Inspired of these thoughts, I was becoming as un-English in disposition as though I had been forty years in the land, and, as old Sir Thomas Browne puts it, ‘of a constitution so general that it consorted and sympathised’ with things American. My British antipathies and proclivities were dropping from me as rapidly as the littlenesses of my servile life were replaced by the felicities of freedom. I shared in the citizens’ pride in their splendid port, the length and stability of their levee, their unparalleled lines of shipping, their magnificent array of steamers, and their majestic river. I believed, with them, that their Custom-House, when completed, would be a matchless edifice, that Canal Street was unequalled for its breadth, that Tchapitoulas Street was, beyond compare, the busiest street in the world, that no markets equalled those of New Orleans for their variety of produce, and that no city, not even Liverpool, could exhibit such mercantile enterprise, or such a smart go-ahead spirit, as old and young manifested in the chief city of the South. I am not sure that I have lost all that lively admiration yet, though I have since seen dozens of cities more populous, more cultivated, and more opulent. Many years of travel have not extinguished my early faith, but it would require ages to eradicate my affection for the city which first taught me that a boy may become a _man_. Had the joylessness of boyhood endured a few years longer, it is probable that the power of joyousness would have dried up; but, fortunately, though I had seen fifteen summers, I was a mere child in experience. It was only eighteen months since I had left St. Asaph, and but two months and a half since I had entered the world outside my family. Since I became a man, I have often wondered what would have become of me had my melting mood that last night at Roscommon Street lasted a little longer. It was the turning-point of my life, I am disposed to think, and it was good for me to have had the courage to say ‘No,’ at that critical moment. A trifle more perseverance, on the part of Uncle Tom, would have overcome my inclination for departure from England, and made me a fixture within his own class. On that occasion my weakly, half-hearted negative served me to good purpose; but I should have been spared many trials had I been educated to utter my ‘Noes’ more often, more loudly, and more firmly than I have; and I suppose most men have had cause to condemn that unsatisfactory education which sent them into the world so imperfectly equipped for moral resistance. In my opinion, the courage to deliver a proper ‘No’ ought to be cultivated as soon as a child’s intelligence is sufficiently advanced. The few times I have been able to say it have been productive of immense benefit to me, though to my shame, be it said, I yearned to say ‘Yes.’