To me Newport could never be a place charming by reason of its own charms.  That it is a very pleasant place when it is full of people and the people are in spirits and happy, I do not doubt.  But then the visitors would bring, as far as I am concerned, the pleasantness with them.  The coast is not fine.  To those who know the best portions of the coast of Wales or Cornwall—­or better still, the western coast of Ireland, of Clare and Kerry for instance—­it would not be in any way remarkable.  It is by no means equal to Dieppe or Biarritz, and not to be talked of in the same breath with Spezzia.  The hotels, too, are all built away from the sea; so that one cannot sit and watch the play of the waves from one’s windows.  Nor are there pleasant rambling paths down among the rocks, and from one short strand to another.  There is excellent bathing for those who like bathing on shelving sand.  I don’t.  The spot is about half a mile from the hotels, and to this the bathers are carried in omnibuses.  Till one o’clock ladies bathe, which operation, however, does not at all militate against the bathing of men, but rather necessitates it as regards those men who have ladies with them.  For here ladies and gentlemen bathe in decorous dresses, and are very polite to each other.  I must say that I think the ladies have the best of it.  My idea of sea bathing, for my own gratification, is not compatible with a full suit of clothing.  I own that my tastes are vulgar, and perhaps indecent; but I love to jump into the deep, clear sea from off a rock, and I love to be hampered by no outward impediments as I do so.  For ordinary bathers, for all ladies, and for men less savage in their instincts than I am, the bathing at Newport is very good.

The private houses—­villa residences as they would be termed by an auctioneer in England—­are excellent.  Many of them are, in fact, large mansions, and are surrounded with grounds which, as the shrubs grow up, will be very beautiful.  Some have large, well-kept lawns, stretching down to the rocks, and these, to my taste, give the charm to Newport.  They extend about two miles along the coast.  Should my lot have made me a citizen of the United States, I should have had no objection to become the possessor of one of these “villa residences;” but I do not think that I should have “gone in” for hotel life at Newport.

We hired saddle-horses, and rode out nearly the length of the island.  It was all very well, but there was little in it remarkable either as regards cultivation or scenery.  We found nothing that it would be possible either to describe or remember.  The Americans of the United States have had time to build and populate vast cities, but they have not yet had time to surround themselves with pretty scenery.  Outlying grand scenery is given by nature; but the prettiness of home scenery is a work of art.  It comes from the thorough draining of land, from the planting and subsequent thinning of trees, from