THE PROMISED LAND Having made such good time across the ocean, I ought to be able to proceed no less rapidly on _terra firma_, where, after all, I am more at home.

And yet here is where I falter.

Not that I hesitated, even for the space of a breath, in my first steps in America.

There was no time to hesitate.

The most ignorant immigrant, on landing proceeds to give and receive greetings, to eat, sleep and rise, after the manner of his own country; wherein he is corrected, admonished, and laughed at, whether by interested friends or the most indifferent strangers; and his American experience is thus begun.