“The Messenger was one among a crowd of high-pressure steamboats, clustered together by a wharf-side, which, looked down upon from the rising ground that forms the landing-place, and backed by the lofty bank on the opposite side of the river, appeared no larger than so many floating models.

"She had some forty passengers on board, exclusive of the poorer persons on the lower deck; and in half an hour, or less, proceeded on her way. We had, for ourselves, a tiny state-room with two berths in it, opening out of the ladies' cabin. There was, undoubtedly, something satisfactory in this 'location,' inasmuch as it was in the stern, and we had been a great many times very gravely recommended to keep as far aft as possible, 'because the steamboats generally blew up forward.'

"We are to be on board the Messenger three days: arriving at Cincinnati (barring accidents) on Monday morning. There are three meals a day. Breakfast at seven, dinner at half-past twelve, supper about six. At each, there are a great many small dishes and plates upon the table, with very little in them; so that although there is every appearance of a mighty 'spread,' there is seldom really more than a joint: except for those who fancy slices of beet-root, shreds of dried beef, complicated entanglements of yellow pickle; maize, Indian corn, apple-sauce, and pumpkin.

"At dinner, there is nothing to drink upon the table, but great jugs full of cold water. Nobody says anything, at any meal, to anybody. All the passengers are very dismal, and seem to have tremendous secrets weighing on their minds. There is no conversation, no laughter, no cheerfulness, no sociality, except in spitting; and that is done in silent fellowship round the stove, when the meal is over.

"The people are all alike, too. There is no diversity of character. They travel about on the same errands, say and do the same things in exactly the same manner, and follow in the same dull cheerless round. All down the long table, there is scarcely a man who is in anything different from his neighbour. It is quite a relief to have, sitting opposite, that little girl of fifteen with the loquacious chin: who, to do her justice, acts up to it, and fully identifies nature's handwriting, for of all the small chatterboxes that ever invaded the repose of drowsy ladies' cabin, she is the first and foremost.

"The beautiful girl, who sits a little beyond her - farther down the table there - married the young man with the dark whiskers, who sits beyond her, only last month. They are going to settle in the very Far West, where he has lived four years, but where she has never been. They were both overturned in a stage-coach the other day (a bad omen anywhere else, where overturns are not so common), and his head, which bears the marks of a recent wound, is bound up still. She was hurt too, at the same time, and lay insensible for some days; bright as her eyes are, now.

"Further down still, sits a man who is going some miles beyond their place of destination, to 'improve' a newly-discovered copper mine. He carries the village - that is to be - with him: a few frame cottages, and an apparatus for smelting the copper. He carries its people too. They are partly American and partly Irish, and herd together on the lower deck; where they amused themselves last evening till the night was pretty far advanced, by alternately firing off pistols and singing hymns.

"Cincinnati is a beautiful city; cheerful, thriving, and animated. I have not often seen a place that commends itself so favourably and pleasantly to a stranger at the first glance as this does: with its clean houses of red and white, its well-paved roads, and foot-ways of bright tile. Nor does it become less prepossessing on a closer acquaintance. The streets are broad and airy, the shops extremely good, the private residences remarkable for their elegance and neatness.  I was quite charmed with the appearance of the town, and its adjoining suburb of Mount Auburn: from which the city, lying in an amphitheatre of hills, forms a picture of remarkable beauty, and is seen to great advantage.

"The society with which I mingled, was intelligent, courteous, and agreeable. The inhabitants of Cincinnati are proud of their city as one of the most interesting in America: and with good reason: for beautiful and thriving as it is now, and containing, as it does, a population of fifty thousand souls, but two-and-fifty years have passed away since the ground on which it stands (bought at that time for a few dollars) was a wild wood, and its citizens were but a handful of dwellers in scattered log huts upon the river's shore.”

Dickens came away from his American experience with a sense of disappointment. To his friend William Macready he wrote "this is not the republic I came to see; this is not the republic of my imagination".

On returning to England Dickens began an account of his American trip which he completed in four months. Not only did Dickens attack slavery in American Notes, he also attacked the American press whom he blamed for the American's lack of general information. In Dickens' next novel, Martin Chuzzlewit he sends young Martin to America where he continues to vent his feelings for the young republic.
American response to both books was extremely negative but eventually the passion subsided and Dickens' popularity was restored.

Mrs. Dickens is a lady of moderate height; with a full, well-developed form, a beautiful face and good figure. I call to mind the high, full forehead, the brown hair gracefully arranged, the look of English healthfulness in the warm glow of color in her cheeks, the blue eyes with a tinge of violet, well-arched brows, a well-shaped nose, and a mouth small and of uncommon beauty. She is decidedly a handsome woman, and would have attracted notice as such in any gathering of ladies anywhere. She had a quiet dignity mingled with great sweetness of manner; her calm quietness differing much from the quick, earnest, always cheerful, but keen and nervous temperament of her husband, a temperament belonging to the existence, and absolutely necessary to the development, of a great genius like that of Charles Dickens.

Mrs. Dickens felt all a mother's anxiety for the little ones left at home, and seemed impatient to return to them. They brought from England a large pencil-drawing of their four children, "Charles, Walter, Kate, and Mary," made by their friend Maclise, the eminent English artist. The picture was framed, and wherever we afterwards went it was at once taken from its case and placed on the mantel-piece or table. Mr. and Mrs. Dickens talked constantly of their children, and seemed to derive great comfort from the pictured presence of their little ones.

From Hartford Mr. Dickens went to New Haven. Arriving there in the evening, the news spread rapidly that "Dickens had come," and at once the throng of visitors poured in. Before he had been there an hour the hotel was crowded and the street outside filled with people. Citizens of the highest distinction hastened, with their families, to pay their respects, for it was understood that his stay in the city would be very short.

The Yale students were there in force, and such was the desire to see him that he was urgently requested to receive the throng assembled, and for hours the people filled the reception-room and held the halls and passages of the hotel. As the crowd increased, the landlord found it necessary to post two stout porters on the main staircase, who locked their hands across the stairs and kept the throng somewhat at bay.

As fast as those in the reception-room had their introduction and retired by another way, the two porters on the stairs would raise their arms and suffer another installment of the crowd to pass; and thus till near eleven o'clock at night the admirers of "Boz" pressed around him for a look and an introduction, and all this was evidently from a love and appreciation of the man. It was nearly midnight before Mr. Dickens could retire to his room.

Washington Irving came very often, and the meeting of these kindred spirits was such as might have been expected. They were greatly delighted with each other.