ARISTOCRACY IN AMERICA.

THESE volumes contain a series of lively, pleasant, and entertaining sketches of a certain class of life and notions in the American capital, and in a few of the great scabord towns, where mercantile wealth excites a desire for factitious distinctions, but the circum- stances of the country, and the reckless gambling of American speculation, prevent that stability in individual fortunes, or in a particular society, which is requisite to give distinction to a " caste." The reader, however, must be warned to take the representations of Mr. GauNo, or ;he "German Nobleman" to whose offspring he acts as guardian, coin gram) ; whilst any thing in the shape of conclusion or speculation to be deduced from the statements of Aristocracy in America had better be drawn with great caution. Not that we think any thing invented, scarcely caricatured : the lusting after "exclusiveness," the expressed contempt for native institutions, the tuft-hunting servility, and that mental sub- mission to foreign standards of opinion which must be destructive to independence of judgment, may exist in individuals, perhaps in classes, as Mr. GRI;ND'S book describes, and his incidents and dialogues be actual transcripts. But, though we have the truth, we may not have the whole truth. Compared with the mass of American population, a few silly fashion-hunting mushrooms of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, arc as nothing. And besides the independent millions, we believe, on the authority of' ADDY, a man of enlarged and reflective mind—of MURRAY, a gentleman well acquainted with the nobility of the Old World— and CHARLES MATHEWS, an exquisite judge of manners, and pro- fessionally alive to their weaknesses—that there is a class of families in America distinguished alike by solidity and simplicity of tastes and feeling, and equally removed from a vulgar depre- ciation of conventional distinctions or an undue admiration of those who possess them. These are not seen by a casual tra- veller, or an adventurer bent on pushing his fertune ; for it is not the character of old-established families to seek new acquaintances, or open their doors indiscriminately to all corners: and these "old families" are the true aristocracy of America. Let us therefore have no speculations Gamin teste, as to the destruction of the republic, the establishment of a monarchy, an aristocracy of stock- jobbers and land-speculators, or even more diatribes against American manners. It would be easy for a keen observer and clever describer to find in London, families of citizens whose absurd assumption of fashion would surpass any thing of Howes broadest ; but such would not furnish a true picture of the mercantile manners and feel- ings of Great Britain—hardly of the individuals described, for we should not have their whole character, but their weak points. And something like this we conceive to be the case with many of the instances of Mr. GRUND'S Aristocracy in America.

The framework of the book is not ill-adapted to its purpose. A foreigner arrives at New York, with letters of introduction ; and be falls in with a Southern friend, who acts the part of a cicerone. Thus provided, he begins by walking through the city ; and finds, what is not peculiar to America, that the most convenient places are deserted by the fashionables, and that the most delightful promenade-spots for air and view are abandoned to foreigners and the vulgar. After this, we are carried into rather a select party of American gentlemen at a hotel at Staten Island, who confidentially pour out their troubles upon the rabble—the mischiefs of universal suffrage, the want of a distinction of ranks, and the superiority of Europe. As the steamer returns to New York, she takes in the passengers of a vessel, which has brought a young lord, and the with and daughter of a baronet ; and the excitement and anxiety to behold the titled arrivals, as well as the contempt with which the steerage-passengers are regarded by the Americans, are well struck off. In the course of the German's sojourn at New York, the reader is introduced into a first-rate boarding-house, the theatre, and several fashion- able parties ; in all which, manners and sentiments arc not only described, but their operation upon the American character and mode of life is pointed out, either by the author or by inter- locutors. Havinfi.° exhausted New York, our foreigner proceeds to Boston ; which is painted by a similar process, though not quite so elaborately : and he then sets out Southward. Philadelphia is more briefly dismissed, and with something like praise ; the antiquity, steadiness, and peculiarities of dress, manner, and reli- gion of its Quakers, having given it something like a natural aris- tocracy. At Baltimore the tourist begins to feel the influence of the South ; the people in public conveyances exhibiting the man- ners of gentlemen in slight things. Washington terminates the Journey of the German : and of that capital he speaks better than many others have done—not indeed as a city, but as a place where the American character can be seen to the best advantage ; the collection of leading men from all parts of the Union giving the stranger a view of the whole at once, and the collision operating on the provincial tone of mind which is visible at their homes. Man- ners and amusements, however, are not the only things introduced at Washington : the leading Senators and Ministers, with the late President JACKSON, and the present VAN BUREN, are passed in' review ; the author being a very strong Jacksonian or Democrat. And perhaps his political feelings have contributed to colour his, book, if they have not induced its publication, for the purpose of running down the Anti-Democratical party.

