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CHAPTER XXIII.

A LAST FAREWELL.

TIME and experience together have united to reveal to the inhabitants of the ancient capitals of Europe what their descendants, in the hemisphere more recently populated, have yet to learn, that air and space are as necessary to the existence of a city as they are to human life.

It is but poor economy to "build up and pull down," though there is doubtless "a time" for both. But this discriminative wisdom is certainly not found in the construction of interminable streets of ill-ventilated houses, built on speculation, and packing away multitudes of pale sedentary inhabitants, whose only hope of escape from the prison, to which they are condemned for a year, is that of a month's reprieve, passed at some noisy, fashionable, uncomfortable watering place.

Happy those who have means, even, for this indulgence. There are thousands to whom such a luxury is denied; and they still drag on their wearied existence "in populous cities pent," advancing, by slow degrees, literally to "dusty death.”

New cities begin by closing up every avenue to health and life, and end by purchasing, at the cost of millions, what, in their first creation, they might have secured for nothing,-the lungs indispensable to both. The capitals of the old world have, doubtless, passed through this ordeal, and at the present day it is marvellous to see how much of the loveliness of nature may be found in the midst of those great cities.

The revolving year had again brought round the month of May, with its buds and blossoms, to revive the freshness of the gardens, the most pleasing feature of the metropolis of France. Those of the Faubourg St. Germain, united, rather than separated, by walls invisible to the eye, from their impervious covering of ivy, conveyed the impression of extensive grounds; and neighboring houses were completely concealed from the view of each other by the leafy screens of trees, clothed with their tender verdure, that rose in soft masses between them.

For a distant promenade, the Luxembourg, the Jardin des Plantes, the never-failing resource of the Bois de Boulogne, and the Champs Élysées, vary the morning or evening drive. For a convenient walk, the garden of the Tuileries is always the favorite.

The peculiar taste of this garden, like that of Versailles on which the Grand Monarque lavished so many millions, will always be a subject of criticism, but who will venture to affirm that both are not beautiful in the month of May? If they are angular, and pompous, and formal in design, yet even where the artist still shapes arches and colonnades out of the foliage, nature in her redundant beauty effaces his work,

breaking through all restraint, and giving freshness and shade and brightness and perfume, wherever she finds her joyous home.

The gigantic marronniers of the Tuileries, if their trunks are planted with quincunx regularity, find freedom in their huge interlacing branches above, and in the foliage that forms an impervious shade beneath; the parterres of flowers, if they are laid off with geometrical precision, have, within their bounds, all the variety of coloring and form that nature can lend to art. The saucy little sparrows are as much at home among the elms trimmed into arches like a Gothic cathedral, as if they were in the grounds of a citizen's country-box,-the fishes frisk in their basins, as merrily as the trout in a mountain stream, though their scales are golden, and their habitation is encircled with marble walls. The children of the artisan and the laborer trundle their hoops and dance as gayly to the music of their nurses' songs, as those of the princes who watch their sports from the windows of the palace that overlook the scene.

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Comparisons," Mrs. Malaprop might truly have are odorous" wherever nature can exercise her sweet influences; and art may regulate, but cannot destroy, her charms. A comparison between Versailles and a Swiss valley, or the Tuileries and an English park, would be as fruitless and unreasonable as to draw a parallel between the costume of a marquise of the court of Louis Quinze and that of the "Hours" of Guido; both depend for success on the natural beauties they adorn.

The return of spring had now restored nature to

her dominion in the metropolis, and the pale votaries of dissipation gratefully exchanged the heated ballroom for fetes de jour, which involved less fatigue and restraint. These assumed the favorite form of the dejeuner, though, in some instances, the breakfast was offered at six o'clock in the afternoon, and the guests remained until midnight, if they were disposed to partake of the dance that succeeded the breakfast, or to indulge in an evening ramble through an illuminated garden.

Of this description was one offered, during the season, by the hospitable and distinguished occupants of "the Embassy" in the rue St. Honoré, known throughout the metropolis by this apparently exclusive title, though one merited by its pre-eminence in seniority as well as style.

The sunlight had ceased to gild the trees around the tapis vert of velvet turf in the garden, and the guests were returning from their rambles toward the ball-room, their gossamer dresses, and bright scarfs, and transparent hats, with light plumes fluttering, appearing and disappearing, among the trees and shrubbery, and giving added life and beauty to their natural charms.

A few colored lamps glittered among the foliage, and served rather to ornament, than to illuminate, the walks of the garden, giving a mysterious light that heightened the illusion of the long imaginary distance to which they extended.

The lively music of the orchestra hastened the steps of the wanderers through these pleasing shades; and they disappeared by pairs into the domain of

Comus. A few only, who seemed to find the fresh evening air more to their taste than the melting glories of the ball-room, still lingered, as if unwilling to exchange certain enjoyment for no less certain discomfort.

In these groups were several ladies, among them Mrs. Melville and Constance. Captain Delamere had joined the walking, instead of the dancing, party.

"Such a scene as this," he said to Constance, "is well suited to increase the regret I feel in abandoning the haunts of civilized men, and exchanging them for the jungles of India.”

"But we have lions here, you perceive, to match the tigers in those jungles,” said Constance, looking archly after a German duke who bowed as he passed them, and whose gorgeous dress was in keeping with his curled wig, rouged cheeks, and other imitations of youth long gone among other wasted and regretted things.

"The lions and tigers are, perhaps, the most interesting portion of the native population of my adopted land," ," said Captain Delamere, "and a hunt is one of the few enjoyments afforded to the dull monotony of our existence. But why should I dwell on a theme which can give me nothing but unmingled pain ?"

"I can well imagine it," replied Constance, "by the feelings I should myself, doubtless, experience in such sad circumstances, though they are not liable to the test yours are compelled to endure. Let us change the subject; there can surely be found a gayer one in so pleasant a place and company."

"And yet," said Captain Delamere, "I find it im

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