“I have heard that America called a land, John, where God has lavished his favors with an unsparing hand; where he has bestowed many climes with their several fruits, and where his power is exhibited no less than his mercy. It is said her rivers are without any known end, and that lakes are found in her bosom which would put our German Ocean to shame! The plains, teeming with verdure, are spread over wide degrees; and yet those sweet valleys, which a single heart can hold, are not wanting. In short, John, I hear it is a broad land, that can furnish food for each passion, and contain objects for every affection.” “Ay, you have found those, Alice, in your solitude, who have been willing to do her justice! It is a country that can form a world of itself; and why should they who inherit it look to other nations for their laws?” “I pretend not to reason on the right of the children of that soil to do whatever they may deem most meet for their own welfare,” returned Alice--“but can men be born in such a land, and not know the feelings which bind a human being to the place of his birth?” “Can you doubt that they should be patriotic?” exclaimed the Pilot, in surprise. “Do not their efforts in this sacred cause--their patient sufferings--their long privations--speak loudly in their behalf?” “And will they who know so well how to love home sing the praises of him who has turned his ruthless hand against the land of his fathers?” “Forever harping on that word home!” said the Pilot, who now detected the timid approaches of Alice to her hidden meaning. “Is a man a stick or a stone, that he must be cast into the fire, or buried in a wall, wherever his fate may have doomed him to appear on the earth? The sound of home is said to feed the vanity of an English man, let him go where he will; but it would seem to have a still more powerful charm with English women!” “It is the dearest of all terms to every woman, John, for it embraces the dearest of all ties! If your dames of America are ignorant of its charm, all the favors which God has lavished on their land will avail their happiness but little.” “Alice,” said the Pilot, rising in his agitation, “I see but too well the object of your allusions. But on this subject we can never agree; for not even your powerful influence can draw me from the path of glory in which I am now treading. But our time is growing brief; let us, then, talk of other things.--This may be the last time I shall ever put foot on the island of Britain.” Alice paused to struggle with the feelings excited by this remark, before she pursued the discourse. But soon shaking off the weakness, she added, with a rigid adherence to that course which she believed to be her duty: “And now, John, that you have landed, is the breaking up of a peaceful family, and the violence ye have shown towards an aged man, a fit exploit for one whose object is the glory of which ye have spoken?”