The former speak of wealth, and the happiness that depends on wealth; the latter of comparative poverty, and the home pleasures that are compatible with poverty. On the continent, there is always something out of keeping in the picture. In the great chateaux and their grounds, there is always some meanness, some make-shift observable; while in the great country seats of England, on the contrary, all is uniform. In the cottages abroad, even those of a higher order, there are always dirt and slovenliness—inattention to the minute comforts of humble life—meals snatched anyhow and anywhere—sleep taken without an idea of the luxuries of sleep. In England, on the other hand, notwithstanding the irregularities of fortune, we find an absolute identity in the various classes of the population. The labourer—returned, perhaps, from mending the highway, sits down in state to dinner, with a clean white table-cloth, and the coarse ware nicely arranged before him. The floor is swept, perhaps washed, to do honour to the occasion; and his wife, who is at once the mistress and the servant of the feast, prides herself on making her husband (whom she calls her “master”)—_comfortable_.
We need not be told that this is not a universal picture. We need not be reminded of the want and misery which exist in numerous parts of the country, for with these we are well acquainted. The _foreigner_, however, to whom such scenes are new, will meet with them frequently enough, and especially on the road we are now travelling, to induce him to set them down as one of the grand characteristics of England.
The road presents, also, at various turnings, that truly English scene, a well-known specimen of which is viewed from Richmond Hill. A level country lies a few hundred feet below us, and extends in front, and on either side, till it is lost in the distance, or bound in by low and filmy hills which just mark the horizon with their waving line of shadow. This expanse is studded with towns, and villages, and seats, and cottages, and square towers, and tapering spires, rising amidst woods and groves, and surrounded by green fields and meadows. A great part of the peculiar character of the landscape is due to the enclosures of various kinds of foliage which separate one field from another. In most parts of the continent—and more especially in France—these are of very rare occurrence; and thus the beauty of the picture, when it has any beauty at all, depends upon the colours of the different kinds of grain or other productions, which make the vast expanse of vegetation resemble an immense and richly variegated carpet. In spring, therefore, before these colours have been fairly brought out, it may easily be conceived that France is one of the least interesting countries in Europe. With us, on the other hand, the face of the earth resembles a garden, and more especially in one of those flat landscapes we have alluded to. The changes of the seasons diversify without diminishing the beauty; and even winter presents, instead of a uniform and dreary waste, a varied picture executed in hoar frost and snow.