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+Project Gutenberg's Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone, by John Hughes
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone
+       Made During the Year 1819
+
+Author: John Hughes
+
+Release Date: March 24, 2007 [EBook #20891]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ITINERARY OF PROVENCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://dp.rastko.net
+(Produced from images of the Bibliothèque nationale de
+France (BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Hughes
+
+South of France
+
+ONLY TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY COPIES PRINTED.
+
+"----I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+journal of a tour made in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar--in which he gives such an
+animated and interesting description of the Château Grignan, the
+dwelling of Madame de Sevigné's beloved daughter, and frequently the
+place of her own residence, that no one who ever read the book would be
+within forty miles of the same without going a pilgrimage to the spot.
+The Marquis smiled, seemed very much pleased, and asked the title at
+length of the work in question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An
+Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone made during the year 1819, by John
+Hughes, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'--observed, that he could now
+purchase no books for the Château, but would recommend that the
+Itineraire should be commissioned for the Library to which he was abonné
+in the neighbouring town,"--_Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward_.
+
+Thomas White, Printer, Johnson's Court.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+ITINERARY
+
+OF
+
+PROVENCE & THE RHONE,
+
+MADE DURING THE YEAR 1819.
+
+BY JOHN HUGHES, M.A.
+
+OF ORIEL COLLEGE OXFORD.
+
+[Illustration: J. Hughes Esq. del. W. Woolnoth, SG.
+ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE NEAR CANNES AND PRISON OF MASQUE DE FER.]
+
+SECOND EDITION.
+
+LONDON:
+
+JAMES CAWTHORN.
+
+MD.CCCXXIX.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+IT has been the Author's object to render the following volume a
+companion to persons visiting the country described. He has therefore
+not so much studied to compile from known books of historical reference,
+as to answer those plain and practical questions which suggest
+themselves during an actual journey, and to enable those whose time is
+limited, and who wish to employ it actively, to form the necessary
+calculations as to what is to be seen and done. The best points of view,
+and the parts which may be passed over rapidly, are therefore specified,
+as well as the places where good accommodation are to be expected, or
+imposition to be guarded against.
+
+The subjects of the Illustrations will be mentioned in the course of the
+Itinerary, for the information of collectors, of whose notice it is
+trusted they will be rendered worthy by the well-known talents of Mr.
+Dewint and the Messrs. Cookes.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAP. I.--Paris to Rochepot
+
+CHAP. II.--Rochepot to Lyons
+
+CHAP. III.--Lyons
+
+CHAP. IV.--Lyons to Montelimart
+
+CHAP. V.--Château Grignan
+
+CHAP. VI.--Orange--Avignon
+
+CHAP. VII.--Avignon--Murder of Brune--Hôpital des Fous--Mission of 1819
+
+CHAP. VIII.--Pont du Gard--Nismes--Montpelier--Cette
+
+CHAP. IX.--Tarascon--Beaucaire--St. Remy--Orgon--Lambesc
+
+CHAP. X.--Aix--Marseilles
+
+CHAP. XI.--Ollioules--Toulon
+
+CHAP. XII.--Frejus--Cannes--Isle of St. Marguerite--Antibes
+
+CHAP. XIII.--Nice--Col di Tende--Conclusion
+
+
+
+
+* * *
+
+AN
+
+ITINERARY,
+
+&c.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. I.
+
+PARIS TO ROCHEPOT.
+
+
+NO one, I imagine, ever yet left an hotel in a central and bustling part
+of Paris, without feeling the faculty of observation strained to the
+utmost, and experiencing a whirl and jumble of recollections as little
+in unison with each other as the well known signs of that whimsical
+city, the _Boeuf à-la-mode_, (with his cachemire shawl and his ostrich
+feathers) and the _Mort d'Henri Quartre_. The contrasts and varieties of
+the grave and gay, the affecting and the burlesque, the magnificent and
+the paltry, which exist and may be sought out in abundance in every
+great capital, are perhaps more vividly concentrated at Paris than any
+where else, and brought with less trouble under the eye of those whose
+spirits or leisure may not allow them to mix in society. In London
+every thing wears a busy uniform exterior, varied only by the apparition
+of a Turk, a Lascar, or a Highlander; and home appears to be the place
+reserved for the development of character: but in Paris, from the
+fashion of living almost in public, and the freedom which every one
+enjoys of following his own taste in dress or amusement without notice,
+the history of most individuals appears to a certain degree written on
+their exterior; and a morning's walk brings you in contact with all the
+diversities of character which rapidly succeeding events have created.
+The old beau, with the identical toupet of 1770; the musty, moth-eaten
+nondescripts sometimes seen at the mass of Notre Dame, which remind you
+of a still earlier period; the faded royalist, with a countenance
+saddened by the recollection of former days; the ex-militaires, whose
+looks own no friendship with "the world or the world's law;" the old
+bourgeois riding in the same roundabout with his grandchildren, and
+enjoying the _jeu de bague_ as cordially,--revolve in succession like
+the different figures in a magic lantern, while the place of Punch and
+Pierrot is supplied by a host of laborious drolls and _gens à
+l'incroyable_. The various members of this motley assemblage appear also
+more distinct from each other, as connected in the recollection with
+places so strongly marked by historical events, or bearing in themselves
+so peculiar a character:--the place Louis Quinze, the grim old
+Conciergerie, the deserted Fauxbourg St. Germain, with the grass
+growing in its streets; the Place de Carousel, the Boulevards, and the
+Catacombs, the Palais Royal and the Morgue.
+
+To attempt, however, to say any thing new of a place so well known and
+so fully described as Paris, would be as superfluous as to write the
+natural history of the dog or cat. The peculiarities of such animals are
+continually striking one in new and amusing points of view; but verbal
+delineation has already done its utmost in acquainting us with them. In
+like manner, every thing relating to Paris, and illustrative of it at a
+period of interest which probably will not arise again for centuries,
+has been already made known in Paul's admirable letters, in poor Scott's
+powerful but unmerciful satire, and finally in a host of books,
+booklings, and bookatees, teaching us how to spend any period of time at
+Paris from three to three hundred and sixty-five days; how to enjoy it,
+how to eat, drink, see, hear, feel, think, and economise in it. Kotzebue
+has devoted sixty pages to its bon bons and savories; others more
+modestly give you only a diary of their own fricasseed chicken and
+champagne, and information of a still lower sort is supplied by the
+delectable Mr. Hone, for the instruction of our Jerries and Corinthian
+Toms. I shall commence dates, therefore, from the 26th of April, on
+which day we quitted the Hôtel de l'Europe, Rue Valois, not sorry to
+obtain a respite from sounds and sights.
+
+Though in such a country as Tuscany, where every furlong of ground
+affords a new and rich subject for the pencil, the voiture mode of
+travelling is preferable to posting; yet no one, I think, would
+recommend it in traversing the tedious interval which separates Paris
+from the southern provinces. We had adopted this species of conveyance
+from the idea that it would afford more leisure for observation to those
+of the party to whom France was new; but we found in reality that by
+subjecting us to a dependence on hours, it diverted our attention from
+those places where we might have spent half a day to advantage, and
+familiarized us only with one branch of knowledge,--the merit and
+demerit of most of the inns on the roads, whose characters I shall not
+fail to give as we found them. Homely as this species of information may
+be, I have often regretted the want of it beforehand; and concluding
+that others may be of the same opinion, I shall therefore afford it as
+far as I am able: premising, that it is as well not to vary, on this or
+any other road, from the practice of ascertaining beforehand the rate of
+the aubergiste's charges. The traveller's first impulse certainly is to
+save himself trouble, by paying whatever is demanded, and not to expend
+time and attention on a series of petty disputes, which make no great
+difference in his travelling expenses. There is, however, in all or most
+of those who are fitted to conduct the business of life, a feeling of
+shame at being outwitted even in trifles, which naturally rebels
+against this easy mode of proceeding, and inclines one rather to take
+the trouble of asking a few questions, than to be laughed at as a _grand
+seigneur_ by a cunning landlord. This trouble after all may be taken by
+a servant, and need not subject the master to the necessity of entering
+every inn like an angry terrier, with his bristles up and ready for
+battle; and the settlement of preliminaries does not lead to any want of
+attention on the part of the people of the inn.
+
+We neglected this precaution at Essonne, where we breakfasted on leaving
+Paris, and where accordingly we paid about double the charge which
+Tortoni or the Cafe Hardy would have made. It appears, in truth, that at
+the Croissant d'Or, as at the Emperor Joseph's memorable German inn,
+"though eggs are not scarce, yet gentry are."
+
+The distance from Paris to this place is about 24 miles: the road of
+course excellent, as is uniformly the case in the route to Chalons; but
+the only thing during the stage which remains on my recollection, is an
+obelisk inscribed, "Dieu, le Roi, et les dames;" a melange perhaps
+compounded in compliment to Louis XV. who greatly improved a part of
+this road, which was once nearly impassable. Corbeil, a neat flourishing
+town within half a mile of Essonne, and possessing large cotton
+manufactories, derives some interest from the celebrated siege it
+sustained during the war of the league. Two miles beyond Essonne we
+remarked, at a short distance to the right, Château Moncey, once the
+seat of the gay and brilliant Duke de Villeroi and his descendants; and
+on a hill to the left, Château Coudray, the former residence of the
+Prince de Chalot. Both the possessors of these estates were guillotined
+during the reign of terror, and their places are filled by Marechal
+Jourdan, and some _nouveau riche_, whose very name the peasants seemed
+never to have heard, or to have forgotten from want of interest.
+
+We found the Hôtel de la Ville de Lyon at Fontainebleau a good inn, and
+fair in its charges. The old palace, though not intrinsically worth a
+visit in point of architecture, yet conveys one of those "sermons in
+stones," in which the Fauxbourg de St. Germain so much abounds; and
+presents also more pleasing recollections of Louis Quatorze (a prince
+possessing many of the good points of the _bon Henri_) than the
+bombastic personification of him as Jupiter Tonans, in the palace of
+Versailles, which is on a par as a painting with Tom Thumb as a tragedy.
+
+April 27.--To Fossard, eighteen miles: the first six through the forest,
+just sufficiently sylvan to suffer by a comparison with that of Windsor.
+At the end of two more miles we crossed the valley, in which is situated
+the town of Moret, to which is attached a history equally curious, as
+Anquetil observes, with that of the Iron Mask. The following is the
+extract from the Duke de St. Simon's Memoirs, which he introduces as
+relative to it.
+
+"Il y avoit à Moret, petite ville auprès de Fontainebleau, un petit
+couvent, où étoit professé une Mauresse inconnue, et qu'on ne montroit a
+personne. Bontemps, Gouverneur de Versailles, par qui passoient les
+choses du secrèt domestique du roi, l'y avoit mise toute jeune, avoit
+payé une dot assez considerable, et continuoit à lui payer une grosse
+pension tous les ans. Il avoit attention qu'elle eût son necessaire, que
+tout ce qu'elle pouvoit desirer en agrémens et douceurs, et qui peut
+passer pour abondance pour une religieuse, lui fut fourni. La reine y
+alloit souvent de Fontainebleau, et prenoit grand soin du bien-être du
+couvent; et Mad. de Maintenon après elle. Ni l'une ni l'autre ne prenoit
+de cette Mauresse un soin direct, et qui peut se remarquer. Elles ne la
+voyoient même toutes les fois qu'elles alloient au couvent, mais elles
+s'informoient curieusement de sa santé, de sa conduite, et de celle de
+la superieure à son egard. Quoiqu'il n'y eût dans cette maison personne
+d'un nom connu, Monseigneur (le Dauphin) y a été quelquefois; les
+princes, ses enfans, aussi; et tous demandoient et voyoient la Mauresse.
+Elle étoit dans un couvent avec plus de consideration que les autres, et
+se prevaloit fort des soins qu'on prenoit d'elle, et du mystère qu'on en
+faisoit. Quoiqu'elle veçut très-religieusement, on s'appercevoit bien
+que sa vocation avoit été aidée. Il lui echappoit une fois, entendant
+Monseigneur chasser dans le forêt, de dire negligemment, 'c'est mon
+frère qui chasse.' On dit qu'elle avoit quelquefois des hauteurs, que
+sur les plaintes de la superieure, Mad. de Maintenon alla un jour exprès
+pour tâcher de lui inculquer des sentimens plus conformes a l'humilité
+religieuse; que lui ayant voulu insinuer qu'elle n'étoit pas ce qu'elle
+croyoit, elle lui repondit, 'Si cela n'étoit pas, Madame, vous ne
+prendriez pas la peine de venir me le dire!' Ces indices ont fait
+conjectures qu'elle étoit fille du roi et de la reine, et que sa couleur
+l'avoit fait sequestrer, en publiant que la reine avoit fait une fausse
+couche."
+
+In addition to this extract, Anquetil adds, "En effet, la fantaisie de
+garder devant ses yeux une naine monstreuse (her favourite negress
+mentioned previously), peut faire conjecturer que Marie Therèse n'aura
+pas été assez exacte à detourner ses regards d'objets qu'une femme
+prudente doit s'interdire; qu'elle les aura fixés sur les negres que le
+progrès du commerce maritime commençoit de rendre communs en France; et
+que de là sera venue la couleur de cette infortunée, qu'il aura fallu
+cacher dans un cloître. Cette Mauresse et l'homme au masque de fer sont
+les deux mystères du regne de Louis XIV. Le redacteur des Memoires de
+St. Simon dit qu'elle est morte à Moret en 1732, et que son portrait
+étoit encore en 1779 dans le cabinet de l'abbesse, d'où, quand cette
+maison a été réunie ou Prieuré de Champ Benôit à Provins, il a passé
+dans le cabinet des antiques et curiosités de l'abbaye de St. Genevieve
+du Mont à Paris, où il est encore. On lit au bas de ce portrait, ces
+mots, Religieuse de Moret." Such are the words of the extract relative
+to this singular person.
+
+The Hôtel de Poste, (as it chooses to style itself) at Fossard, is a
+dismal pot-house; and the people possess none of that good humour and
+alacrity which cover a multitude of faults. Having swallowed some of
+their gritty coffee, which might have been very delectable to the palate
+of a Turk, we walked about a mile and a half to the bridge[1] of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, on which John Duke of Burgundy was murdered by
+Tannegui de Chastel, in the presence, and probably with the connivance
+of the Dauphin, afterwards Charles VII. Near this spot we remarked a
+small mass of ruins, the only remains of the once magnificent Château
+Varennes. Its former owner, the Duke de Châtelet, as we were informed by
+some market-people, resided for six months in the year at this seat,
+maintaining or employing most of the poor within his reach, and
+entertaining his peasantry with a weekly dance at the Château. Like many
+others, he fell a victim to the guillotine during the reign of terror;
+his lands, with the exception of a portion recovered by his heirs, were
+alienated, and the fragment which we observed was the only part of his
+residence left standing. From the tone and manner in which the French
+peasantry appear to speak of these very common occurrences, I should
+judge that the effects of the revolution have not yet eradicated that
+"subordination of the heart," which is natural among a simple and
+industrious people, and which nothing but very gross neglect or
+misconduct on the part of their superiors, or the unchecked licence of
+political quacks, can destroy. Most of the ravages in question might no
+doubt be traced to bands of plunderers, organized from the most
+desperate and notorious characters in many different parishes, and
+sufficiently countenanced by the revolutionary tribunals to overawe the
+peaceable and unarmed mass of the population, whom it would be hardly
+fair to confound with them. Let us fancy for a moment, how quickly,
+under similar political circumstances, a moveable Spencean brigade
+might be collected in any district of England from poachers,
+sheep-stealers, gypsies, incendiaries, and those whose latent love of
+mischief might be drawn out by proper encouragement, and we may find
+reason not to condemn the French peasantry in general, as sharers in the
+outrages which they probably abominated, but could not prevent.
+
+[Footnote 1: In 1419, John Duke of Burgundy, and the Dauphin, against
+whom he had taken part during the troubles of France, agreed to a
+reconciliation. "An interview was fixed to take place on the bridge of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, where a total amnesty was to be concluded, to be
+followed by an union of arms and interests. Every precaution was taken
+by the duke for his safety; a barrier was erected on the bridge; he
+placed his own guard at one end, and advancing with only ten attendants,
+threw himself on his knees before the Dauphin. At this instant Tannegui
+de Chastel, making the signal, leaped the barrier with some others, and
+giving him the first blow, he was almost immediately despatched. Though
+the Dauphin was in appearance only a passive spectator of this
+assassination, there can be no doubt that he was privy to its
+commission."--_Wraxall's Valois_.]
+
+From Fossard to Sens, 21 miles: the country uninteresting as far as
+Pont-sur-Yonne. Chapelle de Champigny affords a tolerably exact idea of
+a Spanish village; each farm-house and its premises forming a square,
+inclosed in blank walls, and opening into the street by folding gates,
+with hardly a window to be seen. From Pont-sur-Yonne to Sens, the road
+becomes more cheerful; and its fine old cathedral forms a good central
+object in the valley, along which the Yonne is seen winding. The
+principal inn at Sens being full for the night, we found neat and
+comfortable accommodations, with great civility, at the Bouteille.
+Whether there be any object worthy of notice in this cheerful little
+city, besides its cathedral, I do not know; but the latter possesses
+works of art which deserve an early and attentive visit. Nothing can be
+more minutely beautiful than the small figures and ornaments on the tomb
+of the Cardinal du Prat, which is sufficient in itself to give a
+character to any one church. But the grand object of interest is a large
+sepulchral group in the centre of the choir, to the memory of the
+Dauphin and his consort, the parents of Louis XVI. The grace and
+classical contour of this monument, which is executed by the well-known
+Nicholas Coustou, would excite admiration even in the studio of Canova,
+while the deep tone of genuine feeling displayed, particularly in the
+figure of Hymen quenching his torch, is worthy of the chisel of our own
+Chantry. Somewhat might perhaps be owing to an evening light, which cast
+strong mellow shades on the figures, and gave an effect of reality to
+the fine white marble of which they are composed; but their merits are
+very striking, and are quite unalloyed by the graphic bombast of which
+the most able French artists have been with too much truth accused. The
+character of the Dauphin, whose exemplary life in the midst of a corrupt
+court, was a tacit reproof which his haughty father could ill brook, is
+well known.
+
+    Ostendunt terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultrâ
+    Esse sinunt.
+
+He was snatched in the flower of his age, in the year 1765, from an evil
+which was even then brooding, and which might have brought his grey
+hairs to a bloody end at a more advanced period: and his consort
+survived him about a year and a half. "They were lovely and pleasant in
+their lives, and in their deaths they were not divided." The latter
+monument, as well as others of inferior merit, owed its preservation
+from revolutionary fury to the conduct and firmness of Mons. Menestrier,
+an avocat, and mayor of Auxerre during the reign of terror. _Ce brave
+homme_ (I like the old sacristan's term of _brave homme_, as it is one
+of the few untranslateable French words) flew to the cathedral at the
+moment that a horde of brigands had entered it to commence the work of
+mutilation; and, seconded by nothing but his known character for
+resolution, and an athletic person, fairly intimidated and turned them
+out for the time. Losing not a moment, he removed to a place of safety
+the Dauphin's monument, the avowed object of their vengeance, before a
+second visit took place; and desirous also to preserve a fine bas relief
+which stands in another part of the church, representing St. Nicholas
+portioning three orphan girls, he engraved on the wall under it an
+inscription to Benevolence in the republican style, which produced the
+desired effect. Not very long afterwards he fell a victim to a fever
+caught by over-exertion in advocating the cause of a poor family; and
+his wife survived him only a few days, exhibiting an humble copy of the
+conjugal affection of those whose memorials her husband had so loyally
+preserved. Whether to give full credit or not to the old sacristan's
+narration, I do not know; but it appears more probable that even so
+large a monument was removed piecemeal at short notice, than that the
+malice of the brigands would have allowed it to stand unhurt; and there
+is besides an ingenuity and presence of mind shown in the preservation
+of St. Nicholas, quite consistent with the character of M. Menestrier,
+as described by the old man. Had the latter felt that inclination to
+romance, which is not uncommon among his brethren, he would probably
+have adopted the hacknied legend, that both monuments were miraculously
+secreted from the eyes of the marauders.
+
+April 28.--To Joigny, where we breakfasted, twenty-one miles. Passed
+through Villeneuve, a decayed old town, with two singular gateways. Even
+this place emulates Paris in the possession of a Tivoli, which, in the
+present instance, consisted of a walled square of court-yard (for garden
+it could not be called), measuring about thirty yards by twenty, and
+overshadowed by poplars from three to four feet high: a most pleasant
+representative, in truth, of the wild olive woods, the sequestered
+waterfalls, and the classical ruins of the original Tivoli.
+
+      Domus Albunese resonantis,
+    Et præceps Anio, et Tiburni lucus.
+
+On leaving Joigny, a neat pleasant town, extending in one wide street
+along the Yonne, and crowned by a handsome château, left unfinished by
+the Due de Villeroi, we reached the heart of the wine district of
+Burgundy. The country here assumes the appearance of a garden, both from
+the steep and regular form of the hills, which exactly resemble the
+Dutch slopes in old-fashioned gardens, and from the high state of
+culture to which their thin gravelly soil is brought. The hoe and the
+pruning-knife seem never at rest, and not a weed is to be seen; while
+the slightest portion of manure dropt on the high road becomes a prize,
+if not an object of contention, to the nearest vignerons. The air of
+cheerfulness and beauty, however, which we annex to our notions of high
+cultivation, is wholly wanting. The appearance of the vines was that of
+sapless black stumps, about thirty inches high, and pruned so as to
+leave only four or five eyes; and though the subject of poverty is too
+serious to joke on, the withered and stunted appearance of the country
+people exactly corresponded to that of these dry pollards. I trust that
+we were in some degree deceived by their natural ugliness, and that hard
+labour and scanty profits are not the only reasons which render their
+_tout ensemble_ such a contrast to the healthy robust looks of the
+Normans and Picards, whose very horses show the effects of their
+abundant corn harvests.
+
+From Joigny to Auxerre, twenty-one miles. We arrived too late to visit
+the interior of the cathedral, which was not mentioned to us as
+containing any thing remarkable. Its exterior, however, is fine and
+venerable, and affords a beautiful evening study, viewed from the
+opposite bank of the Yonne, about half a mile on the Vermanton road. The
+rest of the town, seen from this point, is broken into fine masses of
+conventual and other old buildings; and the river and bridge complete a
+landscape very well worthy of an accurate sketch.
+
+The excellence of the Hôtel de Beaune, at Auxerre, "tenu par Boillet,
+gendre Mineau," as his cards inform us, deserves notice. This is one of
+those palm-islands among a desert of dirty pothouses, most treacherously
+adapted to lure onward a certain class of fair weather pilgrims, whom
+one wonders to meet with beyond Paris, and whose dolorous complaints of
+thin milk and large coffee-spoons, have afforded me no small amusement
+in casual rencounters. The most fastidious, however, of this class of
+smelfungi, would find but little to carp at under the roof the civil Mr.
+Boillet; and would do well to lay in a stock of comfortable
+recollections in this place, on which to feast as far as Chalons; for
+the interval between Auxerre and the latter city will prove but a dreary
+one to a traveller of the gastronomic school.
+
+The general air of Auxerre is ancient and respectable; but conveys no
+ideas of populousness or commerce. In the opinion, however, of an old
+sub-matron of the Enfans Trouvées (who looked over my shoulder while
+sketching, and whom, by way of something to say, I ignorantly
+complimented on her fine family of grandchildren), there is nothing, or,
+according to Malthus, much to complain of in the former respect. "Ah,
+Monsieur, que voulez vous? ce sont les militaires, ils vont par çi, ils
+vont par là, et puis--voilà des enfans, et où chercher les peres?"
+
+April 29.--To Vermanton, our first stage, eighteen miles: a succession
+of fine vineyards and square steep hills, such as Uncle Toby might have
+constructed for his amusement, with Gargantua for an assistant instead
+of the corporal. About six miles short of Vermanton, at the bottom of a
+long descent, we remarked Cravant, a little town to the right, fortified
+in an ancient and picturesque manner, and which, the peasants said, had
+been the seat of much fighting in days of old. Our informant was
+ploughing in a fierce cocked hat, with a team composed of a cow and an
+ass. Query, might not cocked hats, which appear to our ideas an
+exclusively military costume, have originated in such countries as
+these, among the vine-dressers? who flap down the sides alternately, in
+a manner that shows they understood the true use of them as a parasol.
+Vermanton is a small obscure place, affording an inn slovenly enough,
+though not glaringly bad.
+
+From hence to Lucy le Bois, where the horses were baited, fifteen miles.
+A pretty sequestered valley occurs about three miles beyond Vermanton;
+but the whole of the road, like that of the day before, may be travelled
+in the dark without any loss: the best part of it consists of a distant
+view of the vale and town of Avalon, backed by the Nivernois hills. In
+the old French Fablieux, the valley of Avalon is selected as the spot
+where a fairy confined Sir Lanval, her mortal lover; but whether the
+French Avalon, or the beautiful vale of Glastonbury was meant, appears
+doubtful, as the latter formerly bore the same name. There is a
+resemblance between the two districts, which amounts to an odd
+coincidence, particularly with regard to one of the Nivernois hills in
+the back ground, which presents a strong likeness of Glastonbury Tor. We
+should have passed through Avalon, but for a trick of the voiturier, who
+took a cross road to avoid paying the post duty there, and save his
+money at the expense of our bones. For this manoeuvre he might have been
+severely punished, had we chosen to interfere.
+
+From Lucy le Bois to Rouvray, where we slept, the level of the country
+becomes gradually more elevated, and its general features much more
+English, consisting of corn, woody copses, and pastures full of
+cowslips. I cannot say, however, that we found any thing to remind us of
+England at the detestable inn where we were quartered for the night, and
+have no doubt but that Lucy le Bois or Avalon would have afforded
+somewhat much better. The only civilized person was a large black
+baker's dog, who, like Gil Blas's first travelling acquaintance, seemed
+free of the house, and did the honours of the supper to us with an
+assiduity as disinterested, "Ah, messieurs," said his civil master, when
+we stept across the street in the morning, to return the dog's visit in
+form, "je suis charmé que vous trouvez l'Abri si beau; je suis au
+desespoir qu'il ne soit pas chez lui a present, mais je vais le chercher
+partout afin qu'il vous fasse ses hommages." The good man could not have
+spoken of a favourite son with more unsuspecting complacency.
+
+April 30.--To Saulieu, where we breakfasted at a tolerably good inn,
+fifteen miles: the morning intensely cold, and one of those white frosts
+on the ground, which so much endanger the vintage at this season. We
+observed, however, no vineyards on the elevated ridge of country along
+which we were travelling, and which was perfectly English. A respectable
+old château, with a rookery, quick hedges, and extensive woods, thick
+enough for a fox covert, kept up the illusion agreeably. This style of
+ground continues beyond Saulieu; and between the latter place and Arnay
+le Duc, eighteen miles farther, its features are not unromantic. One or
+two castles of a very baronial air occur; the first of which, reduced to
+ruins, is visible at about a mile beyond Saulieu, occupying an insulated
+hill at some distance from the road, and much resembling the remains of
+an Italian freebooter's stronghold. Another, situated at the head of a
+glen, about six miles farther on, and overlooking a small village, is
+more perfect and striking in its appearance. It is the property, as we
+were informed, of the widow of M. Fenou, a royalist, who, during the
+revolution, stood a siege within its walls equal to that of
+Tillietudlem, repulsing a strong body of republicans with considerable
+loss. Buonaparte subsequently recalled M. Fenou, with the grant of a
+free pardon; and the estate was, in the course of things, restored to
+his widow. Such, as far as we could collect from the account of our
+informant, was the history belonging to Château Torcy la Vachere, which
+bears some resemblance, in situation and general outline, to Eastnor
+Castle, the seat of the Earl of Somers, at the foot of the Malvern
+hills.
+
+Arnay le Duc, a town situated on commanding ground, where we slept,
+boasts of an earlier celebrity, having been the scene of one of Admiral
+de Coligni's victories. It possesses several convents, now private
+property, and one or two fragments of building of a peculiarly
+antiquated style. Among these I particularly remarked an old iron-shop,
+supposed, as a bourgeois informed me, to be more than seven hundred
+years old, and which seems to have communicated with the ancient walls
+as a guard-house. While busied in sketching this singular relic, we were
+saluted gracefully by an old chevalier de St. Louis, who was passing,
+and whose distinguished air would have become the person of Coligni
+himself. On casually inquiring the name of this gentleman, we learnt
+that he had been one among the many imprisoned during the reign of
+terror, and would have fallen by the guillotine, had the fall of
+Robespierre happened four-and-twenty hours later. This, it must be
+owned, is a trite and common story; but it is, perhaps, by the very
+triteness and frequency of such hair-breadth escapes, more than by any
+other circumstance, that the extent and ferocity of the revolutionary
+massacres are brought home to the imagination. The appointed victims,
+whom the delay of a day or an hour preserved from destruction at this
+crisis, still survive in all parts of France, like widely-scattered
+land-marks, to remind one of the numbers swept away in the previous
+deluge of murder.
+
+May 1.--To Rochepot twenty-one miles. We were not sorry to leave the
+Hôtel de Poste, at Arnay le Duc, which, with higher pretensions than the
+inn at Rouvray, only differs from it in the ratio of "dear and nasty" to
+"cheap and nasty;" and to commence a stage which promised more to the
+eye than any part of our former route. The country still continues to
+rise in this direction, and soon assumes the air of an extensive forest
+or chase, enlivened by half-wild herds of cattle, and opening into green
+glades and vistas of distant ranges of hills. At Ivry, we wound up a
+steep hill; the summit of which, a wide naked common, might match most
+parts of Dartmoor in height and bleakness. I had observed heaps of
+granite and micaceous stone at a much lower elevation in the course of
+the day before; and conclude that we were now on one of the highest
+inhabited points which occur in the interior of France. We had not
+leisure to walk to a telegraph on the right, which, to judge from the
+occasional glimpses which we had, must command a splendid map of the
+country near Autun. It had been recommended to us to take the route to
+Chalons through the latter town, as affording the most objects of
+interest; but, on the whole, I doubt whether that which we had adopted
+as the least circuitous, be not also preferable, as possessing the
+striking panoramic point to which we had climbed. After two or three
+more miles over an expanse of parched turf, we reached what geologists
+would call the bluff escarpment of the stratum. The descent before us
+was so precipitous, as to leave us at first at a loss to make out how
+the road could be conducted down it: and the prospect which burst upon
+us in front, had apparently no limit but the power of human vision.
+Beyond the foreground, which was formed by a series of rocky glens
+diverging from below the point on which we stood, the immense vale of
+the Saone extended like a bird's-eye view of the ocean, its relative
+distances marked by towns and villages glittering like white sails.
+Above the flat line of haze, which, at the first glance, appears to
+terminate the prospect at the distance of sixty miles, or more, we
+distinguished a faint blue outline of lofty mountains, which must have
+been the barrier separating France from Switzerland; and, as occasional
+gleams of sunshine broke out, the glittering and jagged lines of a
+barrier still more distant, and apparently hanging in mid air, became
+distinctly visible. Among these I recognised, at last, the features of
+Mont Blanc, in whose peculiar outline I could not be mistaken, and
+which, according to the map, cannot be less than 110 or 120 miles
+distant, in a direct line from the Montagne de Rochepot. It is, perhaps,
+not necessary to be a mountaineer, like Jean Jacques, by birth and
+education, in order to feel the peculiar expansion of mind, which he
+describes as caused by breathing mountain-air, and contemplating
+prospects like this of which I speak.[2] A boundless plain, and enormous
+mountains, such as the Alps, whether viewed individually, or contrasted
+with each other, are objects not physically grand alone, but affording
+also food for deep and enlarged reflection. The mind, while expatiating
+over the mass of feelings and projects, of hopes and fears, which are
+passing within the limits of the wide map below, feels the nothingness
+of the atom which it animates, and the comparative insignificance of its
+own joys and griefs in the scale of creation, and retires at last into
+itself, sobered into that calm state which is so favourable to the
+formation of any momentous decision, or the prosecution of a train of
+deep thought. A moment's glance changes the scene from culture and
+population to the silence and solitude of a dead icy desert; from the
+redundancy of animal and vegetable life to its "solemn syncope and
+pause." The ideas of obscurity, danger, and infinity, all powerful and
+acknowledged sources of the sublime, are excited at the view of a range
+of frozen summits, cold, fixed, and everlasting as the imaginary nature
+of those destinies, with whom a noble bard has peopled them; alternately
+glittering in sunshine, and enveloped in clouds, and from the well-known
+effects of haze and distance, appearing suspended in the air in their
+full dimensions and relative proportions. The imagination dwells upon
+the appalling hazards peculiar to their few accessible parts, and on the
+almost total extinction of life and animal powers, which is the penalty
+of a few hours sojourn there. And here again, too, the mind is forcibly
+impressed with the utter helplessness of the speck of dust which it
+inhabits, and that momentary dependence on Providence, which must be so
+convincingly felt in traversing such regions. Ascending in the scale of
+comparison, it may reflect, that these gigantic forms, which fill the
+eye at a distance at which cities and pyramids would fade into
+imperceptible specks, are but excrescences on the face of that earth,
+which itself is but an atom in the map of the universe. But I am
+wandering from my subject, and from the route, which, in this quarter,
+is somewhat precipitous. I shall, therefore, only remark what has
+frequently struck me as not an improbable conjecture, that Milton might
+have formed his splendid conception of the icy region of Pandæmonium
+from some of these colossal ranges of Alps with which his eye must have
+been familiar, seen through the vistas of a stormy sky. In the
+well-known passage which I shall take the liberty of quoting, one seems
+to recognise the deep drifts of snow, and the blue crevasses which
+abound in such a spot as the Mer de Glace, as well as the castellated
+peaks and glaciers which border on it, and the biting atmosphere which
+prevails among their summits.
+
+[Footnote 2: The Welsh proverb, that a man who sleeps on the top of
+Snowdon, must awake either a fool or a poet, refers as probably to the
+effect produced on the mind by the prodigious mountain panorama
+discernible from thence, as to any fancied influence of the genius
+loci.]
+
+    "Beyond this flood a frozen continent
+    Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms
+    Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land
+    Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems
+    Of ancient pile; or else deep snow and ice,
+    A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog
+    'Twixt Damiata and Mount Casius old,
+    Where armies whole have sunk: the parching air
+    Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire."
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. II.
+
+ROCHEPOT TO LYONS.
+
+
+"MON Dieu, ma fille," says Madame de Sevigné in one of her letters to
+Mad. de Grignan, "que vous avez raison d'etre fatiguée de cette Montagne
+de Rochepot! je la hais comme la mort; que de cahots, et quelle cruauté
+qu'au mois de Janvier les chemins de Bourgogne soient impracticables!"
+Allowing this to have been the case in her days, I can hardly wonder
+that even Mad. de Sevigné was insensible to the magnificence of the
+prospect from this elevated point; and thought only of the safety of her
+neck. No danger however exists at present, as the road descending to
+Rochepot is good, and judiciously conducted down the brow of the hill;
+though the nature of the ground gives no very pleasing idea of what it
+must have been as a cross-country track. The inn also at Rochepot,
+situated at the junction of four roads, is clean and comfortable. A
+household loaf, weighing not less than thirty pounds, stood on the table
+to welcome us on our arrival, and we saw for the first time straw hats
+bearing a full proportion to it, the rim of which equalled in size a
+moderate umbrella.
+
+After breakfast we visited the ruined castle of Rochepot,[3] on which we
+had at first looked down, but which, seen from the village, bears a
+strong resemblance to Harlech Castle in North Wales, both in its form,
+and its position upon a commanding rock. We found upon inquiry that it
+had been tenanted at a much later period than its appearance would have
+led us to suppose. M. Blancheton, the proprietor, had made it his chief
+residence some thirty years ago, and kept it up in a style imitating as
+nearly as possible its ancient feudal grandeur. At the Revolution
+however it was forfeited, and has since been sold twice; but though each
+purchaser has pulled down a part, and sold the materials, enough still
+remains to give a perfect idea of its former strength and massiveness.
+M. Blancheton now resides, as we were informed, near Beaune, regretted
+as a _bon seigneur_ by his poorer neighbours, whom he has not visited
+since the demolition of his paternal seat. "It would break his heart,"
+said a poor old woman, "to see it as it now is." I could not help
+thinking of Campbell's "Lines on visiting a spot in Argyleshire," which
+bear the impress of a real occasion of this sort.
+
+[Footnote 3: Vide Cooke's View.]
+
+From Rochepot to Chalons-sur-Saone, eighteen miles; commencing with a
+steep hill, to the left of which winds a rocky valley of a singular
+description, cultivated to the very top of the abrupt heights which
+surround it, and so bare of soil, that the eye is surprised by the
+flourishing state of its corn and fruit-trees. The heat reflected from
+the rocks upon the thin gravel which supports its vineyards, must boil
+their juices to a liqueur; at least such was its effect on ourselves,
+while winding along a series of these natural forcing-houses, through
+which the road is conducted into the great plain of Chalons. From the
+ridges which border these valleys, the wide extent of the latter, and
+its border of Alps, are visible, though not so finely as from the
+elevation which we had descended. "Mont Blanc, the monarch of
+mountains," was however more plainly discernible than before, like a
+thin distinct fabric of vapour, with his "diadem of snow faintly lighted
+up by the sun;" and I never recollect to have seen this white-headed
+patriarch of the Alps before in any position which gave so fully the
+effect of his enormous height, I will not even except the spot near
+Merges, where from a gap in the intervening mountains, he appears almost
+to rest his base upon the lake of Geneva.
