sated with the sweetness and freshness of a country so completely
carpeted with verdure; where every air breathed of the balmy pasture,
and the honey-suckled hedge. I was continually coming upon some little
document of poetry, in the blossomed hawthorn, the daisy, the cowslip,
the primrose, or some other simple object that has received a
supernatural value from the muse. The first time that I heard the song
of the nightingale, I was intoxicated more by the delicious crowd of
remembered associations than by the melody of its notes; and I shall
never forget the thrill of ecstasy with which I first saw the lark
rise, almost from beneath my feet, and wing its musical flight up into
the morning sky.

In this way I traversed England, a grown-up child, delighted by every
object, great and small; and betraying a wondering ignorance, and
simple enjoyment, that provoked many a stare and a smile from my wiser
and more experienced fellow-travellers. Such too was the odd confusion
of associations that kept breaking upon me, as I first approached
London. One of my earliest wishes had been to see this great
metropolis. I had read so much about it in the earliest books that had
been put into my infant hands; and I had heard so much about it from
those around me who had come from the "old countries." I was familiar
with the names of its streets, and squares, and public places, before
I knew those of my native city. It was, to me, the great centre of the
world, round which every thing seemed to revolve. I recollect
contemplating so wistfully, when a boy, a paltry little print of the
Thames, and London Bridge, and St. Paul's, that was in front of an old
magazine; and a picture of Kensington Gardens, with gentlemen in
three-cornered hats and broad skirts, and ladies in hoops and lappets,
that hung up in my bed-room; even the venerable cut of St. John's
Gate, that has stood, time out of mind, in front of the Gentleman's