For the reasons already stated, it is not easy to draw any con. elusions as to what may be the general feeling in America, from the pages of Mr. GRUND ; because we cannot tell whether the sentiments expressed by his interlocutors are those of an indivi- dual, a coterie, or a class, and whether that class is provincial or national. But, testing his evidence by that of other writers, we suspect the following is not far from the truth. The power of the " tyrannical majority " seems to be admitted—and let us add, the subserviency of the minority ; the bitterest opponents of the people, as well as the more moderate, suppressing their opinions, It is alleged by " the first classes," that politics is a trade only taken up by ruined men, and in which only " blackguards " sue. ceed,—an exaggerated statement, but based perhaps in truth ; for many other pursuits offer snore ready means of wealth, and polities are not associated with so much distinction as in Europe. There seems to exist throughout the old States a strong feeling against the Irish : the people look upon them as interlopers, interfering with their material pursuits; the more steady disapprove of their spi. rilt.liti devotions, and the consequences which follow ; the "first classes " charge upon them the evil of " mob governments„"—this feeling, however, beingone of 110 LAC date, for WASHINGTON in Sarmagandi, a publication of the earlier part of the century, men. tions " Irish rebel " as the last term of political vituperation. The superiority of the Southern upper classes to those of the North, in education, manners, and enlarged views, is not only admitted, but dwelt upon; and the causes assigned are—property held origi- nally in large masses, which the law of partition has not yet quite broken down, and the institution of slavery. The former gives as aristocracy founded on natural causes; hereditary wealth, which necessarily implies an "old family.; " leisure, with the social ac. complishments it brings ; and an education better, at all events, than that of the North. Blood, the law, and public opinion, give to the Southern a position akin to that of a privileged class in Europe : he can descend to humanity, or familiarity, without the risk of compromising his dignity. On the other hand, the mer- cantile aristocracy of the orth, or those who would be thought such, have nothing but hollow show to depend upon. In the commercial cities of New York and Boston, the fluctuations of fortune, and consequently of tinnily, are so considerable, that if the "first people" of a few years hence could avoid falling from their stools, the men of to-day will push them off; to be thrust aside themselves to-morrow by some other successful gambler, or gentle. man who dashes upon credit. The importance attached to makings dollar, renders time too valuable to be wasted on education at youth or literature in age ; the numerous individuals striving to get on in society, and the various coteries into which it is divided without any well-defined division, keep the Northerns constantly on the watch to repel intruders, whom an ill-timed condescen- sion might raise up as rivals, or would-be intimates. Hence a rudeness, approaching to insolence of manner, towards all who do not belong to the particular set ; and, what is of more consequence if true, a straining on the part of every class beyond the people, to ape the expenditure of that above it, with little care as to how the means are procured. Yet after all is done, the New Eng- landers, the men especially, fail in society ; always " smelling of the shop." The reader of the volumes will meet numerous anecdotes of meanness and impudence on the part of individual Americans', but characteristic, it is probable, only of individuals, and not, as the German traveller would infer, of whole classes. The regrets which some people are made to express for the separation from Great

Britain, and the general regard which is entertained for British. institutions, may exist without the exact motives assigned. They are quite as probably the principles of the Federal party, or the inherited sentiments of old American Loyalists. IRVING, in the work already alluded to, represents a character supposed to be the head of the Livingstones of New York, making a voyage to Halifax solely to hear his Britannic Majesty prayed for in church, and as once triumphantly remarking in an unguarded moment, that things had not been so forward nor had such flavour since the Re- volution.