+
+On emerging from the hilly country near Rochepot, the road to Chalons
+passes along a dead flat, cheerful from its richness, but rather
+monotonous. To the right, we looked back upon a semicircular range of
+well wooded hills, in front of which, on an eminence, stands a stately
+old château belonging to the Count de Rouilly. It answers very much to
+the beau ideal of what a French château ought to be, but seldom is. I
+say "ought to be," premising that most of us have formed our first ideas
+of French châteaux, from those works of imagination which endow such
+places so liberally with gothic architecture and haunted woods. The
+mansion of the Count de Rouilly would not greatly disappoint a reader of
+Mrs. Ratcliffe's romances; and bears a strong resemblance to Westwood,
+near Ombersley, in Worcestershire, the seat of Sir John Packington,
+which is said to have been once a conventual building.
+
+With no small pleasure did we arrive at the handsome town of Chalons,
+our patience being nearly exhausted by the tiresome running base with
+which our Noah's ark accompanied the driver's abuse of his clumsy grey
+mares. _Grand chameau, sacre vache_, and _canaille_, where the most
+genteel and decent terms with which he favoured them, and his
+perverseness was in proportion. For this precious commodity, selected I
+should conceive from the most consummate ragamuffins on the road, we
+were indebted to Mons. Picon, a master voiturier at Paris, who imposed
+on us both as to the number of horses, and the length of time in which
+we were to be conveyed to Chalons.
+
+"Hic niger est; hunc tu, Romane, caveto."
+
+Having met with a respectable voiturier, named Veroux, who conveyed us
+admirably from Calais to Paris, my habitual distrust of this class of
+gentry had relaxed just at the wrong time, for the benefit of M. Picon.
+
+If cities are to be estimated by their appearance of neatness and
+opulence, Chalons deserves to be marked on the map in more capital
+letters than the imposing names of Sens or Auxerre. To no town indeed
+does it bear a greater resemblance than to Tours, both from the modern
+air of its houses, and from its noble river, adapted for every purpose
+of internal commerce. The Hôtel des Trois Faisans is also an excellent
+inn, and, like that at Auxerre, sufficiently well frequented to find no
+account in these little beggarly impositions which are practised at
+inferior places.
+
+May 2.--We walked before breakfast to St. Marcel, a village about a mile
+from Chalons, to visit the church and monastery where Abelard, after his
+removal from Cluni, died and was buried. Our excursion however only
+answered in affording us an hour's healthy exercise; for the monastery
+has been destroyed, and the church stript of what ornaments it
+possessed, during the time of the Revolution; and the monument of
+Abelard is removed to Paris. Nor does the town of Chalons itself,
+handsome and cheerful as it is, present any food for the pencil, the
+more particularly as its flat situation offers no favourable point of
+perspective. The spot from which its stately quay, and its stone bridge
+ornamented with obelisks, are seen to the most advantage, is about a
+mile down the river;--in fact from the deck of the coche d'eau, in which
+we embarked at noon for Lyons. This excellent conveyance is a large
+covered boat, towed at the rate of six miles an hour by four
+post-horses, or, when necessary, by six; and performs the journey from
+Chalons to Lyons, a distance of about ninety miles, in twenty-eight or
+thirty hours, affording ample time for rest and refreshment at a line of
+inns of a superior description. The reasonable amount of the fare paid
+by each person at the bureau des diligences, (nine francs fourteen sous)
+might induce a fastidious or inexperienced traveller to form an
+indifferent idea both of the company and accommodations of the coche
+d'eau. Both however appear unexceptionable in their way, as this is the
+mode of conveyance adopted for the royal mail, and as generally
+preferred for the sake of comfort and expedition, as the Margate or
+Glasgow steam-boats. It affords the range of a tolerably spacious deck,
+and a couple of cabins, to which the passengers may retire in inclement
+weather. Had it indeed been less convenient or agreeable, we should have
+found it a blessed respite after the rumbling tub of penance in which we
+had been cooped. Indeed, the abuse which our voiturier had vented on the
+_desagremens et disgraces_ of the coche d'eau, in order to secure
+himself our company to Lyons, had determined us on trying this
+conveyance; for the habit of lying is so constant and inveterate in this
+class of fellows, as to possess all the advantages of truth; inasmuch as
+you have only to believe the direct contrary of what they say. The only
+inconvenient and perplexing liars are those who sometimes speak truth by
+accident; and their fictions moreover are seldom extravagant enough to
+afford the amusement created by romancers of the former class; among
+whom I may reckon a beggar, who beset us on the quay of Chalons,
+maintaining in a strong French accent, that he was the son of a carman
+of Thames-street, in the parish of St. George Hanovre, and had only been
+a few months in France.
+
+The _élite_ of our company consisted of a tall well-looking officer,
+wearing the croix d'honneur; a shrewd old Provençal merchant, to whom we
+were indebted for much valuable travelling information; two young
+friends, one of whom sang very agreeably and unaffectedly, and the
+other, a lively French Falstaff ate and talked enough for both; and
+last, not least, an old gentleman of the name of C. travelling to his
+campagne in Languedoc, whose arch quiet manners answered very much to my
+idea of the imaginary Hermite en Province. At Tournus, we took in a host
+of additional passengers, not so polished, but unobtrusive and
+well-behaved. I question however, whether, in the event of a rainy day,
+we should have found this mode of travelling very desirable; as the
+common cabin is but small in proportion to the number of persons capable
+of being accommodated on deck. There is indeed a smaller cabin
+adjoining, which, though the exclusive right of the diligence passengers
+from Paris, is usually shared by them with the rest. It is distinguished
+by the words over the door, "Chambre de Pairs," which some wag had
+altered into "Chambre des Paris," or the Upper House, inscribing the
+other cabin with his pencil as the Chambre des Deputés.
+
+Many a person fond of indulging in classical reveries, and not aware of
+the real breadth of the Clitumnus, may have formed a very spacious idea
+of that celebrated stream, and longed to contemplate its wide reaches
+from the foot of its well-known temple. As however the Clitumnus is in
+this identical spot, not broader than what a Yorkshire farmer would call
+"a bonny beck," and a Yorkshire fox-hunter would ride at without
+hesitation, the imaginary picture of it may with real propriety be
+transferred to the Saone near Tournus, winding as it does through the
+extensive meadows of a rich champaign country, and reflecting in its
+broad blue mirror the herds of fine white cattle which we saw paddling
+in every creek. It bears a strong resemblance to many parts of the Po,
+excepting in the stillness of its current, which was so great, that it
+would have been easy while leaning over the bow of the vessel, to fancy
+the Saone into the blue sky, and the coche d'eau, into Southey's vessel
+of the Suras, or Wordsworth's ærial skiff.
+
+At seven in the evening we came within view of the stately towers of
+Mâcon, a town, to all appearance, fully equal to Chalons in size and
+opulence, and much exceeding it as a subject for the pencil. Its fine
+navigation, the general richness of the country, and the productive
+vineyards on the neighbouring hills, all unite to render it a central
+point of business and bustle. There are several inns on the quay, of a
+good appearance; but we found the Hôtel de l'Europe, to which we had
+been directed, in every respect deserving of its high reputation, and
+inferior, perhaps, to no country inn on the continent. After
+reconnoitring Mont Blanc again from the windows of the clean and airy
+bed-rooms to which we had been shown, we dined at the table d'hôte,
+which was served within a quarter of an hour after the arrival of the
+coche. Among the more polished company present, I was not a little
+diverted by some scattered specimens of the French gentleman-farmer,
+present for the express purpose of wallowing for once in a dinner drest
+by the Duc d'Angouleme's ci-devant cook; fat and well-clad; their
+countenances wearing a sort of awkward purse-proud defiance to the cool
+sarcastic look with which the Parisian travellers eyed them; and their
+conscious shame struggling with the desire to appropriate all the good
+things before them. Numps, in the well-known old tale, was but a type
+of these honest personages, who seemed to be considered as "de trop" by
+the majority. In spite of the mixtures (I do not mean those made in the
+stomach) which must necessarily take place on these occasions, and
+allowing for the English prejudice in favour of privacy, there are
+advantages in dining at all French table d'hôtes, frequented by
+tolerable company. To the epicure it ensures better fare and attendance
+than he can command by any other means, as the landlord and his
+attendants feel both their credit and interest concerned in displaying
+the most alacrity, and producing the greatest variety of dishes before a
+large party; while chance customers, after waiting for a long hungry
+interval, may have to encounter tired waiters, and partake of the
+tossed-up leavings of this very table d'hôte;
+
+    Which, certainly, these gentlemen must own,
+    Is much more dignified than entertaining,
+
+as Colman pleasantly saith. There is a better and more satisfactory
+reason for this practice, which is, that it affords the best opportunity
+of ascertaining those points of local knowledge, which at once give an
+interest to the district through which you are travelling, and instruct
+you in the best methods of doing and seeing every thing. A Frenchman's
+manners and acquirements ought never to be judged of by his travelling
+suit, which is always avowedly the refuse of his wardrobe; and the
+importance which he is apt to attach to everything connected with his
+own town or district, if it leads to ridiculous minuteness, at least
+insures the accuracy of his details. The marked civility and attention
+of the French to strangers is too well known to be commented on,
+particularly to those who pay them the compliment of acquiescing in
+their national customs. I think I never saw the temper of French
+travellers thoroughly ruffled but on one occasion, when a shabby-looking
+Englishman and his gawky son, who had arrived in a cabriolet, made a
+fruitless attempt to exclude a large diligence party from any share in
+the table and fire of a country inn. Had they been contented to make
+their bread-and-butter arrangements in concert with the party, which
+included a member of the chamber of deputies, and a young officer, their
+company would have been considered as a pleasure.
+
+May 3.--We embarked at five o'clock in the morning, in the face of a
+very strong gale, which rendered six horses necessary, and tempted us to
+wish for warmer clothing. The morning, however, was beautifully clear
+and bright; and Mont Blanc, which is perceptible even from the low level
+of the river, was without a cloud. To the right, the Beaujolois hills,
+at the foot of which Mâcon stands, accompanied us as far as Trevoux,
+presenting an outline not unlike that of our own Malverns; but more
+varied and rich, as well as occasionally more lofty, and sprinkled with
+thousands of white farm-houses and villas: many of the parts are
+similar, and almost equal, to the hills which front Florence on the
+Fiesole side.
+
+At noon we stopped to breakfast, or rather dine, at Trevoux. Here the
+Beaujolois hills (or, at least, a range which runs in an uniform line
+with them) recede, and conduct the eye to a distant vista of higher
+mountains, toward the south; while, to the left, the river takes a
+sudden turn among the steep but cultivated sides of the Limonais. This
+curve brought us all at once upon such a green sunny nook, as might have
+served for the hermitage of Alexander Selkirk, in the island of Juan
+Fernandez; in the centre of which stands Trevoux, crowned by the ruins
+of an old castle, and overlooking the beautifully fertile valley which
+skirts the foot of the Limonais hills. From its situation, and the form
+and disposition of its houses, piled tier above tier to the top of a
+woody bank, Trevoux affords a perfect idea of a little Tuscan town. The
+Hôtel du Sauvage, and the Hôtel de l'Europe, are equally well
+frequented; and, like Oxford pastry-cooks, take care to employ the fair
+sex as sign-posts to their good cheer. Each inn has its couple of
+waiting-maids stationed at the waterside, in the costume of
+shepherdesses at Sadler's Wells, full of petits soins and agrémens, and
+loud in the praises of their respective hotels. By these pertinacious
+damsels every passenger is sure to be dragged to and fro in a state of
+laughing perplexity, like Garrick, contended for by the tragic and comic
+muse, in Sir Joshua's well-known picture; nor do their persecutions
+cease, till all are safely housed. We went to the Hôtel de l'Europe,
+whose table may be supposed not deficient in goodness and variety, from
+the specimen of one man's dinner eaten there. I shall enumerate its
+particulars, without attempting to decide on the question so often
+canvassed, whether our neighbours do not exceed us in versatility and
+capacity of stomach. Our young Falstaff then (for it was he of whom I
+speak), ate of soup, bouilli, fricandeau, pigeon, boeuf piquée, salad,
+mutton cutlets, spinach stewed richly, cold asparagus, with oil and
+vinegar, a roti, cold pike and cresses, sweetmeat tart, larded
+sweetbreads, haricots blancs au jus, a pasty of eggs and rich gravy,
+cheese, baked pears, two custards, two apples, biscuits and sweet cakes.
+Such was the order and quality of his repast, which I registered during
+the first leisure moment, and which is faithfully reported; and, be it
+recollected, that he did not confine himself to a mere taste of any one
+dish. Perhaps I may be borne out by the experience of those who have had
+the patience to sit out an old Parisian gourmand, by the help of coffee
+and newspapers, and observed him employed corporeally and mentally for
+nearly two hours, digesting and discriminating, with the carte in one
+hand, and his fork in the other. The solemn concentration of mind
+displayed by many of these personages is worthy of the pencil of
+Bunbury; and though French caricaturists have done no more than justice
+to our guttling Bob Fudges, I question whether they would not find
+subjects of greater science and physical powers among their own
+countrymen. On our return to the coche d'eau, our fat companion lighted
+his cigar, and hastened to lie down in the cabin, observing, "Il faut
+que je me repose un peu, pour faire ma digestion;" and Monsieur C.,
+instead of leaving him quietly in his state of torpidity, like a boa
+refreshed with raw buffalo, began to argue with us on the superior
+nicety of the French in eating. "Nous aimons les mets plus delicats que
+vous autres," quoth he; at which we laughed, and pointed to the cabin.
+We found, upon explanation, however, that Mr. C., though well-informed
+in general upon the subject of English customs, entertained an idea not
+uncommon in France, viz. that we always despatch the whole of those
+hospitable haunches and sirloins, which appear at an English table, at
+one and the same sitting: with this notion, his observation was
+certainly natural enough.
+
+From Trevoux, the Saone winds between narrow, steep, and picturesque
+banks as far as Lyons, near which place they close in upon its channel,
+exhibiting more varieties of rock and wood than before. For the good
+taste displayed by the rich Lyonnais in their villas and gardens, which
+began to peep upon us at every step, I cannot in truth say much; but
+our French companions, who had overlooked the merely natural beauties of
+the country, found much to commend in these little vagaries of art. A
+lively bourgeoise, on whom we stumbled the next day behind the counter
+of a glove-shop, ran up, openmouthed, to explain to us the beauties of
+one of their show spots, in view of which a sudden turn of the river was
+just bringing us. A conspicuous inscription on a large vulgar-looking
+house painted red and yellow, informed us that it was styled the
+"Hermitage du Mont d'Or." In the space of not quite an acre of ground,
+on the side of a wooded hill of the highest natural loveliness, the
+proprietor had contrived to commit a host of the most outrageous and
+fantastical absurdities, which were hailed with a smile from Mons. C.,
+and a burst of approbation from the rest of the party. At the top of the
+hill were four scattered pillars of different diminutive forms, with
+gilt balustrades; all painted with gaudy colours, and none large enough
+for a moderate tea-garden, or sufficiently solid to have resisted the
+point-blank stagger of a drunken man. Lower down were two holes in the
+rock, which, from their size and appearance, I should have taken for a
+rabbit-burrow and a badger's earth, but for the young lady's joyous
+exclamation--"Ah! voilà les hermitages. Messieurs, il y a deux hermites
+là-dedans." "À la bonne heure, Mademoiselle; ils sont vivans, sans
+doute"--. "Mais pour cela--pas absolument--c'est que--ils sont de cire,
+voyez vous, mais d'une beauté! ah, c'est une chose à voir!" Then came
+an inclosure so thickly studded with pillars of different sizes, as to
+resemble a Mahometan burying ground. "Vous y trouverez des inscriptions
+de toute espèce, et là vous voyez la colonne de Trajan." This was a
+wooden obelisk about ten feet high, painted white, at the base of which
+ROME was written in large black letters, occupying the whole of one
+side. Immediately above the house stood a small wooden building, with a
+red and white dome, and pillars and windows painted on the sides. The
+name COSMORAMA, which took up half the height of the side fronting us,
+still left us in doubt as to its use or intention; and our fair cicerone
+could no more explain the nature of her favourite building, than
+Bardolph could the meaning of the word "accommodate." "Eh, Monsieur,
+c'est ce qu'on appelle Cosmorama; je ne saurois vous dire precisement;
+peut-être il y a des bêtes sauvages;--ou--quelque chose de gentil, voyez
+vous--mais enfin c'est un Cosmorama." "Mais voilà ce qui est vraiment
+joli," resounded on all sides; and so general and good-humoured was
+their admiration of this rickety bauble, that we did our best to
+acquiesce in it. After all, we could admire, without any breach of
+sincerity, the natural beauties of this spot, which very much resembles
+the more open parts of the glen where Matlock is situated, and which all
+these abominations could not entirely deface. How to account for this
+perversion of eye in a people of sensibility and taste, I am rather at a
+loss; but this last is by no means a singular instance. "Bientôt vous
+allez sortir de ces tristes bois," compassionately observed a very
+gentleman-like officer, with whom we had fallen in during a stage of
+beautiful forest scenery; and not a soul in a voiture which breakfasted
+in the salle à manger at Rochepot, could understand why we stopped to
+admire the distant prospect of the Alps. Not to multiply instances of
+the indifference to the beauties of simple nature, which will, I think,
+be allowed to exist in the French, as contrasted with ourselves, I am
+inclined to extend the line of distinction still farther, and to affirm,
+that this deficiency in taste appears generally to distinguish the
+Teutonic from the Southern blood. It is no exaggeration to say, that for
+one French or Italian traveller in Switzerland, twenty English, or ten
+Germans, may be reckoned. The French taste in landscape gardening is
+well known, and that of the Italians[4] is but a shade or two better:
+witness the detestable baby-house with which they have defaced one of
+the finest scenes in the world, and which they distinguish, _par
+excellence_, as the Isola Bella; to say nothing of a host of similar
+instances, as contrasted with our own Longleat and Rydal Park.
+
+[Footnote 4: The characteristic beauties of Italy are no proof of the
+picturesque taste of the Italians themselves, as planners and
+architects. The commanding situation of their villages, and the small
+proportion of window to wall, are circumstances favourable to landscape,
+but intended merely as the means of catching and retaining cool air.
+Their classical ruins are preserved as a source of pride and profit, and
+the natural features of the country cannot be altered.]
+
+The fairest account of the matter, perhaps, is, that this inferiority in
+one branch of taste may result from a difference of temperament in our
+lively southern neighbours, which, in other respects, has its
+advantages. Restless, acute, and loquacious, they delight more naturally
+in those objects which remind them of the "busy hum of men:" and,
+whatever the force of circumstances may have effected in particular
+cases, it may be safely asserted, that the diplomatist and man of the
+world is the indigenous growth of France and Italy, while the powers of
+abstraction and meditation exist more naturally in English and German
+minds, inducing the love of solitary nature.
+
+The styles of Claude, who was a German by birth, and of our own Wilson,
+are strongly contrasted with that of Vernet, as illustrative of the
+present subject. In the admirable paintings of the latter, bustle and
+motion are generally the characteristics of the scene represented, and
+the features of nature seem intended to be subordinate to some human
+action which is going on. In the pictures of Claude, the combinations of
+scenery are every thing, and the figures nothing, or rather, merely
+introduced to illustrate and harmonize with the effect which the
+landscape itself is to produce: and nothing is allowed to disturb the
+repose and serenity of the whole. Of Wilson, who delighted more in
+storms and convulsions of nature, it may be said, that his figures, also
+are merely subordinate to the effect of a dashing sea, a thunder-cloud,
+or a forest waving and crashing with the wind; and that they are not
+strongly enough marked to interrupt the eye in the contemplation of
+these objects. Gaspar Poussin, I must own, is an instance that a French
+painter can understand and represent the deep repose of nature; but the
+style of Poussin is certainly not that of the French school in general,
+nor that of Salvator to be considered as establishing a rule by which to
+judge of Italian taste.
+
+Mais revenons à nos moutons. We were surprised to observe how much our
+fellow-passengers interested themselves about the characters of the
+royal family of England. Several of its members underwent a free review,
+though not an ill-natured one; but all who spoke of our late queen
+Charlotte, did her more justice than has, perhaps, been done in England,
+and particularly praised the purity of her court, and the excellent
+domestic example which her private life afforded to Englishwomen in
+general. On this point we cordially agreed with them; but our sly
+acquaintance, Mons. C., was not disinclined to lead us to ground more
+debateable, and lay a trap for our national vanity. The master of the
+vessel had a wooden leg, which led to the subject of artificial limbs,
+and the perfection to which the art of making them had arrived in
+England. We accidentally mentioned the case of Lord Anglesey. "Et qui
+est ce Lord Anglesey?" said M.C., looking archly. "Un de nos plus grands
+seigneurs, Monsieur." Still he persisted in inquiring how he lost his
+leg. "C'était in Flandres." "Ah, vous voulez dire à Vaterloo, n'est ce
+pas?" said the old gentleman, with a smile, not displeased to observe
+the motive of our hesitation. He would not allow us to use the word
+_emprunter_, as applied to the conduct of his countrymen, with regard to
+the Louvre collection, "Non, _voler_, voilà le mot." The little
+bourgeoise, who had lionized the Hermitage du Mont d'Or so eloquently,
+grew very communicative on the strength of the display which she had
+made, and M.C.'s good humour; and volunteered her sentiments on the
+folly of reflecting too deeply, observing, that all but the old ought to
+banish the idea of death and such dismal bugbears from their minds.
+"Mais, songez, Mademoiselle," quoth he, interrupted in some observation
+rather better worth hearing, "que tout le monde ne possède pas votre
+force de caractère;" a compliment to which the young lady assented with
+a grateful curtsy.
+
+By the time F. had finished his sleep and digestion, as he had proposed
+to do, and learned "Pescator dell' Onda," by repeated trials and
+lessons, we arrived at the Pierre Incise, at the corner of which the
+Saone enters Lyons. Tradition says that this spot, which reminded me of
+St. Vincent's rocks, near Clifton, derives its Latinized name from the
+great work performed by Agrippa in cutting through the solid rock, and
+enlarging the channel of the river. The site of the castle of Pierre
+Incise, formerly a prison, and destroyed at the Revolution, is still
+visible on a strong height overhanging the river to the right; the
+bottom of which appears to have been cut away artificially.
+
+On another height, to the left, stands an old fort; on passing which, an
+abrupt turn of the Saone brought us into the centre of dirt, bustle, and
+business. Its course becomes in a moment confined between masses of
+tall, smoky, old houses, and its azure colour stained by party-coloured
+streams from dyers' shops, and a thousand other abominations, which
+would defy the pen of a Smollett to describe, and all the breezes from
+the Alps to purify. There are several bridges in this quarter, mostly
+appearing from their paltry and irregular character, to have been
+erected on some sudden emergency; from these, however, the noble Pont de
+Tilsit, near the cathedral, claims an exception. Long before we
+approached this last bridge, however, the boat reached the diligence
+office, and our porter dived with us to the left, through a succession
+of courts and streets as high and gloomy as the cavern of Posilipo. We
+emerged into the Place de Terreaux, and took up our quarters opposite to
+the Hôtel de Ville, a formal, but fine old building.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. III.
+
+LYONS.
+
+
+EVERY traveller on his first arrival at a large place of any interest,
+and where his time is limited, must have experienced a difficulty in
+classing and forming, as it were, into a mental map, the various objects
+around him, and in familiarizing his eye with the relative position of
+the most striking features. To meet this difficulty, I should advise any
+one visiting Lyons, to direct his first walk to the eastern bank of the
+Rhone, and after crossing a long stone bridge called the Pont la
+Guillotiere, to follow the course of the river for about a mile along
+the meadows, towards its junction with the Saone. From this point of
+view, Lyons really presents a princely appearance.[5] The line of quays
+facing the Rhone, and which constitute the handsomest and most imposing
+part of the city, extend along the opposite bank in a lengthened
+perspective, in which the Hôtel Dieu and its dome form a central and
+conspicuous feature. In the back ground, the heights which divide the
+Rhone and Saone from each other rise very beautifully, covered with
+gardens and country seats. More to the left, and on the other side of
+the Saone, the hill of Fourvières (anciently Forum Veneris) presents a
+bold landmark, and forms a very characteristic back-ground to the city.
+Instead of continuing his walk towards the junction of the Rhone and the
+Saone, which possesses nothing worthy of notice, I should recommend the
+traveller to re-cross the Pont la Guillotiere, and make for this
+eminence. In his way he may pass through the Place Louis le Grand,
+formerly the Place de Bellecour, of the architecture of which the
+Lyonnais are very proud, and which is a marked spot in the revolutionary
+history of Lyons. Though on a costly and extensive plan, its proportions
+want breadth, and are too much frittered away to convey the idea of
+grandeur or solidity; and the inscription Vive le Roi, which occupies a
+place on two of its sides, in enormous letters, assists in giving it the
+air of a temporary range of building for a loyal fête. Not so the
+beautiful[6] Pont de Tilsit, by which you cross the Saone soon
+afterwards. This bridge, built by Buonaparte, to commemorate the treaty
+of Tilsit, unites elegance, solidity, and chasteness of design in a very
+great degree. Some of the stones, which I measured, are eighteen feet in
+length, and proportionably large, and altogether it reminded me of
+Waterloo bridge upon a smaller scale, and divested of its columns. The
+cathedral, which stands on the other side of the Saone, nearly at the
+foot of this bridge, is a venerable black old building of great
+antiquity, and though far inferior to those of Beauvais, Tours,
+Abbeville, or Rouen, in its general outline, possesses many detached
+parts of rich and curious architecture. It bears no marks of the
+devastation which it suffered in the Revolution, or during the late war,
+when, as we were told, the Austrians stabled their horses in it. Much of
+its repair has been owing to Cardinal Fesch, the late archbishop. The
+windows, rich as they are, have a gloomy effect, from being entirely
+composed of painted glass; and prevented us from distinguishing much
+very clearly. A statue of John the Baptist, however, crowned with
+artificial roses, should not be forgotten. A considerable part of the
+old town of Lyons lies on this side of the Saone; but as it will not
+repay the trouble of exploring, the traveller will do well to proceed
+immediately, or rather climb, to the church of Notre Dame de Fourvières.
+The fame of peculiar sanctity which this church enjoys, attracts many
+daily visitors from Lyons, though from its situation, it reminds one of
+the chapel in Shropshire, which as country legends tell, "the devil
+removed to the top of a steep hill to spite the church-goers." The
+continual resort of all ranks hither has attracted also a host of
+beggars, who have taken their stations in the only footway leading up
+to the church, some singly, some in parties, every four or five yards,
+and all besetting you in full chorus. The same cause has drawn to the
+terrace in front of the church a seller of Catholic legends, who to suit
+all tastes, mingles the spiritual, the secular, and the loyal, in his
+profession. The legend of St. Genevieve, Le Testament de Louis XVI.,
+L'Enfant Prodigue, Damon and Henriette, Judith and Holofernes, and Le
+Portrait du Juif ambulant, might all be bought at his stall, adorned
+with blue and red wood-cuts. Poor Damon cut but a sorry figure in this
+goodly company; for though adorned with a crook secundum artem, he
+looked more rawboned and ugly than Holofernes, and more villainous than
+the wandering Jew: fully justifying the scorn with which the
+stiff-skirted Henriette seemed to treat him. It is almost misplaced
+however to enumerate such follies in a place, which on a fine day
+presents perhaps one of the most varied and magnificent views in the
+world: and which a person who had only an hour to spare in Lyons, ought
+to visit, to the exclusion of every other object of curiosity. By
+changing one's position from the terrace of the church to some rude and
+imperfect remains of Roman masonry on the western side of it, a complete
+panorama of the surrounding country is obtained. The Rhone and Saone are
+both seen inclining towards each other from the north and north-east,
+like the two branches of the letter Y; the former issuing like a narrow
+white thread from the distant gorges of the Alps, and widening into
+broad reaches through the intermediate plain; and the latter issuing
+suddenly from among the hills of the Mont d'Or: till after inclosing the
+peninsula in which the principal part of Lyons is situated, and which
+lies like a map under your feet, they unite towards the south; and the
+broad and rapid body of water formed by their junction, loses itself at
+length among ranges of hills surmounted by Mont Pilate, a lofty mountain
+near Valence. Towards the east, north-east, and south-east, the view is
+of the same description as that from Rochepot; a wild chain of Alps seen
+over a plain of great extent and richness. In a western direction, the
+broad hilly features of the adjoining country are enlivened by a
+continual succession of vineyards, woods, gardens, and villas of all
+sizes, absolutely perplexing to the eye from its undulating richness:
+with which the sober gray of distant ranges of mountains contrasts well.
+One cannot form a better idea of this part of the view, than by fancying
+the most hilly parts of the country near Bath, clothed in a lively
+French dress; the only deformity of which consists in the high stone
+walls that enclose every tenement, and whose long white lines cut the
+eye unpleasantly. Most persons can point out the Château Duchere, which
+is visible from this spot at the distance of about a mile on the
+north-west side, and was the scene of a sharp action between the French
+and Austrians in 1814.
+
+[Footnote 5: Vide Cooke's View.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+If an hour or two of leisure remain after this walk, they may be filled
+up by a visit to the public library and the Palais des Arts. The former
+contains, they say, ninety thousand volumes, rather an embarrass de
+richesses to a hurrying traveller. I confess I was more amused by the
+importance with which the little old woman, who acted as concierge,
+talked of the "esprit mal tournu de Voltaire." The latter building
+adjoins the Hôtel de Ville, in the Place des Terreaux, the scene of one
+of the revolutionary fusillades. It contains, besides, several good
+pictures hung in bad lights, a large collection of Roman altars and
+sepulchral monuments, arranged in a cloister below, which serves as the
+exchange; and a cabinet of Roman antiquities found in the environs. The
+Hôtel de Ville itself is a massy stone building, a good deal in the
+taste of the Tuileries, and containing two fine statues of the rivers
+Rhone and Saone, which deserve notice. Whether the interior of Lyons can
+boast of any thing else worth notice I know not, but from the specimen
+which we had, too minute a survey of it can hardly be edifying to any
+one but a scavenger; and no single building can be named of any
+particular beauty, though its masses of tall well-built houses are
+imposing at a distance. To complete the short general survey of Lyons,
+which I mentioned, another not very long walk will suffice; traversing
+first the fine line of quays which front the Rhone, from the Pont la
+Guillotiere to the Quai St. Clair. From this point ascend the highest
+part of the city, called the Croix Rousse, and inquire for a place
+called Château Montsuy, which stands bordering upon its outskirts, and
+is best described as the most elevated spot on this line of heights.[7]
+From hence the view of Mont Blanc and the vale of the Rhone is
+peculiarly fine on a bright evening; and the whole prospect as rich and
+extensive as that from Fourvières. Beware of being persuaded by the
+laquais de place to visit La Tour de la belle Allemande, which is one of
+their show spots, and so called from some old legend of the imprisonment
+of a German lady. The view from Château Montsuy must, from the nature of
+the ground, be just the same, or, perhaps, even superior: and, what is
+more to the purpose, the Baroness de Vouty, in whose garden this old
+tower stands, seldom admits either Lyonnese or strangers to see it. On
+descending from the Croix Rousse, cross the Rhone by the Pont Morand,
+the wooden bridge next to that of La Guillotiere. Near the foot of this
+bridge is situated a large open space of ground, called Les Brotteaux,
+where the most atrocious of the revolutionary massacres took place. The
+site of the fusillade, by which two hundred and seven royalists perished
+at one time, is marked by a large chapel, dedicated to the memory of the
+victims, in the erection of which they are now proceeding. Three only
+are said to have escaped from this massacre, and to be still living.
+One of them finding his cords cut asunder by the first shot that reached
+him, escaped in the confusion, and plunging amid the thick bushes and
+dwarf willows which bordered upon the Rhone, baffled the pursuit of
+several soldiers. There is nothing remarkable in the appearance of the
+Brotteaux at present; but no true lover of his country ought to neglect
+visiting a spot associated with such warning recollections. One of the
+stanzas inscribed by Delandine on the cenotaph of his countrymen (which
+has been removed to make room for the chapel above mentioned), expresses
+briefly, and much in the spirit of Simonides's well known epitaph on the
+Spartans, the impressions conveyed by the sight of this Aceldama:
+
+    Passant, respecte notre cendre;
+    Couvrez la d'une simple fleur:
+    À tes neveux nous te chargeons d'apprendre
+    "Que notre mort acheta leur bonheur."
+
+This passage is, indeed, prophetic of the salutary effects of a lesson,
+which these and a thousand more voices from the tomb will proclaim to
+future ages; if, indeed, future ages will believe, that a[8] dastardly
+stroller was allowed to glut his full vengeance on the kindred of those
+who had hissed him from their stage, and to vow in a fit of wanton
+frenzy, that an obelisk only should mark the site of the second city in
+France; that he found himself seconded in this plan of destruction by
+thousands of hands and voices; that one citizen was executed for
+supplying the wounded with provisions, another for extinguishing a fire
+in his own house; and that when these pretexts failed, such ridiculous
+names as "quadruple" and "quintuple counter-revolutionist" were invented
+as terms of accusation. Such facts as these, written in the blood of
+thousands, furnish a strong practical comment on the consequences of
+anarchy, and the uncompromising firmness which should be displayed in
+checking its first inroads; the nature of which was never more
+eloquently or instructively described than in Lord Grenville's words.
+
+"What first occurred? the whole nation was inundated with inflammatory
+and poisonous publications. Its very soil was deluged with sedition and
+blasphemy. No effort was omitted of base and disgusting mockery, of
+sordid and unblushing calumny, which could vilify and degrade whatever
+the people had been most accustomed to love and venerate. * * * * * * *
+And when, at last, by the unremitted effect of all this seduction,
+considerable portions of the multitude had been deeply tainted, their
+minds prepared for acts of desperation, and familiarized with the
+thought of crimes, at the bare mention of which they would before have
+revolted, then it was that they were encouraged to collect together in
+large and tumultuous bodies; then it was that they were invited to feel
+their own strength, to estimate and display their numerical force, and
+to manifest in the face of day their inveterate hostility to all the
+institutions of their country, and their open defiance of all its
+authorities."
+
+[Footnote 7: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Collot d'Herbois.]
+
+A vivid description this, and strikingly applicable to the operations of
+that evil spirit which is still at work, with less excuse and
+provocation than France could plead for her atrocities. Such are the
+first and second acts of the drama of modern sedition; the fifth is well
+delineated in a tract by M. Delandine, the public librarian of Lyons in
+1793, as introduced in Miss Plumtre's Tour in France. This interesting
+narrative, intitled "An Account of the State of the Prisons at Lyons
+during the Reign of Terror," bears a character of truth and feeling,
+which bespeaks him an eye-witness of the horrors he describes. Torn from
+his family without any assignable cause, and imprisoned in the hourly
+expectation of death, his own apprehensions seem at no time to have
+absorbed his interest in the fate of his suffering friends; and to their
+merit and misfortunes he does justice in the verses before alluded to.
+The following is a free translation of them.
+
+    Oft, Lyonnese, your tears renew
+    To those who died upon this spot;
+    Their valour's fame descends to you,
+    In life, in death, forget them not.
+
+    Here calm they drew their parting breath,
+    Soul-weary of their country's woes,
+    Here, fearless, in the stroke of death
+    Met honour,--victory,--repose.
+
+    Pilgrim, revere their dust, and strew
+    One flow'ret on this lowly tomb;
+    Then say unto thy sons, "For you,
+    "Children of France! they braved their doom."
+
+    Thou fatal, hallow'd spot of earth,
+    Immortal shrines shall mark thy place!
+    Alas! what genius, valour, worth,
+    Lie mouldering in thy narrow space!
+
+Within less than half an hour's walk of the Brotteaux, and on the same
+side of the river, stands the Château la Motte, in which Henry IV.
+received Mary de Medicis as his bride. The way thither is best found by
+following the street leading to the Turin road for about a mile, when a
+turn to the right, not far from the junction of the road to Vienne,
+brings you in the course of a few minutes to the castle. When seen at a
+distance either from the Croix Rousse or Fourvières, its four turrets
+and a watch-tower give it an air of grandeur consistent with its former
+history, and distinguish it from the adjoining suburb. In a nearer point
+of view, indeed, its patched and dilapidated appearance shows the vain
+attempts which have been made to repair the ravages of the Revolution.
+At that period it belonged, as we were informed, to M. de Verres, a
+brave royalist gentleman, whose activity against the Revolutionists
+drew their marked vengeance upon himself and his possessions. At the
+time of the siege of Lyons, he garrisoned the Château la Motte with a
+strong detachment of chasseurs; and, as a peasant informed us, "fought
+like a devil incarnate," obstructing the operations of the sans-culotte
+army materially, and retarding their success against Lyons by his
+obstinate resistance. The position of his extensive premises, detached
+from the rest of the suburb, and surrounded with a wall, added to the
+advantage of a gently rising ground, must have enabled him to prolong
+the contest with effect. His fate was like that of so many other loyal
+and intrepid Lyonnese: being forced at last to surrender, he underwent,
+as may be supposed, a very summary trial, and was shot on the Brotteaux,
+in sight of the distant turrets of his own house. The property was
+confiscated, and great part of the château pulled down; but fortunately
+the round tower, containing Henry the Fourth's bed-room, still remains,
+rather owing in all probability to the ignorance of the Jacobins, than
+their good will. A part of the estate has been restored to his daughter,
+Mad. d'A., together with the château, which she inhabits; but I have
+reason to fear this part is but an inconsiderable one. Observing us
+wandering round the château with an air of curiosity, she politely sent
+to invite us to walk in. The room in which she was sitting opened upon a
+terrace, commanding a fine view down the Rhone towards Mont Pilate; and
+its interior was decorated with a few specimens of magnificent old
+furniture, which contrasted strongly with the air of desolation visible
+throughout. Two fauteuils of rich crimson velvet, with massy gilt
+frames, and two commodes inlaid and ornamented with brass, seem all the
+remains of the splendour of this once royal residence. From hence we
+visited Henry's apartment, which occupies the middle story of a large
+turret. It commands a fine view of Lyons and its noble environs; and the
+ceiling and walls bore some remains of the golden fleurs-de-lys on a
+blue ground, which had once ornamented them. Nearly the whole, however,
+had been white-washed during the Revolution; and on the advance of the
+Austrians, in 1814, the whole building suffered more by the hands of the
+combatants, than during the former sanguinary times. "Cependant il est
+bien connu," as Mad. d'A. answered with a proud smile, when we expressed
+our surprise at having found a well dressed person who could not direct
+us to Château la Motte. It may claim, indeed, to be well known to every
+good Frenchman, both from its former and latter history. It is singular,
+that in the course of the same day we should receive attentions from two
+persons, both of whom had lost their dearest friends in the carnage
+which followed the siege of Lyons. While I was sketching Mont Blanc and
+the course of the Rhone from the environs of Château Montsuy, a tall
+genteel old man, looking very like a Castilian, accosted us civilly,
+and, having peeped over my shoulder for a moment or two, invited us into
+his garden, which commanded the same view in a much superior manner. His
+sister-in-law, who was walking with him, had, he informed us, lost her
+husband and son in the fusillade. Yet, perhaps, when we consider the
+extent of the havoc, it would seem more singular to find a family who
+had not suffered, nearly or remotely, from its consequences.
