Miscellany: Professor Wright's Letters From England

LoNDoto, Aug. 17, 1844. 1'riend JLeavitt- I must wnte only of the surface of things, for 1 have not time to write profoundly, even if I had the ability to see much below the surface. Society here is too cömplicated to be'ühdérstood at once. Yoü might as w'éïl ex'p'e'ct to know all about a steam engine or a cotton mili at a glance, as to understand such a nation as this in thrce or four months. I can only say how things seem jj&Hjne. The more I see of this island the better I like il, and the worse I like its in8titutions. Nothing could be more comjortable than the weather we have had since March. Though we had a long drought, it did not seem dryynö'r hot. - The English sky, like the Engltsh beds, is curtained. The rains we have had lately have been after the manner of April. No down-pourings of xohole tvater, cutting up the roads and iields with gullies, have I seen. But the groundhas been well soaked, and the second erop of gfass - there was scarcely nny first - will be abundant. ïïow they make hay in aclimate so moist, cool and sunless, is a mystery. What a country it is for the growth and preservation of beauty! No danger of tanning the complexion, - no danger. of mosquitoes! If it were not for strong tea, malt liquors, wines, and sometimos midnight and .morning dances, the English daughters of Eve would probably eclipse their mother. As it is, on i he average, oneisnot likey to :'tint hisreason a' the gither" by any superior effulgence of the sex on this side of the water. - Butwhenwe come to the country itself, it is beautiful b'eyond all comparison or expression, and that aside f rom the beauty of its cultivation alid the decorations of it.s architecture, lt mut have been inexpressïbly beautiful when the druids lived undér' its primeval oaks. AH that art can: do for the beauties of these deeply indented coasts, and of the mountains and lakelets of Scotland, Westmoreland' and Wales, is simply not to lessen them. - And this it has done. I have just returned from a tour in which I'have seensomething of Derbyshire, the cl i lis of Scarborough, the valley of the Tyne, Dumbarton Castle upon its vvonderful rock, the vale of Leven, Loch Lomond, Ben Lomond, theCobbler, Edinbuvgh and itscastle, and Arthur's Seat, Mei rose Abbey, and the hill which overloöks it and is worth two of it, the lakes of Cumberland and Westmoreland, such as Brassenthwaite, Derwen't Water, Grasmére, Rydal Water, and Windermere, and the mountains that watch over them, such as Skiddavv, Helvellyn, Ridal, &c., and glorious hills thèy are. It is not fair to name three, for there arè hundreds of them - a great flock of mountains which appear to he frolicking for joy. Their outlines are wonderfully diversilied and are constantly clmnging ás you proceed. They rise from twoto three thousand feetabove the lakes, nd though the rocks here and therc erop out, they are mostly cover'ed with á carpet of green grass, beautified with patches of purple heather, and are speekled over with sheep, which to the naked' eye look like minute, parasitic insects, or to speak plainly- a thought wliich forced a laugh from the midst of my wonder and awe - they scemed to be a sort of mountain lice. On all these mountains you see white lines streaking down, like little currents of milk. On a near approach, these turn out to be tor rents of water dashing down in a perfect foam, falling perhaps two thousand feet in' half a mile. At the time of my visit, il had been raining constantly for several days, and the waterfalls were all in their glory, and the lakes brimfull. After all, I pronounce material England a paradise. It is ñot too large, too hot, nor too cold. It has no noxious insects- or none which good housewifery does not dispose of with very little care. it is fuil, naturally, of all conceivable beauties of mountain and plain, land and water, except frozen water, and all within a space which one might travel round in a [cw weeks on foot, anU any one not a dolt and a ninny-hammer - a mere concocting alembic of pork, cabboge and vinegar, would love to do it. - Talk about poetry - why to live where Southey did at Kcswick, or where Wordsvvorth does at Ryda!, is enough to make any man - even a Dutchman - a poet. - Me has but to make the least opening in his case, and the poetry flows in till presently itoverflovvs. By the way, I had an introduction to the venerable poet of RyJal Mount, from Thomas Clarkson, who is his particular friend, and was at one time his neighbor. He lives upon a beautiful little bovvery shelf of the mountain, where he can peep out between the green rustling laurel and holly boughs over the village of Amble-side and down the fine vale of si!. very Windermere, wilh its mountains around like flowing curtains of soft green and figured vel vel, pinned aboye the clouds. I was received with kindness and courtesy, by a man who takes a lively, and, notwiihstanding his losses on Mississippi and Pennsylvania bonds, a hopeful interest in American affairs. His conversation was exceedingly instructive, except when, as he was much inclined to do, he endeavored to elicit information from me. . He asked me, among other things, if we did not need a class of gentlemen in the U. States, bom to such large property that they could devote ihemselves entirely to