Into the Country
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INTO THE COUNTRY.
Just now there is nothing very exciting on the carpet. The anticipated war with England has collapsed into the most unmitigated fizzle; the war with the Mormons is nowhere, the many-wived Saints declining to show fight; the threatened civil war in New Orleans has quieted down and peace once more reigns in that turbulent city. Nothing has come of either of these imbroglios, and now that the hot weather is upon us, it is well that it is so. The idea of taking up the morning paper with the thermometer at ninety and being obliged to read about blood and battles, killed and wounded, until the sulphureous odor begins to taint the very aroma of one's coffee seems to us far from being a pleasant and desirable one. Fighting and slaughter have nothing in common with the sweet influences of the leafy month of June. The name suggests far other pictures, sights and sounds. It tells of green, waving trees, many-toned harps for the wandering breezes to sweep music from; of the musical murmur of brooks, slipping down moss-grown stones with endless laughter; of rustic farm-houses with their delicious country cheer; of rural walks and talks; of health-giving rambles during the day and refreshing sleep at night; of all the thousand marks and signs that tell us that God made the country and man the town.
The eyes of the fashionable world will soon be turned in good earnest toward the usual summer resorts: soon the Saratoga trunks will be packed and there will be, to use the snobbish phrase, "no one in town." Europe, however, will be the haven for the crème de la crème this year. The pretty dears have already begun to turn up their noses at the watering-places, "they're getting so horridly common." and even Niagara has got to be a bore of the first magnitude, and the White Mountains a mere chain of commonplace, uninteresting hills. "No!" exclaims the matronly lady and fair [cut away] nothing. Let us get a sight of "cloud capped Jura," and read Byron on the bosom of "clear, placid Leman" and see the dear, delightful Rhine, with its romantically dilapidated castles and all that!" This is the way of all the monied aristocracy this year, and our foreign friends must expect a regular invasion of dollared Americans, who will doubtless give them a capital notion of our progress in intellect and refinement.
But the rank and file of the people who don't live in brown stone fronts and are glad to get a couple of weeks "up the river" during the Summer months will enjoy themselves far better after all. They will leave the city behind them, and sink the shop and have a good old-fashioned time. As they can't get the Rhine they will find the Hudson a pretty good substitute and in lieu of the Alps they will accept the Catskills thankfully. And so as this warm South wind, "Made for Beauty and a still magnificence," steals gently through the open casements and reminds us of the Junes that are past and of the old haunts of times long gone, we can only wish them success in their journeyings when the time of "flitting" comes, and ask a portion of their commiseration for those unfortunates who for their sins are cooped up in city offices during the dog-days and, like Sterne's starling, "can't get out."