Millions of men are marching at once towards the same horizon; their language, their religion, their manners differ, their object is the same.

The gifts of fortune are promised in the West, and to the West they bend their course.

*b [Footnote b: [The number of foreign immigrants into the United States in the last fifty years (from 1820 to 1871) is stated to be 7,556,007.

Of these, 4,104,553 spoke English--that is, they came from Great Britain, Ireland, or the British colonies; 2,643,069 came from Germany or northern Europe; and about half a million from the south of Europe.]] No event can be compared with this continuous removal of the human race, except perhaps those irruptions which preceded the fall of the Roman Empire.

Then, as well as now, generations of men were impelled forwards in the same direction to meet and struggle on the same spot; but the designs of Providence were not the same; then, every newcomer was the harbinger of destruction and of death; now, every adventurer brings with him the elements of prosperity and of life.