I should like to have a peep
about five hundred years ahead. I am sure the ignorant nurse-maids will
have killed our baby by then, and we shall be a wretched down-trodden
commune, while they will be a splendidly governed aristocratic nation
under one autocratic king!
I have not told you a thing about the Park, or the general aspect of
the houses; we are rushed so it is hard to write. But the Park is a
perfectly charming place, as nice as the Bois, and much nicer than our
attempt that way, and everyone who goes there seems to be out on a
holiday. Fifth Avenue runs beside it like our Park Lane, beginning at
Fifty-ninth Street, and about every five years people have to move
further up, because of the encroaching shops. So it hardly seems worth
while to spend millions on building white marble palaces which may be
torn down or converted in so short a time. Nothing is allowed to last.
Heaps of the mansions are perfectly beautiful in style, and many simple
as well, which is always the prettiest; but you can meet Francois
Premier Castles, and Gothic Halls, and all sorts of mixed freaks, too,
in half an hour's walk, and it seems to me a pity they can't use their
rollers and just cart these into the side streets.
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