Abuse her, as we will—pity her starving peasantry, as we may—smile at her court pageantry, as much as we like—old England is dear old England still. Her cottage homes, her green fields, her castles, her blazing firesides, her church spires are as old as songs; and by song and story, we inherit them in our hearts. This joyous boast, was, I remember, upon my lip, as I first trod upon the rich meadow of Runnymede; and recalled that GREAT CHARTER: wrested from the king, which made the first stepping stone toward the bounties of our western freedom. [Illustration] It is a strange feeling that comes over the Western Saxon, as he strolls first along the green by-lanes of England, and scents the hawthorn in its April bloom, and lingers at some quaint stile to watch the rooks wheeling and cawing around some lofty elm-tops, and traces the carved gables of some old country mansion that lies in their shadow, and hums some fragment of charming English poesy, that seems made for the scene. This is not sight-seeing, nor travel; it is dreaming sweet dreams, that are fed with the old life of Books. I wander on, fearing to break the dream, by a swift step; and winding and rising between the blooming hedgerows, I come presently to the sight of some sweet valley below me, where a thatched hamlet lies sleeping in the April sun, as quietly as the dead lie in history; no sound reaches me save the occasional clink of the smith’s hammer, or the hedgeman’s bill-hook, or the plowman’s “ho-tup,” from the hills. At evening, listening to the nightingale, I stroll wearily into some close-nestled village, that I had seen long ago from a rolling height. It is far away from the great lines of travel—and the children stop their play to have a look at me, and the rosy-faced girls peep from behind half opened doors. Standing apart, and with a bench on either side of the entrance, is the inn of the Eagle and the Falcon—which guardian birds, some native Dick Tinto has pictured upon the swinging signboard at the corner. The hostess is half ready to embrace me, and treats me like a prince in disguise. She shows me through the tap-room into a little parlor, with white curtains, and with neatly framed prints of the old patriarchs. Here, alone beside a brisk fire, kindled with furze, I watch the white flame leaping playfully through the black lumps of coal, and enjoy the best fare of the Eagle and the Falcon. If too late, or too early for her garden stock, the hostess bethinks herself of some small pot of jelly in an out-of-the-way cupboard of the house, and setting it temptingly in her prettiest dish, she coyly slips it upon the white cloth, with a modest regret that it is no better; and a little evident satisfaction—that it is so good. I muse for an hour before the glowing fire, as quiet as the cat that has come in, to bear me company; and at bedtime, I find sheets, as fresh as the air of the mountains.