Domestic Manners of the Americans

is a two-volume travel book published in 1832. Following her residence in frontier Cincinnati and travels across America, Trollope delivered a caustic critique that scandalized readers on both sides of the Atlantic. She attacked American egalitarianism, evangelical influence, slavery, and social habits she found crude and offensive. Her sharp observations of what she perceived as American arrogance and lack of refinement created enormous controversy while also becominga bestselling sensation that saved her family fromfinan cial ruin.On first touching the soil of a newland, ofanewcontinent,ofanewworld, it is impossible not to feel considerable excitement and deep interest in al most every object that meets us. New Orleans presents very little that can gratify the eye of taste, but nevertheless there is much of novelty and inter est for a newly arrived European. The large proportion of blacks seen in the streets, all labour being performed by them; the grace and beauty of the elegant Quadroons, the occasional groups of wild and savage looking Indi ans, the unwonted aspect of the vegetation, the huge and turbid river, with its low and slimy shore, all help to afford that species of amusement which proceeds from looking at what we never saw before. The town has much the appearance of a French Ville de Province, and is, in fact, an old French colony taken from Spain by France. The names of the streets are French, and the language about equally French and English. The market is handsome and well supplied, all produce being conveyed by the river.