The Express.
London, England, 1867-08-20 00:00:00

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TO CORRESPONDINTS
Avertionneote intended for " The Irptien" London immlng
=must be at the Mee, le, lionessio-sinek by Two
on the dm of publication.

HAYMARKET.
TEM EYEsiteo, AN UNEQUAL MATCH. Morn, Baekstene,
Chippendale. Roers, Kendal, Clark Weathersby, de. ; Mes-
dames Sedgylrk, Pilaw em. dc.—TO PARIS AND BACK MR
RS. Mr. Buckstene.—And PETER SMIRK.

riPtclPrL

Tins Eyrrtwo. THE DAY ♦FnK3 THE WIDDINCL—THE
MAN 0' A 111.1.111. James Harebell, Mr. Herman Veda; Moms.
N. Price. Forrester. ()realm, Maclean, and 611erton ; Massa Z.
Innate, Nally Moore, dic.—And AN UNPROTECTED "'IMAM

WTANNIA.

Tow STUMM THE LASFWAN ; OE, THE MIRES OF
ZLTHAM ORKEN.—The Brothers Hanlon; Mr. and Mrs. Cole-
man and Mr. W. Brown; Has Champion Skaters: Mr. J. Plump-
eon; Mr. C. Woodman's—And THE LAST SHILLING.

NIGH WAY= AT LONDON BRUM.
Irmo DAT —Warning, 411. Ms— _AA room, mi. IS.
tolloasow—Mands& 611. 34M.. --Afternoon, Sh. Um

LONDON, TUESDAY, AUGUST 20.

This is the season in which the inhabitants of
this island perform their annual exodus. The
call of fashion is imperious : movement becomes
necessary to life, and the restlessness displayed
by swallows in September is exhibited a month
previously by every one who claims to be
fashionable, we had almost said respectable.
In the fresher and perhaps lovelier months of
the year, when the birds are in full cong, when the
orchards are laden with blossoms and the fields
and hedgerows bright with beauty, London is the
only place in which existence is supportable. In
May and June we prefer Hyde-park to Devon-
shire, and the view (after dinner) from the Star
and Garter at Richmond to the grandest scenery
of the Highlands. We leave the country then to
ignorant rustics and ill-conditioned semi-civilized
gentlemen, but at the close of the season the
poetry of our nature periodically bourgeons. We
cry out for mountain air or woodland solituOos,
we study BRADSHAW and MURRAY, we revive oar
French and German—somewhat rusted, perhaps,
from want of use—and we exhibit a most unmis-
takeable aversion to our ordinary habits and
haunts.

It is well in this toil-weary world for all who
can thus escape awhile from their cares—well for
the intellect, for the bodily health, and well
assuredly for the temper. Travel however, like
all other pursuits or recreat'ons, needs to be
entered upon advisedly if we would gain from it
its full benefit. There is one prevalent delusion
about it which it would be doing good service
to remove. Englishmen are apt to imagine that
a foreign tour must under almost all circumstances
be more desirable than a tour in their own coun-
try, that the further they travel from their native
land the greater must be the pleasure, and the
more complete the change. They who hold this
belief are, we think, utterly mistaken. They have
imbibed a vulgar error, and retain it as tenaciously
as if it were an article of faith. No doubt foreign
travel has many and great advantages. Homely
wits may with some justice be attributed to home-
keeping youths. By visiting other nations we
learn our own deficiencies, we increase our stock
of knowledge, we lose the angularity which per-
tains to us as islanders, we gain broader views and
more generous sympathies. All this, and much
more, may be gained even if we keep along the
well-worn macadamized track of continental
tourists.

But then in the greater number of cases these
possibilities of improvement cannot be realized.
We receive but what we give, and the average
Englishman who prides himself upon " doing" the
lions of Europe at railway speed is not likely to be
wiser or happier for his pains. He spends, per-
haps, a hundred pounds instead of fifty, and ima-
gines that he has reaped a corresponding advan-
tage ; yet it is probable that by seeing less and
spending less he would have returned more con-
tented and more richly laden. Neither art nor
nature can bo apprehended at a glance. The beauty
which abides with us, and becomes as it were a
part of our being, must be gazed at lovingly and at
leisure. We must dwell for some space in ita pre-
sence, until it stirs the imagination and touches the
heart. It has been truly said that it is the chance
felicities in minor things that are so pleasant
on a journey ; but of these stray pleasures
the hasty traveller knows nothing. It has been
truly said also that foreign travel is •
part of education, but then it can never form the
preliminary part. COWPER, the poet, has a well-
known passage in which he describes a stupid
youth making the tour of the Continent, and then
returning only to show

How much a dunce that has been sent to Rome

Excel. a dunce that has been kept at borne.
But if travelling abroad is of no service to fools,
it demands to be of much service to sound and
liberal culture ; and even where this culture is
possessed, we hold, with the wise and witty Titoman
leint.rn, that a man should be familiar with his
own country before going over the threshold.

There is beauty enough, there is variety enough
in this island to satisfy the traveller, enough to
stimulate the mind and to gladden the eye. For
simple rural charms England is unequalled by any
European country. Where else will you find such
pleasant homesteads, such picturesque cottages,
such green meadows and park-like uplands, such
shady lanes, or such well-stocked and carefully
tended farms! The land in the tamer
parts of the country is like a garden,
marked, indeed, everywhere with man's
handiwork, yet full also of natural grace and un-
adorned loveliness. And for those who desire it
there is scenery of a higher order in Westmore-
land and Cumberland—mountains and lakes ; in
Devonshire and Cornwall a noble sea coast, as well
an a magnificent inland country ; in Yorkshire,
dale and moor scenery, said to be only excelled
by certain portions of the Spanish Pyrenees ;
while the tourist, without leaving the United
Kingdom, will find in Wales, in the Scotch High-
lands, and in the south and west of Ireland
scenery which to know as it deserves to be known
would require months of travel. But if there