"Thank Heaven, however, that the age of poetry is not gone too; for poetry, you know, is but the shadow or reflection of chivalry--heroism--and action! First an age of deeds, and then an age of song--so here goes for the doggerel. But let me see; are there not more than two ages? what succeeds to an age of poetry? One of philosophy! What succeeds philosophy? Cynicism or infidelity--next a utilitarian age, and lastly we have a mongrel compound of all--then we have revolutions, bloodshed, sentiment, religion, and spinning-jennies. Now you see I have hit it! we live in the mongrel age; a hero of this era should fight--write--pray--and spin cotton! Let's see how all these could be united into a picture suitable for a frontispiece to a work of the current age. First there must be a spinning-jenny to go by steam, to the wheel of which there must be a hand-organ. The steam must be scattered against an enemy; a long nosed fellow with the real nasal twang must be seen upon his knees attending the jenny, and singing doggerel to the music of the hand-organ--there's a pretty coat of arms for you, and suitable for the present age. "But seriously, my dear Chevillere, what am I to do? I cannot get on without your assistance, and yet I am ashamed to ask it; however, I shall leave all these things to time--fate--and a better acquaintance between the charming Miss Bell and your humble servant. "I find you have more negroes here than we have in Virginia, in proportion to the whites; and existing under totally different circumstances, so far as regards the distance between them and their masters. "With us slavery is tolerable, and has something soothing about it to the heart of the philanthropist; the slaves are more in the condition of tenants to their landlords--they are viewed more as rational creatures, and with more kindly feelings; each planter owning a smaller number than the planters generally do here, of course the direct knowledge of, and intercourse between each other is greater. Every slave in Virginia knows, even if he does not love, his master; and his master knows him, and generally respects him according to his deserts. _Here_ slavery is intolerable; a single individual owning a hundred or more, and often not knowing them when he sees them. If they sicken and die, he knows it not except through the report of those wretched mercenaries, the overseers. The slaves here are plantation live-stock; not domestic and attached family servants, who have served around the person of the master from the childhood of both. "I have known masters in Virginia to exhibit the most intense sorrow and affliction at the death of an old venerable household servant, who was quite valueless in a pecuniary point of view.