Their day may be not yet; before such a
change can come, the nation must find rest--the pulse of this great,
restless, thriving people must beat less quickly, they must know (as the
Greeks knew it) the meaning of the word 'repose.'
It was a good sign, we thought, when Felix Darley, an American artist on
a tour through Europe (a '5000 dollar run' is, we believe, the correct
expression), on arriving at Liverpool, was content to go quietly down
the Wye, and visit our old abbeys and castles, such as Tintern and
Kenilworth, instead of taking the express train for London; and it is to
the many signs of culture and taste for art, which we meet with daily,
in intercourse with travellers from the western continent, that we look
with confidence to a great revolution in taste and manners.[58]
To these, then (whom we may be allowed to look upon as pioneers of a new
and more artistic civilization), and to our many readers on the other
side of the Atlantic, we would draw attention to the towns in Normandy,
as worthy of examination, before they pass away from our eyes; towns
where 'art is still religion,'--towns that were built before the age of
utilitarianism, and when expediency was a thing unknown. To young
America we say--'Come and see the buildings of old France; there is
nothing like them in the western world, neither the wealth of San
Francisco, nor the culture of its younger generation, can, at present,
produce anything like them.
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