Versailles, and as the distance is short, and probably the speed
attained not great, seats are attached to the tops of the cars, and for
a very small sum the poorer classes can ride in them. In fine weather it
is said that this kind of riding is very pleasant.

I passed out through the gates beyond the fortifications, and was in the
open country--among the trees, the birds and flowers, and the cultivated
fields. The contrast between what I saw and the city, was great. Here,
all was beautiful nature. There, all that is grand and exquisite in art.
The fields around me were green with leaves and plants; the branches of
the trees swayed to and fro in the restless breeze; the little peasant
huts had a picturesque appearance in the distance, and the laborers at
work seemed more healthy than the artisans of Paris. I approached a
peasant who was following the plow. I was surprised to find the plow he
used to be altogether too heavy for the use to which it was put. Yet I
was in sight of Paris, the city of the arts and sciences. Such a plow
could not have been found in all New England. I looked at the man, too,
and compared him with an American farmer or native workman. He was
miserably dressed, and wore shoes which might have been made in the
twelfth century. He had no look of intelligence upon his face, but
stared at me with a dull and idiotic eye. This was the peasant under the
walls of Paris--what must he be in the provincial forests?

Leaving the plowman, I walked on, following a pretty little road, until
I came to a large flock of sheep in the care of a shepherd-boy and a
dog. While I stood looking at them, the boy started them off across the
fields and through the lawns to some other place. All that he did was to
follow the sheep, but I certainly never saw a dog so capable and
intelligent as that one. He seemed to catch from his master the idea of
their destination at once, and kept continually running around the