—Swiss in train from Clyde—His grape vines and wine—Grant born at Sandusky—The old man—A poor farmer talks poetry—Remarkable condition of things in the United States—He is well versed in literature of the Bible—Would have delighted M. de Lamartine—Set out for Toledo—Great contrast between the West and the East—Great contempt for fashion and neatness—Chicago always the city of the West—Moore and Smith's new hall inaugurated—Hall crammed, audience cold—'Tremont House'—Second concert large, brilliant, and enthusiastic—The farmer who owns seventy-three thousand acres of arable land—Sold in one lot twenty thousand head of cattle—Talk of gigantic canal—New Academy of Music being built by Crosby—Notice to artists without engagements—Attacked for playing Chickering's pianos—Honest editor not au fait in matter of concerts—Thalberg and Erard's pianos—Chopin and Pleyel's—Liszt and Erard's—Reasons why—Why I like Chickering's—Sandusky—Hotel and bill of fare—Detroit—Population—Frightful accent—Dangerous neighbourhood—En route for Peoria—The Frenchman and his monkey—Idaho—Fighting with the Indians—Very ugly place—The platform gives a vertigo—Emigration to the West—Where going—Cincinnati—Burnet House, dirty and dear—Physiognomy of Western people—Their free and easy behaviour | 312 |
