American beauty, and it must be acknowledged that
the American women are the _prettiest_ in the whole world.

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ELEVEN.

Saratoga Springs.--Watering places all over the world are much alike:
they must be well filled with company, and full of bustle, and then they
answer the purpose for which they are intended--a general muster, under
the banner of folly, to drive care and common sense out of the field.
Like assembly-rooms, unless lighted up and full of people, they look
desolate and forlorn: so it was with Saratoga: a beautiful spot,
beautiful hotels, and beautiful water; but all these beauties were
thrown away, and the water ran away unheeded, because the place was
empty. People's pockets were empty, and Saratoga was to let. The
consequence was that I remained a week there, and should have remained
much longer had I not been warned, by repeated arrivals, that the
visitors were increasing, and that I should be no longer alone.

The weariness of solitude, as described by Alexander Selkirk and the
Anti-Zimmermanns, can surely not be equal to the misery of never being
alone; of feeling that your thoughts and ideas, rapidly accumulating,
are in a state of chaos and confusion, and that you have not a moment to
put them into any lucid order; of finding yourself, against your will,
continually in society, bandied from one person to the other, to make
the same bows, extend the same hand to be grasped, and reply to the same
eternal questions; until, like a man borne down by sleep after long
vigils, and at each moment roused to reply, you either are not aware of
what you do say, or are dead beat into an unmeaning smile. Since I have
been in this country, I have suffered this to such a degree as at last
to become quite nervous on the subject; and I might reply in the words
of the spirit summoned by Lochiel--

"Now my weary lips I close;
Leave, oh! leave me to repose."

It would be a strange account, had it been possible to keep one, of the
number of introductions which I have had since I came into this country.
Mr A introduces Mr B and C, Mr B and C introduce Mr D, E, F, and G.
Messrs. D, E, F, and G introduce Messrs. H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, and so
it goes on, _ad infinitum_ during the whole of the day; and this to me
who never could remember either a face or a name.

At introduction it is invariably the custom to shake hands; and thus you
go on shaking hands here, there, and everywhere, and with