The impression which my mind received from the character and manners of
these republicans, suggested the Epistles which are written from the city
of Washington and Lake Erie.[2] How far I was right in thus assuming the
tone of a satirist against a people whom I viewed but as a stranger and a
visitor, is a doubt which my feelings did not allow me time to
investigate. All I presume to answer for is the fidelity of the picture
which I have given; and though prudence might have dictated gentler
language, truth, I think, would have justified severer.
I went to America with prepossessions by no means unfavorable, and indeed
rather indulged in many of those illusive ideas, with respect to the
purity of the government and the primitive happiness of the people, which
I had early imbibed In my native country, where, unfortunately, discontent
at home enhances every distant temptation, and the western world has long
been looked to as a retreat from real or imaginary oppression; as, in
short, the elysian Atlantis, where persecuted patriots might find their
visions realized, and be welcomed by kindred spirits to liberty and
repose. In all these flattering expectations I found myself completely
disappointed, and felt inclined to say to America, as Horace says to his
mistress, "_intentata nites_.
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