The many sins of omission and commission of which the City Fathers of New York are accused, are, I think, wonderfully redeemed and covered by the beauties of the provision for humanity which they have made in Central Park. Having seen every park in the world, I am not ashamed to glorify our own, as providing as much beauty and cheap pleasure as can anywhere be found under the sun. Especially ought all lovers _par excellence_ to crown the projectors and executors of this Park with unfading wreaths of olive and myrtle. It is so evidently adapted to all the purposes of falling in love and keeping in love that the only wonder is that any one can remain a bachelor in presence of such advantages and privileges! There is all the peacefulness, all the seclusion, all the innocent wildness of a country Arcadia, given for the price of a five cents' ride in the cars to any citizen who chooses to be made moral and innocent. The Central Park is an immortal poem, forever addressing itself to the eye and ear in the whirl and bubble of that hot and bewildered city. It is a Wordsworth immortalized and made permanent, preaching to the citizens. "One impulse from a vernal mood May teach you more of man-- Of moral evil, and of good-- Than all the sages can." Certainly during this one season of my life I did full justice to the beauties of Central Park. There was not a nook or corner where wild flowers unfolded, where white-stemmed birches leaned over still waters, or ivies clambered over grottoed rocks, which I did not explore; and when in the winding walks of "the Ramble" I caught distant sight of a white drapery, or heard through budding thickets the silvery sounds of laughing and talking, I knew I was coming on one of those pleasant surprises for which the Park grounds are so nicely arranged. Sometimes Eva would come with a carriage full of children, and with the gay little fairies would pass a sunny afternoon, swinging them, watching them riding in the little goat-carriages, or otherwise presiding over their gaieties. We had, under these circumstances, all the advantage of a tête-à-tête without any of the responsibility of seeking or prolonging it. In fact, the presence of others was a salvo to my conscience, and to public appearance, for, looking on Eva as engaged to another, I was very careful not to go over a certain line of appearances in my relations to her. My reason told me that I was upon dangerous ground for my own peace, but I quieted reason as young men in my circumstances generally do, by the best of arguments. I said to myself that, "No matter if she were engaged, why shouldn't I worship at her shrine, and cherish her unage as Dante did that of Beatrice, and Tasso that of Eleanora d'Este?" and so on.