nineteenth century, that those who had them under their power
worried, befouled, and degraded men out of malice prepense: but it
was not so; like the mis-education of which we were talking just now,
it came of their dreadful poverty. They were obliged to put up with
everything, and even pretend that they liked it; whereas we can now
deal with things reasonably, and refuse to be saddled with what we do
not want."

I confess I was not sorry to cut short with a question his
glorifications of the age he lived in. Said I: "How about the
smaller towns? I suppose you have swept those away entirely?"

"No, no," said he, "it hasn't gone that way. On the contrary, there
has been but little clearance, though much rebuilding, in the smaller
towns. Their suburbs, indeed, when they had any, have melted away
into the general country, and space and elbow-room has been got in
their centres: but there are the towns still with their streets and
squares and market-places; so that it is by means of these smaller
towns that we of to-day can get some kind of idea of what the towns
of the older world were like;--I mean to say at their best."

"Take Oxford, for instance," said I.

"Yes," said he, "I suppose Oxford was beautiful even in the
nineteenth century. At present it has the great interest of still
preserving a great mass of pre-commercial building, and is a very
beautiful place, yet there are many towns which have become scarcely
less beautiful."

Said I: "In passing, may I ask if it is still a place of learning?"