there are four flourishing stables which let horses by the hour. Every one is well-dressed, and I think there are few houses where meat is not eaten twice a day-few where the floors are not carpeted and the rooms well furnished with expensive furniture. A good average house rents for £40 sterling a year, but most of them are owned by their occupants. The taxes amount to one and onequarter per cent. on the assessed value of real and personal property, but a skilled laborer worth a thousand pounds can pay his annual tax by sixteen to eighteen days' labor. The only sufferers from the taxation are those who own unproductive real estate, and are not laborers. These are very few. There is a savings bank in the town, which has been established only a few years, but its deposits amount to £65,000 sterling, and large amounts are known to be deposited in out-of-town banks. The town has no debt of any consequence. So far as its material prosperity is concerned, European socialists could hardly dream of a higher ideal. No rich, no poor,* no tyrannical landlords or manufacturers, and no oppressed laborers; but all enjoying everything that is essential to human development. this exists, however, without the overthrow of either the Church or the State; and infidel beer-drinking German reformers might be surprised to learn that this happy state of society is due largely to the moral and religious character of the people. There is not a liquor-shop or beer-garden in the town, and hardly a man who ever takes anything stronger than tea or coffee. This is the most astonishing change which has taken place in the town in these fifty years. It is the result of a combination of moral influences and legal enactments. Neither would have accomplished much without the other, but for many years the laws were of a mild type, and the law of the State now is a local-option law. The change has been brought about chiefly by moral means, and at the outset required great personal sacrifices on the part of many leading so far as I can learn, there is not a family in the village poor enough to need charitable aid. Even the Irish families are not poor. But there is much that is peculiar and worthy of consideration in this material growth. It is remarkable that the population of the whole township has increased during this period only about twenty-five per cent., and that while land in the village has risen in value one thousand per cent., in other parts of the town it is worth no more, and in many cases much less, than it was fifty years ago. A farm of two hundred acres, two miles from the village, may now be purchased for much less than the cost of the buildings upon it. The amount of forest land has increased at least twenty-five per cent., and many houses have been moved bodily from the farms into the village. At the same time that the farmers have been moving from their farms into the village, all of the old manufactories have died a natural death. The cotton factories were too small to compete with those at Lowell and Fall River. The furnaces could not compete with those in England and Pennsylvania. Wrought nails were superseded by those made by machinery, and competition destroyed the manufacture of agricultural implements. The valuable water-power in the town now works but a single mill, and that is a new one for woollen goods. Steam factories have been erected in the village for shoes, hats, needles, and boxes, but the value of the goods manufactured .is not greater than it was fifty years ago. Once outside the village, the ruined mills and deserted farms speak rather of decay than of prosperity. In many parts of New England the Irish have come in and occupied the old farms, but here the rocky soil seems to be unattractive even to them. The farmers who are left are now beginning to devote themselves to the production of fruit, vegetables, and other things, which find a ready market in the neighboring cities, while they buy their corn from the West. In this way they can live with comfort, although they would probably all be glad to sell their farms and move into the village. The people of the village seem to be industrious, for there are no idle men seen in the streets, and it is difficult to find an extra laborer when one is needed. Every one seems to live in comparative luxury, although there is not a man in the town worth £20,000 sterling, and very few worth £5,000. A very large number of families keep a horse and carriage, and All * There are persons in the township who receive aid from the town; nineteen superannuated or incompetent persons are very comfortably supported in the almslast year at their homes on account of illness or calamity house; thirty men and twenty-nine women received aid of some kind. The whole amount expended by the and aid to individuals was about one thousand pounds. town (population 5,500) for the support of the almshouse Very few of the fifty-nine persons aided were entitled to it, and it would undoubtedly have been better for them and for the community if they had been left to the care of their neighbors and friends. In England not one of them would have applied for aid. men. The result has fully repaid them. I do not find that men save all or even a greater part of the money formerly spent on drink. They spend it, however, for the comfort of their families, and for luxuries which elevate rather than degrade them. The gain in the increased happiness in family life is incalculable. The general moral character of the people is very good-better on the whole than it was fifty years ago, although some persons are of the opinion that men do not realize their obligation to pay their debts as fully as they did before the abolition of imprisonment for debt. Whatever may be the cause, it must be confessed that public sentiment is not what it ought to be on this subject in town or country, in New England or Old England. One result of the change in the law is that in most of the shops in the village no credit is given, which is an advantage