literary pursuits, and be above sprdid interests, &c. I was quite prepared to reply that what I had seen in England would have convinced me, if I had not been convinced before, that such a class was just what we did not need. However, he expressed it quite distinctly as his opinión, that we do, need such a class. So much for the condition in which a poot lives; and for his having it in his power to be eheated by Mississippi slave-mongers and Pennsylvania speculators. Ask Ebenezer Elliot, the anti-corn rhymer, who, with all deference to the beautifultions of Wordsworth, I must believe ío be as great a poet, whatAe thinks of a class of independent country gentlemen. Indeed, tp me, the longer I stay here, the more this class of independent hereditary gentlemen seqms to me üke a perpetual devouring curse of locusts, the glitter of whose beautiful win gs, and the merry hum of whosc self-satisfied song, by no moans repays the faint and weary working miliions for the toil it costs to support. them. It is quite a misiake on the part of this aristocracy, to suppose that thcy are acting a. very important part in the grand toil and movement, bodily and mental, of soeiety. at largo. They could be quite cornfortably dispensed with, and got along without - but how would they get along, sliould the workers at once quit"? I was happy tö hé able to speak a word Df comfort to Mr. Wordsvvorth in regard :o his Pennsylvania bonds, which, fortunatcly, he did not sell - as, wjien thcy ivere lowest, Jie was advised to do. Lo.vdon, Aug. 19, 1844. Yesterday I stepped en board a Thames steamer to attend an open air temperance meeting on Black Heath. London pours itself out into God's country on the Sabbathday. Why shouldit not? Think of two millions of poople working and scrubbing, hamrhering and tugging, in the midst of dingy brick walls and sulpburous smoke six days of the week, hardly seeing a blessed green thing, except some spindling pot plants, prisoners hke themselves! On Sundays, the Thames swarms with little black steamers, by hundreds, which go crowded with people, to visit the beautiful parks up and down the river. The steamer I boarded was bound for Greenwich. Passing rapidly down the crowded Thames, darting under the bridges and picking up passengers at a dozen piers, we were soon at our destination. Greenwich is wonderful for its naval hospital, its naval school, its observatory, from which longitude is reckoned, and Í may say its park. Passing up the hill from the river, through the park. we emerge upon an extensive common, called Black Healh. Here were a large numberof logs drawn out of the park, trees, which had been uprooted by the wind, probably, and upon them the multitude assembled, lo hear the addressesof a number of devoted working teetotallers. One of the addressas, by a recláimed drunkard, was remarkabl v good. He described drinking usages and drinking feelings to the life, and with an eloquence which would have done honor to a lawyer. The old pensioners I overheard saying, as they carne away, "VV'ell, there is a good deal of truth in that." All the speakers dwelt especially on abstinence, in its connection with religión - indeed they preached better sermons than you would probably have heard that day in the. steepled churches. The congregation, though composed of all sortsof people, and many not usually considered the best, was well behaved and - Work away, brother teetotallers! You are despised by men now, but God is with you, and the great boerocracy must come down! The discouragements to radical temperance here are greater than can well be conceived in the United States, but the zeal of Ihc little band who do go the whole is not to be damped by any thing. The cold-walcr-curc, a system which is likely to supplant the apothecary, is just now, to the great horror of the, physic trade, becoming quite popular with some of the highest classes of English society, or at any rate, gaining great favor among them, and this is likely to have a happy effect upon the temperance cause. It men can be cured by cold water, it seems reasonable that they can be kept well by it. On ra y return I took a look at the magnificent Greenwich Hospital. The old men in their blue coats and cocked hato are a sight. Not a few have wooden legs and lack an arm - and many might doubtless show scars. They seein tó be made as comförtable as it is in the power of a nation's money to makethem. But where are their wives and children and grand children? They were left behind when these rnen wentto fight thsir country's batlles, and have died of-broken hearts, omever been born. Verily, it must take a great deal of glory to make up to an old man, tottering over the grave, the solace and the blessings of his children and' his children's children flourishing in peacearound him. In the lofty gallery ure portraits of a multitude of naval battles- söencs of butchery su'fficient to make a man perfectlv sick of the world lic lives in, - and old tattered banners black and falling to ]ieces with age. 1 don't know but all this might excite a martiai ardor in some people, but to me it wasworth all the peacediscourses lever heard. It no more put me in lóve wüh war, or excited my veneration for war's héroes, than Mr. Delavan's plates of the drunkard'sstomach excited my thirst for rum, or uny respect for drunkards.