AnWocracy in America is not, however, merely a sketch of the

manners and opinions of certain classes of Americans : it contains many shrewd, and sometimes sound remarks, on the causes, operation, and tendencies of passing events; with incidental in- dications of the general feelings and character of Americans. And it is upon the whole a valuable and amusing book, but requiring to be read with caution.

From the more general parts our extracts will chiefly be taken. AVERSIONS OF THE AMERICANS TO WOOD.

The building was very spacious, but its wings were a little too long, and the small garden in front almost entirely destitute of trees ; a fault from which no public, and hardly any private mansion in the United States, can be said to be entirely exempted. The Americans have indeed, a singular aversion to trees and shrubs of every description ; the highest idea of perfection in a landscape being an ex., tended plain sown with grass. They consider trees as a mark of burbarirtil and ate, in their zeal for civilization, extirpating them wherever they find them. The hills and islands in the harbour of Boston, which were once studded with the majestic pine and the gnarled oak, are now completely shorn. The city of Albany, built on a gentle declivity once covered with variegated wood, is daily becoming more and more flat and less shady ; the fashionable inhabit.. ante paying more for levelling the ground and felling the trees than for the C rection of their dwellings. The beautiful trees on the shores of the Monona gshil and the Ohio are, at an enormous expense, destroyed root and branch, to give the inhabitants of Pittsburgh the benefit of light and air ; and even the da Liberty tree " of Boston, with all its historical associations and. recollec- tions, stands no more.. How singularly this taste of the Americans contrasts with that of the English, who, after burning and sacking, the colony of New Jersey, placed a sentinel near the tree under which William Penn had con- cludeil the treaty with the Indians !

AMERICAN BEAUTY.

She was a new-blown rose, scarcely past sixteen, with black eyes and black hair, a straight Grecian nose, and to say all, she had dimples in her cheeks. her neck, in gracefulness and whiteness, might have challenged flint of a swan; and although her bust was somewhat diminutive, it corresponded well with her slender waist and the extreme delicacy of her hands and feet. ln short, she was one of those American beauties one cannot behold without. loving and pitying at the same time ; for such is the exquisite proportion and symmetry of their limbs, that not an atom of them can suffer the least ultra - , ties without completely destroying the harmony of the %elude. Oile might I compare their beauty to that of an elegantly-turned period, in which von can- not alter one word without destroying the whole sentence ; or, to use a more correct simile, to a finished piece of poetry, by the alteration of a single syllable, degenerates into prose. I never could look on any one of tiloc sylphs without feeling an in emstion to place them, like other jewel:, in wine velvet ilerin,°.to protect them from vulgar contact, or the blighting in- fluence of the atmosphere.

AMERICAN LADIES AND GENTLEMEN RESPECTIVELY.

The ladies vere all en graud toilette, though amang the gentlemen not one appeared to be dressed for dinner. The conversation was very loud ; but, not- withstanding completely drowned. in the clattes of knives and theks. I per- ceived thit die women tal'md, not only in itch in wa but also much louder than the Inca; American gentlemen of the higher classes being indeed the most bashful creatures, in the presence of lathes of fashion, I ever sa.v. They ap- proach women with the most indubitable con atiousuess of their own info.i,w:ty, aud, either from modesty or prudence, seldom open their lips except to agiirm what has been said by the ladies. One is always reminded of poor ems lide's honest prayer, " flats ! madame ; je r4ondrai conune volts youdrez." I have seen one of the most distinguished old gentlemen in the United States—one who held the hi,ellest rank in the gift of the American people, s nd wilmc learn- ing and knowledge on most subjects rendered him a nio4 phsising and enter- taining companion of men—betray as little self-possession in the presence of women as if he had been makin, his daut in society, and this too in the lipase of one of his most intimate friends.

