English flowers are exceptional for substance and pomp. The roses, in particular--though some of them, it should be said, are of French breeds--surpass all others. It may seem an extravagance to say, but it is certainly true, that these rich, firm, brilliant flowers affect you like creatures of flesh and blood. They are, in this respect, only to be described as like nothing in the world so much as the bright lips and blushing cheeks of the handsome English women who walk among them and vie with them in health and loveliness. It is easy to perceive the source of those elements of warmth and sumptuousness that are so conspicuous in the results of English taste. It is a land of flowers. Even in the busiest parts of London the people decorate their houses with them, and set the sombre, fog-grimed fronts ablaze with scarlet and gold. These are the prevalent colours--radically so, for they have become national--and, when placed against the black tint with which this climate stains the buildings, they have the advantage of a vivid contrast that much augments their splendour. All London wears crape, variegated with a tracery of white, like lace upon a pall. In some instances the effect is splendidly pompous. There cannot be a grander artificial object in the world than the front of St. Paul's cathedral, which is especially notable for this mysterious blending of light and shade. It is to be deplored that a climate which can thus beautify should also destroy; but there can be no doubt that the stones of England are steadily defaced by the action of the damp atmosphere. Already the delicate carvings on the palace of Westminster are beginning to crumble. And yet, if one might judge the climate by this glittering July, England is a land of sunshine as well as of flowers. Light comes before three o'clock in the morning, and it lasts, through a dreamy and lovely gloaming, till nearly ten o'clock at night. The morning sky is usually light blue, dappled with slate-coloured clouds. A few large stars are visible then, lingering to outface the dawn. Cool winds whisper, and presently they rouse the great, sleepy, old elms; and then the rooks--which are the low comedians of the air in this region--begin to grumble; and then the sun leaps above the horizon, and we sweep into a day of golden, breezy cheerfulness and comfort, the like of which is rarely or never known in northern America, between June and October. Sometimes the whole twenty-four hours have drifted past, as if in a dream of light, and fragrance, and music. In a recent moonlight time there was scarce any darkness at all; and more than once I have lain awake all night, within a few miles of Charing Cross, listening to a twitter of birds that is like the lapse and fall of silver water. It used to be difficult to understand why the London season should begin in May and last through most of the summer; it is not difficult to understand the custom now.