+
+In returning over the Pont la Guillotiere, we were led to remark the
+probable antiquity of its construction. The centre still retains the
+drawbridge; and the whole fabric appears to have been widened, when
+wheel carriages came into fashion, with a supplementary parallel slice,
+riveted on to it by iron bolts. This expedient rather reminded me of a
+story which I had heard in my infancy, of a prudent housewife, who first
+roasted half a turkey for the family dinner, and when it had been twenty
+minutes on the spit, sewed on the remaining half to welcome an
+unexpected guest.
+
+Our excursion on the Saone had in every respect answered so well, that
+we were tempted to make inquiry whether the Rhone was also practicable
+as far as Avignon. Learning, however, that this mode of conveyance was
+seldom resorted to, and not liking the appearance of the passage-boats
+which we saw, we concluded, and found afterwards, that there were
+sufficient objections against it, excepting to those who wish to save
+time and expense. The rapidity of the current, and the violence and
+uncertainty of the winds which prevail upon the Rhone, render it
+necessary to employ a very skilful boatman; and, in a picturesque point
+of view, as much is lost by the intervention of the high banks of the
+Rhone, which shut out the distant parts of the landscape, as is gained
+by the perpetual accompaniment of water as a foreground. On the whole,
+we found reason to prefer the land route by Vienne and Valence, for
+which our arrangements were made accordingly.
+
+I think it is an observation of Cowper, that
+
+"God made the country, and man made the town;"
+
+and not even the centre of Lombard-street itself affords a truer
+illustration of the sentiment, than this town of mud and money,
+contrasted with its beautiful environs. The distant view of Lyons is
+imposing from most points; but the interior presents but few objects to
+repay the traveller for its closeness, stench, and bustle (not even good
+silk stockings). Its two noble rivers have had no apparent effect in
+purifying it, nor the easterly winds from the Alps, which stand in full
+sight, in ventilating its narrow smoky streets: and though usually
+considered the second city of the empire in wealth and importance, the
+houses and their inhabitants appear marvellously inferior to Bordeaux
+and the Bordelais in the air of neatness and fashion which might be
+expected to mark this distinction. In every thing relating to Bordeaux
+there is an easy elegant exterior, which conveys the idea of an
+independent and frequented capital of a kingdom, and an eligible
+residence; whereas Lyons bears the obvious marks of its manufacturing
+origin, defiling, like our own Colebrook Dale, a lovely country by its
+smoke and stench, and leaving hardly one of the five senses unmolested.
+Those fine buildings of which it can boast, take their place amid the
+general mass, like a fastidious courtier in low company,
+
+"Wondering how the devil they came there."
+
+Whereas the elegant theatre of Bordeaux appears just in its proper
+situation, and supported by suitable accompaniments of well-dressed
+people and airy streets. After the sight of the Hôtel Dieu, a standing
+proof that the Lyonnese can employ their money laudably and well, I will
+not pretend to judge whether there is any truth in the charge of avarice
+brought against them, and which Voltaire slyly admits in a professed
+eulogium on Lyons. There are other reasons accounting in a degree for
+its inferiority to Bordeaux in appearance, and the sordid impression
+which it leaves on the mind. In the first place, to judge from the
+innumerable quantities of villas of all sizes within reach of the town,
+it seems that the rich Lyonnese appreciate their fine environs as they
+deserve, and consider the country as the scene of display and enjoyment,
+while they treat Lyons as a mere counting-house. On the contrary, the
+villas in the neighbourhood of Bordeaux appear comparatively few, and
+business and pleasure to unite in the town itself. The imagination also
+may have some share in giving the preference, particularly after
+reading[9] M. de Ruffigny's tirade against his infantine life in the
+silk mills of Lyons. One fancies the merchant conversant with a higher
+and less sordid class of persons and details than the master spinner,
+and vineyards more agreeable objects than dying-houses and treddles. Be
+this as it may, appearances are certainly in favour of Bordeaux as the
+second city in France.
+
+[Footnote 9: See Godwin's St. Leon.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. IV.
+
+LYONS TO MONTELIMART.
+
+
+MAY 7.--From Lyons to St. Symphorien, our breakfast-stage, twelve miles.
+For the first seven, the outskirts of Lyons, extending along the western
+bank of the Rhone, continue to exhibit one unvarying appearance of
+wealth and population. The Archbishop's palace, which stands about two
+miles out of the city, on a hill overlooking the river, does not add
+much to the beauty of the country, as it strongly resembles a large
+manufactory. St. Symphorien, a neat small town, marked by a ruined
+watch-tower to the left of the road, possesses no inn at which a
+tolerable breakfast can be procured; but we fared well, in this respect,
+at a coffee-house in the middle of the town, situated under the Mairie.
+To Vienne, nine miles more. During this stage, the Alps become again
+visible in full majesty, from a high terrace overlooking a range of
+woody rising ground; and extend as far as the eye can reach from north
+to south. Mont Blanc and Monte Viso, the Gog and Magog of this gigantic
+chain, preserve their pre-eminence; the distant pyramid of the latter,
+which shoots into the clouds like the Peak of Teneriffe, from a cluster
+of lower mountains, contrasting with the massy dome of the former. From
+its figure and position in the map, I judged it could be no other than
+Monte Viso, which is so strikingly conspicuous on the road from Coni to
+Turin. Mont Pilate, towards the foot of which the Rhone wound to the
+right, sinks into utter insignificance when compared with these Alps,
+though of a height and grandeur which would render it a leading feature
+in Wales or Cumberland. It is considered in this neighbourhood as stored
+with rich specimens of botany, and its appearance, much less scorched
+and barren than the mountains of a southern climate usually are, renders
+this probable.
+
+The view of Vienne, as you descend into the narrow green valley in which
+it is situated, crowned by the dark ruins of an old Roman castle, and
+watered by a deep and rapid reach of the Rhone, combines beauties
+calculated to please all tastes. On the opposite side of the river,
+overlooking the ruins of a bridge with which it probably once
+communicated as a guard-house, stands a tall, square, Roman tower,
+called the Tour[10] de Mauconseil. The legends of the country affirm,
+that this was the abode of Pontius Pilate,[11] and that, in a fit of
+despair and frenzy, he threw himself from its windows into the Rhone,
+where he perished. This point the good Catholics must settle as they can
+with the Swiss, who maintain that he drowned himself in a little Alpine
+lake on the mountain which bears his name; and that the storms by which
+it is frequently agitated are occasioned by the writhings of his
+perturbed spirit. Nothing shows more forcibly the power of association
+in minds not capable of discriminating, than that the name of a man so
+obviously a reluctant instrument in the hands of God, and who declared
+by a public act his abhorrence of the part he was forced to act, should
+be selected as synonymous to every thing fiendlike and murderous.
+
+[Footnote 10: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 11: There is, I believe, positive historical authority, which
+fixes Vienne as the place of Pilate's banishment and death.]
+
+The cathedral of Vienne was shut, and its external appearance did not
+tempt us to make further inquiries; but we were directed to a Roman
+temple, which, like that at Nismes, is called the Maison Carrée. It can
+only boast of the remains of lofty pilasters, and the marks of what was
+once an inscription; and the inside being converted into a
+paltry-looking palais de justice, will hardly repay the trouble of
+waiting for the concierge. We departed from Vienne with too unfavourable
+an impression of its dirty inn, and of the place in general, to render
+us desirous of spending the night there. The squalid, dispiriting
+appearance of the town itself, indeed, forms a strong contrast both to
+the fine country in which it stands, and the capital letters which
+decorate its name in the map of France. Instead of loitering in its
+smoky, desolate streets, while horses are changing, I should recommend
+the traveller to walk on and await their arrival at the Aiguille, an old
+Roman monument so called, which stands close to the road on the right,
+within about a mile of the town. This singular pyramidical relic
+commands a beautiful view of the Rhone, winding into the sequestered
+vallies at the foot of Mont Pilate; and the variety of coins and other
+small relics, found there, indicate the ancient boundaries of the city
+as extensive, and comprising both this building and the temple
+above-mentioned; The inhabitants, forgetting that a person once set
+afloat "in the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone," would probably find no
+grave but the gulf of Lyons, have denominated this building the tomb of
+Pilate.
+
+Near Vienne the country of silk-worms begins, every tree almost being a
+mulberry; and on the steep hills, which inclose the channel of the Rhone
+during two days journey from this town, the celebrated Cote-Roti wine is
+chiefly produced. The vineyards are in the highest state of cultivation;
+and, as in Burgundy also, the nature and position of the soil seem to
+operate as a forcing-wall upon the vines, which had, at this early
+season, made immense shoots from their knotty close-pruned stumps. Here
+I frequently observed the industrious expedient practised in many parts
+of Valencia and Catalonia. On the steepest parts of the hills, terraces
+above terraces, of loose stones, are built to secure and consolidate the
+scanty portion of earth which would otherwise be washed away from the
+roots of their vines by the first winter storm; and not a spot is
+neglected, however unpromising and difficult of access, where a
+barrow-full of mould can be raked together, and increased by
+hand-carriage. One cannot witness such industry without wishing that it
+could procure more of the comforts of life; but here, as in Burgundy,
+the exertions of the inhabitants seem hardly repaid by a bare
+subsistence, if one may judge by the general appearance of their houses
+and persons. Those travellers who have not yet learned to button
+themselves up in total indifference, will find, that the interest and
+pleasure derived from a tour depend on nothing more than on the apparent
+well-being of those whom they see around them. It is this circumstance
+which, viewed in the mind's eye, throws a perpetual sunshine over the
+fine scenes of Tuscany and Catalonia, and lends a charm even to the flat
+uninteresting corn-fields of Picardy. The absence of it, on the
+contrary, disfigures the finest scenes in the south of Italy, and causes
+Naples, the most delightful spot on earth, perhaps, for situation and
+climate, to dwell on the recollection like a whited sepulchre, a gilded
+lazar-house of helpless and incurable wretchedness. A Roman beggar,
+glaring at you from the arches of a ruined temple, like one of Salvator
+Rosa's Radicals, with a look at once abject and ferocious, may be,
+perhaps, a characteristic accompaniment to the scene; but the active,
+erect walk, the frank countenance, and cheerful salutation of a peasant
+of the Val d'Arno, leave a more pleasing recollection on the mind, as
+connected with the ideas of comfort, manliness, and independence.
+
+About five miles from Vienne, we ascended a steep hill to the left,
+leaving on the opposite side of the Rhone a well-wooded château,
+belonging to a Mons. d'Arangues; which forms a good accompaniment to the
+view of Mont Pilate. By the road side was a very primitive mill, near
+which we saw a woman sifting corn as we walked up the hill. The corn is
+laid in the circular trough, and ground by a stone revolving round the
+shaft in the centre; which is probably worked by an ass. Such little
+circumstances as these frequently remind us more strongly of the change
+of place, than the difference of language and costume, which we are
+prepared to witness in the different provinces of a wide empire.
+Nothing, for instance, forms a stronger or more distinct feature in
+one's recollections of the south of France, than the enormous remises
+which are annexed to every paltry inn on the road from Lyons to the
+southward, and which serve both as warehouse and stable to the hosts of
+stout Provençal carriers, who travel with wine, oil, and merchandise to
+the interior. The remise at Vienne was sixty feet square, without
+compartment; its roof-timbers were worthy of Westminster Hall, and for
+its folding doors
+
+    "The gates wide open stood,
+    That with extended wings a banner'd host,
+    Under spread ensigns marching, might pass through,
+    With horse and chariots ranked in loose array;
+    So wide they stood!"
+
+Independent of the uses to which these capacious buildings are properly
+applied, they furnish the most agreeable place for rest and refreshment,
+during the heat of the day, being, as the traveller will frequently
+experience, the coolest and the sweetest place belonging to the inn.
+
+During the rest of our day's journey, nothing occurred worthy of
+attention, until the descent into Peage de Rousillon, where we slept.
+Here the Rhone, of which we had lost sight, again appears winding
+through the broad rich valley which opens at the foot of the hill; and
+Mont Pilate also, after you have lost sight of it for the last seven or
+eight miles, and expect to see it behind you, again makes its appearance
+at a distance seemingly undiminished. So difficult is it to judge of the
+real bearings of objects in this clear air, which in fact is less
+favourable to the display of the grander features of nature, than our
+own misty Ossianic climate.
+
+Our inn at Peage de Rousillon, although the only place in the
+neighbourhood at which we could have slept in any comfort, somewhat
+resembled, in its general style, those recorded in Don Quixote, and
+afforded similar adventures. In the midst of our supper, (which was by
+no means a bad one of the kind), in burst a fat German woman in a
+transport of fury, who thought herself ill-used in the allotment of the
+rooms; squabbling in a very discordant key with the landlady, who
+followed her "blaspheming an octave higher." Both were apparently
+viragos of the first order, and the keen encounter of their wits was so
+loud, that we turned a deaf ear to the German's appeal, and insisted on
+their choosing another field of battle. Battle however was the order of
+the day, or rather night, for both myself and my servant were roused in
+the middle of the night to put a stop to a drunken quarrel on the
+staircase, which we effected by ordering down stairs the Maritornes, who
+proved the bone of contention. The Hôtel du Grand Monarque, is evidently
+on a par with that class of inns in our English country towns, which
+bear the royal badge of the George and Dragon, through some fatality
+attendant on high names and dignities.
+
+From Peage de Rousillon to St. Vallier, you traverse eighteen miles of
+flat road, only enlivened by the hills to the right of the Rhone, which,
+becoming gradually more rocky and abrupt, meet at length with a
+corresponding barrier on the left, and enclose the river in a narrow
+valley. Just beyond its entrance, which we had distinguished from above
+Peage de Rousillon, stands the town of St. Vallier, where the conducteur
+intended that we should breakfast. The Hôtel de Poste is a most dismal
+hole indeed, in every respect, and no appearance of any other inn: but
+soon after we learnt by experience, that wherever there is a café of
+tolerable appearance, it affords a much better chance for breakfast than
+any inn of the same rank. Neatness is the more the trade of the
+cafêtier, and his notions of breakfast much more English, than those of
+the inn-keeper, who is usually put completely out of his way by our
+habits.
+
+"Eh! Messieurs," said a well-dressed bourgeoise, who saw us sauntering
+about near the door of her shop, "vous irez sans doute voir notre beau
+château: il fut donné par Jean de Poitiers au premier Seigneur de St.
+Vallier, et il a descendu jusqu'à Mons. de St. Vallier l'actuel
+proprietaire." Nothing could be more acceptable to idle wanderers than
+this information, and off we set at a round pace up a most filthy
+street, according to our directions; our heads full of crenelles,
+pont-levis, donjon, fosse, and the proper etceteras. I am not sure that
+we did not half expect to meet M. de St. Vallier himself, (a good
+baronial name) cap-a-pie at the barbacan gate, his lance in rest, and
+his visor down, like Sir Boucicault, or the Lord de Roye, or the
+doughtiest of Froissart's heroes. A long white-washed mud wall, with
+green folding gates, began somewhat to cool our Gothic
+enthusiasm--. "Perhaps the portcullis was destroyed at the Revolution." A
+bell hung at the gate. "Pshaw, it ought at least to have been a
+bugle-horn." When we had rung, instead of sounding a blast, not a dwarf,
+but a slipshod dirty girl, not much bigger, opened the door cautiously.
+"Il ne faut pas entrer: Monsieur ne permet personne de voir le château."
+We made involuntarily two steps forward; when lo! the end of a modern
+house, with a pea-green door and sash windows, and a shrubbery of lilacs
+interspersed with Lombardy poplars, blasted our sight. No longer
+ambitious of pursuing the lord of St. Vallier in flank, we hoped at
+least that a front view of his castle from the road to Avignon might
+afford some remains of feudal splendour. Off we set accordingly, and
+emerging from the dirty town as quickly as possible, beheld on turning
+round!--a large modern front, in the full smile of complacent ugliness,
+with a Grecian portico, not of masonry, but of red and yellow paint à la
+Lyonnaise; the whole edifice quite worthy of the Hermitage du Mont d'Or.
+The two short round towers on the sides might have been originally
+Gothic; but if really so, they had been most effectually disguised by
+white-washing, and new tiled tops, which very much resembled Grimaldi's
+red cap and his whited face. In front of the windows, instead of the
+sweeping lawns and dark avenues of which Mrs. Ratcliffe is so liberal,
+stood a large close-pruned vineyard, inclosed by a high white wall; at
+one end of which, and facing the front of his red and yellow château, M.
+de St. Vallier had built a red and yellow summer-house, with green
+shutters, to keep it in countenance. Very much diverted at our ludicrous
+disappointment, we sauntered along the road, which followed the course
+of the Rhone. At two miles distance, just where the river winds with a
+broad and rapid sweep into a woody gorge, with one blue mountain peeping
+over it, a black venerable old ruin, with turret and watch-tower, and
+every thing to render it complete, stood cresting an abrupt rock which
+hung over the river. Nothing, said I, shall persuade me that this castle
+is not the genuine gift of John of Poitiers, and the real object of our
+search. Down we sat at all events to sketch it, and meeting by good
+fortune a communicative young officer on the road, we learnt that this
+castle, called[12] Château la Serve, had in reality been the residence
+of the lords of St. Vallier; that many years ago it had been reduced by
+an accidental fire to its present state, and was finally wrested from
+the family at the Revolution. Of the present Château St. Vallier, and
+the estate annexed, they have remained in uninterrupted possession; and
+all admirers of the Gothic must rejoice that the ruin has been
+purchased by the commune of La Serve: for, standing as it does within
+view of the new château, no doubt it would have been brought to the
+state of that delectable domicile by the aid of the trowel and
+paint-brush.
+
+[Footnote 12: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From La Serve to Tain, the same style of country continues, without much
+alteration. The utmost exertions of the inhabitants seem necessary to
+struggle against the stony ungenial nature of the soil; and a black
+storm which was rolling to the right over Mont Pilate, appeared to
+menace the scanty crops of vines which their labour had produced. In
+every hamlet we heard the bells ringing, and saw the poor peasants
+crowding to the church to put up prayers against the coming hail, which
+at this season of the year is peculiarly fatal. If this be a
+superstition, it is surely not a contemptible or uninteresting one to
+witness: nor can one wonder at the influence gained over peasants thus
+instructed to associate Heaven with their daily hopes and fears. To our
+great satisfaction, after two or three vivid flashes of lightning, the
+clouds broke away to the north-west, and a light rain fell partially,
+more beneficial to the parched vineyards than hurtful to the hay, which
+even at this early season was in great forwardness in most places. On
+the whole, I should say that the district lying fifty miles south of
+Lyons, is a month more early than our own in point of climate and
+productions.
+
+At Tain, the Rhone forces for itself a narrow passage into the vale of
+Valence, from among the rugged skirts of Mont Pilate, leaving on the one
+side Tain, and on the other Tournon; both backed by strong heights,
+which seem to guard the entrance of the defile. The situation of Tournon
+is striking, and very much corresponds with the ideas which one forms of
+a strong baronial hold upon the Rhine. A large portion of the
+precipitous hill which commands it, is connected with the town by a
+broken line of grim old walls and towers, which betoken the former
+importance of this position. Its castle, a building of a heavy
+conventual style of architecture, and standing on a fortified terrace,
+formerly belonged to the Prince de Soubisc, but is now converted, as we
+were informed, into a prison. To this purpose it is well adapted, as a
+leap from one of the round towers which breast the river at the angles
+of its terrace, would be fatal; and the character of despotism impressed
+on its walls seems to say, that in former times its uses were not very
+different. The resemblance indeed which it bears to the Château
+d'Amboise on the Loire, the scene of the Duke de Guise's murder, may
+possibly assist its effect on the imagination.
+
+On issuing from this gloomy but not uninteresting spot, the eye opens
+upon an extensive prospect, rich in many of those features which we find
+scattered through the works of Claude and Salvator. To the right, the
+hills which hung[13] over the road to Tain, recede into a long
+perspective, terminated in the distance by a ruined castle on a
+pyramidical rock, near Valence; and the Rhone, following the same
+direction, winds away from the road in a slower and wider current than
+before. To the left, the outskirts of the Dauphiné Alps form a
+singularly wild and fantastic barrier, sometimes rising in abrupt
+pinnacles, and sometimes rent as if by an earthquake into precipices of
+some thousand feet of sheer perpendicular descent. The vale inclosed
+between these rough walls, and in the centre of which the Isere unites
+itself to the Rhone, appears a perfect garden in point of richness,
+cheerfulness, and high cultivation. We crossed the Isere, a strong and
+rapid stream, by a ferry, for our Itineraire, with its usual accuracy,
+forgot to mention that the bridge of which it speaks was broken down by
+Augereau on the advance of the Austrians. Within two or three miles of
+Valence, a rising ground, fringed with scattered oak underwood, affords
+a more distinct and striking semicircular view of the mountains to the
+left; and glimpses of others yet more distant, bordering an immense
+plain, through which the Rhone takes its course towards Avignon.
+
+[Footnote 13: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+As we approached Valence, the ancient Civitas Valentinorum, we again
+observed the ruined castle which we had at first remarked, called
+Château Crussol. It stands on a conical cliff on the opposite side of
+the river, overlooking the town at about two cannon-shots distance. On
+inquiring into the history of this eagle's nest, we found that it had
+been in days of yore the fortress of a petty free-booting chieftain, who
+kept the inhabitants of Valence in a perpetual state of war and
+annoyance; a history which almost appears fabricated to suit its
+appearance and character. It bears a very strong resemblance, in point
+of situation, to the ruin within a mile of Massa di Carrara; which the
+tradition of the peasants assigns as the abode of Castruccio Castracani,
+the scourge of the Pisans. Seeing it relieved by a gleam of sunshine
+from a dark evening cloud behind it, we could fancy, without any great
+effort of imagination, that, like the bed-ridden Giant Pope in honest
+John Bunyan, it was grinning a ghastly smile of envy at the prosperity
+which it could no longer interrupt. Or, if this idea should seem
+extravagant, at least the two opposite neighbours present as lively a
+personification as stone and mortar can afford, of their respective
+inhabitants; the town of Valence flourishing in industrious
+cheerfulness, and the castle domineering, savage, poverty-stricken, and
+formed only for purposes of plunder and mischief.
+
+In the suburbs of Valence we found an excellent inn, called the Croix
+d'Or, worthy to be recommended both for comfort, civility, and fair
+charges. A walk into the town of Valence itself has very little in it to
+repay the traveller, with the exception of the Champ de Mars, a sort of
+public garden bordering on the Rhone. Certainly no place ever united
+such a degree of dirt and closeness to so smiling an exterior. Its old
+Gothic walls still remain, and the streets therefore are probably built
+on the same scale as in those times when they crowded together for
+security against feudal aggressors.
+
+May 9.--To Loriol five miles. The road passes through a country as
+beautiful and diversified as before, seldom deviating above a mile or
+two from the course of the river: corn and hay-fields, the latter fit
+for cutting, mulberry, almond, and fig-trees, cover every inch of
+ground. About a mile before we reached Loriol, and just after passing a
+small town called Livron, we crossed the Drome, over a noble bridge of
+three arches, constructed of a rough sort of whitish marble, and
+reminding us somewhat of a reduced section of the Strand bridge. Its
+massy solidity is not misplaced, as a view up the mountain glen to the
+left of it convinced us. Though the river was at this time low, the
+immense extent of dry beds of gravel showed what its volume and force
+must be when swoln by rain; and the cluster of gloomy mountains which
+close the valley from whence it issues, seem the perpetual abode of
+storms. In one of them I recognised the Montagne de Midi, whose form is
+so remarkably perpendicular when seen from Tain; and altogether, I have
+no idea of forms more wild and extraordinary upon so large a scale. The
+rocks of St. Michel, in Savoy, near St. Jean de Maurienne, are a
+miniature resemblance of them; but a better idea as to size and
+wildness, may be formed by those who recollect the mountains of Nant
+Francon, in Wales, and can imagine them not yet settled into place,
+after the first confusion of the Titanic war.
+
+    "Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam
+    Scilicet, atque Ossâ frondosum involvere Olympum;
+    Ter pater exstructos dejecit fulmine montes."
+
+The view is worth several hours of an artist's time, and its effect is
+considerably increased by a solitary tower, resembling a moss-trooper's
+abode, which stands in the middle distance. It is called, as we
+understood, the Château de Crest, and is the relic of a state prison. On
+passing a corner of rising ground this wild valley disappears, and the
+same rich and cheerful country as has been already described
+recommences. The same unbroken rocky barrier bounds the Rhone on the
+right, while in front numberless peaks of very distant mountains become
+visible over the plain through which its windings are traced.
+
+The neat-looking inn at Loriol probably affords better breakfasts than
+the café, which, in spite of its neat outside, is dirty and imposing, an
+exception to the usual rule.
+
+To Montelimart fifteen miles: the first three we walked, and rested on a
+rising ground, commanding in each direction a long day's journey through
+this fine district. Our walk perhaps made us relish the more a bottle of
+the vin du pays, which Derbieres, a little village a mile or two farther
+on, afforded; but I have no doubt that worse is sold in Paris at seven
+or eight francs a bottle, under the name of pink champagne: it is at
+least worth the while of any thirsty traveller to try the experiment, if
+it were merely for the sake of the civil old landlady of the little inn.
+We could obtain no information from her respecting the history of a
+singular ruin on the opposite side of the river, excepting that it was
+called Château Crucis, and about seven hundred years ago was an abbey.
+Somewhat beyond this black pile stand two or three pyramidical rocks,
+projecting from the general line of hills, the same probably which the
+French Itineraire mentions as commanding a celebrated view, and
+exhibiting in themselves a geological curiosity. I doubt, however,
+whether any person would do well to cross the Rhone to explore them,
+upon the mere credit of that wise octavo.
+
+Montelimart is a large old town, the ancient fortifications of which,
+as of Valence, remain in perfect preservation. The approach to it from
+Loriol gives by no means so favourable an idea of it as it deserves; and
+to estimate its beauties fully, it is necessary to visit the citadel,
+now used as a prison, which stands on a height above the town.[14] The
+view which it commands is uniformly mountainous in the back grounds, and
+flat and rich in its nearer details; but the finest part of it is
+towards the east. The snowy Alps near Grenoble, and the line of
+mountains from whence the Drome issues, and at whose foot Château
+Grignan is situated, are its prominent features; and the little
+farm-houses and tufts of trees in the rich pasture grounds which
+intervene, seem disposed by the hand of a painter.
+
+[Footnote 14: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Not to omit the luxuries of the palate as well as those of the eye, it
+is worth while to procure at Montelimart a wedge or two of the nogaux,
+or almond-cakes, which Miss Plumptre so particularly recommends. The
+genuine sort is as glutinous as pitch, and made in moulds, from whence
+it is cut like portable soup; and the makers at Montelimart, like the
+rusk-bakers of Kidderminster, have, I understand, refused a large sum
+for the receipt. Another of the good things of Provence, to which Miss
+Plumptre's Tour introduced us, was the confiture de menage, or fruit
+boiled up with grape juice instead of sugar. This is a preserve which
+you meet with in most of the commonest inns, but which is so easily made
+and little esteemed, that they do not bring it without a particular
+order. It is very much like asking for treacle at an English inn;
+nevertheless I, for my part, felt obliged to the fair tourist for an
+information which has served to mend many a bad breakfast; and a bad
+breakfast, as the world doth know, is the stumbling-block, or the
+grumbling-stock, of most Englishmen, travelled or untravelled.
+
+The inn at Montelimart is excellent; but Madame must not be left to make
+her own charges. We should, however, have parted from her in good
+humour, had not her avarice affected persons less able to help
+themselves. The poor maid, who appeared jaded to the bone, confessed
+that her mistress detained half her etrennes, and I have reason to
+believe that she spoke truth.
+
+To the classical ground of Château Grignan, which we visited next day, I
+shall devote a separate chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. V.
+
+CHÂTEAU GRIGNAN.
+
+
+MAY 10.--This was the day of the greatest interest and fatigue which we
+had as yet passed; and moreover afforded us a tolerably accurate idea,
+at the risk of our bones, of the nature of French crossroads. Having
+understood that the road from Montelimart to Grignan was inaccessible to
+four-wheeled carriages, we set off at four in the morning in a patache,
+the most genteel description of one-horse chair which the town afforded.
+Let no one imagine that a patache bears that relation to a cabriolet
+which a dennet does to a tilbury; for ours, at least, would in England
+have been called a very sorry higgler's cart. The inside accommodations
+were so arranged, that we sat back to back, and nearly neck and heels
+together, after swarming up a sort of dresser or sounding-board in the
+rear, which afforded the most practicable entrance. "Mais montez,
+montez, Messieurs, vous y serez parfaitement bien," quoth our civil
+conducteur, haranguing, handing, and shoving at the same time. The
+alacrity with which he and his merry little dog Carlin did the honours
+of the vehicle, and the stout active appearance of the horse (to say
+nothing of the whim of the moment, and the fine morning), reconciled us
+to a mode of conveyance no better than that which calves enjoy in a
+butcher's cart; and for the first few miles we forgot even the want of
+springs.
+
+After travelling a league or two, the road began to wind into the
+outskirts of the range of mountains which we had first seen from Tain,
+and reminded us, in its general features, of some of the most
+sequestered parts of South Wales. The soil is generally poor, but
+derives an appearance of verdure and cheerfulness from the large walnut
+and mulberry-trees which shade the road, and the stunted oak copses
+through which it occasionally winds. We passed an extensive pile of
+building, of a character which we had not before observed, consisting of
+a number of small awkwardly-contrived rooms, without any uniformity,
+piled like so many inhabited buttresses against the outside and inside
+of a circular wall. This, it seems, is the property and habitation of
+one person, a M. Dilateau; but it certainly has more the appearance of
+the residence of a whole Birkbeck colony, each back-settler established
+in his own nook, amid the contents of his travelling waggon. A little
+farther, on the summit of a bare rocky ridge to the left, stands a
+castle of a more Gothic character, but equally uncouth and comfortless.
+It was demolished, as we understood, at the time of the Revolution; but
+in its best days must have been but a wretched residence, as no trace
+remains within many hundred yards of it, of any soil where tree or
+garden could have stood. To the genuine admirers of Mad. de Sevigné,
+however, even these cheerless mountain holds present an interesting
+object, as having been peopled by the honest country families whose
+ceremonious visits to Grignan afforded her many a good-natured
+laugh.[15] Or to treat the Château Race-du-fort (for such we understood
+to be the name of this last castle) with more respect, we may fancy its
+proprietor sallying forth, like old Hardyknute, at the head of his armed
+sons and servants, to join the seven hundred country gentlemen who
+volunteered their services, with the Count de Grignan at their head, in
+besieging the rebellious town of Orange.
+
+[Footnote 15: "See Mad. de S.'s Letters."]
+
+We found it necessary, both from common consideration for the
+patache-horse, and our own necks, to walk up the two miles of steep
+ascent, which occur after passing this last castle. On the top of the
+hill all vegetation appears to cease, excepting a few shrubby dwarf
+firs, and a profusion of aromatic plants, such as juniper, lavender,
+southernwood, and wild thyme, which delight in the stony hot-bed
+afforded by the interstices of disjointed rocks. The view from the high
+table of ground to which we climbed at length fully repaid our
+exertions, and may be almost compared, for extent and beauty, to those
+from the church of Fourvières, and the Montagne de Rochepot. Towards the
+north we surveyed not only the valleys of Montelimart and the Drome, but
+nearly the whole of the route of the three preceding days, bordered on
+the one side by the abrupt and lofty mountains, from which the latter
+river takes its source, and on the other by the steep banks of the
+Rhone. On proceeding a little farther, over a road which consisted of
+the native rock in all its native inequality, we caught sight of the
+Comtat Grignan, and the great plain of Avignon, into which that district
+opens in a south-western direction, flanked on the east by a colossal
+Alp, called Mont Ventou, on whose long ridge traces of snow were still
+visible. In the centre of the Comtat, [16]Château Grignan is easily
+distinguished by the grandeur of its outline and proportions, and the
+tall insulated rock on which it stands, somewhat resembling that on
+which Windsor Castle is situated, though inferior in size. Its effect is
+somewhat heightened by several other smaller crags at different
+distances, which thrust themselves through the scanty stratum of soil,
+each crowned with a solitary tower, or little fortalice. In the feudal
+days of the Adhemars, ancestors of the Grignan family, who possessed the
+whole of the Comtat, these were probably the peel-houses, or outposts,
+of the old Château, in the quarter from which it would have been most
+exposed to attack. The Château Race-du-fort was, in all likelihood, also
+the key of the mountain glen leading to the hill which we were
+descending, and formed the line of communication with Montelimart, which
+was formerly included in the family territory. The records on this
+subject trace the foundation of the lordship of Grignan up to the days
+of Charlemagne, who is said to have created Adhemar,[17] one of his
+paladins, Duke of Genoa, as a reward for having re-conquered Corsica
+from the Saracens. Adhemar having fallen in a second expedition against
+the same enemy, his children divided his possessions: the elder
+remaining Duke of Genoa, another possessing the towns of St. Paul de
+Trois Château et Mondragon; and a third, the sovereignty of Orange. A
+fourth possessed the town of Monteil, called after him Monteil Adhemar,
+or Montelimart; and in 1160, the emperor Frederic I. granted to Gerard
+Adhemar de Monteil, his descendant and heir, the investiture of Grignan,
+with many sovereign rights, such as that of coining money. It was to
+this noble family that the Count de Grignan, whose third wife was the
+daughter of Madame de Sevigné, traced his blood and inheritance in a
+direct line.
+
+[Footnote 16: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 17: "Je me réjouis, avec M. de Grignan, de la beauté de sa
+terrasse; s'il en est content, les ducs de Genes, ses grands pères,
+l'auraient été; son gout est meilleur que celui de ce temps-là;
+* * * * * ces vieux lits sont dignes des Adhemars."--_Mad. de Sevigné_.]
+
+As we reached the level of the plain, and approached the castle, its
+commanding height and structure seemed completely to justify Mad. de
+S.'s expression to her daughter, "Votre château vraiment royal." Few
+subjects certainly ever had such a residence as this; which, though
+reduced to a mere shell by the ravages of the Revolution, still seems to
+bespeak the hospitable and chivalrous character of its former possessor.
+It rises from a terrace of more than a hundred feet in height, partly
+composed of masonry, and partly of the solid rock. The town of Grignan,
+piled tier above tier, occupies a considerable declivity at the foot of
+this terrace, and communicates with the castle by a road which winds
+round the ascent, and terminates in a massy gateway.
+
+On entering the town, we were directed to the Bons Enfans, kept by a man
+of the name of Peyrol; which, contrary to the expectations we had
+naturally formed of an inn not much frequented, provided us with a
+breakfast, which even the editor of honest Blackwood would delight to
+describe in all its minutiæ, for it was quite Scotch in variety and
+excellence, and served up with great cleanliness. It may be well to
+remark, that as far as I could judge from the appearance of the rooms, a
+family might spend two or three days here without sacrificing their
+comfort to their curiosity, and would be as well off as at the Quatre
+Nations at Massa, or the Tre Maschere at Caffagiolo, the models of
+little country inns. Our host, we found, was entrusted with the
+privilege of showing the castle by the Count de Muy, in whose family he
+had been a servant; and he accordingly accompanied us in our visit
+thither. On gaining the level of the terrace, we found the wind, which
+had been imperceptible in the town, blowing with such force, as to
+account for[18] Mad. de Sevigné's fears lest her daughter should be
+carried away from her "belle terrasse" by the force of the Bise. Persons
+travelling to the south of France for the sake of health, should be
+particularly on their guard against this violent and piercing wind, as
+well as that called the Mistral; both of which are occasionally
+prevalent in this country at most seasons of the year, and render warm
+clothing adviseable. I shall quote, as illustrative of the power with
+which the Bise blows, an extract from a letter by an intelligent
+traveller, written previous to the destruction of Château Grignan: "En
+faisant le tour du Château, je remarquais avec surprise que les vîtres
+du coté du nord étaient presque toutes brisées, tandis que celles des
+autres faces étaient entières. On me dit, que c'était la Bise qui les
+cassait; cela me parut incroyable; je parlai à d'autres personnes, qui
+me firent la même reponse: et je fus enfin forcé de le croire. La Bise y
+souffle avec une telle violence, qu'elle enleve le gravier de la
+terrasse, et le lance jusqu'au second étage, avec assez de force pour
+casser les vîtres." From the violence of the Bise wind this morning, and
+my subsequent experience of its force at Beaucaire, I have but little
+difficulty in believing this account; and conceive that the danger of
+yielding to the occasional temptation of heat, and wearing light
+clothing, cannot be too strongly insisted on in this country. Persons,
+indeed, who have not visited the south of France, connect its very name
+with the idea of uniform mildness; but in reality, its caprices render
+it, without proper caution, a more dangerous climate than our own.
