PART XVIII.




CHAPTER I.


Adieu, thou beautiful land, Canaan of the exiles, and Ararat to many a
shattered ark! Fair cradle of a race for whom the unbounded heritage of
a future that no sage can conjecture, no prophet divine, lies afar in the
golden promise--light of Time!--destined, perchance, from the sins and
sorrows of a civilization struggling with its own elements of decay, to
renew the youth of the world, and transmit the great soul of England
through the cycles of Infinite Change. All climates that can best ripen
the products of earth or form into various character and temper the
different families of man is "rain influences" from the heaven that
smiles so benignly on those who had once shrunk, ragged, from the wind,
or scowled on the thankless sun. Here, the hard air of the chill Mother
Isle,--there, the mild warmth of Italian autumns or the breathless glow
of the tropics. And with the beams of every climate, glides subtle Hope.
Of her there, it may be said, as of Light itself, in those exquisite
lines of a neglected poet,--

"Through the soft ways of heaven and air and sea,
Which open all their pores to thee,
Like a clear river thou dost glide.
All the world's bravery that delights our eyes
Is but thy several liveries;
Thou the rich dye on them bestowest;