climate. But our climate is active and intellectual,
especially in winter, and in all seasons more pure and transparent than
the inking skies of Europe. It sustains the infancy of beauty--why not
its maturity? It spares the bud--why not the opened blossom, or the
ripened fruit? Our negroes are perfect in their teeth--why not the
whites? The chief preservation of beauty in any country is health, and
there is no place in which this great interest is so little attended to
as in America. To be sensible of this, you must visit Europe--you must
see the deep bosomed maids of England upon the Place Vendome and the Rue
Castiglione."

I have quoted this passage, because I think Mr Sanderson is not just in
these slurs upon his fair countrywomen. I acknowledge that a bad temper
does not directly proceed from climate, although sickness and suffering,
occasioned by climate, may directly produce it. As for the snub nose, I
agree with him, that climate has not so much to do with that. Mr
Sanderson is right in saying, that the chief preservative of beauty is
health; but may I ask him, upon what does health depend but upon
_exercise_? and if so, how many days are there in the American summer in
which the heat will admit of exercise, or in the American winter in
which it is possible for women to _walk_ out? for carriage driving is
not exercise, and if it were, from the changes in the weather in
America, it will always be dangerous. The fact is, that the climate
will not admit of the exercise necessary for health, unless by running
great risks, and very often contracting cold and chills, which end in
consumption and death. To accuse his countrywomen of natural indolence,
is unfair; it is an indolence forced upon them. As for the complexions
of the females, I consider they are much injured by the universal use of
close stoves, so necessary in the extremity of the winters. Mr S's
implication, that because negroes have perfect teeth, therefore so
should the whites, is another error. The negroes were born for, and in,
a torrid clime, and there is some difference between their strong ivory
masticators and the transparent pearly teeth which so rapidly decay in
the eastern states, from no other cause than the variability of the
climate. Besides, do the teeth of the women in the western states decay
so fast? Take a healthy situation, with an intermediate climate, such
as Cincinnati, and you will there find not only good teeth, but a