to the buyer as well as the seller. Crime is not more common than it was fifty years ago, and is confined almost exclusively to the foreign population; but before the passage of a severe law last year against tramps, the country was overrun with them, and the people learned to use locks upon their doors. The law was effectual, and tramps have disappeared from the State. Religion is the basis of morality, and there has certainly been a steady growth in the religious character of the population of the town. There are now four churches in the village, and six others in what formerly constituted the township. Fifty per cent. of the village population are to be found in the churches every Sabbath, and religious meetings are well attended two or three evenings in the week. The preaching is less doctrinal and more practical, and sectarian distinctions have much less influence. There is a frequent interchange of pulpits by clergymen of different denominations, and union meetings are very common. There is a kindly feeling even towards the Roman Catholics. The only modern form of unbelief which seems to have gained any place in the town is Spiritualism. A few years ago this threatened to make serious inroads upon the Churches, and regular services are still maintained by believers, but it seems to have spent its force, and is now rapidly losing ground. There are atheists, Agnostics, Positivists, and other unbelievers, in the town, as there were fifty years ago; but they are not numerous, and have little influence. The Sabbath is not generally observed with as much strictness as it was, but it is still a day of rest and religious worship. The spirit of the Puritans is still dominant. In education it is generally believed by the people that they are far in advance of their fathers. There have certainly been great changes in many respects. There are five hundred daily papers taken in the town. A weekly and a monthly are published there, and every family takes at least one weekly paper. There is a town library of three thousand volumes, very well selected, and the number of volumes taken out during the last year was 20,804. This library, curiously enough, is supported by a tax on dogs, which produces a hundred pounds a year. Music and art are cultivated in the town, which boasts of several very fair painters and musicians. Public lectures are common, and there are several literary societies. In the olden times it was a very rare thing for any one to leave the town except on business, but now there is almost a mania for travel. Almost half the families in the village go to some wateringplace in the summer, and a number have cottages on one of the islands off the coast, where is to be seen a new variety of American social life, which is worthy of a study by itself. The home life of a New Englander is ordinarily as private and exclusive as that of an Englishman, but here everything is reversed. Every door is open, and life is made as public as possible. For amusements they have an endless round - religious meetings, conventions, lectures, and concerts, with seabathing and fishing. Some ten thousand person congregate at this unique watering-place every summer. Martha's Vineyard, as the island is called, is far better worth a visit than aristocratic Newport. I know of no place like it in the world. This summer life, and the more extended travel, which is very common, is no doubt a species of education which was known fifty years ago, and has a certain value along with some disadvantages. un But the great pride of the village is its public schools, on which the town expends a thousand pounds a year, in addition to another thousand on the sev enteen schools in other parts of the township. The village schools are six, with eleven teachers and about five hundred scholars. They are called the primary, higher primary, lower intermediate, intermediate, grammar, and high schools. Two of the teachers are men, with salaries of £17 and £24 a month. The others are the roads must be broad and straight; there is also a general impression that there cannot be too many roads. After leaving the village, the town is a labyrinth of roads, cut in all directions through the wild woods, wide enough for a city, but often not used once a day. But there is not a rod of paved or macadamized road in the township. The bridges are as unsatisfactory as the roads. women, with salaries of from £6 to £10 The superficial nature of our education a month. There are sixty scholars in the is seen in many things, which prove that high school, which has a four years' even New England villages have not yet course, and in which instruction is given attained any utopian perfection. They in Greek, Latin, French, mathematics as are much nearer perfection than our cities, far as surveying, physiology, natural bis- however. There is no fraud or corruption tory, physical geography, English litera- in the administration, but there is a great ture, history, geology, chemistry, phys- deal of extravagance and stupidity in ics, botany, and civil government. All many cases. Within twenty years the the schools are free, and scholars living taxes have been doubled without any corat a distance are brought to school at the responding advantages, and in some towns expense of the town. They usually enter tripled. In the town of which I am writthe high school at the age of fourteen. ing £1,700 was expended on roads, and The buildings for the village schools are this is about the usual annual expendicommodious, but less expensive than ture; but there is not a properly-built those in many other towns. The mate- road in the town. On this subject the rial arrangements are good, and the disci- authorities have only two ideas pline is strict; but it may be questioned whether there is much real improvement over the old district schools of fifty years ago. There is more display and more expense, but a well-known American writer has lately condemned the public schools of this State as utterly impracticable and