232 RURAL ARCHITECTURE. 



delicate and pale as lilies of the valley, or' fine ladies of the Fifffli 

 Avenue. If one catches a glimpse of a rose in their' cheeks, it is 

 the pale rose of the hot-house, and not the fresh glow of the garden 

 damask. Alas, we soon discovered the reason. - They, too, live for 

 seven months of, the year in unventilated rooms, heated by close 

 stoves! The fireplaces are closed up, and ruddy. complexions have 

 vanished with them. Occasionally, indeed, one meets with an ex- 

 ception ; some bright-eyed, young, rustic Hebe, whose rosy cheeks 

 and round, elastic figure would make you believe that the world has 

 not all grown " delicate ;" and if you inquire, you vnll learn, proba- 

 bly, that she is one of those whose natural spirits force them out 

 continually, in the open air, so that she hks, as yet, in that way 

 escaped any considerable doses' of the national poison., ■* 



Now that we are fairly afloat on this dangerous sea, we must 

 unburthen our heart sufficiently to say, that neither in England nor 

 France does one meet with so much beauty — rcertainly not, so far as 

 charming eyes and expressive faces go towards constituting beauty 

 — as in America. But alas, on the other hand, as compared with 

 the elastic figures and healthful irames abroad, American beauty is as 

 evanescent as a dissolving View, contrasting with ,a, real and lining 

 landscape. What is with us a sweet dream, fi-om sixteen to twenty- 

 five, is there a permanent reality till forty-five or fifty. 



We should think it might be a matter of climate, were it not 

 that we saw, as the most common thing, even finer complexions 

 in France — yes, in the heart qf Paris, and especially among the 

 peasantry, who are almost wholly in the open air — than in England. 



And ■What, then, is the mysteiy of fine physical health, which 

 is so much better understood in the old world than the new ? 



The first traiisatlantio secret of health, is a much longer time 

 passed daiUy in the open air, by^aU classes of people ; the second.^ the 

 better modes of heating and ventilating the rooms in which they live. 



Regular daily' exerqise in the open air, both as a dutyand>a 

 pleasure, is something looked upon in a very difierent light on thet 

 two difierent sides of the Atlantic. On this side of the water, if a 

 person— say a professional man, or a merchant — is seen regularly 

 devoting a certain portion of the day to exercise, and the preserva- 

 tion of his bodily powers, he is looked upon as a valetudinarian, — 



