THE SABBATH. 



in the same caittegory. I remember some years ago 



standing by tht'e Thames at Putney with my lamented 



friend Dr. Be* ? nce Jones, when a steamboat on the river 



with its living freight passed us. Practically acquainted 



with the inc-->ral and physical influence of pure oxygen, 



my friend exclaimed, " What a blessing for these people 



to be f 1 ^ ie thus to escape from London into the fresh 



a j r jf the country ! " I hold the physician to have been 



right and, with all respect, the Bishop to have been 



wrong. 



Bishop Bloomfield also condemns resorting to tea- 

 gardens on Sunday. But we may be sure that it is not 

 the tea-gardens, but the minds which the people bring 

 to them, which produce disorder. These minds already 

 possess the culture of the city, to which the Bishop 

 seems disposed to confine them. Wisely and soberly 

 conducted and it is perfectly possible to conduct them 

 wisely and soberly such gardens might be converted 

 into aids towards a life which the Bishop would com- 

 mend. Purification and improvement are often possible, 

 where extinction is neither possible nor desirable. I 

 have spent many a Sunday afternoon in the tea-gardens 

 of the little university town of Marburg, in the company 

 of intellectual men and cultivated women, without ob- 

 serving a single occurrence which, as regards morality, 

 might not be permitted in the Bishop's drawing-room. 

 I will add to this another observation made at Dresden 

 on a Sunday, immediately after the suppression of the 

 insurrection by the Prussian soldiery in 1849. The 

 victorious troops were encamped in some meadows on 

 the banks of the Elbe, and I went among them and saw 

 how they occupied themselves. Some were engaged in 

 physical games and exercises which in England would 

 be considered innocent in the extreme, some were con- 

 versing sociably, some singing the songs of Uhland, 



