artist? Where would Shakspeare's dramas have been, had he studied the old dramatic unities?

So, you see, like an obstinate republican, as I am, I defend my right to have my own opinion about this monument, albeit the guide book, with its usual diplomatic caution, says, "It is in very questionable taste."

We went for our dinner to the White Hart, the very inn which Shakspeare celebrates in his Merry Wives, and had a most overflowing, merry time of it. The fact is, we had not seen each other for so long that to be in each other's company for a whole day was quite a stimulant.

After dinner we had a beautiful drive, passing the colleges at Eton, and seeing the boys out playing cricket; had an excellent opportunity to think how true Gray's poem on the Prospect of Eton is to boy-nature then, now, and forever. We were bent upon looking up the church which gave rise to his Elegy in a Country Churchyard, intending, when we got there, to have a little scene over it; Mr. S., in all the conscious importance of having been there before, assuring us that he knew exactly where it was. So, after some difficulty with our coachman, and being stopped at one church which would not answer our purpose in any respect, we were at last set down by one which looked authentic; embowered in mossy elms, with a most ancient and goblin yew tree, an ivymantled tower, all perfect as could be.

There had been a sprinkle of rain, — an ornament which few English days want,- and the westering beams of the sun twinkled through innumerable drops. In fact, it was a pretty place; and I felt such "dispositions to melancholies," as Sir Hugh Evans would have it, that I half resented Mr. S.'s suggestion that the cars were waiting. However, as he was

engaged to speak at a peace meeting in London, it was agreed he should leave us there to stroll, while he took the cars. So away he went; and we, leaning on the old fence, repeated the Elegy, which certainly applies here as beautifully as language could apply.

What a calm, shady, poetical nature is expressed in these lines! Gray seems to have been sent into the world for nothing but to be a poem, like some of those fabulous, shadowy beings which haunted the cool grottoes on Grecian mountains; creatures that seem to have no practical vitality— to be only a kind of voice, an echo, heard for a little, and then lost in silence. He seemed to be in himself a kind of elegy.

From thence we strolled along, enjoying the beautiful rural scenery. Having had a kind invitation to visit Labouchère Park that day, which we were obliged to decline for want of time, we were pleased to discover that we had two more hours, in which we could easily accomplish a stroll there. By a most singular infelicity, our party became separated; and, misunderstanding each other, we remained waiting for W. till it was too late for us to go, while he, on the other hand, supposing us to have walked before him, was redoubling his speed all the while, hoping to overtake us. In consequence of this, he accomplished the walk to Labouchère Park, and we waited in the dismal depot till it was too late to wait any longer, and finally went into London without him.

After all, imagine our chagrin on being informed that we had not been to the genuine churchyard. The gentleman who wept over the scenes of his early days on the wrong doorstep was not more grievously disappointed. However, he and we could both console ourselves with the reflection VOL. II.

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that the emotion was admirable, and wanted only the right place to make it the most appropriate in the world. The genuine country churchyard, however, was that at Stoke Pogis, which we should have seen had not the fates forbidden our going to Labouchère Park.

DEAR SISTER:

:

LETTER XXIII.

The evening after our return from Windsor was spent with our kind friends, Mr. and Mrs. Gurney. Mr. Gurney is rector of Mary-le-Bone parish, one of the largest districts in London; and he is, I have been told, one of the court chaplains; a man of the most cultivated and agreeable manners, earnestly and devoutly engaged in the business of his calling. As one of the working men of the church establishment, I felt a strong interest in his views and opinions, and he seemed to take no less interest in mine, as coming from a country where there is and can be no church establishment. He asked many questions about America; the general style of our preaching; the character of our theology; our modes of religious action; our revivals of religion; our theories of sudden and instantaneous conversion, as distinguished from the gradual conversion of education; our temperance societies, and the stand taken by our clergy in behalf of temperance.

He wished to know how the English style of preaching appeared to me in comparison with that of America. I told him one principal difference that struck me was, that the English preaching did not recognize the existence of any element of inquiry or doubt in the popular mind; that it treated certain truths as axioms, which only needed to be stated to be bclieved; whereas in American sermons there is always more or less time employed in explaining, proving, and answering

objections to, the truths enforced. I quoted Baptist Noel's sermon in illustration of what I meant.

I asked him to what extent the element of scepticism, with regard to religious truth, had pervaded the mind of England? adding that I had inferred its existence there from such novels as those of Kingsley. He thought that there was much of this element, particularly in the working classes; that they were coming to regard the clergy with suspicion, and to be less under their influence than in former times; and said it was a matter of much solicitude to know how to reach them.

I told him that I had heard an American clergyman, who had travelled in England, say, that dissenters were treated much as free negroes were in America, and added that my experience must have been very exceptional, or the remark much overstated, as I had met dissenting clergymen in all circles of society. He admitted that there might be a good deal of bigotry in this respect, but added that the infrequency of association was more the result of those circumstances which would naturally draw the two parties to themselves, than to superciliousness on the side of the establishment, adding that where a court and aristocracy were in the established church, there would necessarily be a pressure of fashion in its favor, which might at times bring uncomfortable results.

The children were sitting by studying their evening lessons, and I begged Mrs. Gurney to allow me to look over their geographies and atlases; and on her inquiring why, I told her that well-informed people in England sometimes made such unaccountable mistakes about the geography of our country as were quite surprising to me, and that I did not understand how it was that our children should know so much more about