Neighborhood intercourse was poisoned with selfishness, and the
effort to overreach, and make money out of, the ignorance or
necessities of these, was universal. These degrading practices crept
into every business, and petty frauds soon became designated as Yankee
tricks. There was nothing ennobling in their pursuits. The honorable
profession of law dwindled into pettifogging tricks. Commerce was
degraded in their hands by fraud and chicanery. The pernicious and
grasping nature everywhere cultivated, soon fastened upon the features.
Their eyes were pale, their features lank and hard, and the stony
nature was apparent in the icy coldness of manner, in the deceitful
grin, and lip-laugh, which the eye never shared, and which was only
affected, when interest prompted, or the started suspicions of an
intended victim warned them to be wary. The climate, and the
inhospitable and ungenerous soil, seemed to impart to the people their
own natures.
The men were all growing sharp, and the women, cold and passionless;
the soul appeared to shrivel and sink into induration, and the whole
people were growing into a nation of cheats and dastards.
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