The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, is a Collection of Magazines of New-York in February 1844. These magazine are very popular at that time. The book describes that A few months only have elapsed since I travelled over the classic land of Sicily; and the impressions left on my mind by its picturesqueness, fertility, and the grandeur of its architectural remains, are more vivid, and fraught with more sublime associations, than any I received during my late sojourn in Europe. The pleasure of travelling, it seems to me, is chiefly experienced after the journey is over; when we can sit down by our own snug fire-side, free from all the fatigues and annoyances which are its usual concomitants; and, if our untravelled friends are with us, indulge in the comfortable and harmless vanity of describing the wonders and dangers of those distant lands, and like Goldsmith's old soldier', Shoulder the crutch and show how fields were won'. I was about to remark, that those who travel only in books travel with much less discomfort.
