Front matter
Reading edition
[Illustration: PETER BROWN'S ARMS.]
TRAVELS IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA;
Commencing in the Year 1793, and Ending in 1797. With The Author's Journals of his Two Voyages Across the Atlantic
* * * * *
BY WILLIAM PRIEST, Musician, Late of the Theatres Philadelphia, Baltimore and Boston.
* * * * *
CAPPRICCIO con——
* * * * *
LONDON: Printed for J. Johnson, No. 72, St. Paul's Church-Yard
* * * * *
1802.
Bryer, Printer, Bridewell Hospital, Bridge Street.
PREFACE.
An elegant writer observes that a preface may be dispensed with in any work, if the author (either from his humility of justice) think that his style be calculated only to put his readers to sleep. Though I do not think the publication of the following sheets will materially affect the price of opium, I cannot intrude this volume on the public without informing them, what all my friends will vouch for the truth of, viz.— that on my return from America, in 1797, I wrote the work in its present form for their perusal; and, that conscious of my want of talent as a writer, I resisted all their entreaties for its publication, till within these three months.
The public, I presume, will not be wholly disappointed; the extracts I have made from Jefferson, Belknap, and other american writers, are worthy their attention: I have no other merit than having placed them in a tolerable point of view.
"The God of Truth, and all who know me, will bear testimony that, from my whole soul, I despise deceit, as I do all silly claims to superior wisdom, and infallibility, which so many writers, by a thousand artifices, endeavour to make their readers imagine they possess."