The fondness for rural life among the higher classes of the
English has had a great and salutary effect upon the national
character. I do not know a finer race of men than the English
gentlemen. Instead of the softness and effeminacy which
characterize the men of rank in most countries, they exhibit a
union of elegance and strength, a robustness of frame and
freshness of complexion, which I am inclined to attribute to
their living so much in the open air, and pursuing so eagerly the
invigorating recreations of the country. The hardy exercises
produce also a healthful tone of mind and spirits, and a
manliness and simplicity of manners, which even the follies and
dissipations of the town cannot easily pervert, and can never
entirely destroy. In the country, too, the different orders of
society seem to approach more freely, to be more disposed to
blend and operate favorably upon each other. The distinctions
between them do not appear to be so marked and impassable as in
the cities. The manner in which property has been distributed
into small estates and farms has established a regular gradation
from the noblemen, through the classes of gentry, small landed
proprietors, and substantial farmers, down to the laboring
peasantry; and while it has thus banded the extremes of society
together, has infused into each intermediate rank a spirit of
independence.
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