On
Friday I was again dead beat at the end, and was once more laid upon a
sofa. But the faintness went off after a little while. We have now cold
bright frosty weather, without snow; the best weather for me." Next day
from Philadelphia he wrote to his daughter that he was lodged in The
Continental, one of the most immense of American hotels, but that he
found himself just as quiet as elsewhere. "Everything is very good, my
waiter is German, and the greater part of the servants seem to be
coloured people. The town is very clean, and the day as blue and bright
as a fine Italian day. But it freezes very very hard, and my cold is not
improved; for the cars were so intolerably hot that I was often obliged
to stand upon the brake outside, and then the frosty air bit me indeed.
I find it necessary (so oppressed am I with this American catarrh as
they call it) to dine at three o'clock instead of four, that I may have
more time to get voice; so that the days are cut short and
letter-writing not easy."

He nevertheless found time in this city to write to me (14th of January)
the most interesting mention he had yet made of such opinions as he had
been able to form during his present visit, apart from the pursuit that
absorbed him. Of such of those opinions as were given on a former page,
it is only necessary to repeat that while the tone of party politics
still impressed him unfavourably, he had thus far seen everywhere great
changes for the better socially. I will add other points from the same
letter. That he was unfortunate in his time of visiting New York, as far
as its politics were concerned, what has since happened conclusively
shows. "The Irish element is acquiring such enormous influence in New
York city, that when I think of it, and see the large Roman Catholic
cathedral rising there, it seems unfair to stigmatise as 'American'
other monstrous things that one also sees. But the general corruption in
respect of the local funds appears to be stupendous, and there is an
alarming thing as to some of the courts of law which I am afraid is
native-born. A case came under my notice the other day in which it was
perfectly plain, from what was said to me by a person interested in
resisting an injunction, that his first proceeding had been to 'look up
the Judge.'" Of such occasional provincial oddity, harmless in itself
but strange in large cities, as he noticed in the sort of half
disappointment at the small fuss made by himself