This excessive awkwardness in the men, to whi:•11 eveo the most distin- guished of their race make no exception, must be owing to something radically wrong in the composition of American society, which places men as well as women in a lidse position. The conviction of this fact must force itself on the mind of every impartial observer who has had an opportunity or making him- self familiar with the customs and manners of the higher ela,,,es. There ap- pears to be a singular mixture of respect and want of sinverily on the part of the men with regard to the women, produced, I believe, by the unnatural position which the latter hold wherever they are brought into contact with the former.

In the first place, American ladies occupy., from mere courtesy, a rank in society which is not only opposed to that which they hold in private life and in their own families, but which is actually incompatible with the exercise of discretion Onthe part of the gentlemen. " The ladies must be waited upon ;" "the ladies must be helped;" "the ladies must be put into the carriage ; " "the ladies must be taken out of the carriage:" "the ladies must have their shoe-strings tied;" "the ladies must have their India-rubber shoes put on ;" "the ladies must be wrapped up in shawls ; " "the ladies must be led up stairs and down stairs ;" "the ladies must have their candles lit for them when they go to bed." On every occasion they are treated as poor helpless creatures, who rather excite the pity than the admiration of omen; and as the services they require are mime- room just in proportion to the scarcity of hired servants, the gentlemen are obliged to officiate in their stead, These continual exigencies cannot but render the society of women often irksome to men who are daily engaged from ten to twelve hours in active business, before they dress to do the agreeable at a party ; and hence the re- tiring of the ladies is but too frequently hailed as the signal for throwing off restraint, or, as I once heard it called, "for letting off the steam," and tieing again natural and easy. If in any of these matters the men \MT.' allowed to use their own discretion in bestowing attention on those only whom they like, al would be well enough. The ladies would receive a great deal of voluntary tribute; and the gentlemen, delighted with the privilege of a choice, would be more prodigal of their petits soins to those who would have a smile in return for their devotion. But instead of this, a fitshionable American is harassed by au imiuterrupted series of exactions, made for no other 1)1111)0SC than for gratifying "the Lilies;" while the rules of society are such, that he can scarcely ever find a chance of making himself agreeable to a particular indi- vidual. Hence an American sa/on exhibits nothing but generalities of men and women, in which no other merit is recognized but that which belongs to the sex. In this manner American ladies are worshipped; but the adoration consists in a species of polytheism, in which no particular goddess has a temple or an altar dedicated to herself.

EVILS OF EQUALITY AND PRETENCE.

"If we had as many distinct and established orders of society as in England, there would not be that everlasting attempt to go bevond one another which particularly characterizes our women, and, joined to .the credit system, is the cause of so many failures ; a circumstance which, in whatever light merchants and bankers may view it, is nevertheless one of the greatest moral evils with which au honest community can be afflicted. "A large portion of our matrons," he continued, "would, I am sure, be more happy in wearing muslin or calico, instead of silk; and the men, instead of racking their brains in order to find the means of providing for a thousand Unnecessary expenses, would find their homes cheap and comfortable. They would look upon their wives as friends and counsellors, instead of mere com- panions of their pleasures. Instead of boarding out '—a custom which is the grave of affection and domestic happiness—young husbands would be euribled to keep house, aunt to give their wives a home; a thing which is not so much rendered difficult by the badness of the servants—the usual complaint of the higher classes—as by the exactions of society. I know many an Ame- rican that is now living in Europe merely because lie does not wish to board, and is not rich enough to keep house according to our expensive fashion." if this state of things were confined only to the wealthier classes—to those who have large estates and expectancies—all would be well enough • the cx- travag,anee of the rich furnishes scope for time iudustry of the poor : 'hut with US, -where young men without fortunes marry, at the age of twenty-one, girls of eighteen that have no money either—where the husband relies solely on his wits for supporting his wife and children—but few men can indulge themselves in reckless expenditure without growing indifferent as to the ways and means of paying their debts. I am proud a the enterprising spirit of my country- men, who are always full of speculation and hope—who live in the future, and care little about the present ; but I regret that our fashionable ladies too should, have caught the inspiration. A large portion of these, as has been said before, know little or nothing about their husbands' property; they live in housea built or routed on credit, drive in carriages that are not paid for, wear clothes that are charged by the milliner, sit down to a dinner which stands in the book of the victualler, and finally sink to rest on beds that are settled for by a note of six months. They have no other regulator of their expenses but fashion ; but not the fashions of their own country, grown out of the natural position and the manners and customs of the people, but the fashions of Paris and London made for a different people—at least different as regards custom and circumstances ; and are at last as muclm surprised at the bankruptcies of their husbands, as their creditors, who took them for rich men.,

