"It is not requisite in America to take a license from the police to establish a boarding-house, unless a bar-room be therewith connected. The person undertaking such an enterprise rents a house, makes it known in newspapers or among friends, or simply placards on the door 'Boarding'--and the establishment is opened without further ceremony. Particular introductions and recommendations are requisite to be received in a boarding-house of higher rank." There is even yet a lingering prejudice prevailing in this country in favor of certain musical instruments of European manufacture, which this work is well adapted to dissipate, since the author appears to be in this particular an excellent judge. Take for example his chapter on pianos: "The favorite musical instrument of the American ladies is the piano, and in every family with the slightest pretensions to education or refinement a piano may certainly be found, upon which, of an evening, the young 'Miss' plays to her parents the pieces which she has learned, or accompanies them with her voice. If the stranger will walk of an evening through the streets of an American city, he can hear in almost every house a piano and the song of youthful voices, often very agreeable, though the latter are not unfrequently wanting in proper culture. Many of these amateurs have beyond doubt remarkable talent, and would in their art attain to a high degree of perfection if they had better opportunities to hear the best music, to study more industriously, and practice more than they do, but their domestic audiences are unfortunately easily pleased, in consequence of which their knowledge seldom extends beyond well known opera pieces and favorite popular airs.