What was the life of our great nobility formerly in their country halls? With little intercourse with the capital; in the midst of huge forests, and almost impassable roads; hunting and carousing were their chief pleasures and employments, amid a throng of rude retainers. Look now at the mode of life of a private gentleman of no extraordinary revenue. When he comes down in a morning, he finds on his breakfast-table the papers which left London probably on the previous evening, bringing him the news of the whole world. There is nothing which is going on in Parliament, in the courts of law, in public meetings in the capital, or in any town of the kingdom; no birth, marriage, death, or any occurrence of importance, but they are all laid before him; there is nothing done or said in the mercantile, the literary, the scientific world, nothing which can affect the interests of his country in the most remote degree; nothing, indeed, which can thoroughly affect the well-being of men all the world over, but there it is too. He sits in the midst of his woods and groves, in the quietness of the country a hundred miles from the capital, and is as well acquainted with the movements and incidents of society as a reigning prince could have been some years ago, by couriers, correspondents, spies, fast-sailing packets, and similar agencies, maintained by all the aid and revenues of a nation. And for his morning meal, China and the Indies, east and west, send him their tea, coffee, sugar, chocolate, and preserved fruits. Lapland sends its reindeer tongues; Westphalia its hams; and his own rich land abundance of rural dainties. When breakfast is over, if he ask himself how he shall pass the day, what numerous and inexhaustible resources present themselves to his choice. Will he have music? The ladies of his family can give it him, in a high style of excellence. Does he love paintings? His walls, and those of his wealthy neighbours, are covered with them. There are said to be more of the works of the great masters accumulated in our English houses than in all the world besides. Is he fond of books? What a mass of knowledge is piled up around him! Greece, Rome, Palestine, Arabia, India, France, Germany, Italy, every country, ancient or modern, which has distinguished itself by its genius and intelligence, has poured into his halls its accumulated wealth of heart and imagination. There is hoarded up in his library, food for the most insatiate spirit for an eternity. In the literature and science merely of this country, he possesses more than the enjoyment of a life. Think only of the works of our historians and divines, of our travellers,--our natural, moral, and scientific philosophers; of the wit, the pathos, the immense extent of inventions and facts in our general literature; of the glorious and ennobling themes of our great poets. What a mighty difference is there between the existence of one of our old baronial ancestors, who could