CATHOLIC EXCLUSIVENESS.

But what is all this, compared to the artificial distinctions introduced into their churches? It has always been the pride of the Catholic Church in Etta rope to offer a place of worship to every luau, withoutdistinctiou of rank, title, or wealth. The utmost a man pays for a chair in any of the churches of France or Italy is one sou. The fashionable American Catholics, however, imitate the practice of those gentlemanly followers of Christ who choose to worship God in good company. Thus the respectable Catholics of New York, "who do not wish to be annoyed by the presence of an Irish mob," being for the most part composed of their own servants, have built a church for their own specific snug little concertt, just large enough for a genteel audience to hear the Lord en famille. In order to exclude effectually every thing that might be disagreeable, no one is allowed to stand in the aisles; so that those poor devils who cannot afford to pay for a pew, must lie content to seek the Lord elsewhere, among their equals.

EUROPEAN AND NEW ENGLAND ARISTOCRACY.

" Iii all countries in which there exists an hereditary wealthy nobility, there exists a sort of good-will towards the inferior classes, which leads to the rela- tion of patron and client, and through which many an apparent injustice is smoothed over by liberality and kindness; but the mere moneyed aristocracy which is establishing itself in this country, however you may disguise the fact by cunning and soft speeches, or an hyperbolical affectation of Republicanism, hales the industrious misses over whom it strives to elevate itself.

"The exclusiveness of your wealthy brokers, that hoard money without spending it, offends the people without benefiting the artisan or the tradesman; and the meanness with which your lirst people bargain for every trifle to save a penny, renders their custom scarcely desirable to respectable tradespeople. You are extravagantly fond of splendour, and yet are afraid of displaying it. You must understand MC right : I speak of the rich, calculating Bostonians, who really live on their property ; not of your wealthy men in New York, who live on nine months' credit. Besides, you yourself will allow that your aristocracy is far from being generally well educated ; and I do not see how this fault is to be remedied as long its wealth constitutes the chief title to good society.

"1 our aristocracy, therefore, has not the power of dazzling the lower classes with that air of self-possession and dignity by which gentlemen of rank are at once recognized iii Europe. On the contrary, the manners of your rich people, in their intercourse with less successful aspirants to fortune, are markedly coarse and vulgar, in order, I believe, to give the latter to understand that they are sufficiently independent—that, I think, is the word—not to care for their opinion."

ONE WORKING OP SLAVERY.

"This state of timings," added he, after a pause, "does not exist at the South. There the veriest fault of the people is generosity. The slaves, who enable them to be aristocratic without being mean, stand to them in the relation of vassals to timely lords; and the planters, not fearing the power and political in- fluence of their slaves, hut, on the contrary, having an interest in their physical wellbeing, treat them generally- with humanity and kindness. There never was a great moral evil without producing also some good; and thus it is that the very relation between master and slave engenders tics and affections which no one can understand without having witnessed their effect. I have seen the wives of planters watch at the sick-bed of their slaves, and perform acts of charity which the misconstrued self-esteem of our Northern people would have deemed menial, merely because the feelings of kindness and gratitude, which are strongest in the Southern States, are, with us, construed into obligation and nt—two things which effectually destroy all poetry of life, even in the relation of parents to their children. I am not here disposed to under- rate the miseries of slavery, as they will always appear to the mind of an Eu- ropean ; but I cannot entirely overlook some of the advantages which result from it to the moral and social relations of this country." And I could not but agree with my cicerone. If the tendency of wealth in the Northern States is towards an aristocracy of mouey, the aristocracy of the Southern States, founded on birth and education, is a sort of offset to it— a means of preventing the degeneration of the high-minded democracy which once swayed the country, into a vulgar oligarchy of calculating-machines, without poetry, without arts, and without generosity.

