On his train ride from New York to St. Louis in chapter 22 of Life on the Mississippi, Twain first notes that grace and picturesqueness in the dress of both men and women "drop gradually out of it as one travels away from New York." He says that this is so consistently the case that:

Whether you move north, south, east, or west, no matter: you can get up in the morning and guess how far you have come, by noting what degree of grace and picturesqueness is by that time lacking in the costumes of the new passengers, I do not mean of the women alone, but of both sexes.

However, since many people in the provinces employ New York tailors, he concludes that there may be something in the style and department of New Yorkers, rather than merely their clothing, that accounts for this difference.

Twain's next observation is that the train has come into a region where all the men have goatee beards. He describes this as an "obsolete and uncomely fashion," which he had imagined to be long dead.

In the afternoon of the same day, Twain observes that they have entered a part of the country where all the men loafing at railways stations have both hands in their breeches pockets, rather than just one, as before. Later, they enter a region where people chew tobacco, formerly a widespread habit but now greatly restricted. Finally, shortly before reaching St. Louis, Twain begins to see some people wearing boots, of which he remarks:

They disappeared from other sections of the Union with the mud; no doubt they will disappear from the river villages, also, when proper pavements come in.