+
+[Footnote 18: "L'air de Grignan me fait peur pour vous; me fait
+trembler; je crains qu'il n'emporte, ma chere enfant, qu'il ne l'épuise,
+qu'il ne la dessèche--."
+
+"Voilà le vent, le tourbillon, l'ouragan, les diables dechaînés qui
+veulent emporter votre château; quel ébranlement universel! quelle
+furie! quelle frayeur répandue partout!"--_Mad. de Sevigné_.]
+
+On advancing to the balustrades of what appeared a projecting part of
+the terrace, we were surprised to find that it formed one of the towers
+of the lofty church of Grignan, on the top of which, as on a massy
+buttress, we were standing. A trap-door, formed by a moveable paving
+stone, admitted us upon the leads of the church, which are secured from
+the effects of weather by the additional casing which the terrace
+affords. Its interior communicates with the lower rooms of the castle by
+a passage, terminating in a stone gallery, where from its height above
+the body of the church, the family could hear mass unperceived, as in a
+private oratory. The establishment of this church, founded entirely at
+the private expense of the Count de Grignan's ancestors, was very rich,
+and consisted of a deanery, twenty-one canonries, and a numerous and
+well-appointed choir. From its lofty proportions, I should suppose that
+the internal decorations had also been costly; but much mischief, we
+were informed, had been done to it during the time of the Revolution by
+the same troop of brigands which burnt the castle, and which consisted
+of the refuse of the neighbouring towns, countenanced by the
+revolutionary committee of Orange. With a natural aversion to every
+thing noble, these ragamuffins directed their outrages particularly
+against the statue of the founder of the church, whose grim black trunk
+stands in the vestibule, deprived of its head. One almost regrets that
+the figure did not possess the miraculous power of revenge which the
+corpse of Campeador[19] exerted when the Jew plucked his beard, and fall
+headlong of its own accord into the thick of its assailants. The remains
+of Mad. de Sevigné, and of the Grignan family, however, were safe from
+their violence, as the adherents of the castle had taken the precaution
+of changing the position of the flat black stone inscribed with the name
+of the former, which marked the entrance of the family vault; and which
+has since been restored to its original place. The inscription on this
+stone, which stands, a little to the right of the communion-table, is
+simply, "Cy git Marie de Rabutin Chautal, Marquise de Sevigné;" the date
+of her death, April 14, 1696, annexed. Such a name, in truth, does not
+need the assistance of owl-winged cherubs, brawny Fames, and blubbering
+Cupids, those frequent appendages of departed vanity and selfishness;
+which would have been probably as repugnant to the wishes of the good
+marchioness, as inconsistent with her simple and unassuming character.
+
+[Footnote 19: See Southey's translation of the Cid.]
+
+To return to the subject of the revolution, as it affected Château
+Grignan. Miss Plumptre, a writer of much research and general accuracy,
+and whose book would furnish twenty gentlemen-tourists with good
+materials, has, I believe, been misled as to one circumstance, the
+disinterment of Mad. de Sevigné, which, as far we could ascertain by
+inquiry, never took place from causes to which I have just alluded. The
+silk wrapping-gown, the expression of the features, and the respect with
+which the brigands beheld the corpse, are circumstances which Miss
+Plumptre's French informant appears to have accumulated, "pour faire une
+sensation;" and, had they taken place, our communicative guide, who was
+rather given to the melting mood, would have dwelt on them for the same
+purpose. They appear, however, to know nothing about the matter at
+Grignan, a place which Miss P. acknowledges herself never to have
+visited.
+
+The work of destruction was more complete in the castle than in the
+church. The Count de Muy, whose family had become possessed by purchase
+of this splendid pile of building, inhabited it for half the year, doing
+extensive good, if one may trust the partial account of his old servant,
+and maintaining a mode of living which would have done honour to a
+legitimate descendant of the Adhemars. Eighty-four lits de maître, and
+servants' beds in proportion, were made up, we understood, during a
+visit paid to the count by the present king, then Count of Provence.
+These hospitable doings, however, were not to last long. The
+revolutionists broke into the castle, and having pillaged it of whatever
+they could turn to any use, burnt the remainder of the furniture,
+pictures, &c., in the market-place, to the amount of 20,000 francs. One
+fellow, now residing at Montelimart, had the good taste to select for
+his share the dressing-glass and writing-table known as those of Mad. de
+Sevigné. The castle, which they set on fire, continued burning for two
+or three days: yet such was the solidity and goodness of the masonry,
+that an imposing mass still remains, sufficient to give an idea of what
+it must have once been.
+
+      "Qualem te dicam bonam
+    Antehac fuisse, tales cum sint reliquiæ!"
+
+As the terrace remains uninjured, and many of the walls are still
+perfect, the castle might be rendered again habitable at a comparatively
+reasonable expense. But the Count de Muy is seventy, has no children,
+and has lost 25,000 pounds per annum by the revolution; a combination of
+circumstances not very favourable to the spirit of improvement. "C'est
+là," said Peyrol, pointing out a small house at the foot of the terrace,
+"c'est là que demeure l'homme d'affaires de M. le Comte; il y vient tous
+les ans pour peu de jours; moi je lui fais son petit morceau; et souvent
+je le vois se promener sur cette belle terrasse, les larmes aux yeux;
+c'est que Monsieur aimait passionnement ce beau château. Ah, mon Dieu!
+ça me fait pleurer; moi qui ai tout perdu; ma place, mon bon maître, et
+puis je gagne le pain ici avec beaucoup de peine: cette pauvre ville est
+abîmée; nous avons perdu tous nos droits, notre bailliage, notre cour de
+justice, tout, tout--" &c. Our host had apparently imbibed all his
+master's enthusiastic respect for the house of Grignan; for, finding
+that we had purposely deviated from our route to behold the residence of
+Mad. de Sevigné, his delight and loquacity appeared to know no bounds.
+The space of years, and the succession of owners from the time of the
+good Marquise and her son-in-law, to that of his own master, seemed to
+have no place in his mind. He had her letters by heart, I believe, for
+he quoted them with great volubility and correctness, a-propos to almost
+every question which we asked; and seemed fairly to have worked himself,
+by their perusal, into the idea that he had seen and waited on her.
+"C'est ici qu'elle dormait; voilà le cabinet où elle écrivait ses
+lettres; c'est ici qu'elle prisait ses belles idées." Nothing indeed
+could be more delightful, or more calculated to inspire fine ideas, than
+the situation of the ruined boudoir into which he conducted us at these
+words. It occupies one floor of a turret, about fifteen feet in
+diameter, and opens into the shell of a large bedchamber. Its large
+croisees, which look out in three directions, command an extensive
+bird's eye view of the Comtat Grignan, surmounted by the long Alpine
+ridge of Mont Ventou, and an amphitheatre of other smaller mountains:
+and enough remained of both apartments to give a full idea of the
+lightness and airiness of their situation, and of their former
+magnificence.
+
+The walls, on which some gilding still remained, the stone
+window-frames, and the chimney-pieces, were still entire. From the door,
+we looked out into the long gallery[20] built by the Count de Grignan,
+and communicating with different suites of handsome rooms, or at least
+their remains. We explored them as far as was consistent with safety,
+and descended to the "belle terrasse," now over-run with weeds and
+lizards, in order to take[21] another survey of the castle, and form a
+general idea of the parts which we had separately visited. Though built
+at different periods of time, each part is in itself regular and
+handsome. The two grand fronts are the north and west, the former of
+which is represented in Mr. Cooke's first engraving of Grignan. The
+eastern part, facing Mont Ventou, is in a more ornamental style of
+architecture, somewhat resembling that of the inside square of the
+Louvre.[22] The southern part, affording a view of Mad. de Sevigné's
+window, and of the collegiate church founded by the family, is
+represented in the second engraving, the subject of which was sketched
+on the road to La Palud, whither we were bound for the night. In our way
+thither, we made a short detour, accompanied by our host, to the Roche
+Courbiere, a natural excavation on the rock, within sight of the
+terrace, and to the left of the road. This cool retreat, it may be
+recollected, was discovered and chosen by Mad. de Sevigné, as a sort of
+summer pavilion; and was embellished by the Count de Grignan with a
+marble table, benches of stone, and a stone bason, which collected the
+filterings of a spring that took its source from this cavern. I have
+since seen a drawing made previous to the Revolution, which confirms
+Peyrol's account. Even this modest hermitage, however, was not spared by
+the systematic spite of the brigands who destroyed the castle. Only one
+stone bench remains; the table and bason are demolished, and the spring
+now oozes over the damp floor as it did in a state of nature. On
+returning from this spot to the road, we crossed an open common field on
+the south side of the castle, planted with corn, and apparently of a
+better quality than the land in its vicinity. "Voilà le jardin," said
+our guide; "c'étoit là où il y avoit de ces belles figues, ces beaux
+melons, ce delicieux. Muscat dont Madame parle." The fine trees, which
+marked the limits of the garden, have all been cut down and burnt, with
+the exception of a row of old elms on the western side, forming part of
+the avenue which flanked the mail, or ball-alley, a constant appendage
+in days of old to the seats of French noblemen. The turf of the mail is
+even and soft still, and the wall on both sides tolerably perfect--"And
+now, Messieurs," said mine host, "you may tell your countrymen, that you
+have walked in the actual steps of the Marquise. C'est ici qu'elle
+jouoit au mail avec cette parfaite grace--et M. le Comte aussi--ah!
+c'étoit un plaisir de les voir." We hardly knew whether to laugh at, or
+be interested by the comical Quixotism of this man, who I verily believe
+had, by dint of residence on the spot, and thumbing constantly a dirty
+old edition of Madame's letters, worked himself up to the notion that he
+had witnessed the scenes which he described. We were induced, in the
+course of our walk, to inquire somewhat into his own history, which
+appeared rather a melancholy one, though common enough in the times
+through which he had lived. About a week after the pillage and
+destruction of Château Grignan, he was denounced as a royalist, and
+immured in the prison of Orange, in company with several gentlemen of
+the neighbourhood, acquaintances of his master. By means of a friend in
+the town, (for they were not all devils at Orange, as he emphatically
+assured us), he was enabled to procure a few common necessaries, to
+improve the scanty prison allowance of some of the more infirm; but his
+charitable labour soon ceased, for all were successively dispatched by
+the guillotine in a short space of time. In the course of three months,
+378 persons perished by decree of the miscreants composing the
+Revolutionary tribunal at Orange, whose names were Fauvette, Fonrosac,
+Meilleraye, Boisjavelle, Viotte, and Benôit Carat, the greffier. One of
+their first victims was an aged nun of the Simiane family, canoness of
+the convent of Bollene, accused of being a counter-revolutionist; so
+lame and infirm, that her executioners were forced to carry her to the
+scaffold. Madame d'Ozanne, Marquise de Torignan, aged ninety-one, and
+her grand-daughter, a lovely young woman of twenty-two, perished in the
+same massacre. The personal beauty of the latter, which was much
+celebrated in the neighbourhood, had interested one of the brigands of
+Orange in her fate, who promised to exert his influence with the council
+of five, to save the life of the grandmother, on condition of receiving
+the hand of Mademoiselle d'Ozanne. The poor girl overcame her horror and
+reluctance for the sake of her aged relative, and promised to marry this
+man on condition of his success in the promised application. The life,
+however, of so formidable a conspirator as a superannuated and dying
+woman, was too great a favour to be granted even to a friend; and the
+only boon which he could obtain was the promise of Mademoiselle
+d'Ozanne's life, in consideration of her becoming his wife. "Eh bien! il
+faut mourir ensemble;" was her answer without a moment's deliberation,
+and next day, accordingly, both the relatives perished on the same
+scaffold. Poor Peyrol himself, after expecting the fatal _Allons_ for
+many a morning, was at length relieved from his apprehensions by the
+fall of Robespierre, and obtained his release, on condition of serving
+in the army. After fighting for four years, with a cordial detestation
+of the cause in which he was engaged, he was disabled for the time by a
+severe wound, and obtained leave to return to Grignan, where he settled
+in the little inn; but the most severe blow of all was yet in store for
+him; for his wife died not long after, leaving him with five children.
+"Ainsi vous voyez, Monsieur, que j'ai connu le malheur. Au reste, Mons.
+de Muy m'a donné la clef de ce château, et cela me vaut quelque chose;
+car il y a du monde qui viennent quelquefois le voir." Then, relapsing
+into his habitual strain of complaint, he ended with, "Oh mon pauvre
+cher maître! ce beau, ce grand château! ah, j'ai tout perdu!" One bright
+moment, however, as he exultingly remarked, occurred during his
+compulsory service in the army; for it so chanced that he was one of the
+guard on duty during the execution of his former oppressor, Fauvette.
+"Moi à mon tour je l'accompagnois a cet echafaud où il m'auroit envoyé;
+il avoit la mine triste, un fleur de jasmin à la bouche; ma foi, ça ne
+sentoit pas bon pour lui."
+
+Such is an exact transcript of our communicative host's conversation,
+which, notwithstanding the suspicion with which I regard the prattle of
+foreign guides, seemed to me not so much a well-conned lesson, as the
+genuine overflowing of such a disposition as honest Thady M'Quirk's. His
+interest in the persons and events of which he spoke, appeared as warm
+and genuine as his _naïveté_ was amusing and we took leave of him with a
+strong feeling of good will towards himself and his little clean inn.
+
+[Footnote 20: Eighty feet by twenty-four, according to a measurement
+made previous to the burning of the castle.]
+
+[Footnote 21: Pour entrer au vestibule (says the same letter which I
+quoted before, written before the Revolution) on monte par un escalier,
+car les appartemens sont tous au premier. Il y a quatre beaux salons,
+qui s'appellent la salle du roi, la salle de la reine, la salle des
+evêques, et la galerie: le reste de la maison, qui est vaste, est
+distribuêe en divers appartemens, dont chacun est composé d'une chambre
+a coucher, un grand cabinet, et un cabinet à toilette.]
+
+[Footnote 22: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+It is as needless to apologize for devoting a whole chapter to local
+circumstances connected with Madame de Sevigné's life, as it would be to
+detail the well-known social virtues which have erected this amiable and
+unpretending woman into a sort of household deity in the eyes of so
+large a class of persons, while the Lauzuns, the Montespans, and other
+gay and brilliant favourites of that period, are only recollected with
+disgust.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VI.
+
+ORANGE--AVIGNON.
+
+
+OUR road to La Palud lay along the rocky vale first discovered from the
+heights above Château Grignan, which in fact is not so much a vale as a
+high plateau of ground enclosed between hills, like many parts of
+Castille. To the latter country, indeed, the Comtat Grignan bears a
+striking resemblance in the characteristic features which prevail
+through the greater part of it. The insulated grey rocks have forced
+themselves through the starved soil, like projecting bones; the parched
+fields are more full of pebbles than corn; and the stunted evergreen
+oaks, with their diminutive tough leaves of a dingy grey, though well
+enough adapted to the inhospitable ground in which they grow, present an
+appearance quite repugnant to our English ideas of verdure and
+vegetation. The immediate neighbourhood of Château Grignan, indeed,
+seems tolerably fertile, but it is difficult nevertheless to conceive
+from whence the adequate supplies for the Count's immense table were
+procured, or how the feudal contributions of such a country could have
+supported in earlier days the number of castles and towers, whose ruins
+we saw on the summits of every detached rock. These, from their
+resemblance to the "antiguas obras de Moros," which the muleteers used
+to point out, presented another feature strongly reviving my Spanish
+recollections. In the days of romance, this country must have been the
+Utopia of Troubadours, where each might in the compass of a short walk
+have taken morning draught, breakfast, nooning, dinner, and supper, at
+the strong holds of different barons. The first of these fortalices,
+called Chamaret le Maigre, presents a striking landmark from the town of
+Grignan; but, on a nearer approach, consists of little more than a tall
+slender tower upon an insulated rock; the rest is in ruins. At a short
+distance beyond this spot stands Montsegur, a little old fortified town
+upon a hill, which, from its name and appearance, may have been one of
+those cradles of civil liberty, where the "bon homme Jacques" first
+found refuge from his haughty feudal oppressors. A ruin of a more lordly
+description close to it, is called, as we understood, the Château
+Beaume: but the number of less important ruins, which occurred in this
+day's journey, is too great to admit of a particular description. A turn
+to the right between a couple of commanding heights, brought us out of
+this barren country into the wide and fertile plain of the Rhone, and
+under the walls of St. Paul de Trois Châteaux, the ancient Augusta
+Tricastinorum. From the respectable appearance of this town, we
+conceived ourselves in the high road to La Palud, and likely to be soon
+indemnified by dinner and rest, for the joltings of the day; but our
+driver, instead of taking the proper direction, lost himself in a series
+of inextricable cross roads, which terminated in a quagmire. In this
+slough of despond the unfortunate patache, from which we had descended,
+might have stuck for ever, but for the assistance of two shepherds, as
+wild in their attire, and as civil, as Don Quixote's friendly goatherds.
+By dint of their exertions and those of the floundering and groaning
+horse, the vehicle, which was too deeply imbedded in the muddy ruts to
+dread an overturn, was dragged out by main force; the driver sometimes
+wringing his hands in King Cambysses' vein, and sometimes strenuously
+applying his shoulder to the wheel. A franc or two dismissed our
+bare-legged friends grinning to their very earrings, and we pursued our
+road without further interruption, quite satisfied with this specimen of
+the loamy fatness of the soil. From the experience of this day, I
+certainly should recommend no one to make the detour to Grignan in a
+wheeled carriage of any sort. An active person might accomplish on foot,
+before breakfast, the whole distance from Montelimart to Grignan, and
+might reach St. Paul de Trois Châteaux, or perhaps La Palud, by night;
+but even lady travellers would find less fatigue in hiring
+saddle-horses and mules from Montelimart, than in being bumped at the
+rate of two miles and a half per hour, over roads which frequently seem
+a jumble of unhewn paving-stones. We afterwards understood that there
+was a direct road from Grignan to Orange, which would have saved us some
+distance, and could not have been worse than that which we travelled
+this evening.
+
+At La Palud we found the servants and voiture established in the second
+inn, the name of which I forget. The accommodations, however, were
+decent and comfortable, and the charges moderate: and, on the whole, the
+appearance of this inn was nearly, or quite as good as that of the Hôtel
+d'Angouleme. The people of the latter house, to which the servants were
+originally directed, concluding that they had positive orders to await
+us there, persisted in demanding a price for every thing which more than
+doubled any charge yet attempted; an instance of pertinacious rascality
+which it is not amiss to mention, and which would have diverted us by
+its very absurdity, had we not been too tired to find amusement in any
+thing but supper and beds. In the course of this day and the next, we
+heard, for the first time, the Provençal patois, which seems a bad
+compound of French, Spanish, and Italian, with an original gibberish of
+their own. As far, indeed, as a slight and partial observation enables
+me to judge, I have been much struck by a similarity which the
+inhabitants of the Mediterranean coast bear to each other in language
+and character, a similarity so great, as to lead one to suppose them
+descended from the same original stock. The same savage originality of
+manner, (accompanied frequently by much good-humour and civility), the
+same extravagance of gesture, which seems the overflow of bodily vigour
+and animal spirits, the same red cap, and lastly, the same villainous
+compound of languages, mixed up in discordant cadences and terminations,
+appear to distinguish the inhabitants of Provence, Languedoc, Naples,
+and Genoa, and last and noblest of all, the Catalans.
+
+May 11.--To Orange eighteen miles, through the same rich and extensive
+plain, from which the barrier of hills that accompanied us before,
+receded to a considerable distance; but which is still interrupted and
+broken occasionally by rocks of the wildest and most abrupt shape
+possible, with the addition in general of a frowning castle in ruins.
+The little towns of Montdragon[23] and Mornas, which we passed this
+morning, are each situated under heights of this description. The castle
+of the former, of which a plate is given in Mr. Cooke's work, I think
+even superior to that of Caerphilly, in South Wales, in the "awsome
+eyriness," as a Scotsman would express it, with which its detached
+masses are grouped. The castle of Mornas is not so remarkable, but the
+rocks on which it stands are very striking; for if they have any
+inclination out of the perpendicular, it is rather towards than from the
+road. It is indeed impossible, when you stand under the shade of this
+lofty barrier, and look up to the clouds drifting over it, to fancy that
+it is not in the act of toppling down upon your head. We had not as yet
+emerged from the land of castles, for, as in yesterday's route, almost
+every little town possessed some vestige of ancient fortification, a
+silent testimony to the peaceful virtues of "the good old days." The
+heat of the weather at this comparatively early season of the year,
+induced us to congratulate ourselves that we had not chosen a month, or
+even a fortnight later, for our excursion, particularly as the
+mulberry-trees, which in this thrifty country form almost the only
+shade, were beginning to lose their covering of leaves. Every where we
+met women and children carrying ladders, shaped exactly like those used
+by cocks and hens in roosting, or perched high in trees, stripping them
+for the food of the silk-worms. The natural gracefulness of the mulberry
+foliage is entirely destroyed by the unmerciful pruning and pollarding
+which it undergoes in this country, in order to concentrate it for
+gathering. Very little fruit, and that small and tasteless, is produced
+from these cabbage-cut trees; a circumstance which I mention to prevent
+disappointment, since, no doubt, many a gentle traveller may indulge, as
+I confess to have done, the luxurious hope of feasting on this fruit in
+perfection under every hedge-row in Provence. Another month would have
+rendered the heat of the country insufferable, and stript it of much of
+its beauty, by reducing to bunches of bare poles those trees which still
+continued to afford verdure and finish to the prospect.
+
+[Footnote 23: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Within a few miles of Orange we crossed the river Aigues by a handsome
+stone bridge, commanding a magnificent view of Mont Ventou. This
+mountain seems the most conspicuous landmark in the part of France which
+we were traversing, continuing visible as it does for two or three days
+journey with very little alteration of outline. To judge from its
+situation on the map, it could not be less than twenty-five or thirty
+miles from the place where we stood, though from the deception caused by
+its enormous length and height, and not uncommon in mountain scenery, it
+appeared accessible in a walk of two or three hours. I well remember, as
+an instance illustrative of this deception, the surprise of a Berkshire
+servant at Capel Curig, when informed that he really could not take an
+evening's walk to the top of Snowdon after littering up his horses, and
+return to supper. The effect in question is increased, and rather to the
+detriment of picturesque beauty, by the less hazy atmosphere of southern
+countries; but I never recollect so strong an instance of it, as in the
+view of Mont Ventou of which I am speaking. I was struck also by its
+great similarity to drawings which I had seen of Ætna from the Catanian
+coast, as well its outline, as the manner in which it rises from a
+cluster of satellite hills into the borders of the snowy region. Several
+scattered snow-ridges were visible near its top, contrasting curiously
+with the effect of the sun's rays reflected from its sides, which,
+instead of Campbell's picturesque "cliffs of shadowy tint" appeared a
+red-hot stony mass, and might be fancied by a slight effort of
+imagination, into Ætna covered with an eruption of burning cinders.
+
+The approach to the celebrated arch of Orange, commemorating Marius's
+victory over the Cimbri, is marked by an avenue of Lombardy poplars
+which line the high road. The classical and sombre stone pine, which
+gives so striking an effect to the tomb of the Scipios (as it is styled)
+near Tarragona, would have been more in character as an accompaniment to
+this proud monument also; but since the days of [24] Alpheus and his red
+silk stockings, the taste for _quelque chôse de gentil_ has constantly
+poisoned those classical associations of which the French are so fond.
+The grave Patavinian is still designated by the tom-tit appellation of
+Tite Live; and the majestic arch, whose history would have been so well
+illustrated by his lost annals, is tricked out with a poplar avenue,
+like a summer-house on Clapham-common.
+
+[Footnote 24: See the Spectator.]
+
+The townsmen of Orange, however, deserve credit for the substantial
+style in which they have repaired one end of it, to prevent farther
+dilapidation, and for the manner in which the road is diverted from it
+on both sides in a handsome sweep, leaving a green space in the middle,
+in which the arch stands. We returned to it immediately after breakfast,
+and our second impressions were fully equal to the first. As[25] a work
+of art, it is certainly worthy of one of the proudest places in the
+Campo Vaccino, though of course its effect is more striking in the
+neighbourhood[26] of the victory which it commemorates. The bas relief
+on the side facing Orange, would not be unworthy of a place between the
+well-known statues of Dacian captives, which ornament the arch of
+Constantine. Different as were their respective æras, the stern
+thoughtful dignity of the barbarian chiefs, and the spirit which
+animates
+
+    "The fiery mass
+    Of living valour, rolling on the foe,"
+
+as represented in the battle of Marius, appear to have been conceived by
+the same powerful mind, and embodied by the same master hand. The same
+chastened energy and unaffected greatness of design which characterizes
+the poetry of Milton, the painting of Michael Angelo, and the music of
+Handel, is conspicuous in both. The bas relief which I have mentioned
+forms the principal ornament of the arch; but the trophies, the rostra,
+&c. which appear in other parts, are in a style of simple and
+soldier-like grandeur corresponding with its character and the
+achievement which it commemorates. I do not pretend to consider this
+monument as comparable on the whole to the arch of Constantine; but
+still it is of a very different school of art from that which produced
+the arch of Severus. On the bas relief representing Marius's victory,
+one might fancy the most high born and athletic of Achilles's Myrmidons
+in the full "tug of war;" whereas the swarms of crawling pigmies which
+burlesque the triumph of Severus might be supposed the original Myrmidon
+rabble, just hatched, as the fable reports, from their native ant-hills,
+and basking in the sun like so many tadpoles.
+
+[Footnote 25: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 26: Marius's victory is said to have been gained near Aix
+(Aquæ Seætiæ).]
+
+The Roman colony of Orange, to judge from the relative positions of the
+arch and circus, must have been very considerable, and have occupied a
+far larger space than the present town. The arch stands detached from
+its entrance, as I mentioned, on the Lyons' side, and the circus at the
+extreme end, in the direction of Avignon; yet the former we may suppose
+to have joined on to the ancient town, and the latter to have stood in
+the same central position which the Colosseum occupied in Rome. Of the
+circus nothing now remains but the chord of the semicircle, or, to
+express it more familiarly, the straight line of the D figure, in which
+it was built. As far as I could guess, from pacing the length of this
+enormous wall, encumbered and buttressed as it was by dirty shops, it is
+in length nearly or quite a hundred yards, and of a height
+proportionate. The point of view from which it appears to the most
+advantage, is on the road to Avignon, about two or three furlongs out of
+the town. When viewed in this direction, it stands with a commanding air
+of a grim old Roman ghost among a group of men of the present day;
+forming, by its blackness and colossal scale of proportions, a striking
+contrast to every thing around it, and overtopping houses, church-tower,
+and every thing near, excepting a circular hill at the foot of which it
+stands. The latter is marked as the position of the ancient Roman
+citadel by the remains of tower and wall, half imbedded in turf, which
+surround it: and one veteran bastion still stands firm and unbroken, in
+a position facing the Circus, its companion through the silent and
+ruinous lapse of so many centuries. Without the affectation of decrying
+well-known and celebrated monuments of antiquity, or the wish to put any
+thing really in comparison with the ruins of ancient Rome, I must still
+own, that the unexpected view which I caught of the citadel and Circus
+from this position, realized more strongly to my mind the august
+conceptions so well expressed in Childe Harold, than any view in Rome
+itself, hardly excepting the Colosseum.
+
+      O'er each mouldering tower
+    Dim with the mist of years, grey flits the shade of power.
+
+The stanza concluding with these lines involuntarily occurs to the mind,
+while viewing Orange in the direction of which I now speak; and the
+lofty visions of the noble author, which are, perhaps, too over-wrought
+and ideal to harmonize with the sober contemplations of the closet, seem
+in this spot to assume "a local habitation and a name." Undoubtedly they
+ought to do so more particularly at Rome, and would so in every
+instance, but that much of the effect of the "Eternal City" is lost from
+the deserved eminence in which we know it to stand, and the consequent
+familiarity which we have acquired with it through the works of Piranesi
+and innumerable other artists. Thus its very celebrity lessens its
+effect, as the commendations bestowed on a celebrated beauty frequently
+occasion disappointment. The _on admire ici_ of the well-bound
+Itineraire, the elaborate descriptions of Vasi, and the _Ecco Signore_
+of your obliging cicerone, produce the same effect upon the mind, which
+the mistaken attentions of Koah, the South Sea priest, did on the
+stomach of Captain Cook. The meat was good, but honest Koah spoiled its
+relish by proffering it ready chewed; and in the same manner, the effect
+of what is really most admirable in nature and art is weakened by the
+impertinent obtrusion of ready-made ecstasies. It is no reflection on
+human perverseness to say, that every one has his own way of admiring,
+and loves to feel and observe for himself; as well as to chew with his
+own teeth. For my own part, I never could appreciate the stupendous
+beauties of Rome as I wished, until I managed to abstract myself from
+the notion that I was come to admire as thousands had done before, and
+from the recollection of the unclassical comforts of the excellent inn
+in the Piazza di Spagna. An English letter, or newspaper, is an
+excellent preparative for this purpose; and when once absorbed in the
+train of thought which it creates, the sudden transition to the mighty
+scenes before you, produces by contrast the effect which it ought to do.
+
+I have been led into these observations, to account for the reason why
+Orange struck me so much; a place of which I had heard and read little
+or nothing. No attentive and intelligent cicerone anticipated our
+reflections in this place; nor did the creature-comforts of a good inn
+debase our Roman reveries, though we could well have pardoned their so
+doing. Madame Ran, of the Croix Blanche, was as mean and dirty as the
+hole in which she lived; and looked as malevolent as Canidia, Erichtho,
+or any other classical witch; and as to the inhabitants of Orange,
+though the revolutionary anecdotes which we have heard of them at
+Grignan might create some prejudice to their disadvantage, I think, in
+truth, that I never beheld a more squalid, uncivilized,
+ferocious-looking people. A grin of savage curiosity, or a cannibal
+scowl, seems almost universally to disfigure features which are none of
+the best or cleanest; and their whole appearance is as direct a contrast
+as can well be imagined, to the hale, honest Norman, or le franc Picard,
+as he is proverbially styled. We turned our backs upon them with
+pleasure, after casting back one lingering look at the noble old Circus;
+and soon found ourselves in the centre of the extensive plain in which
+Avignon stands. The forwardness of the climate, and the skilful system
+of irrigation pursued here, afforded us, at this early time of the year,
+the spectacle of hay-making in many places. An English farmer might be
+shocked by the rudeness of the method here pursued, the hay being mostly
+carried in sail-cloth sheets, and turned with large wooden forks. With
+respect to the former practice, I have nothing to say; but, having
+attentively observed their method of using these forks, I am confident
+that they are better adapted to the purpose of turning the hay than our
+heavy prongs of ash and iron. They are at once lighter in hand, and,
+from the length of their teeth, they take up a larger portion of hay at
+once; and must therefore be well calculated for making the most of the
+fine weather, which, in our climate, cannot always be calculated upon,
+and occasions a scarcity of working hands.
+
+At three or four miles from Avignon, and before any other part of the
+town becomes visible,[27] the legate's palace appears conspicuously
+
+    Rising with its tiara of proud towers
+    At airy distance, with majestic motion;
+
+and a more splendid Gothic building, both as to outline and dimensions,
+cannot be imagined. On a nearer approach, a long and wide reach of the
+Rhone, winding round the base of this noble pile, and reflecting its
+figure in a deep mirror, adds greatly to its effect. In Mr. Cooke's
+work, the palace is represented nearly in this direction, from a point
+somewhat diverging to the right of the road, so as to introduce a broken
+Gothic bridge, and a part of the Roche Don, or Roche Notre Dame (for I
+believe it bears both names). The rest of the town of Avignon, placed as
+it is on a low level, affords no striking coup d'oeil, from the
+direction in which we approached it: the ancient walls, however, which
+inclose its whole circumference, unbroken and perfect, and beautifully
+crenated in every part, are a very remarkable feature. I know but of one
+other instance of this continuity of Gothic wall, which occurs at
+Valencia; but the fortifications of the Spanish town, though they far
+exceed those of Avignon in dimensions and strength, fall as short of
+them in beauty. We had a full opportunity of examining the merits of
+the latter, as the police had unaccountably thought fit to shut up all
+the entrances to the town but one or two; which obliged us, on arriving
+at the foot of the walls, to add two miles more to our day's journey
+before we could reach their interior. We found the Hôtel de l'Europe,
+kept by the widow Pierron, a superior inn in every respect, both in the
+comfort and liberality of the establishment, and the cleanliness of the
+servants.
+
+[Footnote 27: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VII.
+
+AVIGNON--MURDER OF BRUNE--HOSPITAL DES FOUS--MISSION OF 1819.
+
+
+ON the opposite side of the square in which our inn was situated, stands
+the Hôtel du Palais Royal, the scene of Brune's assassination. The
+account which M. Joüy gives in the Hermite en Provence, of this horrible
+transaction, corresponds as nearly as possible with the particulars
+which we heard upon the spot. Being summoned on the restoration of Louis
+to answer the charge of treason, and having stopped with his escort at
+Avignon for the purpose of changing horses and refreshing himself, the
+marshal was recognized by the populace as one of the supposed murderers
+of the Princess de Lamballe. A ferocious mob soon assembled at the door
+of the hôtel, broke in by force, and after deliberately shooting him,
+dragged the body to the adjoining bridge, and with every mark of
+contumely threw it into the Rhone. Such is the brief outline of the
+murder of a defenceless man, on a charge which, whether true or not,
+should have rested between God and his conscience. Joüy may indeed be
+pardoned for commenting and enlarging on this story, though the simple
+facts address themselves more strongly to the mind, than when dressed up
+with stage effect, and must be better adapted to produce the impression
+probably desired by that author. In the detestable ruffians who
+disgraced the good cause of loyalty on this occasion, we recognize the
+same black and fiery blood which flowed in the veins of the Marseillois
+assassins of 1793, and of the fanatics of Nismes: and whose ebullitions
+render them equally hateful as friends or enemies. There are many
+strange historical discoveries which would surprise me more than to
+learn that the Moorish blood remained in this part of France
+unextirpated by the victories of Charles Martel;[28] for to a person who
+knows them only by report and casual observation, the _tout ensemble_ of
+its inhabitants seems to differ totally from that of the Gascon and the
+Basque; names which, like the name of Norman, convey to the mind an
+image of frankness and gallantry.
+
+[Footnote 28: "Cette memorable bataille, sur laquelle nous n'avons aucun
+détail, nous sauva du joug des Arabes, et fut le terme de leur grandeur.
+Depuis ce revers, ils tenterent encore de pénétrer dans la France; ils
+s'emparerent même d'Avignon; mais Charles Martel les défit de nouveau,
+réprit cette ville, leur enleva Narbonne, et leur ota pour jamais
+l'espérance dont ils s'étaient flattés si longtemps."--_Florian's Précis
+Historique sur les Maures._]
+
+On the morning after our arrival, we ascended first of all the Roche
+Don, a hill enclosed within the walls of the town, and backing the
+ruined palace of the legate; being desirous, as in Lyons, to begin our
+survey from a point which might serve as a general key to the whole, and
+instruct us in the bearings of different objects. From this elevated
+spot, situated at the north-western extremity of the city, we looked to
+the east, north, and south, over a plain as rich in verdure and
+cultivation as the finest parts of Lombardy; to which the stately towers
+of the palace, and the clustering spires and battlemented walls of
+Avignon form a fine foreground. The distant hills, at the foot of which
+Vaucluse is situated, form the eastern boundary of this plain; and are
+succeeded and overtopped to the northward by a chain of the Dauphiné
+Alps, among which the long sweeping mass of Mont Ventou predominates.
+From the latter quarter the Rhone is traced winding up in a wide and
+rapid current, till it reaches the highly cultivated islands at the foot
+of Mont Don, and pursues its course with increased grandeur towards the
+southward. The neighbourhood of its junction with the Durance is marked
+in this quarter by a barrier of mountains of less height than those
+above-mentioned, but more abrupt and wild in their forms, at whose foot
+appear casual glimpses of the two rivers, winding like narrow silver
+threads into the horizon. "Vous avez passé ce diantre de Rhone," says
+Madame de Sevigné, "si fier, si orgueilleux, si turbulent; il faut le
+marier avec la Durance quand elle est en furie; ah le bon ménage!" The
+good people of Lyons have, however, settled this point otherwise by
+their inscriptions and statues in the Hôtel de Ville, which certify this
+river-god as already married to the Saone: the Durance, therefore, can
+hold no higher rank than that of his termagant mistress, while the
+gentle, even, beneficent character of her rival, and the priority of her
+claims, suit much better with the title of wife. If it be permitted me
+to quote Mad. de Sevigné once more, I should remark, that the broken
+Gothic bridge beneath our feet, which forms so picturesque an object in
+every point of view, is the same against the piers of which Mad. de
+Grignan was nearly lost.[29] It formerly connected the Roche Don with
+the heights on the western side of the Rhone, up which the road to
+Nismes winds near Fort Villeneuve; and is well worthy of a nearer survey
+as an architectural relic. The few arches which remain have the same
+bold span and elegant lightness of design so remarkable in the
+celebrated Pont y Prydd in South Wales; and the piers, which appear
+slight at a distance, are nevertheless solid and well adapted to the
+nature of the Rhone, whose current they cut like the sharp bow of a
+canoe. Its remarkable narrowness, which hardly allows two horses to pass
+abreast, and the ancient guard-house in the centre, secured by gates on
+both sides, carry the mind strongly back to those days of distrust and
+violence, which have by some been called "the good old times:"--
+
+       "Ego me nunc denique natum
+    Gratulor."
