Should, then, a day of gloom arrive--should those reverses
overtake her, from which the proudest empires have not been
exempt--she may look back with regret at her infatuation, in
repulsing from her side a nation she might have grappled to her
bosom, and thus destroying her only chance for real friendship
beyond the boundaries of her own dominions.
There is a general impression in England, that the people of the
United States are inimical to the parent country. It is one of
the errors which have been diligently propagated by designing
writers. There is, doubtless, considerable political hostility,
and a general soreness at the illiberality of the English press;
but, collectively speaking, the prepossessions of the people are
strongly in favor of England. Indeed, at one time they amounted,
in many parts of the Union, to an absurd degree of bigotry. The
bare name of Englishman was a passport to the confidence and
hospitality of every family, and too often gave a transient
currency to the worthless and the ungrateful. Throughout the
country, there was something of enthusiasm connected with the
idea of England. We looked to it with a hallowed feeling of
tenderness and veneration, as the land of our forefathers--the
august repository of the monuments and antiquities of our
race--the birthplace and mausoleum of the sages and heroes of our
paternal history.
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