CHAPTER I. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



The meanest floweret of the vale, 

 The simplest note that swells the gale, 

 The common sun, the air, the skies, 

 To him are opening Paradise. 



IDE as may be the circle covered by a great 

 town, we come to the country at last. Let 

 the bricks and mortar stride far as they 

 will over the greensward, there are always 

 sanctuaries beyond sweet spots where 

 we may yet listen to the singing of the 

 birds, and pluck the early primrose and 

 anemone. We need but take our survey from a suffi- 

 ciently high point, to see that the vastest mass of houses 

 ever heaped together by man is still only an encampment 

 in the fields. Like the waves of the sea upon the 



B 