+
+[Footnote 29: As late as 1688, Louis XIV. seized on the territory of
+Avignon in consequence of disagreements with Innocent XI., and the Count
+de Grignan held the city as his viceroy for two subsequent years. Mad.
+de Sevigné, in her letters written at this period of time, congratulates
+her daughter (whose boat was nearly overset against the piers of this
+identical bridge), on the dignity of the situation conferred on the
+count, and the more solid advantages which might accrue from it.
+
+"Vous prenez, ma chere fille, (says she) une fort honnete resolution
+d'aller à votre terre d'Avignon, voir des gens qui vous donnent de si
+bon coeur ce qu'ils donnoient au vicelegat."--June, 1689.
+
+"Quelle difference de la vie que vous faites à Avignon, toute à la
+grande, toute brillante, toute dissipée, avec celle que nous faisons
+ici!"--_Les Rochers_. June, 1689.
+
+"Toutes vos descriptions nous ont divertis au dernier point; nous sommes
+charmés, comme vous, de la douceur de l'air, de la noble antiquité des
+eglises honorées comme vous dites, de la presence et de la residence de
+tant de Papes, &c. &c."--June 26, 1689.]
+
+At the period when the territory of Avignon was styled by the kings of
+France the "derriere du Pape," from the convenient posture in which it
+lay for their correction, one may fancy the same scenes to have taken
+place on a larger scale, which are described as occurring at the bridge
+of Kennaquhair, the same struggle between secular and monastic
+authority, the same sullen important bridgeward, and the same forcible
+arguments employed by wandering troops of jackmen to effect a passage.
+In Mr. Cooke's first view of the legate's palace, this bridge appears
+projecting from the part of the Roche Don where we stood, a spot marked
+with two round buildings, like small Martello towers. The window marked
+by two birds flying directly over it, and second from the highest in the
+same tower, has acquired a bloody notoriety. From this giddy height, as
+we were informed by an inhabitant whom we met, the half-murdered victims
+of revolutionary massacre were thrown, to put an end to their
+sufferings: and their remains heaped up for a time in the square
+building which stands below, originally erected for the purpose of an
+ice-house.
+
+Having familiarized ourselves with the leading features of Avignon and
+its vicinity, as viewed from this commanding point, we descended into
+the town to take a more particular survey.
+
+      Rhetor comes Heliodorus,
+    Græcorum longè doctissimus.
+
+To translate Horace freely, our companion was a rhetorician, or talker
+by profession, and the most learned of his class in extraordinary
+legends and fabrications; in other respects an useful civil fellow, with
+an Irish brogue, which his service in the French army had not been able
+to eradicate, or even weaken, and the established cicerone of the place.
+To account satisfactorily for his wooden leg and French uniform, he
+anticipated our inquiries by informing us, that he had been crippled by
+a shipwreck on the French coast, and through the recommendation of his
+friends the _Duchess_ of Westmoreland and _Countess_ of Devonshire,
+patronized by Louis, "who allowed him this uniform coat to wear, and two
+_males_ a-day." In England, one would not have borne the sight of such a
+lying varlet another instant, but I must confess that the mere sound of
+our own language in a foreign town, disarmed our indignation, and we
+bore with the fellow, whom we found not unamusing, and from his local
+knowledge, serviceable. A very small degree of merit indeed suffices to
+open one's heart towards a fellow-countryman in a strange land; a truth
+no doubt known and acted on by knights of industry, matrimonial
+speculators, and
+
+"Broken dandies lately on their travels."
+
+The legate's palace is now divided into barracks and a prison, and the
+nakedness of its appearance upon a nearer view make its lofty
+proportions more striking. We were expressing to each other our wonder
+at its size, when our guide interrupted us with an original observation
+of his own:--"The reason of its size, sir, is quite _clare_. The pope,
+you see, always went about with such a _hape_ of monks--and of nuns--and
+of all them kind of people, that the big number of rooms which you see
+could hardly hold them any how." After all, if the annals of former
+times have been truly written, the Milesian's account of this merry
+menage might be nearer the truth than he knew or suspected.
+
+The Papal Chapel exhibits now but few remains of its former probable
+grandeur, its inside having been defaced with the most persevering
+animosity during the Revolution, and presenting little more than a damp
+bare shell, filled with the broken remains of monumental figures.
+Headless popes and crippled cardinals lie together in heaps, mingled in
+a manner which will render it impossible to restore to each his proper
+allotment of limbs, when the projected repairs of the chapel are put in
+execution. One tomb, broken up and shattered to pieces more than the
+rest, was pointed out by the old woman as the sepulchre of La belle
+Laure, an honour which, for aught I know, may be claimed by a tomb in
+every church of Avignon. An assertion apparently still more apocryphal,
+however, is that one of the small side chapels was built by
+Constantine.
+
+The interior of Avignon affords a much more agreeable promenade than
+that of Lyons, from the superior cleanliness of its inhabitants, and the
+moderate height of the houses. These circumstances tend to disperse the
+combinations of ill smell, and purify the thick, vapid, flagging air
+which is felt so perceptibly at Lyons. It may, perhaps, be beneath the
+dignity of a _printed book_ to enumerate such circumstances as these,
+but they occupy in fact a high place in the scale of human comfort; and,
+joined to the cheapness of the necessaries of life, (which we inferred
+from the price of two or three articles of consumption,) must have their
+weight in rendering Avignon a desirable place of banishment. Banishment,
+I say; for I have no better name by which to express a prolonged
+residence abroad, especially in cases where the mind has lost its power
+of deriving amusement from trifles.
+
+With the exception of its fine walls, its Gothic bridge, and the
+legate's palace, Avignon possesses in itself no remarkable architectural
+feature, or fine combination of buildings. Its churches are numerous;
+but no one remarkable above the rest, as far at least as external
+appearance is concerned; and we had not time for a very minute internal
+survey. The Hôpital des Fous, however, is an establishment well
+calculated to gratify the laudable curiosity of the humane; and to judge
+from all we witnessed, may perhaps exhibit points of internal regulation
+worthy the attention of professional men. Nothing indeed can exceed the
+quiet, orderly behaviour of the patients there confined, whom we found
+walking about at perfect liberty in a square court planted with trees.
+Many of them wore a certain air of content and satisfaction which could
+not be mistaken, and all seemed much gratified by the notice of the mild
+sensible ecclesiastic who accompanied us, and who presides over the
+establishment. No coercion, as we understood from him, is used, save
+restriction from walking with their fellow patients, and the restraint
+of handcuffs, when rendered necessary in cases of violent conduct. I
+particularly observed also, that he had never any occasion to exert that
+command of the eye, on which so much stress is laid as a means of
+intimidation, but passed all their little follies off with a smile, in
+which we were frequently inclined to join. One poor patient accosted us
+with high titles of nobility, dwelling on the peculiar pleasure he
+experienced from our visit; another, an old man of a very venerable
+appearance, called our attention to a dirty stone which he held in his
+hand, affirming it to be a piece of Henri Quatre's identical foot: but
+none were troublesome or obtrusive, and most appeared to be deriving as
+much enjoyment from their own little vagaries as their melancholy state
+would admit of.[30] Their apartments, built round the square, are neat
+and airy, each furnished with a bed, dressing table, and a few plain
+utensils. In one large room are a row of hot and cold baths, which are
+frequently and regularly used; and nothing, the good priest said, has
+been found to produce so desirable an effect on the mind and body as
+this custom. The rank of the patients is various; the poorer sort are
+supported by voluntary contributions; and many persons in the higher
+ranks are also placed here at their own expense, or that of their
+friends. Among others, there is a general who became deranged, as we
+were assured, on hearing of the abdication of his patron Napoleon; the
+most unequivocal instance of misplaced fidelity, which I have ever
+heard. How this poor man contrives to agree with the partizan of Henry
+IV., I am at a loss to make out: and he was not then visible to answer
+for himself. At the time of the Revolution, the estates belonging to the
+hospital were confiscated; and the establishment itself would have been
+abolished, had not one of the members of the council at Avignon
+observed, half in jest, that they might possibly be one day glad
+themselves of such a retreat. It is now, as I mentioned, maintained by
+private donations, and by the salaries paid for the accommodation of the
+richer patients. The only objects of taste belonging to the institution
+are a fine altar-piece attributed to Murillo, and an ivory crucifix
+carved by Jean Guillermin, in 1659. The latter is not above two feet in
+length; but the manner in which every muscle and vein indicate
+suffering, and the mingled expression of pain and resignation in the
+countenance, place it on the footing of a statue; and I could hardly
+have supposed that a small piece of ivory-carving could do such justice
+to a sacred subject. The worthy priest dwelt, with great exultation, on
+the precautions he had taken to secure this favourite relic from
+revolutionary pillage, slightly alluding to the circumstance of having
+been forced to fly for his life to Italy, as a matter of minor
+importance to himself.
+
+[Footnote 30: It is to be hoped that Adam Smith has taken a correct view
+of the subject of madness in his Moral Sentiments. "Of all the
+calamities," says he, "to which the condition of mortality exposes
+mankind, the loss of reason _appears_ by far the most dreadful; and we
+behold that last stage of human wretchedness with deeper commisseration
+than any other. But the poor wretch who is in it, laughs and sings,
+perhaps, and is altogether insensible of his own misery. The anguish
+therefore which humanity feels at the sight of such an object, cannot be
+the reflection of any sentiment of the sufferer. The compassion of the
+spectator must arise altogether from the consideration of what he would
+himself feel if he were reduced to the same situation, and, what perhaps
+is impossible, were at the same time able to regard it with his present
+reason and judgment.]
+
+The admirers of show houses, may find some gratification in visiting the
+hotel of M. De Leutre, the banker; which was purchased of M. Villeneuve,
+an emigré, and contains, besides the usual etceteras of carving and
+gilding, orange-trees, and gold fish, a curious collection of prints
+representing Chinese battles, and supposed to be the only perfect
+duplicate of that in the royal collection. A sight more interesting is
+presented in the hospital of invalid soldiers, established in the place;
+1500 of whom are maintained as in-pensioners, apparently in great
+comfort. "On est bien ici," said a blind veteran, who, hearing the
+voices of strangers, invited us to walk in; and indeed most of those
+whom we saw strolling in the garden, or sitting under the shade of the
+trees, seemed very cheerful, though some of them, and those very young
+men, were dreadfully mutilated, and the loss of both legs very common.
+The two buildings which accommodate them were formerly the Convent des
+Celestins, and that of the Dames de St. Louis. Two other handsome
+convents have been converted to uses less beneficent, one being now a
+gunpowder manufactory, and the other a cannon foundery.
+
+In the evening we walked across the long wooden bridge adjoining our
+hotel,[31] towards the western bank of the Rhone; and the expectations
+which we had formed of the view from this quarter, were not
+disappointed. The Roche Don terminates more abruptly on the side of the
+river than in any other part, and in a manner which sets off strikingly
+the commanding height of the legate's palace. With this princely pile of
+building, the broken Gothic bridge and its guard-house, the ancient
+palace of the archbishop, and a portion of the battlemented walls of
+Avignon, combine to form a striking architectural group, whose unity of
+character is hardly at all broken by meaner objects; and the whole is
+well backed by Mont Ventou and the Dauphiné Alps. From this spot we
+again returned to Roche Don, a station to which every visitor of Avignon
+may return twice or thrice in the day with undiminished pleasure. In our
+way we fell in with a procession of children, the eldest of whom could
+not be more than seven years of age, in pairs, and with lighted candles
+in their hands, escorting a cross of lath and a very indifferent daub,
+which represented some female saint, and screaming in chorus with all
+their might. Those who had no candles, ran about with little dishes,
+vociferously begging money to buy some; and in spite of the respect with
+which one would wish to consider whatever fellow Christians choose to
+denominate, in pure earnest, a religious ceremony, it was impossible not
+to be reminded, by the petitions of these sucking Catholics, of Guy
+Fawkes's little votaries on the fifth of November. We thought
+involuntarily of a boy who had followed us that very morning into the
+church of St. Didier, tossing a ball in his hand, and after crossing
+himself with great gravity, immediately began his game again. Whether
+the interests of religion gain or suffer most by the familiarity with
+the ordinary business of life which it assumes in Catholic countries, is
+a point which I cannot presume to determine. It is true, that it may
+frequently occasion such ridiculous scenes as those which I have
+mentioned; and our habits of mind, as Protestants, may lead us to
+conceive that such familiarity may tend to generate levity and
+indifference. On the other hand, however, amidst all the mummery which
+may mix itself up with the occasional ceremonies of the Catholic
+service, there is much worthy of commendation in the more common
+ordinances, to which alone a sensible Catholic must look for religious
+improvement. I particularly allude to the shortness and frequent
+recurrence of the mass (such as it is), and the constant access afforded
+to Catholic churches, in which some service or other appears to be
+carried on during great part of the day. These regulations are well
+adapted to take advantage of those serious trains of thought which often
+arise most forcibly at accidental times, and from unpremeditated causes.
+The attention is thus excited without being fatigued, and the privacy of
+the closet is combined with that solemnity which attaches itself to the
+house of God. It may be said, indeed, that to consult the caprices and
+associations of the human mind, is to lower the dignity of religion; but
+surely a good end must justify any means which are not in themselves
+culpable or ridiculous. The mechanic, for instance, in returning from
+his daily labour, enters an open church from accident or curiosity,
+crosses himself from habit, and is led on by the momentary feeling of
+reverence which that act must generally awaken, to employ five minutes
+in his devotions, a well spent portion of time, which probably would not
+otherwise have been rescued from the business of the day, but which may
+influence his conduct during the rest of it.
+
+[Footnote 31: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+On ascending the Mont Don, we found it the scene of a graver ceremony
+than the infantine gambols which we had just witnessed. In the centre of
+the terrace facing the river, a new and highly gilt crucifix of colossal
+size has been erected at the expense of the Mission, round which a
+number of monks and inhabitants were collected on their knees, the still
+evening increasing the effect of a solemn mass which they were singing,
+and in which we heard the name of St. Paulus several times repeated.
+Several nuns, belonging to an establishment lately revived, knelt on the
+steps of the cross, enveloped in their black hoods; and the prisoners at
+the palace window united their deep tones to the chant, pausing every
+now and then to solicit the charity of passers by. Scattered at
+different distances from the cross, eight or ten separate groups of
+persons were kneeling farther off, in attitudes of the deepest
+devotional abstraction, though surrounded on all sides by sauntering
+soldiers, children playing, and groups of loungers laughing or
+whispering. The different distances at which they knelt were regulated,
+as we were told, by the degrees of penance imposed upon them, and the
+place which their respective consciences allowed them to assume. Some,
+in the true spirit of the poor Publican, were kneeling at a considerable
+distance, just within view of the cross, to which they hardly lifted
+their eyes; others, whose penance was originally lighter, or its term
+abridged by frequent visits to this place, had approached the cross more
+nearly, and with greater signs of satisfaction.
+
+I must confess, that we observed these poor penitents with an interest
+and attention which the other parts of the ceremony had failed to
+excite. The manifestation of a deep and genuine religious feeling is
+respectable in Catholic, Turk, or Bramin, and seldom or never to be
+mistaken; and though attended by no circumstances of external pomp, must
+impress upon serious beholders of every creed a reverence which
+trappings and mummery fail to excite. It should seem indeed that
+Providence, wishing gently to humble the pride of men, delights in
+producing by the simplest means those physical and moral effects, which
+they waste toil and expense in bringing about. The splendid procession,
+for instance, which takes place on the day of Corpus Christi at Rome,
+with all its assemblage of monks, horse and foot guards, cardinals,
+choristers, and banners, would dwindle before the eye of reason into
+"shreds and patches, were it not for the figure of the truly venerable
+man who now fills the papal chair, kneeling with the same humility and
+abstraction from the busy scene around him, which marked the deportment
+of the penitents just mentioned.
+
+Time, which decides all questions when they have ceased to be any longer
+interesting, will probably show whether the celebrated Mission, which
+has excited such a sensation in many parts of France, be a mere
+political manoeuvre to strengthen the hands of government by calling in
+the aid of superstition, or (which is at least as probable) a sincere
+and well-meant attempt to awaken the forgotten spirit of religion. In
+the mean while, it is a desirable thing to have turned the attention of
+the French to a subject which, by all accounts, is become nearly
+obsolete among the higher orders of the nation. Even with a view to the
+ascendancy which a more simple and purified religion may ultimately
+obtain under an improved and free constitution, it is better that a
+religious feeling of some sort should exist. The worst and most twisted
+crabstock, if alive, possesses an active principle, which allows of
+successful grafting; not so with a dead branch.
+
+I shall annex a statement of the proceedings of the Mission at Avignon,
+during the Lent of 1819, copied and abridged from a short pamphlet,
+written by a M. Fransoy, a lawyer of that city; which being published by
+a layman on the spot where the events in question recently took place,
+possesses the most probable claim to accuracy and impartiality. The
+writer begins by describing the demoralization and ignorance occasioned
+by the Revolution, "which had completely realised," he observes, "in the
+kingdom of the lilies all the misfortunes foretold by the prophet
+Jeremiah. The people of Avignon, who had remained without instruction
+during this period of horror and barbarism, were soon infected with that
+gross ignorance which assimilates men to brutes: and in a short time
+this field of the Lord, once so fertile, only produced brambles and
+thorns; the evil plants choked the good, and the tares every where
+devoured the corn. Scarcely, however, was the Catholic worship restored
+in France by the concordat, before religion shed among us some rays of
+its former light. Dazzled by the majesty of religious ceremonies, the
+people were jealous to emerge from their revolutionary blindness. The
+dearth of ministers was the cause that instruction only distilled drop
+by drop upon this people famishing with want."
+
+The scanty manner in which this dearth had been occasionally supplied
+for some time, excited a longing to participate in the instructions of
+the new Mission, which had already visited Arles, Valence, and Tarascon,
+under the sanction of the state; and whose claims to religious authority
+the writer defends by precedents unnecessary to enumerate here. On the
+first Sunday in Lent, 1819, its proceedings were commenced at Avignon,
+by a solemn procession, which made the circuit of the principal streets
+of the town, singing penitential psalms, and halted on the hill of Notre
+Dame; where an inaugural sermon was delivered on a spot called Calvary,
+and supposed to represent that sacred place. The multitude, assembled by
+curiosity or a better feeling, was so great, that two of the
+missionaries found it expedient to address them at the same time from
+different stations. One of these was M. Guyon, the director of the
+Mission; of whose eloquence and animation, as a preacher, the author
+speaks highly.
+
+On the succeeding day, the nine ecclesiastics composing the Mission
+attached themselves respectively to the different churches of the town,
+and called in the assistance of the neighbouring clergy, as confessors
+to those persons whom their discourses might affect most strongly. This
+step was rendered the more necessary, inasmuch as the common people of
+the vicinity understand French merely as the Welsh do English, and
+converse only in their native Provençal with any facility. If we may
+believe their zealous eulogist, the effects which the missionaries had
+anticipated immediately followed, and their utmost exertions, as well as
+those of their new associates, were taxed to satisfy the spiritual wants
+of the populace. "The Avignonese," says the narrative, "hungered so
+after the word of God, that the gates of the churches were besieged from
+three hours before daybreak, by those who flocked to be present at the
+morning exhortation. The inhabitants of the country and the neighbouring
+communes walked during a part of the night, in order to secure seats;
+each anxiously sought to place his chair many hours beforehand, and
+caused it to be kept, in fear that another might deprive him of it; the
+churches were so full, that it was hardly possible to move in them. The
+eagerness to obtain room was so great, that indecorous and even
+scandalous scenes took place among the wives of the populace; they
+quarrelled for chairs and seats with a ferocity, _qui les mettoit
+souvent hors du cercle de la politesse civile et Chretienne_." (Perhaps,
+as a townsman, he is unwilling to be more particular). "More than twenty
+thousand individuals were assembled in the churches at every service;
+and a circumstance which proves how admirably each missionary and
+associate fulfilled his particular task is, that each parish gave the
+preference to the persons attached to it, and none allowed the
+superiority to its neighbouring quarter. Like mothers, who can see
+nothing more perfect than the children to whom themselves have given
+birth, each parishioner acknowledged no better men than the missionaries
+appointed to his own church. MM. Guyon, Menoult, and Bourgin, shone as
+much at St. Agricol, as MM. Ferrail and Levasseur at St. Pierre; and MM.
+Gerard and Rodet in the church of St. Didier, as much as MM. Fauvet and
+Poncelet in that of St. Symphorien." To the character of M.
+Levasseur[32] the writer bears honourable testimony, as a young man who
+had devoted time, talents, and a liberal private fortune, to the cause;
+and whose exertions on this occasion impaired a naturally delicate
+constitution. "From four in the morning to eight or nine at night, their
+time," he says, "was for many days occupied in public or private
+instruction, and in visiting the hospitals and prisons; and forty
+missionaries would have been necessary to have completely accomplished
+what these nine took cheerfully upon them."
+
+[Footnote 32: "Ce vertueux jeune homme paroit dejà consommé dans l'art
+Evangelique; ses instructions sont aussi sublimes qu'elles sont precises
+et pathetiques; il joint a ses grandes qualités un amour ardent pour les
+pauvres; il consomme annuellement les revenus d'un patrimoine majeur a
+de bonnes oeuvres dans les cours des Missions. Une foule de faits
+attestant ses liberalitês journalieres."--_Fransoy's Memoir_.]
+
+The effects of their preaching were manifested by the number of
+penitents who flocked to confession, which, during the second week of
+the mission, increased to such an extent as to render access difficult.
+The missionaries, unable to meet the wishes of all at once, gave an
+obvious preference, not to the more habitually devout, but to those
+classes of persons whose attendance was most unexpected. "Dissipated
+young coxcombs, disabled soldiers, dragoon officers with fierce
+mustaches, and worldly-wise men with formal wigs," says our author,
+"met with attention and encouragement, to the exclusion of those whose
+habits of piety deserved it better." The apparent injustice of this
+procedure he excuses by the plea, "that it was necessary to quit the
+regular fold in order to recover these lost sheep"--that "the stouter
+and better worth catching the fish were, the more anxious should they be
+to secure them in the net of the Prince of Apostles." When separated
+from the figurative bombast by which a Frenchman frequently obscures a
+sensible reason, this plea seems fair enough: provided that the motives
+of the missionaries were unmixed with spiritual vanity, and the pride of
+creating a strong sensation. It was no doubt most consonant to the
+purposes of a special mission like this, to accomplish that which was
+most difficult, and to make an impression, while the opportunity lasted,
+on a class of persons least accessible to the usual means of religious
+instruction. The example of such, if permanently reclaimed, would
+naturally be more striking than that of others, and influence public
+opinion more strongly, and this may furnish some excuse for a conduct
+which, in the ordinary course of things, would have been unjust and out
+of place.
+
+A large part of the tract is occupied by accounts of several solemn
+ceremonies which ensued, "for the purpose," says the author, "of
+striking the senses of the lower orders, who are not sufficiently
+affected by argument." These, as in the instance of the general
+communion, were rendered more imposing by the attendance of the civil
+and military authorities, and most persons of rank and wealth in the
+vicinity. Nor did they degenerate into mere processions and pompous
+forms, if the narrative is to be trusted. The missionaries appear on
+every occasion to have availed themselves of the excitation of the
+moment, in calling forth such feelings as must be approved by Christians
+of every country and persuasion, and which, among Frenchmen, may not be
+the less sincere for being expressed somewhat extravagantly. In the
+account of the Amende Honorable, a solemn act of profession of
+repentance, the following passage occurs:--"He (the missionary) drew an
+affecting picture of our unhappy country, oppressed by the burden of
+impiety and anarchy. He rapidly enumerated the series of crimes produced
+by license and want of faith. He implored the pardon of the most holy
+God in the name of all; and he proclaimed in a loud tone of voice,
+mutual forgiveness between enemies. All his questions were interrupted
+by the tears and sobs of his audience. 'Do you feel contrition and
+repentance,' said he, 'for your offences against God?'--'Yes.' 'Do you
+ask pardon sincerely?' The congregation again answered 'Yes.' 'Does
+every one of you individually pardon his neighbour all the injuries and
+offences which he may have received from him?'--'Yes.' 'Do you renounce
+all hatred, all enmity, all revenge?'--'Yes.' 'Do you promise God to
+live in future as becomes good Christians, in a perfect union and
+concord among yourselves?'--'Yes.' 'Do you promise fidelity, respect,
+and love, to the monarch who governs France, to the princes of his
+blood, and his representatives, and submission to the laws?'--'Yes.' The
+pen can but imperfectly describe the effect produced by these questions
+of the missionaries, and the answers of the congregation. No countenance
+but wore the expression of grief and repentance, no cheek but was wet
+with tears. The officiating priest who held the host in his hand, then
+pronounced in the name of the God of mercy, his holy pardon; the
+Magnificat, the Benedictus, and the Te Deum, were thundered forth; and
+the festival concluded with the benediction of the host. The innumerable
+crowd of individuals present, each holding a lighted taper, presented a
+magnificent spectacle." In describing the renewal of the baptismal vow,
+the next ceremony which took place, the author says,--"This act was held
+in so solemn a manner, that it will remain eternally engraved in the
+memory of the Avignonese. A magnificent altar was displayed to the sight
+of the faithful: a great number of priests in their sacerdotal habits
+encircled this altar, which a thousand tapers and a thousand sacred
+objects rendered more dazzling, and the holy sacrament was majestically
+exposed on it. After the performance of the anthems appropriate to this
+august ceremony, the missionary delivered a discourse, as forcible as
+it was sublime, on the object of the festival, which produced the
+greatest impression on his congregation. The eternal book of the gospel
+was then held up to the people. They were summoned to swear to the
+observance of the precepts of the Lord, contained in that book.--'We
+swear it,' answered the congregation. All their baptismal vows were in
+turn repeated, ratified, and confirmed by the congregation, with an
+effusion of tears which might have affected the hardest hearts. Their
+cries, their tears, and their sobs, were more eloquent than the
+addresses of the missionaries. The minister in his chair seemed to
+receive the promises and the vows of his parishioners, as Ezra formerly
+received those of the people of Israel."
+
+After the consecration of the Avignonese and their children to the
+service of the Virgin Mary and the general communion, which followed the
+ceremonies last described, the great cross, which now stands near the
+cathedral, was carried in procession to the place of its erection, on
+the 18th of April. So great a sensation had been excited by the
+expectation of this ceremony, and so anxious were all ranks to
+participate in it, that "the town," says the narrator, "swarmed like an
+ant-hill (fourmilloit) with strangers, the inns and private houses
+afforded no more room, and they who could find no quarters, covered the
+roads during the whole of the preceding night."
+
+The number of persons employed to assist in the procession amounted to
+twenty thousand, including the civil and military authorities, the
+monastic establishments, the neighbouring clergy, and a limited number
+of inhabitants from each parish. The cross, amounting in weight to three
+tons and a half, was supported on a frame constructed so as to admit one
+hundred and twenty bearers at once. These were relieved from station to
+station by detachments from all ranks and professions, selected from
+innumerable claimants, and amounting altogether to two thousand men.
+Having thus traversed thirty principal streets, the inhabitants of which
+vied with each other in decorating their windows with garlands and
+tapestry, the cross was borne to the terrace on the Roche Don, and
+erected in sight of more than eighty thousand individuals, who crowded
+the hill above, the extensive space of ground adjoining, and the windows
+and roofs of the houses. "The whole discourse pronounced on the
+occasion," says the narrator, "was as affecting as it was energetic. The
+orator at length closed it, by exhorting his audience not to forget the
+cross and their religion. 'Remember,' said he, 'that you are Christians
+and Frenchmen; fly to the foot of the cross as Christians in all your
+misfortunes, and it will be your consolation; as Frenchmen, you will
+there learn to be faithful to your country, and submissive to your
+king.--Et d'un ton plein de franchise il s'ecria, Vive la Croix, vive la
+Religion, vive la Roi--L'auditoire repeta les mêmes mots avec la même
+enthousiasme, et y ajouta, 'Vive les Missionaries.'"
+
+On the 19th, the following day, a solemn service was performed for the
+dead in the cemetry of St. Roch; and the Mission was closed by sermons,
+exhorting the people to perseverance in the religious vows which they
+had voluntarily made. Having thus performed their proposed duties, the
+missionaries prepared for a private departure. The affectionate zeal of
+the people, however, would not allow the execution of this plan; and
+numbers, consisting chiefly of the national guards, kept watch at the
+doors of their lodgings all night; and in the morning they were besieged
+by a crowd of persons desirous to take leave of them. At the special
+request of these visitors, among whom were some of the most
+distinguished inhabitants of Avignon, they performed an additional
+service at the foot of the newly-erected cross, and were escorted out of
+the town amidst the acclamations of the multitude, who persisted in
+drawing their carnages a certain distance. Many persons accompanied them
+on horseback and in coaches as far as Orange.
+
+To the practical effects of the Mission, the writer bears the following
+testimony.--"Prudence restricts us from naming individuals; and yet we
+can vouch, that many husbands, separated from their wives and living in
+concubinage, have put away their mistresses and re-established their
+legitimate wives in their houses. After the revolutionary horrors which
+have afflicted our city, there existed inveterate hatreds and
+animosities, founded on real offences. Well! union and concord have
+removed many of these intestine divisions, many deadly enmities have
+been laid at rest, many resentments have been stifled; great numbers of
+enemies have made the sacrifice of all their revengeful feelings. A
+citizen, round whose neck one of the revolutionary hangmen had actually
+fixed the noose for the fatal suspension, perceived his executioner in a
+state of penitence during the Mission, and approaching the communion
+table--'I congratulate you,' said he, 'on your reformation, and I pardon
+your offences against me, as I would God may grant me his pardon and
+peace.' The porters of the Rhone, who had been long at variance, have
+been many of them cordially reconciled: the invalids of the national
+guard have also mutually vowed a perpetual friendship."
+
+Whatever the interests and prejudices of M. Fransoy may be, it is
+improbable that he would have risked his professional and private
+reputation, by misrepresenting recent occurrences on the spot where they
+took place; and certainly his narrative places the Mission in a new
+point of view, both as to its conduct, its reception, and its effects.
+It is, indeed, natural enough that such wits as do not affect either
+much knowledge or much interest on religious subjects, should indulge
+in desultory sarcasms (and the Hermite en Provence prudently does no
+more) on such instances of spiritual Quixotism as may possibly have
+occurred. The absurd[33] choice of hymn tunes, the petulant zeal of one
+or two ecclesiastics, and the rueful countenances of some of the
+penitents, though they prove nothing as to the main question, present a
+ludicrous picture to the imagination, and have been made the most of by
+the fictitious correspondent of the Hermite. It is also natural enough
+that the violent Liberaux, who view with distrust every measure
+countenanced by government, should treat the Mission as a mere engine of
+policy; that the avaricious should consider the donatives received on
+its behalf as squandered away; and that a large class of persons, who
+are inveterately sceptical as to their neighbour's good motives, and
+childishly credulous as to his bad ones, should pronounce it a mere
+manoeuvre of bigotry. The little tract in question, however, addressed
+to the experience of eye-witnesses of all that it describes, tells a
+different story, though its effect may be weakened by the ludicrous
+_naïveté_ of its style. It describes the missionaries as addressing
+themselves particularly to those who stood most in need of their
+instructions, and who were most likely to treat them with derision; as
+availing themselves of the favourable reception which they experienced
+from the Avignonese, to preach the duties of forgiveness and
+reconciliation, both private and political, and to dwell on the
+practical and fundamental parts of Christianity.
+
+[Footnote 33: See the letter introduced in Joüy's Hermite en Provence.]
+
+Had they, indeed, in a public manner, denounced the vengeance of Heaven
+against the murderers of the unfortunate Brune, or pointedly rebuked the
+religious and political animosities subsisting in the south of France,
+they would have given a proof of their sincerity, but at the risk of
+much of that good which it was desirable to use their temporal influence
+in effecting. Instead, therefore, of giving unnecessary offence, they
+laboured to eradicate from the minds of their hearers the seeds of
+hatred and uncharitableness, and to divert their attention from their
+private bickerings and dissensions, to the common guilt of all in the
+sight of Heaven. The very object which, from all we learn respecting the
+state of feeling in Languedoc and Provence, appears particularly
+desirable, appears also to have been sought, not only by repeated and
+fervent exhortations, but by the exaction also of public vows and
+promises, so as to enlist the sense of shame as much as possible, in
+favour of the general forgiveness which the missionaries preached. Their
+exertions also, always supposing the tract in question to be entitled to
+credit, were rewarded by the conduct of their penitents, some of whom
+put away their vices, and others their mutual animosities. If this be
+fanaticism, then it were to be wished that such fanaticism should
+prevail widely in the south of France. "Out of the same mouth cannot
+proceed blessing and cursing;" and if the secret object of the Mission
+be to denounce the disaffected, or preach crusades against Protestants,
+it must be owned that their public labours at Avignon savour but little
+of such a purpose, as far as all appearances go.
+
+There is, it is true, something extravagant and bordering on stage
+effect, in many of the ceremonies performed, and expressions used, as
+recorded by the pen of M. Fransoy. An Englishman, however, is not always
+a fair judge of the best means of influencing the mind of a Frenchman,
+more particularly a south-eastern one. The Provençaux possess, both in
+appearance and in character, the strong characteristics of a people born
+under a burning sun; at once lively and ferocious, strongly led away by
+the excitement of the moment, and ardent in their partialities and
+antipathies: in short, the same romance of character is perceptible
+among them, which, in the dark ages, peopled the country with
+troubadours. The mass of such a people, particularly when profoundly
+ignorant, may not be accessible to cool argument; and the manner and
+style of oratory which would disgust a reasoning Scotch peasant, or
+English mechanic, may be exactly adapted to act on the temperament of an
+Avignonese. The surest test, therefore, of the character and design of
+the Mission, will be the practical effects which it produces on the
+conduct of its congregation, as well as the future application of those
+liberal donatives, which have excited so much unfavourable feeling
+against it. Time and fair play alone can justify the motives of those
+who planned and conducted it. The question in the mean time is, not
+whether they may or may not have occasionally gone to the lengths of a
+"zeal without knowledge," but whether or not their purpose has been to
+instruct and benefit their fellow-countrymen according to the best of
+their power and belief, and without reference to political party.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VIII.
+
+PONT DU GARD--NISMES--MONTPELIER--CETTE.
+
+
+MAY 13.--This day was fixed on for a journey to Vaucluse, the road to
+which is better adapted for the accommodation of two wheels than of
+four. M. Durand, our voiturier, attended accordingly with one of his
+portly mares harnessed to a sort of cabriolet, very much resembling an
+Irish noddy. Its high boarded front reaching to our chins, and the
+little fat person of Durand rather incommoded than accommodated on a
+cushion tied to the shaft, and much too near the mare on every account,
+formed a grotesque combination but little in character with what ought
+to have been a voyage of sentiment. The deficiency in pathos, however,
+was made up by the poor mare, who bewailed her absent companion with
+such incessant roarings, as to draw many cuts of the whip, and "sacra
+carognas," from the unrelenting Durand. We were struck, by-the-by, more
+than once during this day's route, by the Spanish and Italian
+terminations of the Provençal patois. A village which we passed, on an
+insulated height commanding the road, and crowned by ruined
+fortifications, is laid down as Château Neuf in the map, and called by
+the peasants Castel Novo. A man of whom we inquired the distance to
+Avignon, answered "Tres horas," using not only the words, but the method
+of computation which a Spaniard would employ.
+
+Whether we really reached our place of destination, or were stopped
+short by intense heat and execrable roads, were interested, or
+overturned, this deponent saith not, nor indeed is it necessary. One may
+be pardoned for omitting the mention of a subject already so fully
+described as Vaucluse, its rocks and fountain, its associations, and
+even its eatables; for some travellers have dwelt on the subject of its
+excellent bisque, or crayfish soup, and its eels, a solace, no doubt,
+to[34] that gentle degree of melancholy, which Fielding affirms to be a
+whet to the appetite.
+
+[Footnote 34: "And do not forget the toasted cheese." Vide _Matilda
+Pottingen_ in "The Rovers."]
+
+    "And, says the anatomic art,
+    The stomach's very near the heart;"
+
+as Peter Pindar also maintains. Some also, with an accuracy worthy
+Moubrays treatise on domestic fowls, have informed us that the hens near
+the fountain of Vaucluse are peculiarly prolific in fine eggs, and so
+on. For my own part, I may as well honestly confess that I am more
+partial to the memory of Petrarch as a philosopher, a patriot, and
+reviver of ancient learning, than as the Werter of Troubadours, though
+in the latter capacity he has stood unrivalled for five hundred years. I
+must own, also, that the hermitage whither he retired to stifle his
+rebellious passion for the wife of another, however melancholy and
+impressive the ideas may be which it would of itself excite, is
+poisoned, in my mind, by the pestilent frivolities with which the
+mawkish of all ages have defaced its sombre features, in violation of
+truth and sound feeling. What syllables of dolour the forgotten
+Della-Cruscan school may have yelled out on the subject, is not worth
+ascertaining, and probably recollected by few or none. The French, who
+with all their ingenuity, are not very apt at comprehending the madness
+of contemplative minds, have caricatured the shade of poor Petrarch most
+woefully, and[35] the Abbé Delille (peace to his ashes!) has teazed the
+innocent trees of Vaucluse with embarrassing questions, fitter for the
+mouths of Susanna's elders. Under such blighting influence, the stern
+rocks of Vaucluse are transformed into a sentimental tea-garden, the
+high-minded and melancholy Petrarch into a more ingenious Piercie
+Shafton, and the virtuous Laura, who probably never saw the place, into
+a starched Gloriana of the old school, paraded and gallanted round it
+with all due form. It is, perhaps, a judgment on Petrarch's adulterous
+Platonism, that it has laid him open to impertinences like these, which
+would torture his sensitive ghost almost as keenly as oblivion itself,
+and which very strongly remind one of Punch's intrusion at a tragedy.
