I Was
Weary Of Travelling Four Or Five Hours, Never Meeting A Carriage,
And Scarcely A Peasant; And Then To
Stop at such wretched huts as I
had seen in Sweden was surely sufficient to chill any heart awake to
Sympathy, and throw a gloom over my favourite subject of
contemplation, the future improvement of the world.
The farmhouses, likewise, with the huge stables, into which we drove
whilst the horses were putting to or baiting, were very clean and
commodious. The rooms, with a door into this hall-like stable and
storehouse in one, were decent; and there was a compactness in the
appearance of the whole family lying thus snugly together under the
same roof that carried my fancy back to the primitive times, which
probably never existed with such a golden lustre as the animated
imagination lends when only able to seize the prominent features.
At one of them, a pretty young woman, with languishing eyes of
celestial blue, conducted us into a very neat parlour, and observing
how loosely and lightly my little girl was clad, began to pity her
in the sweetest accents, regardless of the rosy down of health on
her cheeks. This same damsel was dressed - it was Sunday - with taste
and even coquetry, in a cotton jacket, ornamented with knots of blue
ribbon, fancifully disposed to give life to her fine complexion. I
loitered a little to admire her, for every gesture was graceful;
and, amidst the other villagers, she looked like a garden lily
suddenly rearing its head amongst grain and corn-flowers. As the
house was small, I gave her a piece of money rather larger than it
was my custom to give to the female waiters - for I could not prevail
on her to sit down - which she received with a smile; yet took care
to give it, in my presence, to a girl who had brought the child a
slice of bread; by which I perceived that she was the mistress or
daughter of the house, and without doubt the belle of the village.
There was, in short, an appearance of cheerful industry, and of that
degree of comfort which shut out misery, in all the little hamlets
as I approached Hamburg, which agreeably surprised me.
The short jackets which the women wear here, as well as in France,
are not only more becoming to the person, but much better calculated
for women who have rustic or household employments than the long
gowns worn in England, dangling in the dirt.
All the inns on the road were better than I expected, though the
softness of the beds still harassed me, and prevented my finding the
rest I was frequently in want of, to enable me to bear the fatigue
of the next day. The charges were moderate, and the people very
civil, with a certain honest hilarity and independent spirit in
their manner, which almost made me forget that they were innkeepers,
a set of men - waiters, hostesses, chambermaids, &c., down to the
ostler, whose cunning servility in England I think particularly
disgusting.
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