134 
RURAL HOURS. 
to the public for generations, the privilege is never abused by 
any disgraceful act. The flowers, the trees, the statuary, remain 
uninjured year after year ; it never seems to occur to the most 
reckless and abandoned to injure them. The general population of 
those towns is, in many respects, inferior to our own ; but in this 
particular point their tone of civilization rises far above the level 
of this country. 
Frido.y, 22d. — Still very warm; thermometer 90 in the shade. 
Although the heat has been greater and more prolonged than usual 
in this part of the country, still there is a sort of corrective in our 
highland air which is a great relief ; the same degree of the ther- 
mometer produces much more suffering in the lower counties, 
particularly in the towns. Extreme lassitude from the heat is 
seldom felt here ; and our nights are almost always comparatively 
cool, Avhich is a very great advantage. 
Saturday, 2Sd. — Bright, warm day ; thermometer 89. Fine air 
from the west. 
Pleasant walk in the evening. Met a party of children coming 
from the woods with wild flowers. In May or June, one often 
meets little people bringing home flowers or berries from the 
hills ; and if you stop to chat with them, they generally off"er you 
L share of their nosegay or their partridge-berries ; they are as 
fond of these last as the birds, and they eat the young aromatic 
leaves also. Their first trip to the woods, after the snow has gone, 
is generally in quest of these berries ; a week or two later, they 
go upon the hills for our earUest flowers — ground-laurel and 
squirrel-cups ; a little later, they gather violets, and then again, 
the azalea, or " wild honeysuckle," as they call it, to which they 
are very partial. 
