An American Liar

Mitchell speaks of the how Americans tend to exaggerate events to get a "foreigner get muddled up in ideas concerning the United States."

The average American citizen fakes a keen delight in helping a foreigner get muddled up in ideas concerning the United States. Returning to this country on a steamer recently an American found himself besieged by a young Englishman, who was determined to find out as much as possible about the new world before the steamer landed. He had been warned to keep a sharp outlook for hostile Indians, who sneaked about the streets looking for a chance to pounce upon and kill unsuspecting foreigners, and then make their escape by running around the corner and posing quietly before a cigar store until the crowd rushed on. He then asked about crocodiles, and if they could be found in large numbers. The unsophisticated Britisher was solemnly assured that they were not so numerous in the Hudson river as they were some time ago and that the most of them are found at the Niagara falls, where the water falls 175 feet. It is a very interesting sight, he was told, to stand on the high rocks above and watch the powerful animals swim up over the falls.

“An American Liar,” Black Virginia: The Richmond Planet, 1894-1909, accessed January 20, 2026, https://blackvirginia.richmond.edu/items/show/1739.