THE EXHILARATIONS OF THE ROAD 25 



taste and good breeding are to be inferred from its 

 diminutive size. A small, trim foot, well booted 

 or gaitered, is the national vanity. How we stare 

 at the big feet of foreigners, and wonder what may 

 be the price of leather in those countries, and where 

 all the aristocratic blood is, that these plebeian ex- 

 tremities so predominate ! If we were admitted to 

 the confidences of the shoemaker to Her Majesty or 

 to His Royal Highness, no doubt we should modify 

 our views upon this latter point, for a truly large 

 and royal nature is never stunted in the extremi- 

 ties ; a little foot never yet supported a great char- 

 acter. 



It is said that Englishmen, when they first come 

 to this country, are for some time under the impres- 

 sion that American women all have deformed feet, 

 they are so coy of them and so studiously careful 

 to keep them hid. That there is an astonishing dif- 

 ference between the women of the two countries 

 in this respect, every traveler can testify; and that 

 there is a difference equally astonishing between 

 the pedestrian habits and capabilities of the rival 

 sisters, is also certain. 



The English pedestrian, no doubt, has the advan- 

 tage of us in the matter of climate ; for, notwith- 

 standing the traditional gloom and moroseness of 

 English skies, they have in that country none of 

 those relaxing, sinking, enervating days, of which 

 we have so many here, and which seem especially 



