white metal, in the place of brass, for the doorplates and handles. There is, however, a stillness, or rather a silence in the streets, which it is difficult to reconcile with the idea of a large city. They are as quiet as the streets of Gloucester, or Hereford, but are relieved from vacuity and dullness by a constant succession of well-dressed, genteel-looking, and handsome young ladies. I often think how William Penn would be astonished, if he could take a glimpse of his dear city Coaquonnoc, as the Indians called the place where Philadelphia, with its 120,000 inhabitants, now stands. In 1683, he writes, "Philadelphia, the expectation of those who are concerned in the province, is at last laid out. It is advanced, within less than a year, to about 80 houses and cottages, such as they are, where merchants and handicrafts are following their vocation as fast as they can." The other day I visited, by appointment, the interesting and handsome Institutions of the Orphans' Asylum,* and the Widows' Asylum, both of which owe their origin and good

*A melancholy accident has since happened to the Orphans' Asylum. It accidently caught fire in the night; and of its ninety-one little inmates, twenty-three unhappily perished in the flames.

management principally to the family of my conductress. On my return, I called upon the Reverend Dr. Morse, the American geographer, at present employed by the Government to visit the various nations of Indians, and to point out the best mode of applying the sums which have been appropriated by Congress for their civilization. He had returned from a long tour among the northern Indians, and proposes next proceeding to the southward.

I have also visited the Penitentiary and Hospital. The former is now totally destitute of classification, though, perhaps, justly claiming the honour of first exhibiting some of the most important improvements in prison discipline. It is melancholy to observe this declension, which is to be attributed partly to the frequent change of managers, according to the alternate predominance of political parties; but principally to such an increase of population and crime, as renders the former space wholly inadequate to present wants.

A new prison is projected, on

* I extract the following from the Appendix to Mr. Roscoe's interesting pamphlet, entitled "Additional Observations on Penal Jurisprudence, and the Reformation of Criminals :"

"The following well drawn, but distressing portrait of the once celebrated Penitentiary of Pennsylvania, has been fur

the pan-opticon principle, and furnished, I think, with 700 private cells, is now near its comple

nished by order of the Board of Inspectors, in answer to a letter, addressed to them by the committee of the House of Representatives; and as it expresses in detail the awful situation of that Institution, in language more impressive than your committee could present, it has been deemed expedient to give it entire :"

Extract of the letter alluded to in the preceding paragraph: "It is nearly fifty years since its corner-stone was laid, long before the genius of humanity had erased from our statute-books those sanguinary edicts which had for so many years stained their pages. Still, however, very many beneficial results flowed from the system in the first few years succeeding its adoption.

"The prison was well managed. Industry was encouraged among the prisoners. Employment was abundant, and inconsequence of the number of criminals being small, classification, to a certain degree, was observed. The consequence was, that the internal part of the building appeared to a visitor rather like a well-regulated manufactory than a prison. Instances of reformation, in the early period of this system, occurred; and among all the prisoners, order and good discipline were maintained.

"Hence Pennsylvania obtained a name among her sister states as well as in Europe for her mild penal code, and her well-regulated Penitentiary.

"But this fame was short-lived. The State has not kept pace with the increase of her population, and its consequent increased depravity: she has continued for thirty years past to send hundreds to a prison, which, at the first, as it respects that part of it appropriated to convicts, was not fitted for the solitary confinement of fifty. With the rapid increase of prisoners, there has, within a few years past, owing to the effects

tion at Pittsburgh, in this State.

The Hospital

is a noble institution, and admirably managed.

of the late war, and the difficulties of the times, been a considerable increase in the depravity and high daring of the character of our prisoners; to all which may be added the want of sufficient employment."

Letter XXVI.

Philadelphia, Oct. 1820.

As I am now resting a little after my wanderings, I am anxious to take the earliest opportunity of complying with your wishes, and of giving you the impressions I have received of the American character in the course of my route. I might, indeed, have done this at an earlier period, but it would have been with less satisfaction to myself. Indeed, I have occasionally been led to doubt whether I have viewed the subject with impartiality, either while receiving the kind attentions which I have so generally met with, or when exposed to the inconveniences incident to travelling in the unsettled parts of the country. I have sometimes been ashamed to find how much my opinions were influenced for the moment by humour or circumstances, and how necessary it was to guard against forming ideas of a peculiar town from the reception which I might happen to meet with, or the circle into which I might accidentally fall. I shall, in future, have little