unscientific, as a cross between a cotton factory and a model prison. This is an extreme view, but it is true that they are unpractical, superficial, and, to some ex- Another illustration of a different kind tent at least, adapted to discourage the will show another phase of the results of taste for honest labor, and to develop self- our educational system. I think it is an conceit rather than solid learning. There acknowledged fact that our judges, laware many who question very seriously the yers, and physicians, if not our clergy as propriety of giving a high-school educa- a whole, are not so thoroughly educated tion at the expense of the State, who fear as they were a generation ago. In this that we are raising up a class of dema- village, for example, out of six doctors of gogues too proud to work, too ignorant to medicine only one has had even a nomiearn their living in the learned profes-nally complete education. I think the sions, and accustomed to look to the same thing is true of the majority of the State for aid, who will make the most dan- lawyers. The people are not educated up gerous and unscrupulous of politicians. to the point of appreciating the value of The State should furnish to all a plain, thorough education. There is no country practical education, scientifically adapted in the civilized world where ignorant to make better farmers, mechanics, and quacks and deliberate swindlers obtain merchants, and leave all higher education the patronage from respectable people to be paid for by those who can appreciate that they do in America. According to it. The history of America, especially the theory, the legislators and public of our public men, shows that poverty is men of the country ought to have steadily no hindrance to genius, that free sec- improved in quality as the number of eduondary education is not necessary to cated men brought forward by the freestimulate those who are qualified to appre- school system increased; but it is a ciate it. Such views are not popular now, generally acknowledged fact that our legbecause there is a vague belief among islative assemblies and politicians have the people that free education is a natural rather deteriorated. There seems to be right, and universal education a panacea something wrong in the system, which for all the evils in the land. Common not only brings forward inferior men, but sense will no doubt prevail in the end, also teaches the people to be satisfied but blind sentiment rules at present, even with such men. There are, of course, in New England. We are not yet pre- thoroughly educated men, and great men, pared to offer our free-school system to in high official positions. The presidentEngland as a model for her to follow. elect, Mr. Garfield, is not only a statesWe have still too much to learn our-man, but a scholar; but who are the men selves. who are to represent New England in the next Congress? How do they compare | New-Castle. Tea and iced claret-cup are with the great men of past generations? liberally provided; and the elders lounge They are generally honest and respecta- and chat, and the young folks flirt and ble men, for which we are duly thankful; play tennis, and occasionally get up an but very few of them have ever been impromptu dance. thought of as men of superior ability, and the culture of Boston is represented by a German Jew who deals in ready-made clothing. This is no doubt an honorable calling, and there are worse and weaker men in Congress than he; but it is not the old style of New England statesmen. This is a digression. To return to our New England village. While it is by no means perfect, it certainly comes nearer to an ideal village than anything I have seen in Europe. There is absolute civil and religious liberty. Even public opinion is not tyrannical there. Individual rights are respected, without any infringement upon the dignity and supremacy of the law. The people are moral and religious, without being uncharitable or fanatical. There are no social castes, not even such as a late writer in the Times declares must exist in all communities. The people are contented and happy. They are intelligent, acquainted with what goes on in the world, believe in progress, and contribute freely not only to support their own institutions, but for the enlightenment of the world. It is not strange that they believe in the form of government which secures all this to them, nor that they honor their English ancestors, whose wisdom and piety were the foundation of New England society. A NON-RESIDENT AMERICAN. From Chambers' Journal. CHAPTER IV. A WEST INDIAN STORM AND ITS CON- THE next few days passed over pleasantly enough. We lounged and read and played lawn-tennis in the evenings. We returned the visits of our neighbors, and lunched or dined with them, as the case might be. In all, four or five families were dotted about the hills within visiting distance, and visiting is the business of life in the Jamaican hills. Not by any means the formal visits which bore us at home-quite the contrary. Almost every lady in the hills has her "day," when all her neighbors assemble, and the officers come up from the camp, and down from But in addition to this, Jamaican hill ladies are almost always really at home; and the intimacy between them, on account of their isolation, is much more familiar than is usual in England. So if Mrs. A. feels bored, she slips on a ridingskirt, and goes over to lunch and spend the afternoon with Mrs. B., leaving word for her husband to call for her when he comes up from the plains. And Mrs. B. in her turn does the same. Then a house in the Jamaican hills is seldom or never without one or more guests. Every house has spare rooms; and the mode of living is so simple, that the addition of one or two to the family circle reckons but little in point of cost. Expensive luxuries are unobtainable, and the ordinary articles of consumption are fairly cheap. Beef is sixpence, mutton one shilling, per pound, all the year round; while