y with clean linen and
other niceties of apparel, to mark the day. The doors and blinds of an
oyster and refreshment shop across the street were closed, but I saw
people enter it. There were two owls in a back court, visible through a
window of the bar-room,--speckled-gray, with dark-blue eyes,--the
queerest-looking birds that exist,--so solemn and wise,--dozing away the
day, much like the rest of the people, only that they looked wiser than
any others. Their hooked beaks looked like hooked noses. A dull scene
this. A stranger, here and there, poring over a newspaper. Many of the
stage-folk sitting in chairs on the pavement, in front of the door.

We went to the top of the hill which formed part of Gardiner Greene's
estate, and which is now in the process of levelling, and pretty much
taken away, except the highest point, and a narrow path to ascend to it.
It gives an admirable view of the city, being almost as high as the
steeples and the dome of the State House, and overlooking the whole mass
of brick buildings and slated roofs, with glimpses of streets far below.
It was really a pity to take it down. I noticed the stump of a very
large elm, recently felled. No house in the city could have reared its
roof so high as the roots of that tree, if indeed the church-spires did
so.

On our drive home we passed through Charlestown. Stages in abundance
were passing the road, burdened with passengers inside and out; also
chaises and barouches, horsemen and footmen. We are a community of
Sabbath-breakers!

* * * * *

_August 31._--A drive to Nahant yesterday afternoon. Stopped at Rice's,
and afterwards walked down to the steamboat wharf to see the passengers
land. It is strange how few good faces there are in the world,
comparatively to the ugly ones. Scarcely a single comely one in all this
collection. Then to the hotel. Barouches at the doors, and gentlemen and
ladies going to drive, and gentlemen smoking round the piazza. The
bar-keeper had one of Benton's mint-drops for a bosom-brooch! It made a
very handsome one. I crossed the beach for home about sunset. The tide
was so far down as just to give me a passage on the hard sand, between
the sea and the loose gravel. The sea was calm and smooth, with only the
surf-waves whitening along the beach. Several ladies and gentlemen on
horseback were cantering and galloping before and behind me.

* * * * *

A hint of