MR. CLAY.

From the Secretary of the Treasury I drove to the lodgings of Mr. Henry Clay, the celebrated Senator from Kentucky. I found this extraordinary man, who was then already a little past ltis prime, the very type of what passes in Europe, ever since the clever caricatures of Mrs. Trollope, as "an American character." Mr. Clay stands upwards of six feet ; has a semi-Indian, half- human half-savage countenance, in which, however, the intellectual strongly preponderates over the animal. His manners, at first sight, appear to be ex- tremely vulgar ; and yet he is graceful, and even dignified, in his intercourse with strangers. Ile chews tobacco, drinks whisky punch, gambles, puts his legs on the table or the chimney, and spits, as an American would say, "like a regular Kentucky hog-driver:" and yet he is all gentleness, politeness, and cordiality, in the society of ladies. Add to this, that his organs of speech are the most melodious; alai that, with great inntgination and humour, he combines manly eloquence and the power of sarcasm in the most extraordinary degree; amid it will easily be conceived why he should have been able to captivate high and low—rho/anis du salon and the "squatter" in the Western wilderness.

AMBASSADORIAL INFLUENCES AT WASHINGTON.

A minister in Washington is, with regard to his diplomatic agency, pretty much confined to official acts, such as may at any time be made public : his influence with a particular member of time Cabinet, or with the President himself—his success with a particular coterie—his intrigues against any per- son that may have rendered himself obnoxious to his Government—are of little or no avail at the Congress, with which, as yet, no foreign diplomatist has attempted a political relation. But, mu point of fashion, their power is unlimited; their decisions being quoted as oracles, and their manners made the standard of society. 1mm Washington, no party is considered fashionable unless graced by some distinguished Senator and a few members of the corps diplo- matique. Between the latter and the Seuators exists yet this relation, that every Senator has a right to introduce one friend to a Foreign Minister, either personally or by leaving his card together with that of his friend ; a privilege which is denied to the more vulgar members of the House of Representatives. As far as I was able to ascertain the influence of foreign residents in Wash- ington, it was confined, with the representative of the greatest power in Christendom, to setting the example of genuine hospitality in the shape of the ,mostinits eriiiii-difiner--jilatiCa.giveicin the metropolis; his tiita46,:4 belie, Wentfor -linntini IN the outskirts of the city; with the represents7 ;11) tit* of thela d Of chivalry and ligets, to setting the example of taste in tilc.. shape of regular soirées muaicales; in the clever and witty envoy extraordi- narY and minister plenipotentiary of a Northern power, to introducing ,the fashion oft dancing. on the heels,'—which, by the by, was a pretty little nut- neenvre on be part of the old gentleman, who had long ago lost the use Of his,thesby the gout ; in the representative of.a literary court, to the privi- lege of spouting literature and science to a sober audience, &c. The ministers of, the "Italian courts, who had the longest string of titles printed on their Cards, had no distinct influence, except in setting the fashion of eating and drinking

graeefully—at another man's table. v *

In what light Ambassadors are held by the ladies, will appear from the follow- ing, anecdote. At a dinner-party, to which most of the representatives of the greater -powers, and some of the smaller ones were invited, one of them, a jolly old bachelor of the English school, attempted a song; which so much gratified the ladies, that it was proposed every gentleman present should, in turn, follow the example. Russia and some other great powers immediately obeyed the sammons; but when the turn came to the representative of a new court, he indignantly exclaimed, a illonroi ne nz'a pas envoye ici pour chanter." " W ell," answered a lady, "if you will not sing, we shall ask your gallant King to send tut somebody else who will."

• The Mazurka.