This Nautical Style Of Bidding Their Friends Farewell
Our Germans Have Learned From The English.
The cliff where we
landed was white and chalky, and as the distance was not great, nor
other means of conveyance at hand, we resolved to go on foot to
Dartford:
Immediately on landing we had a pretty steep hill to
climb, and that gained, we arrived at the first English village,
where an uncommon neatness in the structure of the houses, which in
general are built with red bricks and flat roofs, struck me with a
pleasing surprise, especially when I compared them with the long,
rambling, inconvenient, and singularly mean cottages of our
peasants. We now continued our way through the different villages,
each furnished with his staff, and thus exhibited no remote
resemblance of a caravan. Some few people who met us seemed to
stare at us, struck, perhaps, by the singularity of our dress, or
the peculiarity of our manner of travelling. On our route we passed
a wood where a troop of gipsies had taken up their abode around a
fire under a tree. The country, as we continued to advance, became
more and more beautiful. Naturally, perhaps, the earth is
everywhere pretty much alike, but how different is it rendered by
art! How different is that on which I now tread from ours, and
every other spot I have ever seen. The soil is rich even to
exuberance, the verdure of the trees and hedges, in short the whole
of this paradisaical region is without a parallel! The roads too
are incomparable; I am astonished how they have got them so firm and
solid; every step I took I felt, and was conscious it was English
ground on which I trod.
We breakfasted at Dartford. Here, for the first time, I saw an
English soldier, in his red uniform, his hair cut short and combed
back on his forehead, so as to afford a full view of his fine,
broad, manly face. Here too I first saw (what I deemed a true
English fight) in the street, two boys boxing.
Our little party now separated, and got into two post-chaises, each
of which hold three persons, though it must be owned three cannot
sit quite so commodiously in these chaises as two: the hire of a
post-chaise is a shilling for every English mile. They may be
compared to our extra posts, because they are to be had at all
times. But these carriages are very neat and lightly built, so that
you hardly perceive their motion as they roll along these firm
smooth roads; they have windows in front, and on both sides. The
horses are generally good, and the postillions particularly smart
and active, and always ride on a full trot. The one we had wore his
hair cut short, a round hat, and a brown jacket of tolerable fine
cloth, with a nosegay in his bosom. Now and then, when he drove
very hard, he looked round, and with a smile seemed to solicit our
approbation.
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