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68 displeases you, my dear Madam?' said I. 'Why,' she answered, 'it is terribly out of the way; down in the very right-hand corner of the world.' The chart being mine, I cut it in two through the meridian of Iceland, transposed the parts laterally, and turned them upside down. 'Now,' asked I, 'where is England?' 'Ah, boy,' she replied, 'you may do what you like with the map; but you can't twist the world about in that manner, though they are making sad changes in it.'

"Enough of my grandmother. But, notwithstanding the great increase of knowledge which she deplored, English people generally do consider New Holland 'terribly out of the way.' Out of the way of what? Of England? Yes; but is every part of the world a pleasant or hateful residence, only according to its facilities of communication with England? Any people, no doubt, must be the better for communication with the most civilized people in the world; but the degree of intercourse between nations is not entirely regulated by distance. Indeed, distance has very little to do with it; as appears by comparing the case of France and Spain, with that of England and India. Perhaps, if there were no restrictions on trade, the greatest difference of temperature, which involves considerable distance, would cause the greatest degree of intercourse, by means of the greatest difference of production, and the greatest motive for exchange. But, however this may be, I suspect that those who despise New Holland on account of its being out of the way of England, would, if they could be forced to think on the subject, acknowledge that they do not mean exactly what they say. Comparing the inhabitants of Pest, for example, with those of Calcutta, they would see that wealth and civilization are not measured by the longitude from Greenwich; and a glance at Loo-Choo might convince them, if Captain Hall was not deceived, that happiness does not depend on geographical position with respect to England. But without inquiry, a