The English are perhaps too apt to judge a whole nation upon a few unfavorable specimens; also to attach exaggerated importance to trifling peculiarities. This latter tendency is fostered, in the case of America, by those relentless book-makers, who, to point a chapter and raise a laugh, are ready, as Mr. Coke justly remarks, to sacrifice a friend and caricature facts. In our opinion, Englishmen and Americans will like each other better when they see each other more. “All Americans I have met,” says Mr. Coke, “were agreeable enough if humored a little, and perfectly civil if civilly treated.” Brutes and ruffians (like good society) are the same in all countries. At Sacramento, Mr. Coke one day took up a newspaper to read an account of a Lynch execution which had taken place at four that morning. “I was perusing the trial, when a ruffianly-looking individual interrupted me with, ‘Say, stranger, let’s have a look at that paper, will you?’ ‘When I have done with it,’ said I, and continued reading. This answer would have satisfied most Christians endowed with any moderate degree of patience; but not so the ruffian. He bent himself over the back of my chair, put one hand on my shoulder, and with the other held the paper, so that he could read as well as I. ‘Well, I guess you’re reading about Jim, aint you?’ ‘Who’s Jim?’ said I. ‘Him as they hung this morning,’ he answered, at the same time resuming his seat. ‘Jim was a particular friend of mine, and I helped to hang him.’” The narrative that follows, and which is rather too lengthy to extract entire, is very graphic and striking—an excellent specimen of life in California. Jim, it appeared, was a “Britisher,” an ex-convict from the penal settlements, a terrible scamp and desperado. His offenses were many, but murder was the crime he suffered for. Here is the horribly thrilling account of his execution, as given to Mr. Coke by the “friend” who helped to Lynch him.