Page:Over fen and wold; (IA overfenwold00hissiala).pdf/135

 have changed, the spirit still remains. The English country strikes me as a land of magnificent mansions and humble cottages."

I was so struck by this statement of views, that on my return home I looked up the works of some American authors who have written about England, to gather what they might say on the subject, and I found that John Burroughs, in an appreciative essay on English scenery in his Winter Sunshine, writes his impressions of it thus:—"To American eyes the country seems quite uninhabited, there are so few dwellings and so few people. Such a landscape at home would be dotted all over with thrifty farmhouses, each with its group of painted out-*buildings, and along every road and highway would be seen the well-to-do turnouts of the independent freeholders. But in England the dwellings of the poor people, the farmers, are so humble and inconspicuous, and are really so far apart, and the halls and the country-seats of the aristocracy are so hidden in the midst of vast estates, that the landscape seems almost deserted, and it is not till you see the towns and great cities that you can understand where so vast a population keeps itself." It is interesting sometimes "to see ourselves as others see us," and never was I more entertained than by hearing the outspoken opinions upon England and the English of a notable Japanese official whom I met in California, and who confided to me his ideas and views of things British, imagining I was an American citizen all the time, and I did not undeceive him.

On our map we saw Alconbury Hill marked