The next morning I sent for a hair-dresser. As he entered the room I made him a sign, without speaking, to cut my hair. I was reading the morning paper, and my operator had got half through with his job, without a syllable being exchanged between us, when the man of the comb suddenly demanded, "What is the reason, sir, that the Americans think everything in their own country so much better than it is everywhere else?" You will suppose that the _brusquerie_, as well as the purport of this interrogatory, occasioned some surprise. How he knew I was an American at all I am unable to say, but the fellow had been fidgeting the whole time to break out upon me with this question.
I mention the anecdote, in order to show you how lively and general the feeling of jealousy has got to be among our transatlantic kinsmen. There will be a better occasion to speak of this hereafter.
London was empty. The fashionable streets were actually without a soul, for minutes at a time; and, without seeing it, I could not have believed that a town which, at certain times, is so crowded as actually to render crossing its streets hazardous, was ever so like a mere wilderness of houses. During these recesses in dissipation and fashion, I believe that the meanest residents disappear for a few months.
Our fellow-traveller, Mr. L----, however, was in London, and we passed a day or two in company. As he is a votary of music, he took me to hear Madame Pasta. I was nearly as much struck with the extent and magnificence of the Opera-house, as I had been with the architecture of the Abbey. The brilliant manner in which it was lighted, in particular, excited my admiration, for want of light is a decided and a prominent fault of all scenic exhibitions at home, whether they are made in public or in private. Madame Pasta played _Semiramide_ "How do you like her?" demanded L----, at the close of the first act. "Extremely; I scarce know which to praise the most, the command and the range of her voice, or her powers as a mere actress. But, don't you think her exceedingly like the _Signorina?_" The present Madame Malibran was then singing in New York, under the name of Signorina Garcia. L---- laughed, and told me the remark was well enough, but I had not put the question in exactly the proper form. "Do you not think the Signorina exceedingly like Madame Pasta?" would have been better. I had got the matter wrong end foremost.