abroad are aware of the abuse heaped on them by their less fortunate brethren who are obliged to remain at home?

There is some reason for complaint too, as thousands of Americans who know every corner of Paris and every studio in Rome have never seen Niagara, much less California. Patriotic persons shake their heads and sigh over the enormous amount of money taken out of the country and spent in London, Paris, Switzerland, and Italy, whilst the magnificent scenery of their own country is neglected. But it must be remembered that-irrespective of the fact that travelling is much cheaper in Europe than in the United States, and that the cost of living at American watering-places and at all favourite resorts is so enormous that a whole family can enjoy some months of European travel for the same sum that a short sojourn at any of these fashionable places would entail the Old World offers many attractions that are wanting in the New World.

In the first place, the social attractions afforded by the capitals of Europe are vastly superior to those of America. Then there are the charms of antiquity, of historical and artistic association; the wonderful picture-galleries, the museums, the sculpture; everything, in short, to gratify the tastes of the merest tyro as well as those of the most cultivated connoisseur.

Can there be a more memorable

era in the

life of anyone than that of the day when he first enters Rome? After having seen Rome, Naples, and Athens he is not likely to care for Chicago or San Francisco.

Ergo, it would be well for Americans first to study thoroughly their native land and afterwards to cross the Atlantic. The delights of European travel for ladies far outbid anything that can be offered in the New World. But for men, or rather for sportsmen, America offers an unrivalled field. After all, those who complain of American absenteeism must remember that the majority of their countrymen, having once seen Europe, are imbued with an irrepressible longing to return to their own land; firmly resolved not to leave it again.

To this class belong those who are always craving for change of scene and fresh excitement; those who rush through grand scenery, and who after several days' journey to some celebrated spot remain there two minutes, just to say they have been there.'

Not that this class is confined to America, though I think it thrives there in greater perfection than elsewhere.

Californians, above all, are eager to return to their country. But they have their unrivalled climate to urge as an excuse for hurried visits to less favoured lands. And truly the climate of California is marvellous. Fresh and exhilarating air, a clear blue

sunny sky-equalled perhaps in Colorado and British Columbia, but in few other places-and a wonderful evenness of temperature, combine to make California a most charmingly attractive country to those who have once had experience of its delights.

The great, strong, and wildly rushing rivers, and the grand scenery of the West, seem to have imparted something of their freedom and character to the inhabitants. There is an absence among them of that narrowness, that mental tight-lacing, which squeezes all charity out of human nature, and which is so characteristic of the Old World; and there is the presence of an open-hearted fellowship between man and man, of a rare and generous kind.

With this tribute to the Far West I close the record

of my 'Western Wanderings.' To those who have perused its pages, and have thus, as it were, wandered with me, I will only say-I shall be content if they lay it down with a better knowledge than they had before of the distant Evening Land.

LONDON: PRINTED BY

SPOTTISWOODE AND CO., NEW-STREET SQUARE

AND PARLIAMENT STREET