I seldom care about letters of introduction, for I am
one of those who depend much upon an accidental acquaintance. Full many a
face do I see as I go wandering up and down the world whose mild eye and
sweet and placid features seem to beckon to me and say, as it were, "Speak
but civilly to me, and I will do what I can for you." Such a face as this
is worth more than a dozen letters of introduction; and such a face, gentle
reader, I found on board the steamboat from New York to the city of Albany.
There was a great number of well-dressed ladies and gentlemen in the
vessel, all entire strangers to me. I fancied I could see several whose
countenances invited an unknown wanderer to come and take a seat beside
them; but there was one who encouraged me more than the rest. I saw clearly
that he was an American, and I judged by his manners and appearance that he
had not spent all his time upon his native soil. I was right in this
conjecture, for he afterwards told me that he had been in France and
England. I saluted him as one stranger gentleman ought to salute another
when he wants a little information; and soon after I dropped in a word or
two by which he might conjecture that I was a foreigner, but I did not tell
him so; I wished him to make the discovery himself.
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