ENGLISH CHARACTERISTICS. 191 



subdued cast. There is no abruptness in the land- 

 scape, no sharp and violent contrasts, no brilliant and 

 striking tints in the foliage. A soft, pale yellow is 

 all one sees in the way of tints along the borders of 

 the autumn woods. English apples (very small and 

 inferior, by the way) are not so highly colored as 

 ours. The blackberries, just ripening in October, are 

 less pungent and acid ; and the garden vegetables, 

 such as cabbage, celery, cauliflower, beet, and other 

 root crops, are less rank and fibrous ; and I am very 

 sure that the meats also are tenderer and sweeter. 

 There can be no doubt about the superiority of mut- 

 ton ; and the tender and succulent grass, and the moist 

 and agreeable climate, must tell upon the beef also. 



English coal is all soft coal, and the stone is soft 

 stone. The foundations of the hills are chalk in- 

 stead of granite. The stone with which most of the 

 old churches and cathedrals are built would not en- 

 dure in our climate half a century ; but in Britain the 

 tooth of Time is much blunter, and the hunger of the 

 old man less ravenous, and the ancient architecture 

 stands half a millennium, or until it is slowly worn 

 away by the gentle attrition of the wind and rain. 



At Chester, the old Roman wall that surrounds the 

 town, built in the first century and repaired in the 

 ninth, is still standing without a break or a swerve, 

 though in some places the outer face of the wall is 

 worn through. The cathedral, and St. John's church 

 In the same town, present to the beholder outlines as 

 jagged and broken as rocks and cliffs ; and yet it is 



