Whether at home or abroad, he is made conscious of
the claims of his country to respect and admiration. As I fed my eyes on
the loveliness of Nature, or turned to the miracles of Art and Science
on every hand, I had always in my mind a secret reference to the effect
which a visit to England must produce upon an intelligent and observant
foreigner.
Heavens! what a goodly prospect spreads around
Of hills and dales and woods and lawns and spires,
And glittering towns and gilded streams, 'till all
The stretching landscape into smoke decays!
Happy Brittannia! where the Queen of Arts,
Inspiring vigor, Liberty, abroad
Walks unconfined, even to thy farthest cots,
And scatters plenty with unsparing hand.
_Thomson_.
And here let me put in a word in favor of the much-abused English
climate. I cannot echo the unpatriotic discontent of Byron when he
speaks of
The cold and cloudy clime
Where he was born, but where he would not die.
Rather let me say with the author of "_The Seasons_," in his address to
England.
Rich is thy soil and merciful thy clime.
King Charles the Second when he heard some foreigners condemning our
climate and exulting in their own, observed that in his opinion that was
the best climate in which a man could be out in the open air with
pleasure, or at least without trouble and inconvenience, the most days
of the year and the most hours of the day; and this he held was the case
with the climate of England more than that of any other country in
Europe.
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