stile camps, frowning mutual
defiance; and, if not terminating in war, must, if not arrested, end in
embargoes and non-intercourse, or discriminating duties on imports and
tonnage, greatly injurious to both countries. I know it has become
fashionable in England and America to sneer at the fact of our common
origin; but the great truth still exists, and is fraught with momentous
consequences, for good or evil, to both nations, and to mankind. The
United States were colonized mainly by the people of England. Ten of our
original thirteen States bear English names, as do also nearly all their
counties, townships, cities, and villages.

Leaving to Englishmen the task of disabusing the Americans in regard to
their own country, I will endeavor to present, in a condensed form, some
material and authentic facts as regards the United States, for the
consideration of the people of the United Kingdom. I read and hear every
day here predictions of our impending bankruptcy and national
dissolution; our wealth and resources depreciated; our cause, our
people, our armies, and Government decried; and a war in words and in
the press prosecuted against us with vindictive fury. All this hostility
is fully reciprocated in America; and if the war is not confined to
words and types, it will not be the fault of agitators in both
countries. So far as an American can, even in part, arrest this fatal
progress of misapprehension, by communicating information in regard to
his own country, is the principal purpose of these essays.

In answer to the daily predictions here of our impending ruin and
national bankruptcy, I shall first discuss the question of our wealth,
resources, and material progress.

AREA.--The area of the United States, including lakes and
rivers, is 3,250,000 square miles, being larger than all Europe. (Rep.
Sec. of Interior and of Com. of Gen. Land Office for Dec. 1860, p. 13.)

Our land surface is 3,010,370 square miles, being 1,926,636,000 acres.
This area is compact and contiguous, divided into States and
Territories, united by lakes, rivers, canals, and railroads. We have no
colonies. Congress governs the nation by what the Constitution declares
to be '_the supreme law_,' whilst local regulations are prescribed and
administered by the several States and Territories. We front on the two
great oceans--the Atlantic and Pacific; extending from the St. Lawrence
and the lakes to the Gulf of Mexico, from near the 24th to the 49th