parison with the general character of either America or Germany. Although externally the little cottage which you are about to enter, is unadorned and even unpainted, and is generally thrown into the shade by the spacious and extensive barn which you see by its side, you will find that its interior is not without all the substantial physical comforts to which you may have been accustomed. Nor is the reception with which you meet, however rough and unceremonious, wanting in heartfelt hospitality. Soon, however, you are reminded, that in one sense of the word at least, you are not at home. The wild hunter, you are told, has last night been holding his spectral chase through the forest, and has made himself known to the inhabitants of the cottage by a strange clapping of the window shutters; nor has the horse-shoe, which you saw fixed over the outer door, proved a sufficient protection against the visiters of the Blocksberg. Likewise, a blue-light has been seen for several successive evenings in an adjoining meadow; and the question is very gravely discussed, whether the inmates of the cottage should sally forth that evening and dig for secret treasures. The consultation, however, is interrupted by the sudden indisposition of one of the family. Immediately the pow-wow physician is called, for Indian and German superstitions have become intimately associated in the mind of your hosts. On a tripod, in one corner of the room, pieces of wood are placed according to the peculiar laws of the Doctor's art, and by the burning of a charm the patient is to be freed from every pain. The amusement, however, which at first these strange proceedings afforded to you, soon wears off, and you turn round to the book-shelf to seek relief there from the humiliating trains of thought which these occurrences have suggested to you. The Bible, some books on dreaming and witchcraft, and one or two German newspapers, form the whole stock. In glancing at the latter, you meet with another piece of Americo-Germanism: German words with English terminations, or the reverse. Their inter course with Germany, however, has obviously been interrupted for many a year, since the few new thoughts which the progress in science and art has conveyed to them, are entirely expressed in the English language. It is principally owing to this circumstance, and to the fact that there is but very little intercourse between the different settlements, that the dialects spoken by them have few general characteristics in common, and that they are entirely wanting in euphony. In many instances they are perfectly unintelligible to those who have been educated in Germany. But to return to our newspaper. It was at first only the strange mixture of German and English words and terminations which attracted your attention, more than the matter itself. But how great is your astonishment, when you find that the political news which the paper contains, is the very opposite of what you happen to have read the very same day in an English morning paper. Where such glaring deceptions can be practised, it must be easy to misguide the reading community, and a second glance at the paper serves to establish this fact. You meet there with a petition which opposes the interests of education, and yet many of the signers have been compelled to make three crosses, because they are unable to sign their names. It is now time, however, to leave the farmer's cottage, and to enter upon the more pleasing task of inquiring what has been done for the improvement of the Germans, and in what manner this cause may be further advanced. In travelling through that part of the United States, which is mostly settled by the descendants of Germans, you meet from time to time with oases, as it were, in these fields, which are as barren and neglected, in point of intellectual culture, as they are fruitful and cultivated in agricultural respects. There are a small number of institutions, which have been mostly founded by those who have been brought up in the midst of the Americo-German population, but who by a constant intercourse with Germany, and with the most intelligent portion of the English community, have preserved themselves free from the evil influences by which they are surrounded. They have founded seminaries and colleges, and have gradually gained the confidence of their German neighbors, whom they alone are able to approach. Their lectures are partly delivered in German, and partly in English, and the ministers whom they send forth, are likewise taught to preach in either language. Such, for instance, are the institutions at Gettisburg, Nazareth, and a few other places. In Gettisburg, particularly, a spirit of devoted piety and an enlightened zeal, has been, and is now exerting in behalf of the Americo-German population. But it is not only the descendants of Germans, who are to engage our attention; the natives of Germany, who have become naturalized in this country, and many of whom have settled in the cities, are as deserving of our care, lest they should fall into that state of religious and intellectual apathy, which we have before described. As they are in a great measure beyond the influence of the institutions referred to, German societies, together with English and German libraries have been established in the principal cities of the Union. The high and the low, the rich and the poor, the cultivated and the uncultivated, are thus brought into contact, and an opportunity is afforded of attending to the intellectual and physical wants of those who from their ignorance of the English language, are virtually separated from the community around them. It will thus become possible to open a regular intercourse with the Western States, that to those emigrants who wish to settle there, both instruction and physical comfort may be in some measure secured. It deserves particular attention, that these societies, as well as the institutions of which I have spoken before, have procured to some extent the means of English instruction to the Americo-German population, that they may be assimilated in a national point of view to the American population, and that they may receive their share of the favorable influences which prevail among the latter. These efforts have been particularly successful in regard to those emigrants, who have but lately come over to this country. They have always enjoyed the benefits of religious instruction, and with a childlike readiness flock around Him "whose voice they know," whilst many of them, though in the lower ranks of life, are well educated, and, for that reason, prepared to receive instruction in the English language. But all these efforts have been but partial, and therefore to a certain extent unsatisfactory. The torrent of emigration is pouring forth unceasingly so great a mass of foreign elements, that only a general and careful attention to the subject can preserve us from being carried along by its floods. In an absolute monarchy, the intelligent and vigorous rule of the sovereign may preserve the virtuous and cultivated from being directly influenced by the degraded Hor M 66 We and ignorant; in a republic, this is impossible. Under a government where the law directs that he who does not avail himself of the means of instruction, which are placed at his command, shall be compelled to use them; under such a government, we have reason to suppose, that intelligence is in a progressive state. In a country like ours, of which the Italian lasciar far," seems to be the appropriate motto, the free and voluntary action of the intelligent part of the community can alone secure that great result. have heard the warning voice of a well known foreign writer. "Let the Americans beware," said he, "of extending the rights of naturalization indiscriminately to foreign emigrants!" Though this may be justly said in regard to all foreigners, it yet applies with peculiar force to the German population. It is likely, indeed, that in less than half a century the Germans in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia, will be almost entirely absorbed by the English population, as has been the case with the Dutch in the State of New York, and with the Swedes in Delaware. Yet we do not owe this prospect to a decrease of emigration, as has been the case with the nations above referred to, but to the fact that the Western States afford a wider and more productive field to the agricultural pursuits of a great majority of the emigrants. In the West, then, this division of language and feeling, will continue to exist with all its evil consequences, unless we use the means which are yet in our power to prevent it, unless we attend carefully to the intellectual wants of those, whom we permit to become members of our body politic. |