The temperature is the most delicious
conceivable. The slight chill of early dawn, which was itself agreeable,
is succeeded by an invigorating warmth; and the intense sunshine lights up
the glorious vegetation of the tropics, and realizes all that the magic
art of the painter or the glowing words of the poet have pictured as their
ideals of terrestrial beauty."
Or take Dean Stanley's description of the colossal statues of Amenophis
III., the Memnon of the Greeks, at Thebes--"The sun was setting, the
African range glowed red behind them; the green plain was dyed with a
deeper green beneath them, and the shades of evening veiled the vast rents
and fissures in their aged frames. As I looked back at them in the sunset,
and they rose up in front of the background of the mountain, they seemed,
indeed, as if they were part of it,--as if they belonged to some natural
creation."
But I must not indulge myself in more quotations, though it is difficult
to stop. Such extracts recall the memory of many glorious days: for the
advantages of travel last through life; and often, as we sit at home,
"some bright and perfect view of Venice, of Genoa, or of Monte Rosa comes
back on you, as full of repose as a day wisely spent in travel.
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