'" This was probably from the pen of
Franklin, who expatiates as follows on the advantages derivable from
these fireplaces, which are still occasionally to be met with, and
known as "Franklin Stoves":--"By the Help of this saving Invention our
Wood may grow as fast as we consume it, and our Posterity may warm
themselves at a moderate Rate, without being oblig'd to fetch their
Fuel over the Atlantick; as, if Pit-Coal should not be here discovered,
(which is an Uncertainty,) they must necessarily do."
That a taste for the beauties of Nature was extant at the epoch of
which we treat may be inferred from the statement of a writer who
commences "An Essay in Praise of the Morning" as follows:--"I have the
good Fortune to be so pleasantly lodg'd as to have a Prospect of a
neighboring Grove, where the Eye receives the most delicious
Refreshment from the lively Verdure of the Greens, and the wild
Regularity by which the Scene shifts off and disparts itself into a
beautiful Chequer."
The ever interesting and disputed topics of dress and diet come in for
an occasional discussion. The following is a characteristic specimen of
the satirical vein of the British essayist school, though we have been
unable to ascertain, by reference to the "Spectator," "Tatler,"
"Rambler," "Guardian," etc.
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