+Such ideas cannot be engrafted on the [36]Nonwenwerder, or the [36]Pena
+de los Enamorados, spots on which a simple and obscure legend has thrown
+an interest which Vaucluse cannot really possess, though embellished by
+every thing which poetry can do for it.
+
+[Footnote 35: See the Quarterly Review, to which I am obliged for the
+Abbé's remark.]
+
+[Footnote 36: See Campbell's ballad of "The Brave Roland," in one of the
+numbers of the New Monthly Magazine; and Southey's tale of Manuel and
+Leila, in his early productions.]
+
+It were to be wished, that the shade of Petrarch could return to his
+former haunts, to frighten away frivolous visitors, and read a lesson to
+the thinking. Instead of rejoicing at the posthumous fame which his
+poetical talents have earned, he would probably dwell on the
+insufficiency of the highest mental endowments without conduct and
+self-command. He would also probably describe his passion as fostered by
+the pedantic and high-flown gallantry of the age, and the applauses
+bestowed on his verses; as increasing and strengthening, after the
+marriage of Laura had rendered it criminal, without any purpose which
+his better conscience dared avow, till his eyes at length opened
+themselves too late to its culpable nature. His mind, of that
+high-wrought and desponding tone which often characterizes extraordinary
+genius, and too sincere to trifle with impunity, struggled then
+fruitlessly against a fatality formerly imagined, but become real; and
+the flower of his life was passed amid illusions and conflicts, in
+alternate self-deception and self-reproach, in wild and beautiful
+visions from which he awoke to sickness of heart and weariness of
+himself and all things, like the victim of a powerful opiate.
+Compromising weakly between his passion and his conscience, he would
+say, he secluded himself at Vaucluse from a society which had become
+dangerous to him, and by the verses which he composed as a vent to his
+feelings, fixed the illusion too deep to be eradicated by lapse of time,
+or the indifference of Laura. Such voluntary mental martyrdom resembles
+the punishment inflicted by some tyrant of history on his prisoners,
+whom he commanded to embrace his Apega, a beautiful automaton so
+constructed as to plunge a concealed dagger into their hearts.
+
+The better feelings of Petrarch's readers will dwell with the least
+alloy on the period after the death of Laura, when he contemplated her
+as beyond the reach of human ties, affections, or jealousies, and
+sought only to rescue from oblivion the virtues and purity which had
+strengthened and refined his passion, while they rendered it hopeless.
+There is a beautiful passage in Campbell which appears exactly written
+to express his state of mind at this time, and the retrospective glance
+which he must have often cast on his past life.
+
+    "And yet, methinks, when wisdom shall assuage
+    The griefs and passions of our greener age,
+    Though dull the close of life, and far away,
+    Each flower that hailed the dawning of our day,
+    Yet o'er her lovely hopes that once were dear,
+    The time-taught spirit, pensive, not severe,
+    With milder griefs her aged eye shall fill,
+    And weep their falsehood, though she love them still!"
+
+The private memorandum,[37] written in the manuscript Virgil, of this
+extraordinary man, which is shown in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, may
+be considered as expressing his most undisguised feelings, as excited by
+an event which dissolves trifling attachments, while it gives permanence
+to those of a genuine nature. It was probably intended for no eye but
+his own. I annex as literal a translation as possible, and from the
+beauty and ease of their latinity, have been tempted to precede it with
+the original words.
+
+[Footnote 37: I had procured this document from Milan, and translated it
+for the press, previous to reading the version of it which is given in
+the Quarterly.]
+
+"Laura, propriis virtutibus illustris, et meis longum celebrata
+carminibus, primum oculis meis apparuit sub primum adolescentiæ meæ
+tempus, anno Domini 1327, die 6 mensis Aprilis, in ecclesiâ sanctæ Claræ
+Avinioni, horâ matutinâ. Et in eâdem civitate, eodem mense Aprilis,
+eodem die 6, eâdem horâ primâ, anno autem Domini 1348, ab hac luce lux
+illa subtracta est, cum ego forte Veronæ essem, heu fati mei nescius!
+Rumor autem infelix, per literas Ludovici mei, me Parmæ reperit, anno
+eodem, mense Maii, die mane.
+
+"Corpus illud castissimum ac pulcherrimum in loco Fratrum Minorum
+repositum est ipsâ die mortis ad vesperam. Animam quidem ejus, ut de
+Africano ait Seneca, in coelum, unde erat, rediisse, mihi persuadeo.
+
+"Hæc autem, ad acerbam rei memoriam, amarâ quâdam dulcedine scribere
+visum est; hoc potissimum loco, qui sæpe sub oculis meis redit, ut
+cogitem nihil esse debere quod amplius mihi placeat in hac vitâ, et
+effracto majori laqueo, tempus esse de Babylone fugiendi, crebrâ horum
+inspectione, ac fugacissimæ ætatis æstimatione, commonear. Quod, præviâ
+Dei gratiâ, facile erit, præteriti temporis curas supervacuas, spes
+inanes, et inexpectatos exitus acriter ac viriliter cogitanti."
+
+"Laura, illustrious for her own virtues, and long celebrated by my
+verses, first appeared to my eyes, in the time of my early youth, on the
+morning of the sixth day of April, in the year of our Lord 1327, in the
+church of St. Clare at Avignon; and in the same month of April, on the
+same first hour of the morning, in the year of our Lord 1348, that light
+was removed from this light of day, while I by chance was at Verona,
+unconscious, alas! of my fate. The unhappy news, however, reached me at
+Parma, in a letter from my friend Ludovico, on the morning of the 19th
+of May.
+
+"Her most chaste and fair body was buried in the evening of the day of
+her death, in the convent of the Fratres Minores; but her soul, as
+Seneca saith of the soul of Africanus, hath returned, I am persuaded, to
+the heaven from whence it came.
+
+"I have felt a kind of bitter pleasure in writing the memorial of this
+mournful event, the rather in this place, which so often meets my eyes,
+to the end that I may consider there is nothing left which ought to
+delight me in this world; and that I may be reminded by the frequent
+sight of these words, and the due appreciation of this fleeting life,
+that my principal tie to the world being broken, it is time for me to
+fly from this Babylon; which, through the preventing grace of God, will
+be an easy task, when I reflect deeply and manfully on the superfluous
+cares, the vain hopes, and the unlooked for events of the time past."
+
+This simple and affecting tribute, written, as it evidently seems, under
+such solemn impressions, clears the memory of Laura from the imputation
+of any thing trifling or criminal, while it sufficiently establishes the
+identity of "a nymph," according to Gibbon, "so shadowy, that her
+existence has been questioned."
+
+May 14.--We left Avignon this morning, with a more favourable impression
+of its cleanliness and comfort than any other town had as yet left on
+our minds. The road to Nismes, winding up a hill on the opposite side of
+the river, above Fort Villeneuve, is remarkably adapted also to display
+its numerous spires, and the grand Gothic mass of the legate's palace,
+to the utmost advantage: and we watched with something like regret the
+disappearance of these objects over the brow of the hill which we had
+ascended, more especially as on this spot the eye takes leave, for some
+time, of every thing agreeable. The view here consists of a high dull
+flat, with hardly a tree, and the road of rolling stones and dust; and a
+high wind prevailed, which seemed a combination of the Bise and Mistral,
+aided by all the bottled stores of a Lapland witch, and very nearly blew
+poor Durand off his box. After passing Fouzay and Demazan, two Little
+villages, adorned each à la Provençale, with a ruined castle, we turned
+out of the road to Nismes at Remoulin, where the features of the country
+somewhat improve. Another mile and a half brought us to an indifferent
+inn within a ten minutes' walk of the Pont du Gard. It is adapted for
+nothing more than a baiting-place for a few hours, and not at all of
+that description which so well-known a ruin would be in most cases
+capable of maintaining. The landlord, however, "a sallow, sublime sort
+of Werter-faced man," was civil, and inclined to do his best, and
+gathered us some double yellow roses, of a sort we had never seen
+before, to season his bad fare.
+
+The Pont du Gard, which we were not long in visiting, is seen to the
+greatest advantage on the side on which we approached it from the inn.
+The deep mountain glen, inhabited only by goats, whose entrance it
+crosses from cliff to cliff, forms a striking back-ground, and serves as
+a measure to the height of the colossal arches which appear to grow
+naturally, as it were, out of the gray rocks on which they rest.[38]
+There is certainly something more poetical in the stern and simple style
+of architecture of which this noble aqueduct is a specimen, than in the
+more florid and graceful school of art. The latter speaks more to the
+eye, but the former to the mind, possessing a superiority analogous to
+that which the great style of painting (as it is termed) boasts over the
+florid and ornamental Venetian school. Our own Stonehenge is too much,
+perhaps, in the rude extreme of this branch of architecture to be quoted
+as a favourable instance of it; but few persons can come suddenly in
+sight of Stonehenge on a misty day without being struck by its peculiar
+effect; and the Pont du Gard, placed in as lonely a situation, exhibits
+materials almost as gigantic in detail, and knit into a towering mass
+which seems to require no less force than an earthquake, or a battery of
+cannon, to change the position of a single stone. A large and solid
+bridge which has been built against it by the states of Languedoc,
+appears by comparison to shrink into insignificance, and shelter itself
+behind the old Roman arches, the lower tier of which, eleven in number,
+overtop it in height by about three-fifths. The span of the largest arch
+is about 78 feet; of the other ten, 66 each: and they are surmounted by
+a row of thirty-five smaller arches. With the exception of two or three
+of these last, the whole fabric is complete, and, if unmolested, appears
+likely to witness more changes of language and dynasty than it has
+already done. I do not know that the mind is ever more impressed with
+the idea of Roman power and greatness, than by contemplating such
+structures as these, erected for subordinate purposes at a distance from
+the main seat of empire. It is like discovering a broken hand or foot of
+the Colossus of Rhodes, and estimating in imagination the height and
+bulk of the whole statue from the size of its enormous extremities.
+
+[Footnote 38: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From the Pont du Gard the road to Nismes has little to recommend it
+excepting the high state of cultivation of the country, and this is not
+of a nature to gratify an eye accustomed to English verdure.
+Olive-groves, it is true, have been naturalized in poetry as conveying
+an image of beauty and freshness; but in reality nothing can be more
+opposed to the oaks and elms of an English hedge-row, than the pale
+shining gray of this stunted tree, which has more of a metallic than a
+vegetable appearance. Nor does a perpetual succession of corn-fields,
+however rich in reality, present the same appearance of luxuriant
+vegetation as an English pasture. There is, besides, nothing in the
+nearer approach to Nismes, which reminds one of the environs of an
+opulent commercial town, and its precincts would cut a poor figure when
+compared with those of Leeds or Bristol. The transition is immediate,
+from a dull range of corn-fields, without a gentleman's house, to a long
+dirty suburb. On emerging, however, from the latter into the better and
+more central part of the town, one is surprised to find wide and elegant
+streets well watered and planted, and public buildings, whose beauty and
+good taste show that the citizens of Nismes have made a good use of the
+fine architectural models afforded by the ancient Nemausis. The Palais
+de Justice deserves to be particularly remarked for its classical
+elegance, and contrasts well with the black solid arches of the Arenes,
+near which it is placed.
+
+"_Monsieour!_ les antiquités!--_Heou! Monsieour!_ les
+Arenes!--Commissionaire pour voir la Maison Carrée!--_Heou--ou!
+Monsieour!_ decrotteur, s'il vous plait!--Le Temple de Diane,
+_Monsieour!_" are the cries with which every third or fourth ragamuffin
+at Nismes salutes you, enforcing his application by a peculiar yell, of
+which no combination of letters can give an idea uncouth enough. As it
+is hardly possible to walk in the central part of Nismes without seeing
+its antiquities before you, it is best to avoid a troublesome live
+appendage of this sort, by appearing totally deaf. The Arenes are nearly
+in front of the Hôtel du Louvre, and the Maison Carrée is within two or
+three minutes' walk of it: the Temple of Diana and the Baths are
+situated in the most conspicuous spot in the public gardens, whither a
+perpetual concourse of people may be seen thronging; and the Pharos
+overlooks them from the summit of a small precipitous hill, which may be
+ascended in five minutes by a good walker. Every thing therefore lies
+within the compass of an evening's stroll.
+
+The Maison Carrée is a beautiful bijou, better known than any other of
+the curiosities of Nismes. I believe the opinion of Mons. Seguier
+(formed from a laborious examination of the nail-holes belonging to its
+last bronze inscription) is generally adopted; viz. that it was a temple
+dedicated to Caius and Lucius Cæsar, grandsons of Augustus. A perfect
+copy of it, built from actual measurement, may be found in the Temple of
+Victory and Concord, in the Duke of Buckingham's gardens at Stowe. So
+admirable is the preservation of the original in every part, owing to
+the dry and pure air of Languedoc, as almost to operate as a
+disadvantage. Its freshness and compactness suggest rather too much the
+idea of a modern pavilion of twenty or thirty years standing, instead of
+that of a temple; and if I may venture to say so, the same want of the
+ærugo of age, which renders it more valuable as an architectural relic,
+produces an incongruous and unpoetical effect on the imagination. Age,
+in fact, has its own characteristic branch of beauty. An old man with
+curly hair and a fresh smooth complexion, like Godwin's Struldbrugg, St.
+Leon, would be an unpleasant and unnatural object. There is a masculine
+and imposing medium between youthful vigour and decay, in which the
+leading features of the former man may be distinctly traced; as in
+Wordsworth's beautiful description of the old knight of Rylstone, and
+Sir Walter Scott's fine portraiture of Archibald Bell-the-Cat: and I
+think the analogy holds good in classical remains. Somewhat should be
+decayed for effect's sake; and those parts only left which are
+strikingly beautiful, or of a leading and important nature. The Arena,
+which we next visited, is perhaps more consonant to this standard than
+the Maison Carrée. Its structure is similar to that of the Colosseum at
+Rome, of which, however, it falls infinitely short in size and grandeur,
+while at the same time it so far exceeds it in perfectness, as to give a
+complete idea to an inexperienced eye of its original figure and
+arrangement, and of the admirable system of accommodation which such
+places possessed. It has just enough of the graceful decay of age to
+render it picturesque, and enough of freshness to answer the questions
+of the antiquarian: and neither too much nor too little is left to the
+imagination. Mr. Albanis Beaumont, in his work on the Maritime Alps,
+calculates the number of persons which this building must have held at
+16,599, and the spectators in the Colosseum at 34,000. He also states
+the widest interior circumference of the Arena, as 1110-1/2 feet. The
+plate engraved in his work, dated 1795, represents two square towers
+over the principal entrance, erected perhaps by Charles Martel, when he
+converted the building into a citadel; they have however been since
+destroyed, and the work of clearing away the houses which defaced both
+its inside and outside, commenced originally by Louis XVI., has been
+completed. It now stands in a broad open space, adapted to set off its
+full height and proportions.
+
+The public garden also presents a well-arranged group of interesting
+objects; but to behold them to any advantage, it is necessary to turn
+your back upon a pert little café, roofed with party-coloured tiles like
+the scales of a fancy fish, which glares from under the shade of the
+trees. From hence you look over a handsome balustrade into a large
+excavated space adorned with stone steps, which collects the waters of a
+fine fountain, and in which the foundations of the ancient Baths are
+still visible. On the summit of the opposite cliff, from whence these
+waters issue, the ruined Pharos, which forms the principal landmark of
+Nismes, rises with great majesty, and at its foot, immediately to the
+left of the fountain, the ruined temple of Diana, though not
+individually striking, combines admirably with the general group. From
+the fountain arises a beautifully clear stream, which is distributed in
+wide and deep stone channels through some of the principal streets at
+Nismes, and greatly contributes to the ornament and cleanliness of the
+town. The Pharos, or Tour Magne, to which I scrambled from the Baths,
+fully answers to its distant appearance. There is a peculiar dignity and
+solidity in a figure approaching to the pyramidical, when placed on the
+top of a rock; and independent of its height, which is between eighty
+and ninety feet, the Pharos has this recommendation also. Its interior
+appears a curious work of masonry. A high wide conical vault, without
+pillar or buttress, constitutes almost the whole internal space,
+admitting just light sufficient to render "the darkness visible," and
+give additional solemnity to a mere shell of brickwork.
+
+We found the Hôtel du Louvre (to which we had been recommended in
+preference to the Hermite's inn, the Hôtel du Luxembourg) excellent in
+every respect. The two hotels adjoin one another so closely, be it
+observed, and are so similar in appearance, that one may walk into the
+wrong salle-à-manger, and only discover the mistake through the
+difference of the waiter's faces.
+
+May 15.--Seventeen miles to New Lunel, where we breakfasted
+indifferently enough, not liking French customs sufficiently to qualify
+the bad coffee with a glass of the brandy of this place, which is as
+celebrated as its wine. New Lunel, which has grown on the back of the
+old town, in consequence of a branch of the Languedoc canal which runs
+close to it, is a neat and thriving place, but possesses no feature
+worthy of remark. The country is of the same character as the town, a
+dull rich flat, over which one may sleep with the soothing consciousness
+that every thing is going on well with its trade and agriculture. To
+Montpelier eighteen miles. Within the last league or two, the country
+begins rather to improve, and rise into somewhat of an undulating form;
+but no romantic or interesting feature marks the approach to this
+celebrated town.
+
+"How I envy you the sight of that delightful Montpelier, of which one
+reads and hears so much!" exclaims many an untravelled lady, no doubt,
+to her travelled brother or cousin. No place certainly sounds more
+familiarly in the ear as a novel-scene; and its very name is associated
+with ideas of beauty, verdure, retirement, orange groves, hanging woods,
+and all the et ceteras of a spot.
+
+    "Where simply to feel that we breathe, that we live,
+    Is worth the best joy that life elsewhere can give."
+
+The truth is, that the Montpelier of the imagination may be found at
+Vico, Sorrento, Massa di Carrara; or, with a little alteration, in some
+spots of our own Devonshire coast. The real Montpelier is a large,
+opulent, well-frequented provincial capital, full of noise and dress,
+and possessing an air of neatness and fashion, but totally devoid of any
+thing allied to the poetry of nature. It stands on a round sweeping
+hill, commanding a considerable extent of land and sea; but the
+sea-coast is chiefly an expanse of low ground and etangs, or salt-water
+lakes; and the neighbouring hill country, resembling in form a
+succession of cultivated downs, has neither height nor variety to
+recommend it. The most interesting spot in Montpelier is the Place
+Peyrou, a public garden raised on high terraces, in a situation
+commanding the rest of the town. At the extremity of the principal walk
+stands an elegant open building of the Grecian order, overarching a
+basin into which the waters of the celebrated aqueduct of Montpelier are
+received, and from thence distributed through the town. The aqueduct
+itself, which springs from the foot of this pavilion, and conveys the
+water from the crest of an opposite hill, is a truly noble work, and,
+though modern, worthy in every respect of a Roman ædile. It was erected
+by the states of Languedoc in honour of Louis XIV. whose statue is
+placed in the garden. Like the Pont du Gard, it consists of two tiers of
+arches, fifty of which we counted in the lower range, and one hundred
+and fifty in the upper, until the lessening perspective baffled all
+farther attempts at reckoning. The architecture is inferior in dignity
+and massiveness to that of the Roman work, but exceeds it in extent, and
+probably in the quantity of masonry employed. Nothing can be more
+elegant than its general form, and the manner in which it is united to
+the terrace of the Place Peyrou.
+
+Whatever natural objects are interesting in the environs, may be seen
+also from this elevated spot, though I am inclined to think that the
+views of distant Pyrenees which we were taught to expect, are a fiction
+existing in the minds of some travellers. At all events, the glimpses
+must be partial, and only to be obtained on a fine day. The Cevennes
+mountains rise, however, to a tolerable height in the distance to the
+west; and to the south-east, the remains of the old town and cathedral
+of Maguelone, form a striking distant group, projecting like a low reef
+of rocks into the sea at the distance of three or four miles. To judge
+from the site of this ancient town, which tradition describes as the
+original nucleus of Montpelier, the sea must have made great inroads on
+the neighbouring coast. The air, it is said, is growing less wholesome
+than formerly, owing probably to the accumulation of the etangs. From
+the edge of the coast to Maguelone, the distance cannot be much less
+than a mile and a half at low water.
+
+The Montpelliards are considered a scientific people; and, at all
+events, they seem to have found out the secret of perpetual motion, if
+we may judge from the experience of the first night we spent in the
+town. At half past nine, the principal street, which our hotel
+overlooked, began to swarm with heads. The whole population were on the
+alert, promenading during the greater part of the night; and such a busy
+hum arose from beneath the windows, which the heat obliged us to keep
+open, that it was impossible even to think of sleeping till daybreak.
+Our accommodations indeed were not of the most tempting sort; for
+finding the Hôtel du Midi full of travellers, and consequently saucy
+and unaccommodating, we had tried the Cheval Blanc, described to us as
+the next best hotel; and detestable enough we found it. On stepping
+however next morning into a café and restaurant in the Place de Comedie,
+whose superior appearance had attracted us, we found that M. Pical, the
+master of it, was in the habit of letting rooms, and we immediately
+removed to his house. Nothing indeed could be more clean and elegant
+than its accommodations, or more refreshing after the dusty journey of
+the former day, and the nightly bustle of the streets, than its quiet
+and coolness, situated as it is in a large area in the suburbs or
+boulevards. The salle-à-manger partakes of the same character with the
+rest of the house, and the carte contains a list of many more good
+things than we were inclined to do justice to. In short, no traveller
+can do better than order himself to be driven directly to this house,
+which comprises all the advantages of a private residence at a
+reasonable charge, with the recommendations of great attention and
+civility.
+
+This day, May 16, we attended service at the French Protestant Church,
+and were gratified both with spending a morning on the shores of the
+Mediterranean in a manner which reminded us of an English Sunday, and
+witnessing also the full and respectable attendance of fellow
+Protestants. The service was performed in the following order:--1, a
+psalm; 2, a general confession of sins; 3, another psalm; 4, a sermon;
+5, the commandments and the creed; 6, a long prayer for the sick and
+distressed, the king and the royal family; 7, another psalm, and the
+blessing. The singing was impressive, not so much from any intrinsic
+merit in the performance, as the earnestness in which the whole
+congregation joined in it, "singing praises lustily with a good
+courage," instead of deputing this branch of religious duty to half a
+dozen yawning and jangling charity children, assisted by the clerk and
+parish tailor. I believe it is an observation of Dr. Burney, in his
+History of Handel's Commemoration, that no sound proceeding from a great
+multitude can be discordant. In the present instance, certainly, the
+separate voices qualified and softened down each other, so as to produce
+a good compound. Of the sermon I cannot speak so favourably, for in
+truth it savoured somewhat of the conventicle style. Its theme was
+chiefly the raptures which persons experience under the influence of the
+Holy Spirit, and it was calculated to discourage all whose imaginations
+were not strong enough to assist in working them into this state. The
+manner of the preacher was however good, and his delivery fluent; and so
+great was the attention of the congregation, that during three quarters
+of an hour not a sound interrupted his voice, until, on his pausing to
+use his handkerchief, a general chorus of twanging noses took place,
+giving a ludicrous effect to what was, in fact, a mark of restraint and
+attention.
+
+In the evening we departed for Cette. The road, according to the set
+phrase of the French Itineraire, is through a "campagne de plus
+agréables;" but our observation showed us only a bleak high common to
+the right, and to the left a succession of etangs and sandy flats,
+affording a prospect at once desolate and uninteresting. The space
+between the etangs and the road is generally marshy; and instead of a
+fine blue expanse of sea in motion, the horizon is commonly bounded by a
+long white sandy line, over which the sails of the little vessels appear
+very oddly. One or two houses erected on these ridges, which border the
+etangs, give to the view, if possible, a still more desolate appearance,
+being totally unaccompanied by even a tree or a patch of verdure, and
+only serve to remind you of the nakedness of the land. Near Frontignan
+the prospect improves, as far merely as concerns its fertility; for it
+is in the vicinity of this town that the famous Frontignac wine, or to
+denominate it more correctly, the Muscat de Frontignan, is made. The
+only thing during this evening's route which could be considered as a
+feature, was the lofty cape at whose foot Cette stands; a perfect idea
+of which, from the side on which we approached it, is given by Vernet's
+picture of that port, in the Louvre. A bridge of fifty-one arches,
+traversing a series of swampy ground and etangs, connects this
+promontory with terra-firma, and crosses the great Languedoc canal,
+which communicates at this spot with the sea. A beautiful sunset, which
+made the whole expanse of back-water appear of a rose-colour, and which,
+I confess, I have seldom seen equalled in England, gave as much richness
+to the view as it was capable of receiving. There is naturally but
+little in it; and the effect of Vernet's view is derived from accidental
+circumstances purposely introduced; so that, on the whole, we wished
+that our evening's excursion had been confined to the Place Peyrou. I
+should, however, conceive the air of Cette to be much better adapted to
+tender lungs than that of Montpelier, as well from the difference of
+temperature, perceptible even to a person in sound health, as from the
+superior shelter which its situation affords; while the high and exposed
+site of Montpelier leaves a doubt whether, in most cases it would not be
+more hurtful than salutary. The productions of the neighbourhood of
+Cette are also in a more forward condition than those of Montpelier. We
+saw hedges of arbor vitæ in full flower; and peaches two-thirds grown,
+in almost a wild state.
+
+May 17.--We rose at five in the morning, desirous to secure a cool walk
+to the Tour des Pilotes, a signal post on the high cape above Cette. The
+sun was however prepared for us, and continued to grill us alive from
+the first moment; and, after all, the prospect from this station, to
+which you climb as if ascending the steep roof of a house, is not of a
+nature to repay the exertion. We went to satisfy our consciences that
+there was nothing to see, and we saw nothing. The Pyrenees, so far from
+being visible near Montpelier, cannot be distinguished even from this
+nearer point, excepting, perhaps, on a peculiarly clear day; and no
+other feature worth mentioning occurs. The coast presents a bare and
+uninhabited appearance, arising partly from the almost total want of
+trees. Our perquisitions in the town of Cette itself were more
+fortunate, though, by-the-by, it exceeds Lyons itself in dirt and ill
+smells. It is a place of considerable trade in proportion to its size,
+and is employed chiefly as an entrepôt for goods, which may be landed
+and reshipped without paying duty: and a walk on the quay affords, in
+consequence, considerable varieties of the human face divine, neat as
+imported. I recognised a group of Catalan sailors by their brown jackets
+embroidered with shreds of gaudy cloth, their red night-caps, and the
+redicillas in which their hair was bagged. No race of men with whom I am
+at all acquainted bear so marked a character of animation and decision
+in every movement of ordinary life as these sturdy provincials, or would
+be more remarked by a stranger among a mixed concourse of different
+nations. The same exuberance of animal motion which degenerates into
+restlessness and buffoonery in the Neapolitan, or the native of
+Languedoc, assumes a more dignified character in the Catalan, who is
+certainly a gentleman of Nature's own making. One of the crew, a tall
+athletic fellow, was holding forth to the rest on some trivial matter
+with a varied and graceful action, which might have served as a model to
+a painter. The rest were at breakfast; but even their mode of pouring
+the wine on their tongues at arm's length, from the long spout of a sort
+of glass kettle, had somewhat classical in it, and reminded me of the
+recumbent figure in the Herculanean painting, who is drinking in the
+same manner. Simple as it may appear, this knack is not to be acquired
+without a long apprenticeship, and I was ludicrously reminded of my
+abortive efforts to master it by the sight of the party on the quay. It
+certainly is adapted for making the most of any liquid, and might have
+been adopted during such a scarcity of water as the Hanoverian consul
+informed us existed in Cette during the former year. Not a drop of rain
+fell for ten months, and water at last became dearer than wine.
+
+On crossing the bridge, we observed a man on one of the piers, spearing
+aiguilles de mer, a beautiful silvery fish, of which he had taken
+several. They were about two feet long, and of the shape of an eel,
+excepting in the form of their long picked heads and jaws, which
+correspond exactly with their name. The tunny is also caught in
+abundance near this part of the coast; and Vernet has introduced the
+fishery, from a lack of picturesque circumstances, into one of his
+sea-ports, painted by royal order. No other fish can better deserve this
+particular compliment, uniting, as it does, size, flavour, and the
+merits of both fish and flesh in a great degree. The "thon mariné" is
+its plainest and best preparation, and is preferable, with a dish of
+salad, to all the high-seasoned dishes which form a Provençal bill of
+fare; in short, if our national sirloin obtained knighthood, such a good
+lenten substitute as the tunny deserves canonization.[39] I cannot say
+so much for the dish, common enough among Frenchmen, which a
+well-dressed man, the harlequin to a troop of comedians, was eating in
+the salle-à-manger when we entered; viz. a raw artichoke with oil and
+vinegar. Sterne, it appears, little knew the extent of the ass's good
+taste, when he deprived him of this article in the Tabella Cibaria, "to
+see how he would eat a macaroon."
+
+[Footnote 39: A similar dignity was conferred by some heathen poet, I
+believe, on the _potnia sykê_ (the august, or god-like fig).]
+
+We set off at two o'clock in the day on our return to Montpelier, not a
+little envying the horses and mules their cool quarters in the immense
+remise. Within a mile of Cette lies the breakwater of rough stones,
+which forms a prominent object in the foreground of Vernet's picture,
+and serves to ascertain the spot from whence he took his design. At
+Villeneuve, where we stopped to bait the horses, we were diverted by a
+scene characteristic of the country. A bag had just been found on the
+road by the conductor of the Cette diligence, which drove up to the inn
+while we were there; and on Durand disowning it, a shabby-looking foot
+passenger claimed it, but could not establish his plea by identifying a
+single article. In a few seconds every soul in the inn, excepting
+ourselves, was assembled to take part in the discussion, and argued the
+pro and con with a vehemence of voice and action, which would have made
+a stranger believe it was a matter of life and death to each. A female
+inside-passenger, with an infant in her arms, which she nearly let drop
+in her energies, was the coryphée of this chorus of tongues, which could
+be compared to nothing but bees in the act of swarming, or the cackle
+which the entrance of a fox causes in a hen-roost. We were no longer
+surprised at hearing the peasants whom we met conversing in a tone which
+we had mistaken for quarrelling. The French generally, indeed, are fond
+of noise and action and emphasis about what does not concern their own
+interests a jot, while a London mob indulges an equal degree of
+curiosity by silent gaping; but these good folks certainly outdid
+anything I ever witnessed in France before. An action for defamation
+brought in Languedoc[40] might, with propriety, be worded, "that the
+defendant did, with four-and-twenty mouths, four-and-twenty tongues, and
+four-and-twenty pair of lungs, vilify and damnify his neighbour's
+reputation;" for it is probable that a scolding match could not take
+place in the open air of that country, without enlisting volunteer
+seconds to that amount on both sides, all equally bawling and violent.
+At Nismes, a fellow bellows across the street to offer himself as
+cicerone, in a tone which seems intended to warn you of a mad dog at
+your heels; and, in general, the lungs of Languedoc appear constructed
+on a larger and more discordant scale than is usual, and their
+volubility is rather a contradiction to the yea and nay appellation of
+the country. A respectable Frenchman informed us, that the peasants of
+Languedoc were considered to possess much wit and ingenuity by those who
+could understand their patois, which he frankly owned was unintelligible
+to himself. Their liveliness and animal exuberance are as strong a
+contrast to the immoveable form into which they are swathed when
+infants, as the flutter of a butterfly is to its torpidity as a
+chrysalis; indeed a fanciful person might be apt to suppose, that on
+emerging from their bandages, they indemnify themselves for the previous
+constraint by a life of perpetual fidget, and that the same re-action
+takes place as in the case of Munchausen's horn, which played for half
+an hour of its own accord when unfrozen. To speak seriously, nothing can
+be more piteously ridiculous than the state of a poor Languedoc child,
+swathed and bandaged into all the rigidity of a mummy, and totally
+motionless. Our friend H. declares, that his attention was once drawn
+behind a door by a faint cry, and that he there discovered and took down
+one of these little teraphims from the hook by which it hung suspended
+by a loop, like a young American savage. "C'est la mode du pays," is the
+only account of the practice which you get either here or at Nice; and
+it is fortunate that they have not still improved on it by a hint from
+the black nurses of Barbadoes, who embalm weakly young Creoles in
+wrappers lined with assa-foetida, and think it prejudicial to "burst
+their cerements" more than once in a fortnight.
+
+[Footnote 40: The word Oc, according to tradition, meant in the old
+patois of the country "yes:" hence the original derivation of "Langue
+d'Oc."]
+
+After our horses had eaten a pound of honey with their corn, which
+honest Durand considered a powerful cordial, we resumed our route, and
+reached Montpelier to a late dinner, enjoying in no small degree the
+coolness and quiet of Pical's house. It was indeed the love of quiet,
+and the dislike to a constant ferment, which drove our landlord from
+Nismes to settle in this place. The bigotry and party zeal of the former
+town, in truth, appear to have been hardly exaggerated in the accounts
+which have reached England, and to exist in such a degree as to render
+Nismes an unsafe place for a moderate man, who is owned by neither
+party. The spirit of discord and enmity is instilled by the more violent
+of both parties into their children as a duty, so that it will probably
+descend from generation to generation. Both parties, indeed, might adopt
+as a crest and motto a boot-maker's sign in Montpelier, which is
+somewhat diverting from its bombast, when merely applied as honest
+Crispin meant it. A lion is represented tearing a boot, with the
+inscription, "Tu peux me dechirer, mais jamais me decoudre." Construe
+it, "You may cut my throat, but not alter me," and it will show the
+pleasant state of party spirit at Nismes, if what we heard so near the
+scene of action be true. We returned to Nismes on the 18th with
+associations not so pleasant as had been created by its beautiful walks
+and buildings, and the civility with which our questions were answered
+by the inhabitants. We might have seen the country between Montpelier
+and Nismes to greater advantage, the dust being somewhat less stifling
+than before; but unluckily there was nothing worth seeing. The district
+is certainly a garden, but then it is a flat uninteresting kitchen
+garden, for the supply of the Lunel brandy merchants, and the rich
+Nismes manufacturers, who appear too polite in their tastes to venture
+into it. Hardly a single thing that can be called a gentleman's house
+occurs, and that not for want of culture or opulence. The case seems to
+be this; the people of Nismes, like the Bordelais, are proud of their
+elegant and airy city, embellished with classical relics, and uniting
+most of the advantages of town and country, and are well satisfied
+without the campagne which a rich Lyonnais, carrying on his business in
+a close town, considers as his paradise. Although this system of "rus in
+urbe" gives but a mean and poor appearance to the environs of a town, it
+produces much pleasure and convenience to such resident strangers as can
+enjoy the society of Nismes, which, by all accounts, must somewhat
+resemble sleeping in Exeter 'Change, the keepers, in the shape of a
+strong preventive force of military, on the alert, it is true, and the
+bars are well secured, but the beasts only watch their opportunity to
+tear each other to pieces. How an Englishman would fare in a public
+disturbance is difficult to say. It is probable that the Catholics would
+abominate him as a heretic, and the Protestants denounce him as an
+anti-Buonapartist, and that he would consequently be thrust from the one
+to the other, like a new comer between two roguish school-boys. This,
+however, was no concern of ours, as we left Nismes the next morning on
+the road to Beaucaire. The old Pharos was the last landmark we took
+leave of, as it was the first of which we caught sight. It contrasts
+with the Maison Carrée as a wild legend of the dark ages would with a
+letter of Pliny; and though rough in its fabric, and uncertain in its
+history, dwells as strongly on the recollection as that highly-finished
+gem.
+
+    "The tower by war or tempest bent,
+    While yet may frown one battlement,
+    Demands and daunts the stranger's eye,
+    Each ivied arch and pillar lone
+    Pleads haughtily for glories gone!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. IX.
+
+TARASCON--BEAUCAIRE--ST. REMY--ORGON--LAMBESC.
+
+
+TO Tarascon 19 miles of road for the most part bad and sandy. I am not
+geologist enough to decide with accuracy on the formation of that part
+of the banks of the Rhone which we were approaching, but the detached
+specimens of rock are of a curious nature. After passing a little
+village called St. Vincent, we came to an open plain, bounded in front
+by several singular round hills on the summit of one of which, called
+the Roche Duclay, was a rock so exactly resembling an old castle in size
+and shape, that a nearer inspection alone satisfied us as to its real
+nature. There is also a great singularity of outline in the hills which
+became soon visible in the distance on the other side of the Rhone, one
+or two of which appeared as if they had shells upon their backs.
+Beaucaire, with its old castle overhanging the Rhone, soon came in
+sight.
+
+    "Jeunet encore, étois sortant de page,
+    Lorsque à Beaucaire ouvrit un grand tournoi.
+    Maint chevaliers y firent maint exploits,
+    Dames d'amour animoient leur courage;"
+
+says the French Roman: and in the old fabliaux also, the scene of
+Aucassin and Nicolette is laid in this place. These are, I believe, but
+a small portion of the claims which Beaucaire possesses to chivalrous
+celebrity, and its very name is in a manner connected with knights and
+ladies, tourneys and pageants. There is something in its appearance also
+which does not belie these associations, although it was crowded with
+farmers and market people at the time of our arrival: and those too of
+the vulgar bettermost sort, which is the most hopelessly
+unchivalrous.[41] The castle stands detached from the town, on as bold
+and perpendicular a cliff as any romance writer could wish, and
+overlooking one of the broadest and most rapid reaches of the Rhone; an
+extensive green[42] meadow planted with trees, and large enough for a
+tournament on the most extensive scale, or another Champ du Drap d'Or,
+divides the steep side of this rock from the river; and on the land side
+it is backed by another cliff garnished with as many windmills as Don
+Quixote himself could have desired. We crossed the Rhone on a bridge of
+boats to a long narrow island, from whence the view on both sides is
+striking. Beaucaire, with the accompaniments I have just described, and
+Tarascon, flanked by the large ancient castle of the counts of Provence,
+front each other on the opposite banks of the Rhone, which rushes and
+thunders on both sides of the isle, making the cables by which the
+floating bridge is lashed, creak most fearfully every moment.[43] From
+this point I made a drawing of Tarascon in defiance of a violent wind,
+which forced me to place my paper on the lee side of a stranded boat,
+and to sketch in the attitude of a plasterer white-washing a ceiling.
