n took
formal leave of the Students' Union in a brilliant speech, in which
he traced the parallelisms between the lives of Pericles and
Washington,--in his opinion the two greatest men the world had ever
seen,--expounded his theory of democratic government, and explained the
causes of the rapid rise of the American Republic. The next morning he
exchanged half of his worldly possessions for a ticket to New York, and
within a few days set sail for the land of promise, in the far West.

II.

From Castle Garden, Halfdan made his way up through Greenwich street,
pursued by a clamorous troop of confidence men and hotel runners.

"Kommen Sie mit mir. Ich bin auch Deutsch," cried one. "Voila, voila,
je parle Francais," shouted another, seizing hold of his valise. "Jeg
er Dansk. Tale Dansk," [1] roared a third, with an accent which seriously
impeached his truthfulness. In order to escape from these importunate
rascals, who were every moment getting bolder, he threw himself into the
first street-car which happened to pass; he sat down, gazed out of the
windows and soon became so thoroughly absorbed in the animated scenes
which moved as in a panorama before his eyes, that he quite forgot where
he was going. The conductor called for fares, and received an English
shilling, which, after some ineffectual expostulation, he pocketed, but
gave no change. At last after about an hour's journey, the car stopped,
the conductor called out "Central Park," and Halfdan woke up with
a start. He dismounted with a timid, deliberate step, stared in dim
bewilderment at the long rows of palatial residences, and a chill sense
of loneliness crept over him. The hopeless strangeness of everything
he saw, instead of filling him with rapture as he had once anticipated,
Sent a cold shiver to his heart. It is a very large affair, this world
of ours--a good deal larger than it appeared to him gazing out upon
it from his snug little corner up under the Pole; and it was as
unsympathetic as it was large; he suddenly felt what he had never been
aware of before--that he was a very small part of it and of very little
account after all. He staggered over to a bench at the entrance to the
park, and sat long watching the fine carriages as they dashed past him;
he saw the handsome women in brilliant costumes laughing and chatting
gayly; the apathetic policemen promenading in stoic dignity up and down
upon the smooth pavements; the jauntily attired nurses, who