TOWN AND COUNTRY. 101 



cutta — what are these in comparison with the 

 exhilarating pastimes, and health-giving exercises 

 of a comitry life, under the fresh and pure breath 

 of Heaven? How soon, by the influence of the 

 former, do the rosy hues on beauty's cheek fade 

 away, and give place to the sickly shade which be- 

 longs to the votaries of dissipation. 



" Ye who amid this feverish world would wear 

 A body free of pain, of cares, a mind. 

 Fly the rank city, shun its turbid air." 



Yet there are thousands, millions of human 

 beings, from earliest infancy to decrepit old age, 

 doomed to breathe this chaos of eternal smoke 

 and volatile corruption ; and so powerful are the 

 effects of habit, so accommodating is nature to 

 the different circumstances and situations in which 

 mankind may be placed, that town-born children 

 thrive and fatten on the tainted atmosphere, mis- 

 called air, although the ruddy bloom of health is 

 wanting, and that vigour of constitution in after- 

 years, so conspicuous in the fresh cheeks and ro- 

 bust frame of the countryman. 



But, to speak of the higher and middle orders 

 of society, who, by their vocations or duties, are 

 obliged to spend a large portion of their time in 

 the city, we neither envy nor grudge them their 