+Another bridge of boats conducted us to Tarascon;[44] where we walked
+out while the horses were baiting, the whole inn being in the same
+confusion from market people as Beaucaire itself, and not seeming of the
+most comfortable description. Being driven by a heavy scud of rain into
+a shoemaker's shop, we found a civil and intelligent guide in his son,
+from whom, however, we could not ascertain that there was any thing
+worthy of notice in this populous place, except the castle. We passed
+the Maison de Charité, in front of which is a new cross lately erected
+by the Mission, on the scale of that at Avignon, and profusely gilt and
+ornamented. The same agency also has lately re-established an Ursuline
+convent of fifty-two nuns in this place. The cathedral is old and mean,
+and apparently under no very strict regulations, for an old woman was
+selling cakes in the aisle close to one of the chapels. We went into a
+vault beneath to see a marble statue of St. Martha, which has merit in
+itself, and by the light of a single wax candle, had a striking effect:
+the great admiration, however, in which it is held here may chiefly
+arise from an opinion of its miraculous powers. "Elle devenoit invisible
+pendant la Revolution," whispered our young Crispin.--"Oui, elle étoit
+cachée, voilà ce que tu veux dire, mon petit--." "Eh! non, pardon,
+Messieurs, elle se cacha; mais il y a trois ans qu'elle se montre
+encore," replied the little fellow, with the most confident gravity. I
+trust that this monstrous fiction did not originate in the Ursuline
+convent which he mentioned; and that the fifty-two good ladies employ
+their time in more charitable and useful actions than in filling the
+heads of poor children with stories so hurtful to the real interests of
+religion. However credulous our young guide was, he was not mercenary,
+being with difficulty persuaded to accept a franc or two for what he
+styled the pleasure of having conducted us. We next visited the castle
+of Tarascon, now used as the public prison, and in which 1500 English
+were confined during the war. The enormous height and massiveness of
+its walls, which overtop the weather-cock of the cathedral, and the
+smallness of its few windows, qualify it well for this purpose; and a
+greater appearance of strength and solidity is given by the solid rock
+in which its foundations are embedded, and which in some places is
+shaped into wall and moat. We crossed a drawbridge into a court flanked
+by four round towers, and having a square keep in its centre. On the top
+of one of these towers is an esplanade, from whence the view of the
+course of the Rhone, and the great plain of Arles, is fine: the latter
+town, which is about nine miles distant, was seen distinctly. We were
+rather disappointed by the inside of the castle, which seemed chiefly to
+consist of small mean rooms: perhaps the baronial hall might be the
+dormitory of the prisoners, and not in a presentable state; but we saw
+nothing which recalled any idea of feudal magnificence. The same
+description which serves for the tower of Westburn-flat, in the Black
+Dwarf, allowing for the difference of size and finish, would exactly
+suit the cubical shape and high blind walls of this castle, which
+probably was intended to serve similar purposes in the days of club law.
+Its durability is not so remarkable as the fresh colour and sharpness of
+every part of the carving, and it might pass for a modern gothic edifice
+of twenty years standing, but for the solidity and frowning grandeur
+which characterise it. The air of Provence appears more clear and dry
+than even that of Italy, and to be more favourable to the preservation
+of old buildings. Its clearness certainly is remarkable, particularly in
+diminishing the effect of distance; and on Monday night, at Montpelier,
+I recollect that we could plainly discover with the naked eye the stars
+of the milky way, which are commonly imperceptible without a glass. I
+cannot say that our route from Tarascon to St. Remy was well calculated
+to show the climate of Provence in this light. The whole eleven miles
+were performed in almost a perpetual storm of rain and wind, which
+prevented our seeing much of the rich plain we were traversing. What we
+could see, however, was pleasing: every inch teemed with olives, vines,
+mulberries, corn, onions, and lucerne. We remarked many sheep sheared in
+a comical manner, with two or three tufts, like pincushions, running
+down the centre of their backs, and painted red. Circumstances like
+these, though trivial, are or ought to be pleasing, as they indicate
+that something like comfort or leisure exists, and that the farmer's
+business is partly become an amusement. A needy peasant, pinched by high
+rents or bad seasons, would have but little inclination to ornament his
+favourite wether in this absurd manner; and though Forsyth's remark is
+very true, that a peasant never attempts to become fine but he is
+hideous, such hideous attempts[45] are grateful to the mind's eye from
+the cheerfulness and play of mind which they indicate. Within a little
+distance of St. Remy the storm cleared sufficiently to enable us to
+discern the line of hills to the right, the foot of which we were
+skirting, and which border the great plain of Avignon to the south.
+There is something very singular in the outline of these rocks, which
+are a miniature resemblance of the wild mountains near Valence, but more
+savage and fantastic, presenting the appearance of the sea turned to
+stone in its wildest state of commotion, or in the powerful words of
+Manfred,
+
+    "The aspect of a tumbling tempest's foam
+    Frozen in a moment; a dead whirlpool's image."
+
+[Footnote 41: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 42: The celebrated fair of Beaucaire, which may be almost
+called the carnival of the Mediterranean, is held in this meadow
+yearly.]
+
+[Footnote 43: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 44: For an account of the Tarasque, or fabulous dragon, which
+infested the country, and the ceremonies commemorative of it, see Miss
+Plumptre's tour. The name of Tarascon, she says, is derived from this
+animal.]
+
+[Footnote 45: I do not except even John Bull's favourite yew peacocks
+and dragons, at least when they decorate the garden of a poor man.]
+
+At the foot of one of these barren gray rocks, which, from its shape and
+perforation, exactly resembles the barbacan and gate of a castle, St.
+Remy is situated. The Hôtel de la Graille, where we took up our abode
+for the night, was as comfortable as most French inns, excepting those
+in the large towns: and though the _gros chien de menage_, for whose
+company we always stipulated, was perfectly agreeable, and of a gigantic
+size, yet he was by no means, as is frequently the case, the only
+civilized person in the house. This _gros chien du menage_, be it known,
+is a person of great responsibility in a Provençal inn, as well as of
+formidable strength and size, and is entrusted for the night with the
+care of the remise, and all the live and dead stock, horses, carriages,
+and waggons, which it contains; and a more effectual guard cannot well
+be: his manners during the day are very mild and gentleman-like, as if
+he acted as master of the ceremonies; and he generally steals in at
+supper-time, as if to inform you that all is safe, and to claim a pat of
+your hand, and a pairing of your fricandeau in acknowledgment of his
+professional care. The greasy landlord will stand staring at his kitchen
+door, the landlady will not be very attentive to your accommodation when
+you are once safely housed, and the dirty, bare-legged fille will poison
+you with steams of garlic; but the _gros chien_ will always make amends
+to a genuine lover of dogs.
+
+May 21.--We were tempted by a beautiful morning to rise somewhat before
+four o'clock, in order to visit the Roman ruins near this place, before
+our departure for Orgon. A walk of ten minutes conducted us up a gentle
+terrace on which they were situated, and which rises between the town
+and the fantastic hills we had remarked the day before. Having heard but
+little of these classical remains, we were most agreeably surprised to
+find them in such perfect preservation, and so beautiful in themselves.
+They consist of a mausoleum and an arch, which stand within a few yards
+of each other, and appear to have formed the principal objects in a
+public square or place; the area of which is evidently marked out by a
+row of solid stone seats, well adapted for the accommodation of
+gazers[46] at these beautiful gems. The arch has suffered the most decay
+of the two: or rather, it most exhibits the effects of violence; for the
+unmutilated parts are as sharp and bold as if fresh from the hand of the
+sculptor. The human figures on each side have suffered the most, either
+perhaps from some party commotion of past ages, or the same wanton
+propensity which leads man to disfigure his fellow-creature's image in
+preference to any other work of art; and to which we owe the demolition
+of André and Washington's heads in Westminster Abbey. The fretted
+compartments in the inside, and the border which surrounds the bend of
+the arch, are in the highest preservation. The latter represents
+clusters of grapes, olives, figs, and pomegranates with the accuracy of
+a miniature, and in a free and natural style. One of the pomegranates
+was represented as ripe and cracking, and every seed distinctly
+expressed. The mausoleum is, I should venture to say, a building
+perfectly unique in its way, as a remnant of antiquity; and therefore
+more difficult to describe by a recurrence to any known work of art. I
+cannot better, however, describe its effect on the mind than by saying,
+that it ought to be removed to Pompeii in company with the arch. It is
+certainly superior, as a work of art, to any thing yet discovered in
+that singular place; while it possesses the same indescribable domestic
+character which seems to bring you back to the business and bosoms of
+the ancients, in a manner which nothing at Rome can do. As far as I
+could judge by the eye, it is from forty to fifty feet in height. An
+open circular lanthorn of ten Corinthian pillars, surmounted by a
+conical roof of stone, and containing two standing figures, rests on a
+square base, presenting an open arch on each side, which is in its turn
+supported by a solid pedestal, exhibiting on each of its four sides a
+bas relief corresponding to the respective arch. There is great spirit
+and fine grouping in the bas reliefs, which represent battles of cavalry
+and infantry. The standing figures before-mentioned, to whose honour the
+mausoleum may be supposed to have been erected, are in the civil garb:
+and there is an ease and repose in their attitudes, corresponding with
+the grave, calm expression of the heads, of which necessary appendage
+the merciless French Itineraire has guillotined them without warrant.
+The colour of the freestone of which it is built is as fresh as that of
+the castle of Tarascon. The building is constructed with a thorough
+knowledge of what the human eye requires, tapering and becoming more
+light towards its conical top. It is also of size sufficient for all
+purposes of effect, though not too large for a private monument. The
+situation in which these relics stand is sufficient to add beauty to
+objects of less merit. They are placed, as I mentioned, on a cultivated
+rising ground, at the foot of the wild gray rocks which ran parallel to
+the former day's route, and which assume from this spot a more
+castellated appearance than when viewed from the road. On the other side
+a fine and boundless view opens into the great plain of Avignon and the
+Rhone, almost perplexing to the eye by its variety and number of
+objects: in which we distinguished Avignon itself, and Mont Ventou many
+leagues behind it, rising in height apparently undiminished, with light
+hazy clouds sailing along its middle, and backed by the wild Dauphiné
+mountains, near Château Grignan. We could also distinguish Beaucaire,
+Tarascon, and a large part of the former day's route, to the extreme
+left; and the right opened into various vistas of the hilly country
+which we had to cross in our road to Marseilles. The whole scene was
+lighted up and perfumed by the effects of the shower of rain which had
+fallen in the night, and without which a summer landscape in this
+country is a dusty mass oppressive to the eyes. The thyme and lavender
+on which we sat, and the mulberries and standard peaches which shaded
+us, seemed, as well as the vineyards, to be actually growing; and the
+catching lights were thrown in such a manner as to make every distant
+object successively distinct. After a couple of hours survey, we took
+leave of the ancient Glanum Livii, convinced that we had as yet seen
+nothing more perfect in its way than their tout ensemble, when combined
+with the surrounding scenery.
+
+[Footnote 46: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+To Orgon twelve miles: winding still round the base of the cluster of
+rocks which form the southern barrier of the vale of Avignon, and which
+assumed every variety of whimsical shape during our morning's route. At
+about a mile and a half from the conclusion of our stage, we joined the
+high road from Avignon to Marseilles, which renders the Hôtel de la
+Poste at Orgon, a good and well-accustomed inn. While we were at
+breakfast, a Soeur de la Charité called on us to beg for an hospital
+newly established, and in truth her request was but reasonable, for the
+town seems poor enough, and unequal to the maintenance of such an
+establishment. Several of the houses are well built, but wear a decayed
+appearance, as if they had seen much better days. Orgon still deserves
+notice from its beautiful situation, and from its having been the place
+where Buonaparte met with so narrow an escape from the fury of the
+inhabitants during his journey to Elba. "Vous allez sans doute voir la
+Pierre Percée," said every body at the inn, whom we interrogated as to
+what was best worth seeing in the compass of an hour's walk. To the
+Pierre Percée we went accordingly, and found it nothing but a common
+tunnel cut in a neighbouring rock, to draw off the waters of the Durance
+when swoln with avalanches, from the vale of Avignon, and supply a
+canal communicating with the Etang de Berre.[47] The summit of the rock
+affords by far the best view of Orgon, and one which seems expressly
+constructed for the purposes of landscape: nothing can group better
+together than an old ruined castle just above it, and a dilapidated
+convent on the summit of the hill, standing out in bold relief from the
+narrow vale of the Durance, up which we traced the course of our next
+stage; and the variety of exotic dwarf shrubs, which grew on the cliff
+where we were standing, gave great richness to the foreground. These,
+and the hedges of cypress and cane, which we occasionally saw, began to
+give an Italian character to this part of France.
+
+[Footnote 47: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+The adjoining part of the vale of the Durance is called the district of
+the Cheval Blanc, and, like its namesake, the vale of White Horse in
+Berks, is celebrated for its fertility. To Lambesc twelve miles. For six
+or seven miles the road follows the course of the Durance, which, to
+judge from the extent of its stony shoals, must be a tremendous stream
+at high water, and deserving the termagant appellations which Mad. de
+Sevigné bestowed upon it. The back of the rocks of Orgon, which we
+traversed during the first mile, and on which the convent stands, is
+very singular, and resembling more a mass of strange petrifactions than
+any regular stratum. At Senas, we saw the ruins of a handsome house
+belonging to a M. de B. to whom his property has been restored since the
+Revolution; but the gentleman was disgusted at the woods having been cut
+down and sent to Toulon for ship-building, and resides entirely at Aix.
+An English squire in M. de B.'s case would have rebuilt his ruined
+mansion, and raised a belt of young forest trees in a very few years.
+For some miles during this stage the face of the country was interesting
+and rich in cultivation, with a ruined castle or two, which form
+striking features; but on turning to the right up a long hill which led
+to Lambesc, and leaving the vale of the Durance behind us, backed by its
+high barrier of table-shaped mountains, the country became very
+monotonous. It is on a higher level, and though tolerably fertile, is
+deficient in verdure, the olive being almost the only tree met with.
+Lambesc, like Orgon, which it much exceeds in size, has an air of faded
+gentility and desertion, and its fine public fountains tell a tale of
+better days. In this town the states of Provence were convened annually
+in the reign of Louis XIV.; and it possessed also many of the privileges
+of a capital in the days of the counts of Provence, but at present it is
+celebrated for nothing but the growth of the best Provence oil. This is
+no small distinction in the _almanac des gourmands_, as there is no
+article in which it is so difficult to hit the critical taste of a
+Provençal. I have seen them often make hideous faces at the twang of oil
+which a Spaniard would abuse, and an Englishman admire, for its
+tastelessness. A Provençal lady, with the knowing air of a _bonne
+menagére_, told us, that no traveller could meet with really good oil,
+for that the ordinary sort which we ignorantly thought excellent, was
+made from heaps of olives laid to ferment in order to increase the
+quantity of produce. The best (which answers, I suppose, to the Cayenne
+pepper sent in presents) is made by the proprietors in small quantities
+for their own use, from the natural runnings of choice fresh-picked
+olives, like cold drawn castor oil, and has a greenish tinge; and this
+the good lady assured us was the only true thing.
+
+    No more, when ignorance is bliss,
+    'Tis folly to be wise;
+
+more particularly in matters relating to the palate. We walked to see
+the house where the Count de Grignan resided in state, during his
+official visits to Lambese: like many other dilapidated mansions in the
+place, it bears the marks of fallen greatness. There is a handsome stone
+gateway belonging to it, decorated with a carved coat of arms supported
+by lions; but the house, like the poor Palazzo Foscari at Venice, is
+tenanted only by a nest of squalid families. The Hôtel du Bras d'Or is a
+plain, comfortable country inn, civil and reasonable.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. X.
+
+AIX--MARSEILLES.
+
+
+MAY 22.--To Aix sixteen miles. Though the country during the first part
+of the stage is hilly without any romantic character, and rather
+unpromising, the difference of climate was already apparent from the
+strong and brilliant colours of the very hedge flowers, of which we
+observed an endless variety. After passing St. Canat, the first post,
+the country improves a little, and the [48]mountain under which Aix is
+situated begins to thrust its lofty head above the intervening line of
+hills. In proceeding a little further, we caught a distant glimpse of
+the Etang de Berre to the west, and presently distinguished Aix in a
+deep vale under our feet, into which the descent is long and steep. A
+cart escorted by five gens d'armes, in which we saw a priest and another
+person quietly ensconced, and exposed to a burning sun, was toiling up
+the hill on a very different errand from ours. We were surprised to see
+a grave character in so equivocal a situation, but found on inquiry that
+he had benevolently offered his assistance in escorting a woman on her
+journey to Arles, where she was to be executed for a murder. The
+circumstances under which it had been committed, struck us as more
+atrocious than common. About seven years before, this person, in concert
+with her husband, who was since dead, invited an old lady, their friend
+and patroness, and godmother to one of their children, to walk and eat
+grapes in their vineyard. Watching their opportunity, they cut her
+throat, buried her on the spot, and possessed themselves of her
+property, with which they removed from the neighbourhood of Arles, where
+the murder was committed.
+
+[Footnote 48: According to Sanson's excellent Atlas, the French part of
+which was laid down from measurement, in the reign of Louis XIV., this
+mountain is the Mont St. Victoire, near which Marius gained his
+celebrated victory over the Cimbri. The field of battle is fixed by
+history as near Aquæ Sextiæ.--(_Aix_.)]
+
+Arles and its environs, it seems, are a sort of French Lancashire in
+point of brutal ferocity, and are celebrated for murders as much as for
+pork sausages; not that I mean to connect the two things together, as in
+the well-known nursery tale.
+
+The Hôtel des Princes at Aix is justly to be praised for cleanliness
+and excellent accommodations; but Madame Alary is too well aware of its
+merits to lose by them. It is somewhat ridiculous to pay, in this fine
+fruit country, three francs for a small coffee-saucer of marmalade, with
+which we were charged as a separate item in the breakfast; and those
+therefore who intend staying a couple of days at this inn, should make
+their bargain first.
+
+Mons. Gibelin, a physician residing in the Rue Italienne at Aix,
+possesses, and obligingly allows to be shown, some good pictures,
+including original portraits of Mad. de Sevigné and her daughter.
+Finding him from home, and the house shut up, we extended our walk
+further into the town, which, in point of airy streets and cleanliness,
+deserves to hold a very high rank indeed among French cities. The houses
+are generally stately, regular, and well built, and give you the idea
+both of former and of present gentility and opulence. It is in some
+degree cooled by several fine fountains, a circumstance of no small
+importance at this season of the year, for the effects of the "beau
+soleil de Provence" began to exceed even my recollections of Naples.
+Speaking merely at hazard on the subject, I should doubt whether any
+place in the south of France is better adapted for the cure of pulmonary
+complaints than Aix. It stands on the side of a rising ground, facing a
+delightfully well-watered and fertile valley to the south-west, and
+sheltered from the piercing winds, so prevalent in Provence at some
+seasons, by a mountainous barrier which rises to the north and
+north-east. Its situation is thus at once sheltered, airy, and cheerful,
+and does the greatest honour to the taste of King Réné[49] in selecting
+it for his capital.
+
+[Footnote 49: For an account of the curious ceremonies and processions
+instituted by this monarch, see Miss Plumptre, under the heads of "Leis
+Razcassetos," "Lou Juec des Diables," &c. I cannot say but that the
+enumeration reminds me of the merry court of Old King Cole, with his
+fiddlers three, his tailors three, and the long list of et ceteras
+detailed in the well-known song.]
+
+To Marseilles sixteen miles. At the end of a mile and a half, the road
+ascends a hill to the south, marked by a clump of stone pines, which
+commands the best view of Aix and its environs. The vale running up to
+the right under Mont St. Victoire deserves particular mention, as
+uniting the highest degree of beauty and verdure with a certain wildness
+of feature; and would give a fair idea of the best parts of Italian
+scenery to a person not desirous of crossing the Alps. After taking
+leave of this valley, which better deserves to be called the garden of
+Provence than any other district I have yet seen, the face of the
+country is less pleasing, but in some places more singular and original.
+The first few miles were dull enough, it is true; and to add to our
+pleasure intensely hot, and destitute of any sort of shade. It was
+therefore with no small satisfaction that we stopped for a few minutes
+under a grove of tall old trees which overshadowed the road, with a
+fountain spouting up in the midst, which completely altered the
+atmosphere. No palm island in the deserts of Arabia was ever more
+welcome than this cool spot, which belonged, we understood, to the
+adjoining Château Albertas. Whoever was the planner of it, he has
+discovered more true taste and gentlemanly feeling than if he had built
+the finest possible entrance or lodge as a mere tribute to self-love:
+and were pride alone consulted as a motive, nothing leaves so striking a
+recollection on the minds of strangers, or so strongly disposes them to
+inquire the name of the proprietor of a spot, as an elegant proof of
+attention to their convenience, like the one in question.
+
+Having traversed a second interval of dry parched country, we crossed
+another pleasant valley, in which is situated the Château Simiane. This
+seat, visible about a mile to the left, was the residence of Pauline de
+Grignan, wife of the Marquis de Simiane; who is said to have inherited
+much of the talent and liveliness of her grandmother and mother. Her
+verses beginning with
+
+"Lorsque j'étois encore cette jeune Pauline," &c.
+
+jesting on the annoyance of a lawsuit in which she had to defend her
+title to the Grignan estates, are still on record. After passing the
+Château Simiane, the country became wild and singular in parts. We
+particularly remarked a small village built round the base of one of
+those castellated rocks which abound in the neighbourhood of Beaucaire,
+as also a singular defile near the post-house of La Pin. The high gray
+rocks which inclose this spot appear as if seared to the quick with
+drought, and for some distance leave room only for the road and a narrow
+riband-shaped line of rich cultivated ground of a few yards in breadth;
+which is again succeeded by a small village, whose houses completely
+block up the defile. From this point you creep and wind gradually to the
+hill called La Viste, from which we were instructed to expect the most
+celebrated view of Marseilles. It fully equals all that can be said of
+it; and, though inferior to the bays of Naples and Genoa, possesses
+features which strongly remind one of both. On reaching a wood of stone
+pines on the summit of the hill, the bay of Marseilles bursts on you all
+at once, in an immense sheet of bright blue, studded with sunny islands,
+among which the Château d'If, a little spot fortified to the teeth, and
+commanding the entrance of the inner port, is most conspicuous. On
+advancing a little further, the shores of the bay are seen lengthening
+themselves into a half moon, one horn of which is formed by a line of
+mountains of no remarkable outline, and the other by a more lofty chain,
+communicating with Mont St. Baume and Mont Victoire, and the out-post of
+which is formed by a lofty and barren cape jutting into the sea at the
+back of Marseilles. The town itself possesses no remarkable feature from
+this point, except the fort of Notre Dame de la Garde, which crowns and
+commands it at the top of a lofty hill; but its environs, which rise in
+an amphitheatre from the sea to the adjoining mountains, are one
+perpetual succession of white villas, vineyards, orange, lemon and
+fruit-tree groves, and every thing in short which can enrich and enliven
+a prospect. Too much certainly is not said by the French of this
+celebrated Viste, which deserves at least a quarter of an hour's
+attention; and there are one or two decent cabarets on the top of it,
+the resort of the Marseillois for cool air and refreshment, where the
+horses can be baited while a survey or a sketch is taken.
+
+After the descent of this hill, nothing worth notice occurs, till you
+have passed a long and uninteresting suburb, and enter Marseilles by the
+Cours, the first effect of which is striking, as it runs in a straight
+line dividing the town into two parts. We turned off to the right,
+towards the stately quarter which Vernet has represented in his
+celebrated view from the inner harbour; and took up our abode at the
+Hôtel de Beauveau, which we found in every way deserving the rank which
+it holds among the number of excellent hotels in this place. We rose
+soon after day-light the next morning, to walk to the fort and signal
+post of Notre Dame de la Garde, the most conspicuous object in a distant
+view of Marseilles, and which we had observed rearing its flag-staff at
+the end of almost every vista of street, like the castle of St. Elmo at
+Naples. In our walk we picked up a species of locust, the sauterelle of
+this country, of a pale, dirty brown, and somewhat more than three
+inches in length. Thanks to the great cleanliness of the Hôtel de
+Beauveau, this was the first insect which we had as yet met with at
+Marseilles. In a climate, indeed, of a certain degree of heat, perpetual
+scouring and sweeping becomes absolutely necessary in all comfortable
+establishments, and these little evils are more completely eradicated
+than in those places where they are less natural. The simple precaution
+of shutting the windows before candles are brought, is commonly
+sufficient to keep off the mosquitos; and as for the scorpions, this
+formidable bug-bear exists only in the imaginations of travelling
+ladies, in glass jars at apothecaries' shops, and occasionally in the
+poorer houses of the old town, where the dirt and rubbish afford it a
+shelter.
+
+On ascending the hill of Notre Dame de la Garde, we found reason to
+approve our choice of it as a point of general survey. It commands not
+only the whole bay, but also the flat space of land encircled by
+mountains, in which Marseilles is enclosed as between hot walls, and the
+town itself lies like a map under it. As a point, however, for a general
+sketch, I should prefer the island of Ratoneau, which possesses
+sufficient elevation for all purposes of the picturesque, and brings in
+the sea and the Château d'If as a front ground, grouping at the same
+time the masses of building of Marseilles better than a mere bird's eye
+view would do.
+
+The chapel of this fort, like that of Notre Dame de Fourvières at Lyons,
+possesses a great reputation for sanctity, and much resembles it also in
+its steep ascent, which one would suppose that some austere monk had in
+both cases contrived as a penance to short breathed devotees. The same
+hosts of beggars also besiege both places, of all ranks and pretensions,
+from those who stand silent in a white sheet for drapery, to those who
+obstreperously exhibit their want of any drapery at all. The chapel is
+hung with little pictures, dedicated to the Virgin by the honest sailors
+and peasants, and representing different providential escapes: the
+wretched daubing of which is somewhat atoned for by the good feeling
+which placed them there. One of them represents the Virgin appearing to
+a ship in a storm, with a visage and demeanor which might as well
+accompany a flying mermaid; another describes a man run over by a cart,
+and preserved unhurt by a similar interference; a third, the recovery
+from a sick bed, and the joy of the friends on the occasion, whose
+countenances not a little reminded us of our grim friends Damon and
+Holofernes. Some offerings of a better and richer description were
+pillaged at the time of the Revolution.
+
+We descended from this airy situation down a range of streets as
+precipitous as the roof of a house, the slope of which probably
+counteracts the effect of heat, and prevents the stagnation of air in
+the crowded situations of the old town: Marseilles is said to be healthy
+in consequence; and the generally active and fine appearance of its
+population confirms it. The heat, however, to judge from a comparison
+with Naples at the hottest season of the year, must be tremendous. It
+struck on us at nine in the morning, on re-entering the town, like the
+air from the mouth of an oven; and the herds of poor goats who compose
+the walking dairies of Marseilles and the environs, dead asleep on the
+trottoirs, formed, with a few strolling Turks, almost all the
+out-of-doors population in the principal streets. We had no objection
+whatever to imitate the general practice, and to sit still in a cool
+room for the rest of the morning, reserving ourselves for an evening's
+walk on the quay. I have as yet seen no place where a promenade of this
+sort is so fraught with little circumstances of amusement, or where such
+a variety of different ideas can be taken in by the eyes alone.
+
+"Greeks, Romans, Yankeedoodles, and Hindoos,"
+
+and more nations than could be described in a whole stanza of names, may
+be found clustering in knots, or lounging under the awnings of their
+different coffee-houses; while new detachments of fresh-men are seen
+continually landing, with lank staring quarantine faces, and elbowed in
+every direction by the busy Marseillois, whose curiosity is too much
+deadened by continual importations, to be excited by the newest or
+strangest costume. In short, the memorable political masquerade which
+was got up so awkwardly by Anacharsis Clootz and his friends from the
+Fauxbourg St. Antoine, might here be represented almost every day in the
+week by real and genuine actors, in every possible variety.
+
+May 24.--I cannot say much for the old cathedral; and as far as I can
+collect from the conversation of a scientific Englishman, who has dropt
+his watch into one of the boiling vats, while minuting some process, the
+great soap manufactory of this place offers nothing very different from
+other places of the same sort. Our morning's walk was therefore confined
+principally to the Cours, the shade of whose spreading trees, and the
+profusion of fine bouquets and cheerful faces in the flower-market at
+one end of it, render it a most agreeable promenade. The pleasure of
+lounging, which in the spirit-stirring climate, and among the busy faces
+of England is the offspring of conceit, becomes in such places as this,
+and to an unoccupied person, a real and physical satisfaction, and we
+much preferred it to the lions of Marseilles, which are not many. In the
+evening we explored the western side of the bay, and the low reef of
+rocks opposite to the Lazaretto, which may someday or other be known by
+the name of Alfieri's[50] seat, as he has described it in his life with
+sufficient accuracy to mark the spot. It commands one of the best and
+most cheerful views of Marseilles, including several features of the
+prospect afforded from the Viste, but of course on a lower elevation.
+
+[Footnote 50: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XI.
+
+OLLIOULES--TOULON.
+
+
+MAY 23.--From Marseilles to Cujes twenty-four miles. From the views
+which we had from the Viste and Notre Dame de la Garde, we were prepared
+to expect much from the nearer acquaintance with the environs of
+Marseilles, which the first seven or eight miles would afford us. In
+this case, however, as in Campbell's mountain,
+
+"'Twas distance lent enchantment to the View;"
+
+for that which as a distant whole presented a scene of the highest
+beauty, and the richest cultivation, was nothing better in detail than a
+drive between stone walls. I have always thought that the ostentation of
+riches, or of those things which they will procure, was not a subject of
+vanity so common in France as in England; but there is a medium in all
+things, and it would be as well if the Marseillois and their countrymen
+of Lyons, had a little of that social and respectable pride, which
+induces every cit of Hampstead or Clapham to set off his little box to
+the best advantage. They seem to prefer the philosophical sulkiness
+which Shakspeare's Iden describes himself as enjoying between four
+garden walls.[51] On passing Aubagne, however, the valley of Gemenos
+makes ample amends to the eye, uniting the verdure and wild character of
+a Swiss vale, to the rich productions of Provence. After about three
+miles, the road narrows to a mere cleft in the hills, which we threaded
+for several miles, emerging at last upon the green bason of ground on
+which Cujes stands. Here, for the first time, we saw capers, with a
+profusion of every sort of esculent vegetable, which the inhabitants
+cultivate with great assiduity, losing not an inch of ground. To such a
+pitch, indeed, does their laudable economy proceed, that every
+inhabitant of Cujes keeps a pet dunghill before his house, fearing no
+doubt to lose sight of it; and in this wilderness of sweets the good
+women sat basking and gossiping with great satisfaction.
+
+[Footnote 51: See Second Part of Henry VI. Act 4.]
+
+At Cujes we breakfasted in the same salle-à-manger with an agreeable old
+Marseillois and his wife, who confirmed Peyrol's account of the bloody
+revolutionary committee at Orange, and added circumstances which, at
+this distance of time, seemed still fresh in their minds. The latter had
+been confined four months in the prison at L'Isle, near Avignon, from
+which detachments of persons were daily sent to be tried at Orange, none
+of whom returned. Among the sufferers were a Mad. Vidou, a superannuated
+widow of ninety, who was guillotined in company with her son, an amiable
+and respectable man, and was unconscious of her fate till the last.
+Forty nuns of the convent of Bollene were also among the prisoners,
+accused of a plot to bring about a counter-revolution, and four had been
+already guillotined on this charge when the fall of Robespierre took
+place. Three of this lady's friends had been reported as emigrants, and
+lost their property, merely from not having been at home when the
+commissaires made their visit. The wife of one of these offered to
+recall him in ten minutes, if necessary: "Non, Citoyenne, c'est egal;"
+and he was accordingly enrolled and treated as an emigrant, though he
+never had been absent a single day from his home. In a nation where
+almost every person of a certain age has such incidents as these burnt
+into his recollection, it is not wonderful that the general character
+should somewhat alter, and that the lively thoughtless Frenchmen of
+Sterne should become nearly an obsolete race. It may be perhaps a
+fanciful idea to trace to the same source the nature of a Frenchman's
+vanity, which has generally more reference to mental qualities, than to
+those goods of which fortune or the will of a despot may deprive him in
+an instant. "Bene vixit qui bene latuit" should seem the motto of the
+bulk of the nation.
+
+The first part of the road from Cujes to Toulon traverses great
+inequalities of ground, affording very odd bird's eye glimpses of the
+sea through little chasms in the line of cliffs to the right. Beausset,
+through which we passed, is as filthy a town as Cujes, and the country
+as beautifully cultivated, and as rich in flowers, fruit, and corn; it
+is difficult, indeed, to find animal and vegetable nature more strongly
+contrasted. If I may be allowed to parody the words of a noble poet--
+
+    "They are brown as the dunghills whereon they decline,
+    "And all, save the dwelling of man, is divine."
+
+About three miles from Beausset, the road inclines towards a barrier of
+high and nearly perpendicular rock to the right, which it appeared
+impossible either to penetrate or ascend. A large string of mules,
+however, which met us from Toulon, loaded with barilla for the great
+glass works at Beausset, showed us that the one or the other was
+practicable, and on advancing a little farther, we distinguished the
+chasm through which the road to Toulon is conducted, surmounted by the
+black ruins of an old castle to the left. On the right of the road in
+this place, a singular cluster of conical rocks occurs, which, both
+from their form and position, seem exactly like a heap of gigantic
+shells, piled up to batter the old ruin on the opposite cliff. Their
+appearance was that of a mass of large pebbles, held together by
+indurated clay; but as each probably weighed some scores of tons, it was
+impracticable to bring away one as a geological specimen; nor would such
+specimen give a more accurate idea of the singular and wild effect of
+the whole mass, than a single corner stone of the Colosseum would of the
+grandeur of the whole amphitheatre. The country name of the castle is
+Château Negro, as we understood from some gens d'armes whom we met in
+the pass; and the houses adjoining it, which seem actually overhanging
+the perpendicular edge of the rock, belong to the ancient bourg of
+Emenos. Nothing, one would suppose, but the overruling motive of
+security, ever could have induced human beings to take up their abode in
+such an eagle's nest as this, and its date is therefore probably as
+ancient as it professes to be. In days of old, the castle must have been
+completely the key of the pass, many hundred yards of which would have
+been exposed to stones and arrow-shot from it. A turn to the right
+conducted us into the heart of the Val d'Ollioules, as this mountain
+chasm is called, which is somewhat on the scale of the celebrated pass
+of Pont Aberglasllyn in Wales, but far exceeds it in striking effect. A
+dreary whiteness, unrelieved by hardly a single blade of vegetation,
+covers the whole, as if it had been recently cleft by a volcanic
+eruption, and had as yet had no time to smooth down the sharpness of its
+original fissure; and nothing occurs to break the silence, except the
+trickling of a narrow brook, which just finds room to creep along the
+side of the road, the distant bleating of numberless adventurous goats,
+climbing over head from the mere love of peril, and the occasional echo
+of large stones disengaged by their leaps. One of these, of a size which
+would have shattered the carriage to pieces, came whirling and crashing
+down just in the direction which it had quitted. The whole spot, in
+short, is such as Tasso might have imagined to be the scene of Ismeno's
+incantation, and the congress of devils whom he convoked; and at a
+sudden turn of the road, the Château Negro peeps from between the
+opposite heights in such a new and striking position, as to seem,
+without much stretch of imagination, the abode of the wizard himself.
+After threading all the sharp angles of this savage pass, some of which
+are chiseled out to admit the road, the eye is at length relieved by a
+vista of sky, and the sight of the little town of Ollioules close at
+hand, sheltered in a grove of orange trees and olives, and just filling
+up the entrance of the pass. The view is completed by some singular
+gothic ruins to the right, and by the town of Six Fours in the distance,
+which is situated on such a commanding conical hill, that we mistook it
+for the citadel of Toulon. On emerging from the pass, we turned abruptly
+to the left, pursuing our route along the foot of the mountain barrier
+through whose bowels we had just penetrated, and which acts on the
+climate and productions of Toulon like a high south wall. Some corn was
+already reaped at Ollioules; and it may be said almost without
+exaggeration, that the two last miles of the road make a difference of
+at least a degree in latitude, if one could be allowed to judge by one's
+feelings. There is nothing remarkable in the situation of Toulon itself,
+which is flat and uninteresting; but the shores of the bay possess great
+beauty and variety, and the mountains which overhang the town are very
+bold in their outline. The bastides of the wealthy inhabitants are
+sprinkled along the foot and sides of this abrupt range, overlooking
+extensive views of the bay and its vicinity, and disposed with better
+taste and less encumbered with walls than those in the neighbourhood of
+Marseilles. Instead of a multitude of white spots, vying in numbers with
+the trees which surround them, the mansions of the Toulonais are placed
+just thickly enough to agreeably enliven the woods, pleasure grounds,
+and vineyards from which they peep at scattered and irregular distances.
+We found ourselves well accommodated at the Croix de Malte, situated in
+one of the best parts of the town, which although airy, neat, and well
+watered by little streams conducted through the streets, possesses no
+building or feature worth recollection, save its strong and regular
+fortifications.
