rural districts generally, and in suburbs and wretched
towns, beauty and culture are at a lower ebb. I now refer to that form of
beauty which is dependent upon personal accomplishments and intellectual
endowments and culture--that beauty which beams from an intellectual
countenance and sparkles from eyes that glisten with pleasure. That is the
kind of beauty that renders 90 per cent. of the individuals in all
cultivated society acceptable, and 20 per cent. charming and attractive,
but which is wanting to nine tenths of those who cannot, or do not, pay
attention to cultivation and refinement. There are a very few persons
whose forms and features please and fascinate even without the aid of
accomplishments. These may be said to be possessed of _native_ beauty,
which is met with very seldom in all countries that have a climate
unfavorable to health. If I had not gone to Italy, I should not have
hesitated to give my preference to the mild climate of Paris, where health
and beauty are the natural result of a warm temperature, almost
semi-tropical in mildness, and where the highest art assists to make every
grace shine. But when I saw how nature dotes upon Italy, I felt as if she
was only acting the step-mother to the rest of the world. The loveliest
portion of Italy is the valley of the Po. One sees fewer sickly or
consumptive people in some parts of England, France and Germany, than in
our section of America, but in Turin and Milan every person looks hale,
healthy, happy and beautiful, from the tender days of infancy to a ripe
old age.

Nothing that I saw in Europe surprised me more than to come so suddenly
into the midst of a people whose very countenance bear the bloom of youth,
even until the gray locks of age appear.

Old age even knows no wingles here! I know that it seems incredible to any
one that has never been in warmer climes, but the word beauty has a new
meaning here. The glow which is lambent upon the faces of the sons and
daughters of this section of sunny Italy, is something that I never saw
elsewhere, and that cannot be described. It is a solemn truth, that nine
tenths of all the ladies of Turin and Milan are perfect beauties; and I
need not say less for the full round forms of the gentlemen. Only after I
had observed that several very fair persons, who happened, to pass near
me, had gray hair, did I notice that the bloom of youth still glows upon
the faces of those who are 35 to 40 years of age! When I firs