vegetables, fruit, etc., which, as I mentioned before, are brought to the door for sale by the country people, are very cheap. Besides, official salaries in Jamaica are not large, so that any attempt at extravagance or display would be looked on with little favor in the hills. Nothing pleases a lowland young lady so much as an invitation to spend some time in the hills. Life there has a picnic flavor about it, which is a delicious relief to the dust and glare and monotony of the plains, so that invitations are freely given and gladly accepted. Strenuous attempts are made, and in most cases successfully, to prevent the intrusion of the demon ennui. Every man-of-war which touches at Port-Royal has invitations freely accorded to its officers; then a dance is arranged, and young ladies come riding over the hills for miles to enjoy it. The soldiers flock down from New-Castle. Everybody has one or more guests billeted on him, and dancing is kept up with a spirit unknown at home; so that life in the Jamaican hills rubs on not uncomfortably on the whole. One day was spent in an expedition to Flamstead, the governor's hill residence. It being a two hours' ride, first down hill to Gordontown, and then up the other side of the valley, we started at eleven A.M., the major, Mrs. Edgeware, and myself, and reached Flamstead about one P.M. The house is a small, unpretending place, but commands magnificent views of the bay. We were hospitably welcomed by | ing play over every level yard of ground, Sir Anthony Musgrave the governor, and and the thunder rumbling and roaring Lady Musgrave; and after luncheon, nearer and nearer every minute. At strolled over to Little Flamstead, the hill | Gordontown, the slender stream we had residence of the commodore of the sta- crossed in the morning was now a raging tion, which is close by. yellow flood. A very pretty little place is Flamstead "Another twenty minutes will do it," the Lesser, with its flower garden sur- said the major, cantering over the bridge; rounded by a fence all straggling over "and then for a B. and S. and a tub. with jessamine on one side, and its neat By Jove!" The exclamation was caused kitchen garden on the other. In the for- by a vivid flash of lightning, accompanied mer, the commodore pointed out to us an by a most appalling clap of thunder. English holly, the only one in the island. Flash and report were absolutely simultaIn front of the cottage is a heliograph, neous. Across the hideous, steely glare with which the commodore can communi- I saw the forked lightning flickering like cate by flashing signals with Port-Royal a silver ribbon. As for the thunder, it and the ships in the harbor. Everything was simply one dull crash, as if a hammer inside and outside the cottage was trim had struck the mountain; and then all and orderly and shipshape, with the trim- was still save the fierce rushing of the ness and order which sailors' hands only rain. I confess I was startled; but as my can produce. Meantime, as we stood companions did not seem to mind it much, admiring the view, heavy clouds from I said nothing. A quarter of an hour the north-east came pouring up over the later, we got home in a forlorn state. Guava Ridge. In less than ten minutes they had swept up and completely covered the hill on which we were standing. The splendid scenery faded away like a mirage, and a dense, cold mist surrounded us. "We had best be off," said the major; we are going to catch it on the way home." A low muttering of thunder was making itself heard as we put on our waterproofs and rode out of the gate. "The seasons [meaning the rainy seasons, which occur in May and October] are coming, I am sure," said Mrs. Edge ware. "And we shall be all mewed up in the damp for a week, with nothing to do but to stove our clothes." All that day (Thursday), Friday, and Saturday it poured without a moment's intermission. Saturday night was signalized by a thunder-storm which threw into the shade everything of the kind I had previously experienced. From about ten. P.M., when we went to bed, the thunder and lightning never ceased for a moment. About twelve at night I had to get up to close the windows, as the rain was beating in through the venetians; and I confess I didn't like it. The windows of my room looked over the Dutch garden; and in the blinding glare of the successive waves of green, blue, and silver flame that swept across it, every leaf on the bushes, every pebble on the walks, was plainly visible. Through the whole of that awful night of Saturday, October 11, 1879- a night that will long be remembered in Jamaica over all the hideous din of the thunder could be heard the rain, falling ceaselessly, like a shower of bullets, on the shingled roof. I was roused from a troubled sleep next morning by Charley's coming into my room about six A.M. The major's thick boots were covered with mud. a bad business," said he. "This is "Here it comes!" said Charley. Nearly a hundred yards in front, we could see the rain as it came rushing on us, and hear the huge drops, big as half-crowns, pattering on the leaves and branches. Such rain I never saw. In an instant our ponies were as wet as if they had been dragged through a river. Waterproofs, umbrellas, nothing could resist it. It insinuated itself through my umbrella, and came trickling over the peak of my white helmet. It saturated my waterproof, and came pouring over my knees down into my boots. Another moment and the seat of my saddle was as In a few minutes I joined him on the wet as a sponge. Mrs. Edgeware's pretty lawn, where I found him talking to a hat and feather were now a mass of drip- gray-bearded man, the road superintenping pulp. The rain swept away the sur- dent of the district. Here the damage face of the road till it resembled the bed done was plain enough. I have menof a mountain torrent. On we bumped tioned that a border of high lemon-grass in silent misery, the cat-like ponies mak-ran all round the tennis-ground. From "What's the matter?" I asked. 66 as |