periodical exodus to Europe to
cease. Far from it. That cultivated Americans, and Americans
particularly of a more reflective than active mind, should find the
relative ease, culture and simplicity of European life more congenial to
them than the restless, high-pressure life of America, is quite natural.
And if there are no interests or ties to make their presence in their
own country imperatively necessary, it is certainly a matter of option
with them where they take up their abode. There is no law, human or
divine, to bind a person to live in one certain spot when the
surroundings are uncongenial to him, and when no private duty fetters
him to it, for the simple reason that he has chanced to be born there.
Every one is certainly at liberty to seek the centre that best suits him
and answers to his needs. Again, there are numbers of persons who with
moderate means can live according to their taste in Europe when it would
be impossible for them to do so in America on the same amount. There are
a thousand small gratifications that people can afford themselves on a
small income abroad, a thousand small pleasures in life from which in
our country they would be hopelessly debarred; and that they should be
debarred from them when escape is possible, and not only possible but
most simple and easy, would indeed be hard.

But why cannot Americans indulge this preference for life in Europe, why
can they not avail themselves of the choice if it is open to them, and
yet remember that they _are_ Americans, and that no circumstance can
absolve them from a sacred obligation to show respect for their native
country, and to stand as its citizens on their own dignity? Men and
women may be conscious of faults and weaknesses in their parents, but
they are not expected to expose these weaknesses on that account:
instinctive delicacy in any one but a churl would keep him from
acknowledging any such failings to his own heart. And a similar feeling
should teach us, even if our sympathies were not with our own country,
to treat it in word and deed with respect. Until we do learn to show
this respect before Europeans we must still resign ourselves to the
imputation, if they wish to make it, of crudeness, of being still sadly
in want of refining.

ALAIN GORE.

GLIMPSES OF PORTUGAL AND THE PORTUGUESE.

[Illustration: Sketch Map of NORTH SPAIN and PORTUGAL.]

The mere name of Spain calls up at once a string o