Domestic Manners of the Americans

In August 1830, Trollope and her companions travel to Philadelphia. Although regarded by Americans as the country’s finest city, Trollope is relatively unimpressed by Philadelphia; while the city is neatly laid out, this means it is “even, straight, uniform, and uninteresting” (202).

At the Arch Street Theater, Fanny Wright delivers her final address before returning to Europe. She gets a controversial reaction from the audience when she states, invoking the authority of Thomas Jefferson, that George Washington was not a Christian. In the text, Trollope presents a passage from Washington’s farewell address suggesting an alternate view of his beliefs.

Trollope and company go sightseeing in Philadelphia. In a park, she meets a German woman whose critical assessment of Americans resonates with Trollope’s own.

The company visits an annual exhibition of the Pennsylvanian Academy of the Fine Arts and admires paintings, drawings, statuary, and other works. They go to the Chestnut Street Theatre and see a “very bad” performance of King Lear. Coming home, Trollope notes that the streets are deserted and silent—the absence of night life (a legacy of the city’s straightlaced Quaker heritage) is for Trollope a sign of a lower state of civilization.