And, really, the result is good and
beautiful. It is a home,--an institution which we Americans have not;
but then I doubt whether anybody is entitled to a home in this world, in
so full a sense.
The day was very cold, and the skaters seemed to enjoy themselves
exceedingly. They were, I suppose, friends of the owners of the grounds,
and Mr. Bright said they were treated in a jolly way, with hot luncheons.
The skaters practise skating more as an art, and can perform finer
manoeuvres on the ice, than our New England skaters usually can, though
the English have so much less opportunity for practice. A beggar-woman
was haunting the grounds at Otterpool, but I saw nobody give her
anything. I wonder how she got inside of the gate.
Mr. W. J------ spoke of General Jackson as having come from the same part
of Ireland as himself, and perhaps of the same family. I wonder whether
he meant to say that the General was born in Ireland,--that having been
suspected in America.
February 21st.--Yesterday two companies of work-people came to our house
in Rock Park, asking assistance, being out of work and with no resource
other than charity. There were a dozen or more in each party. Their
deportment was quiet and altogether unexceptionable,--no rudeness, no
gruffness, nothing of menace. Indeed, such demonstrations would not have
been safe, as they were followed about by two policemen; but they really
seem to take their distress as their own misfortune and God's will, and
impute it to nobody as a fault.
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