+
+May 26.--A morning of very pleasant lounging, without any particular
+object. We rose at five, and not obtaining admission to the platform of
+the Fort du Malgue, walked about on the heights near it, which are
+situated on the south-east of the town, and form one of the best
+panoramic points in its vicinity. The mountain cape to the south, under
+which the entrance to the harbour winds, the distant islands of Hieres,
+and in a different direction, the town of Six Fours, are striking
+objects from this place. There is certainly more local propriety in this
+latter name, than in its more classical and ancient appellation, Sextii
+Forum, from which it has probably been corrupted in the derivation by
+some wag, for no one would suppose that such a situation afforded room
+to heat more than six ovens, or indeed bread to fill even one.
+
+The town of Hieres, seen at a distance in a contrary direction, appears
+to much more advantage. The nature of its soil is said to be peculiarly
+favourable to the growth of the orange and lemon trees, for which it is
+celebrated, but the climate can hardly exceed that of Toulon in
+mildness. We were particularly struck with the softness of the sea
+breeze during this morning's walk, and the vivid verdure of every thing
+around us, contrasting strongly with the dry and naturally sterile
+character of the immediate neighbourhood of Marseilles. The vegetable
+productions of the latter place seem wrung by the hand of industry from
+a rocky and hide-bound soil, whereas a walk near Toulon almost realizes
+the ideas of some favoured green spot in a tropical climate, where the
+sun has both soil and moisture to act upon. The pleasure of sitting down
+upon cushions of lavender and other aromatic plants, under myrtle hedges
+in flower, of gathering capers in their natural state, and tracing the
+most curious and rich varieties of our own wild and garden flowers, amid
+the infinite profusion of others which we could not name, may seem
+trifling to a scientific botanist, but is no small addition to the
+morning's walk of a plain traveller. A visit to the Jardin des Plantes
+will complete the illusion to the most critical eye: and the lovers of
+romance may fancy themselves at once in Juan Fernandez, or in the Isle
+of France, as they walk in the open air, under the shade of palm-trees,
+and seeing tea, coffee, guava fruit, and a hundred other exotic
+luxuries, growing in their natural state. This establishment, which we
+visited in the course of the day, appears a favourite walk of the
+inhabitants of Toulon, and is conducted in a manner which reflects the
+highest credit on their taste and liberality. The system of irrigation
+is well contrived, and the whole, from its variety and extent,
+interesting to the commonest observer.
+
+We were unsuccessful in our attempts to see the arsenal, the object best
+worth attention in Toulon; as it is open to none but naval officers,
+the very class of men, one would suppose, whose prying eyes it would be
+least desirable to admit. The young officer at the gate, however, was
+very pleasant and communicative, and conversed with us in excellent
+English; a language which he had partly acquired as a prisoner during
+the war, and partly by his education at the Marine School of this place,
+where our language is one of the first things taught. An inveterate John
+Bull might remark, "Ay, these fellows know they are sure to be made
+prisoners, if they fight with us; and that is the reason they take this
+precaution." Our English pride was certainly gratified this evening, but
+it was by the voluntary civility which we experienced during our walk
+from this young man and several others who had been prisoners in our
+country. It is peculiarly pleasing to find those who visited England
+under circumstances commonly the most unfavourable, expressing grateful
+recollections of their treatment, and ready to acknowledge them by
+little attentions. We found, indeed, nothing but friendly faces among
+that very class of people of whom we should have been most shy of making
+inquiries, and at the very place where we should have expected them to
+excite the least pleasant recollections. Two marines accosted us on the
+quay, to point out a sand-bank which the English had attempted to cut
+through during the siege of Toulon, in order to facilitate the entrance
+into the harbour; and on our inquiry whether they had penetrated as far
+as a station where we saw a 140 gun ship and some others laid up, they
+answered with a laugh, "Ah oui, Messieurs, ils étoient là, et encore
+plus loin, je vous en reponds."
+
+It were to be wished on many accounts, that the French government would
+keep their galley-slaves as much out of sight as they do their arsenal.
+Under the ancient regime, these unfortunate creatures were only employed
+in the works of the latter place, which they never left; but under the
+present system, those only who are condemned for life are so treated,
+and the rest are employed in different parts of the port, where they
+perform the work of horses, in the most public manner, chained by the
+leg in pairs. Some were drawing timber, and stone carts; and others,
+rather more favoured, were laying the pavement of the pier, with a
+single heavy iron link on one leg. How far economy may justify this
+arrangement, or whether the exposure of incorrigible offenders may
+answer as a public example, it is not for a mere visitor to determine;
+but certainly a plan more adapted to deaden and sear the sense of shame
+which may still remain in them, and brutalize their minds by constant
+irritation, can hardly be devised. The mildness and temper with which
+the guard and superintendants appear to behave is not likely to
+counteract sufficiently the effect of the constant gaze of passengers, a
+circumstance which to judge by one's own sensations must tend to stifle
+those feelings of repentance which solitary confinement naturally
+induces, and harden every manly particle of the mind into rebellion. It
+is hard to reproach them with the natural effects of this rough mode of
+regeneration; but I think I never saw a worse or more obdurate set of
+countenances. One fellow in particular, when civilly directed by the
+overseer to change the position of a stone, gave him a look of deadly
+malignity when his back was turned, which reminded me strongly of the
+look of Kemble in Zanga, while pronouncing the emphatic "Indeed!"
+Strange as it may appear, we were informed that there were several
+colonels, generals, priests, and men who could afford to spend 300
+francs a day, among this body. These contrive, it seems, by bribery, to
+procure more variety of food than the bread, soup, and vegetables, which
+are the regular allowance; and are permitted to purchase better linen
+than the ordinary convicts; but the dress and regulations are to outward
+appearance the same in all. Those condemned for military insubordination
+are marked by a bullet round their necks, and the convicts cast for life
+by a green cap. The individuals whose term of confinement is nearly
+expired wear only an iron ring round the ankle, as it is presumed they
+will not incur the penalty of fifty blows and three years additional
+confinement by an attempt to escape: there are others, however,
+sentenced for five, ten, fifteen, or twenty years, and these are heavily
+ironed and more strictly watched.
+
+A detachment of the celebrated Thibet goats, who are to make the fortune
+of the French shawl-manufacturers, is now in harbour, and others are
+performing quarantine at Marseilles. The specimen of their fleece which
+was shown us, resembles the coat of the musk ox. The wool of which the
+shawls are made grows at the roots of the longer hair, and is of a warm
+and delicately fine texture; a circumstance which should seem to prove
+these animals natives of the cold and mountainous districts of Thibet,
+and capable by dint of British skill and enterprise, of being
+naturalized in our own country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XII.
+
+FREJUS--CANNES--ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE--ANTIBES.
+
+
+MAY 27.--From Toulon to Puget les Crottes, 23 miles. On passing the
+small town of La Valette, from which the road to Hieres diverges, the
+mountain barrier under which Toulon is situated ends abruptly in a
+precipice, fortified by a strong redoubt. From this spot a detachment of
+the combined forces were driven by the republicans, who scaled the rock
+during the night at the most imminent risk; and the evacuation of Toulon
+was the ultimate consequence of this daring coup de main, in which
+Buonaparte is said to have first distinguished himself. After passing
+this point, and leaving on the right the distant hills of Hieres, no
+remarkable feature presents itself. The country is chiefly an extensive
+olive forest, varied by a few vineyards, and enlivened by hedges of
+pomegranate, and Spanish broom. We found Puget les Crottes but a bad
+exchange for the fountains, and clean airy streets of Toulon: and it
+better deserves the name of Puget le Crotté, by which it is laid down by
+some mistake in some maps. The inn was perfectly worthy of the place; a
+frowzy kennel of bustling Yahoos, totally deficient in that readiness
+and attention which can put a reasonable traveller in good humour with
+the worst accommodations. Our servant fought his way to the kitchen fire
+to execute our orders; finding them neither attended to by the old dame
+who presided in the kitchen, of whom Gil Blas's Leonarda was a faint
+type, nor by the maid who screamed rejoinders at the top of the stairs,
+to the ravings of her mistress at the bottom, in a tone that deafened
+us. The arrival of the Draguignan diligence, which we had passed on the
+road, heavily laden with money and passengers, and travelling at a foot
+pace, escorted like a condemned cart by two gens d'armes, accounted for
+this mighty sensation. We were glad enough to escape from the din of
+tongues and the steams of garlic, and resume our road, which did not
+offer any variety, till we had nearly reached La Luc, 17 miles from
+Puget, whose situation and red sandy soil reminded us of a Herefordshire
+glen. The junction of two main roads has created a tolerable inn at this
+small place, which may with safety be recommended to persons on an
+abstemious regimen, and to none else.
+
+May 28.--To La Muy 19 miles, without any remarkable feature, though the
+character of the country is rather pleasing. La Muy is a wretched
+village, whose _tout ensemble_ is completed by a ruinous house of the
+Count de Muy: this, as well as his castle at Grignan, was destroyed in
+the Revolution, and the annexed property alienated from him. To Frejus
+12 miles: the few last of which improve as to scenery. We saw cork trees
+for the first time, and a profusion of myrtle in hedges and bushes.
+There is something peculiarly stagnant and wo-begone in the appearance
+of Frejus, which, however, is in more strict poetical character with its
+Roman ruins, than the populous and wealthy streets of Nismes would be.
+The inn where we dined and slept preserved the same character most
+rigidly; indeed, Madame, whose ideas seemed perfectly in unison with
+those of mine hostess of La Luc, wished apparently that our feast at
+Forum Julii should be entirely intellectual, and that we should rise
+from dinner with unclouded heads, to enjoy a walk among its antiquities.
+We were really diverted by the formal parsimony with which the good
+woman had contrived to invent a dinner for four, out of what would have
+hardly have sufficed as a whet to an English farmer. Were I blest with
+the culinary accuracy of the facetious Christopher North, or his friend
+Dr. Morris, I could better record a bill of fare which would form a
+complete contrast to the vaunted luxuries of their inspiring deity, Mr.
+Oman of Edinburgh. Suffice it, as a specimen, that three pettitoes of
+an unfortunate roasting-pig, or rather pigling, which I fear must have
+died a natural death, formed the most substantial part of our repast.
+
+The amphitheatre of Frejus, to pass to a more dignified subject, is
+situated without the walls of the town, on the side by which we had
+entered from Toulon; and is sufficiently perfect to be interesting,
+though it must suffer by a comparison with the better known, and finer
+specimens of the same sort which exist. There is also a temple, and an
+arch, the latter known by the name of the Porte Dorée, neither of which
+possesses any thing remarkable when compared with the ruins of Nismes
+and Orange. The aqueduct built by Vespasian, and situated to the
+north-east of the town, is on a more extensive scale, and taken with its
+concomitants, better merits the attention of a painter: even when viewed
+from under the walls of Frejus, which it adjoins at one end, it
+possesses as sombre a character of repose as Poussin could have wished,
+and which is unbroken by the intervention of mean houses, and busy
+figures. Its scattered groupes recede from the eye up a solitary valley,
+interspersed with clumps of olive trees, and backed by pine forests, and
+the foreground derives a degree of wildness from the profusion of
+Spanish broom of an unusual size and beauty, with which its scattered
+blocks are fringed. We walked also to the small village of St. Raphael,
+a mile or two from the town, which is the modern port of Frejus, and
+stands in what was formerly the main sea; while the Pharos which marked
+the entrance of the ancient harbour is now surrounded by an alluvial
+meadow, and in place of the numerous vessels which must have crowded the
+ancient quay, a brig, and two or three feluccas, were quietly at anchor.
+A change like this, of the very soil, and local features, speaks more
+strongly to the imagination than the most mighty and extensive ruins.
+
+29th.--We rose at a very early hour to pursue our route,
+
+    ----for our sleep
+    Was airy light, from pure digestion bred,
+    And temperate vapours bland,
+
+thanks to the precautions of mine hostess of the Chapeau Rouge: the
+first part of our road lay almost parallel with the line of ruins,
+marking the course of the aqueduct, and afforded a more just idea of its
+extent and size than the view which we had taken before. To judge from
+the scattered groupes of arches, it must have extended as far as the
+hills bounding the bay of Napoule, up whose sides we began to wind, at
+the distance of about two miles from Frejus, and continued to ascend for
+six more. This morning's drive was agreeable enough from its novelty, so
+little reminding us of the usual features of France. The bold and
+sombre character of its fine woods, undiversified save by an occasional
+patch of cultivation, or a solitary hut, and swept by bodies of clouds
+in their progress from the Mediterranean, reminded us more of the
+descriptions of Norwegian forests, and of the mountains haunted by the
+Wild Huntsman, than of Provençal scenery. The enormous extent of these
+forests has not, as may well be supposed, improved the state of society.
+About fifteen years ago a banditti, composed of deserters, and of the
+peasantry of the country, and regularly organized, held them for a
+length of time, and defied the efforts of a numerous body of
+gend'armerie sent to subdue them. We observed also the traces of a wider
+spread conflagration, which we understood to have caused damage to the
+amount of a million of francs, and the perpetrators of which had equally
+escaped detection: it had made but a small comparative gap in these
+immense tracts of wood.
+
+Soon after passing the post-house of Estrelles, situated on the summit
+of the mountain, the view which opens on the other side becomes
+strikingly fine, and extensive. The shores of the bay of Napoule,
+beautifully wooded and interspersed with white villas, lie under foot in
+a complete bird's-eye view, backed by the sweeping mountains of the
+neighbourhood of Grasse, and terminated by the cape where Antibes
+stands. Farther still the back-ground is surmounted by the colossal
+groups of the Maritime Alps. The descent from this hill to level ground
+is about seven miles of road as excellent as the former part of the
+stage; the whole having been very much improved by Buonaparte; and
+although the distance from Frejus to Cannes cannot be less than
+twenty-eight miles, it appears to occupy a shorter space of time than
+many much shorter stages.
+
+A nearer approach to Cannes in no way disappointed us: the bay of
+Napoule, in the centre of which it is situated, presents, in different
+points of view, every variety of Italian scenery; and there may be
+conjectures less probable than that it was called originally by mariners
+the bay of Napoli, from some fancied likeness. To the latter celebrated
+spot it bears somewhat of a resemblance, but a stronger still to the
+Porto Venere, or bay of Spezia, both in the wilder and the softer part
+of its features; and the illusion is kept up by the grouping and form of
+the houses, and the Italian patois of the inhabitants, who are mostly a
+colony of Genoese fishermen. Nor ought the Hôtel des Trois Pigeons to be
+forgotten, though its cleanliness and comfort, and the cheerful alacrity
+of its inmates, remind the traveller more of some quiet country inn on
+the Devon or Somerset coast, than of any thing Italian or French. It
+stands on a little rock just out of the town, looking on the sea, and
+facing the island of St. Marguerite; and there is perhaps no scene in
+which more historical recollections are combined under one point of
+view, than that which its windows command. The island, whose garrison
+and buildings are distinguishable by the naked eye, was for many years
+the prison of the mysterious Masque de Fer, whose identity, like that of
+Junius, has hitherto baffled conjecture. In the room where we were
+sitting Murat passed some of the time intervening between his expulsion
+from Naples, and the crisis of his fate; and on the sands about half a
+mile to the left, is the spot where Buonaparte first landed from Elba,
+and bivouacked during the night, surrounded by numbers whom curiosity
+had drawn out of the town to behold him. There is perhaps something
+characteristic of the different fortunes of this singular man, in the
+place from which he had embarked for Elba a year before, and in that
+where he first set foot on his return, full of hope and confidence. The
+former was Frejus, a place dreary and comfortless, surrounded by
+memorials of departed greatness, shrunk within a small part of its
+former limits, and deserted by the very sea, and it might have been
+mercifully chosen on purpose as the scene of his exit, in order to blunt
+his regret at leaving France. The latter was Cannes, a place,[52] as I
+have fully described it, full of cheerfulness, beauty, and rich distant
+prospects, corresponding almost in brilliancy to those which his mind
+was forming at the time.
+
+[Footnote 52: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Far different must have been the feelings of Murat during the anxious
+interval of forced leisure which he spent at this place; and I will
+confess, that while listening to the landlord's simple account of the
+manner in which he passed his time, we forgot the massacre of Madrid in
+the well-known anecdote of the drowning officer's rescue. During the
+first eight days he remained shut up in the bed-room or sitting-room
+which we occupied, in expectation of despatches from Buonaparte, to whom
+he wrote on his arrival at Cannes. At the end of this time, having
+received no answer, he used to beguile his impatience by rambling on the
+sea shore, or watching the sports of the peasants, till at length,
+evidently heart-sick and desperate, he set out for Toulon on the rash
+expedition which closed his career. "Toujours, toujours, il avoit la
+mine triste.--Ah! si vous l'aviez connu, vous auriez pleuré son sort--il
+étoit un si bel homme!--d'une taille superbe!" said our honest host,
+whose knowledge of Murat was probably confined to his soldier-like
+figure, and his desolate state: he could have been no judge of the small
+extent of Buonaparte's obligations to his brother-in-law, whose former
+defection was but repaid in kind. He pointed out a green spot under the
+walls of an old castle which overlooked the inn, where he had frequently
+observed Murat lying with his face concealed in his hands, or in his
+more cheerful moments, watching the dances of the country people who
+resorted thither, and whose sports seemed to interest him considerably.
+It would be a task for the hand of a master poet or painter, to describe
+an ambitious and desperate man, softened for a time by disappointment,
+overleaping in thought the immeasurable distance between his present and
+his former self, and contemplating the sports of his youth with a sort
+of melancholy pleasure, yet under the influence of the strong fatality
+which hurried him to his end. It is by mixing somewhat of this feeling
+in the character of Macbeth, that Shakspeare has excited a momentary
+interest even for a murderer and usurper, who perceives "his life fallen
+into the sere and yellow leaf," and pauses for a moment in melancholy
+reflection as he rushes to "die with harness on his back."
+
+    "Out, out, brief, candle," &c.
+
+Having spent an hour among the sunny basking places which abound in the
+rocks of this place, we hired a fishing-boat to convey us to the island
+of St. Marguerite. It was impossible to help being diverted by the
+uncouth appearance of our new conductors, which was two or three
+degrees wilder than that of poor Murat's amphibious subjects: one fellow
+in particular, was
+
+      "A man,
+    Cast in the roughest mould Dame Nature boasts,
+    With back much broader than a dripping pan,
+    And legs as thick about the calves as posts,"[53]
+
+or indeed thicker, and tanned a bright copper colour by sun and salt
+water; his broad face grinning with good humour, from beneath a mane as
+shaggy as a lion's. It may be supposed that two or three such rowers,
+proud of the new honour of officiating in a pleasure-boat, got us on
+more quickly than the less athletic boatmen of show lakes, and we soon
+landed at the small fort which was the object of our pursuit, and which
+the commandant politely allowed us to explore. At its eastern extremity
+is situated a guard-house, a chamber of which on the ground floor served
+as the prison of the mysterious captive; it is airy and commodious
+enough, in comparison with places of the sort in general; but the height
+of its only window, strengthened by treble bars from the sea, and the
+perpendicular cliff which it overhangs, with the dangerous breach under
+it, are sufficient protections against any escape. For the last five
+years no persons have been confined in this fort, which was formerly
+used exclusively as a state prison, but in the Revolution its benefits
+were extended to persons of all ranks. Restraint, indeed, is not at
+present the order of the day within its precincts, to judge from
+appearances. The soldiers seemed to have little or nothing to do, but to
+flirt with two or three gaudily-dressed negresses, who showed their
+white teeth and their black muzzles from the doors of the casernes, and
+to laugh at the chaplain of the garrison, for such I conclude was the
+grade of the old priest, who met us, toddling about in a state of
+drunken fatuity, very much resembling the condition of Obadiah in the
+Committee, with a nose exhibiting the visible effects of a fight or a
+fall. Having escaped at last from the good man's persecuting attentions,
+we got back to Cannes in time to make a sketch from the precise spot
+where Buonaparte landed.[54]
+
+[Footnote 53: See Colman.]
+
+[Footnote 54: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+May 30.--From Cannes to Antibes eleven miles; a pleasant drive, chiefly
+running close to the sea. Though considerably flattered in Vernet's
+beautiful picture at the Louvre, Antibes, nevertheless, leaves a
+pleasing impression on the mind, from its airy, well-frequented,
+prosperous appearance, and the bustle arising from the presence of a
+garrison. Its inner harbour, and the neck of land which defends it,
+terminated by a little picturesque fort, seem beautifully constructed by
+nature for their respective purposes; but I do not know of any thing
+else meriting notice.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XIII.
+
+NICE--COL DE TENDE--CONCLUSION.
+
+
+FROM Antibes to Nice, sixteen miles, along a beautiful sweep of coast,
+the whole extent of which, crowned by the gigantic chain of Maritime
+Alps, lies in full view for the whole way. No sketch, much less any
+description, can give an idea of the combined effect of this extensive
+bay, or the air of cheerfulness spread over the whole; among all the
+celebrated first views of Italy, there are probably few which speak to
+the imagination in a more imposing as well as pleasing manner. We
+crossed the frontier by a long wooden bridge over the Var, a broad, wild
+stream, roaring down with violence after the storm of the preceding
+night. We were immediately struck with the different culture of the
+vines, festooning as near Naples, over the other trees, in a manner more
+picturesque than useful. The straw hats of the Nissardes, also
+resembling an inverted wicker corn basket, gave quite a new and
+laughable character to the human apex. Such little novelties as this,
+which would excite no more attention in a professed book of costumes,
+than a view into an old fancy clothes shop, are nevertheless recollected
+with interest when seen in travelling, as connected with particular
+trains of thought or association, which they preserve fresh in the mind;
+and to forget these extraordinary potlids of straw, and the fanciful
+little red toques occasionally substituted for them, would be to forget
+an important feature of the Italian frontier.
+
+Much as I had heard of Nice, I was not disappointed either in the first
+view, or in the nearer survey of it. The situation of its ruined citadel
+on a commanding and insulated rock, and its narrow valley of almost
+tropical richness, surrounded by tier above tier of mountains, and
+studded with villas and orange-groves, present every variety of beauty;
+and there is a stateliness of proportion, and a careless elegance in its
+white houses, and an airiness in their situation, which very much remind
+the eye of the best parts of Naples near the Chiaja and Villa Real. The
+first glance of Nice, in short, bespeaks a higher and more fashionable
+tone of society than that of any French town, excepting Paris, through
+which we had passed. It is impossible, nevertheless, for a person
+looking beyond the mere amusement of the moment, to banish a certain
+train of morbid ideas which connect themselves with the sight of this
+beautiful town. There are few persons perhaps moving in good English
+society, whose ears do not familiarly recognise the hopeless phrase of
+"being sent to die at Nice," and many have watched the departure of the
+wrecks of what was once health, strength, and beauty, consigned to this
+painted sepulchre with the certainty of never returning from it. Thus
+the very efficacy of the air of Nice, which has brought it into vogue
+when all other resources have failed, has inseparably connected it in
+the mind with despondency and decay. If such ideas occurred to us, they
+were certainly not removed by the sight of a funeral which past the
+windows of the inn, within an hour or two after our arrival; the corpse
+laid on an open bier, the hands crossed, and ornamented with flowers,
+and the monks and attendants all joining in a solemn chant. A bell was
+also tolling in another quarter, the signal that a man just condemned to
+the galleys was passing in procession through the town, as is customary.
+
+    "But let the stricken deer go weep,
+    The hart ungalled play."
+
+The English dance and dress during an assize week, and the lively
+Nissards, more naturally still, enjoy their fine climate, and elegant
+town, without entering into the gloomy reflections which haunt the mind
+of an Englishman on his arrival. The cafés and public walks were
+swarming with company, and the whole place appeared to take its tone of
+gaiety from the gaudy young officers, whose troops were quartered in the
+extensive barracks; the peasants were dancing their grand round on the
+quay, or fighting between jest and earnest with open hands; the native
+dandies managed their green fans with the same adroitness as their fair
+companions; the shops displayed every luxury and accommodation; and
+every thing, in short, savoured of the habits of a continental
+Cheltenham.
+
+The Hôtel des Étrangers, where we established ourselves, is somewhat
+high in its charges, but proportionably good, and possesses a delightful
+garden of orange-trees adjoining. After being kept awake by mosquitos,
+which seem more prevalent than at Marseilles, and whose little angry
+note of preparation had apprized us of an attack, we walked in the
+morning to the citadel hill, whose solid masses of ruin had attracted
+our notice on the first view of the town. This point affords the best
+general idea of Nice and its vicinity, though in the month of May, it is
+not attained without a roasting walk. The heat indeed was tremendous, as
+may be expected in a triangular tongue of land only a few miles in
+extent, and encircled by lofty mountains; and the mildness of the
+climate in winter, as we were informed, bears a full proportion to its
+oppressiveness in summer. Green peas are to be had all the year:
+mulberries and gourds were already ripe, and every garden was a wood of
+the finest orange and lemon-trees loaded with ripe fruit. The
+thermometer too is seldom or never lower than 55 in the depth of winter.
+At the foot of the citadel hill is a road blasted out of the solid rock,
+running along the edge of the sea, and connecting Nice with its port;
+along which we walked towards the afternoon. I should be inclined to
+remark this spot, near which is an esplanade of good houses, as the most
+sheltered and desirable quarter of Nice. The breeze, which had begun to
+freshen, was just perceptible where we stood, though its effects in the
+open sea were visible by the plunging of the waves under our feet; and
+it appears hardly possible for any but a south or south-west wind to get
+at this point. Whether or not the part of Nice north of the citadel be
+equally calculated for an invalid, I should doubt. The mountain gully
+running up towards Escarene may possibly bring down searching winds from
+the north-east; and on the whole the marine esplanade seems to afford a
+situation cooler in summer, and warmer in winter, than the interior of
+the town.
+
+Such as are tolerably active pedestrians will find themselves well
+repaid for an evening's toilsome walk to the height which divides Nice
+from Ville Franche, and whose situation is marked by a small fort.[55]
+
+[Footnote 55: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From hence the view to the west is very wide, including nearly the route
+of the two preceding days. Towards the east it is less extensive, but
+more striking. The town of Ville Franche, and the beautiful little basin
+which forms its port, appear as completely under the feet, as if you
+could leap over them to the opposite side of the water; and the headland
+between that town and Monaco, up and down which the road to Savona is
+seen meandering, is more boldly defined and on a larger scale than that
+of Lulworth Cove, and though strongly resembling it possesses greater
+beauty and variety.
+
+One of Buonaparte's projects was to render the Corniche, as this giddy
+track is expressively called, practicable for carriages; but the
+Sardinian government, instead of completing, have defaced (as we heard,
+out of jealousy) the part which he had begun: this is, I think, rather
+too absurd for belief. It is at the same time probable enough, that the
+undertaking has been abandoned for want of adequate funds. We were
+lighted homewards by myriads of fire-flies, a circumstance which
+produces on a person unaccustomed to the sight, a more novel and
+brilliant effect than any other accompaniment of an Italian climate.
+
+June 2.--Our original idea had been to have proceeded to Genoa either by
+a felucca or the Corniche, but learning that the latter route was
+impracticable, excepting on mules, and that the variable nature of the
+wind on this coast rendered feluccas a dangerous and uncertain mode of
+performing the journey, we preferred the road into Italy by the Col di
+Tende.
+
+To Escarene twelve miles: the first four skirt along the beautiful
+valley at whose mouth Nice stands, following, and sometimes crossing,
+the course of the river Poglion; the rest gradually winds up into the
+heart of the mountains, through deep ravines and woods of gigantic
+olives, which in this district become picturesque forest-trees. We
+breakfasted at Escarene, a quiet pretty village, possessing tolerable
+accommodation. To Sospello fifteen miles of good road, the first seven
+or eight of which ascend the lofty wall of mountain which closes up the
+entrance of the valley, and appears at a distance like a score of
+corkscrews laid in a Vandyke figure. Up the whole of this we walked,
+mounting, by an easy but tedious circuit of good road, a long series of
+crags, and courses of torrents, and sometimes looking almost
+perpendicularly down upon the point which we had passed half an hour
+ago. Nothing can be more bare or desolate than the rocky mountain ridge
+in which this ascent terminates, and on which vegetation seems at its
+last gasp. A dance of Satyrs might be appropriately introduced to
+complete the wildness of a sketch from this spot, but that it does not
+afford a single berry or blade of grass to regale them, even if they
+could live like their cousins the goats. A large family of peasants, as
+wild and merry as these "hairy sylvans," accompanied us up the mountain
+with their cattle, on their way to the summer chalets, exhibiting the
+laughing side of human nature in a manner which it is delightful to
+witness in the poor.
+
+"Pleased with a feather, tickled with a straw,"
+
+and grateful for the slightest civility, they seemed to consider the
+mere change of place as a festival. The wife had twitched off her
+husband's cocked hat, which she wore in frolic; the bare-legged children
+appeared ready to dance to their own voices as they walked; and the very
+infant, committed in his cradle to the entire discretion of the family
+donkey, was equally pleased and satisfied with his own situation, as he
+headed the patriarchal cavalcade.
+
+The view of the Mediterranean and the coast of France, which this point
+commands, is prodigious; and the intermediate ranges of mountains which
+shut out Nice, and which appeared elevated peaks when seen from its
+citadel, seem from this spot only masses of wavy ground. From hence a
+descent much steeper than the ascent and almost equally long, conducted
+us into the rich and well-inhabited valley in which Sospello stands. The
+inn at this place is rather below mediocrity; the mistress sturdy and
+rapacious in her demands, and shameless in retracting them when forced
+to do so.
+
+From the valley of Sospello, which appears as completely insulated by
+nature from the society of the world as Rasselas's happy valley, we
+wound next morning up another eight miles of ascent as steep and tedious
+as the last. On a wild heath between the tops of two mountains called
+the Col de Brouais, in which this ascent terminated, we unexpectedly
+discovered a hut tenanted by an old gend'arme, a pet lamb, a kid, and
+two tame hares, to all which quadrupeds we were introduced by the master
+with great glee, while waiting for the carriage under his roof. We were
+so much pleased and diverted by the whimsical manner in which this merry
+contented mortal lived among his menagerie, that we sent the horses on
+to Breglio, and complied with his eager desire of entertaining us at his
+cabaret, if a hut the size of a tea-caddy, without another human
+habitation visible for four miles, could be so called. He produced, to
+our surprise, bread, milk, cheese, fresh curd, eggs, fruit, and
+preserves, all clean and neatly served, and was equally surprised at our
+giving him two francs a head, which tender he at first remonstrated
+against with great naivété as too extravagant. The trouble which he had
+taken in fetching most of these articles from a distance of five miles
+appeared not to enter into this honest fellow's calculation. The French
+were encamped in some force on the Col de Brouais at the time of the
+session of the Comtat of Nice and of Savoy by the king of Sardinia in
+1796. It was, also, about four years previous to our visit, infested by
+a band of robbers, to whom its lofty situation afforded great
+facilities: these were, however, swept off and conveyed to the galleys
+by the exertions of the mountain patrole, of whom our host was one, and
+the whole of the country is now perfectly safe and undisturbed. After
+contemplating for a short time the principal summit of the Col de Tende,
+which from this point appears at its full height, we dived into the
+intervening valley of Breglio by a rapid descent, like the road into a
+mine. The trout stream, which runs past this place in its way to
+Vintimiglia, is such as would cause a traveller fond of fishing, to
+regret the want of his rod and tackle. After leaving Breglio we ascended
+the course of this river till it narrowed into a defile between two
+rocks; on entering which the town of Saorgio appears, after a mile or
+two, piled on the top and shelving side of the precipice to the right in
+a singular manner. The architect who planned it must have taken his idea
+from a colony of swallows' nests in a sand-rock, for it seems hardly
+possible to get to or from it without wings: to judge of it from the
+road, there is no room or footing for streets; a man might jump down the
+chimney of his neighbour's house, or be dashed to pieces on its roof, by
+leaping from his own ground floor; and the fall of a house in the upper
+tier would probably open a clear downward passage to the valley. A
+traveller desirous of making a sketch of what is an unique thing in its
+way, would do well to get three hours start of his carriage from
+Breglio,[56] and scramble among the heights to the right of the river,
+for a point which gives a more accurate idea of Saorgio than we could
+obtain from the valley. The view is attempted in aquatinta in Beaumont's
+Maritime Alps, and badly as it is executed, the original drawing must
+have been good, and, as far as I can judge, have given an accurate idea
+of it. The peasants call the place by some name sounding in their patois
+like Chavousse; it cannot, however, be mistaken. This is the only spot
+between Breglio and Tende which would be adapted for a drawing; but the
+scenery, nevertheless, is of the most stupendous and extraordinary
+nature I ever witnessed, exceeding, on the whole, the defile of Gondo
+and Iselle in the route of the Simplon, and more decided, though less
+varied in its features, than that justly admired spot. The pass is not
+on a larger scale than the Val d'Ollioules, as far as Saorgio; but after
+leaving the latter village, the rocks rise to a much greater height, and
+assume a more savage character. It is impossible to form an adequate
+idea of the depth of the defile and its effect on the eye, without
+actual inspection; the nearest approach to it will be made by conceiving
+a chasm rent from top to bottom by an earthquake through Snowdon, or
+any other mountain of similar height. For about twelve miles you travel
+in the condition of those fabled criminals,
+
+    "Quos super atra silex jamjam lapsura, cadentique
+    Imminet assimilis."
+
+[Footnote 56: There is, I believe, no inn at Saorgio.]
+
+Jutting rocks, whose gradual change of posture is marked by the
+inclination of the pines on them, hang toppling over your head at a
+height to which the strongest voice could not be heard from the valley;
+and above and between them just peep glimpses of still more elevated
+heights, where a tree appears hardly of the size of a pin's head. A
+peculiar gray, sombre atmosphere overspreads the whole at noon day,
+similar to that which prevails during a solar eclipse; and the deep echo
+of the river is the only sound heard for miles. On the whole, I never
+saw any place so calculated to convey gloomy and wild ideas, and the
+Sicilian name of "Val Demone," or John Bunyan's "Valley of the Shadow of
+Death," would be appropriately applied to this savage spot. Nor would
+the danger be imaginary at the breaking up of a frost, or after violent
+rains, which might bring one of the highest rocks perpendicularly down
+without the intervention of a single crag to give warning and break its
+fall. The visible rents made in the road from time to time, and the
+obstructions in the deep bed of the stream, show sufficient marks of
+these formidable incursions. In one place the valley originally
+afforded only a passage for the river, and the road has been cut and
+blasted along the cheek of the rock: Close to this spot an inscription
+on the stone informs you that this road was the work of the late king of
+Sardinia; and he had in truth a right to be proud of such an
+undertaking. The whole road from Nice to Turin is admirable, presenting
+hardly a single mauvais pas. The natural difficulties which the
+construction of the road presents have been surmounted in a manner which
+might be a study to a civil engineer, and the whole is, perhaps, as fine
+a specimen of labour and skill as Buonaparte's route over Mont Cenis or
+the Simplon. The natural features of its wilder parts resemble those in
+the pictures of Salvator Rosa, but on a larger scale than he ever
+attempted to give an idea of.
+
+Within a mile or two of Tende,[57] the chasm in the rocks (for it was no
+more) widens into a small narrow valley of a peculiarly quiet character,
+in which the monastery of St. Gervase occupies one of those retired
+green spots which prove so well the good taste of the monks of old. A
+turn which this valley takes to the left affords the view, first, of the
+old castle of Tende, looking quite ghastly in the dusk of evening, and
+next of the town of Tende itself, which stands piled like Saorgio,
+against the shelving side of the valley. Tende is a large and
+apparently flourishing town, affording two inns of very respectable
+appearance. The Albergo Imperiale is high in its charges, but makes
+amends for it by the liberality and comfort of its appointments. It
+fronts one of the principal peaks which form the chain of the Col di
+Tende, which we contemplated as it caught the last rays of the evening
+sun, forming different guesses how we were to get up it.
+
+[Footnote 57: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+June 4.--From Tende to Limone 15 miles. We left Tende at a quarter
+before four: after twisting and re-twisting for about an hour and a half
+among narrow defiles, through which the first part of the rise is
+gradually conducted, we reached a mountain valley at a high level above
+the sea, closed at the opposite end by the main ridge of the Col di
+Tende. Here the chief ascent commences, in a regular zigzag up a jutting
+shoulder of the mountain. The road is wide and good, and free from
+ravine or precipice; but from its continual turns, (of which I counted
+not less than sixty-five) is difficult and embarrassing to any but a
+crane-necked carriage; though in no place could an overturn produce
+worse consequence than a roll of a few yards. The distance may be
+abridged on foot, either by crossing the zig-zags, or by taking the
+summer path to the right through a fine range of Alpine pasture, which
+exhibits a profusion of hardy flowers growing up to the edge of the
+snow-drifts: amongst many others, whose names were unknown to us, we
+observed blue and yellow crocusses, hearts-ease, oxlips, cowslips,
+primroses, and two sorts of gentianella. In this direction the road
+cannot be missed to the turf cabaret which stands on the sharp edge of
+the mountain. It is curious to look back a moment from this elevated
+spot down the narrow valley behind you, and observe the road curling
+from below your feet into blue distance, like the coils of an
+immeasurable white snake.
+
+At this fine season of the year, it exhibits a busy scene of passengers
+and loaded strings of mules, toiling up in your rear, or lessening in
+the perspective till hardly visible at the bottom of the ascent. The
+site of the cabaret borders on the line of perpetual snow, and though
+inferior in height to the crest of the Simplon road, stands in a
+situation, I should conceive, much more exposed to the effects of sudden
+hurricanes and snow storms. The road appears to be commanded by no spot
+where avalanches could accumulate, as on the precipice where you first
+overlook Brieg, and must, therefore, during the winter, be rather
+difficult than dangerous. On the other hand, no mountains intervene on
+the Turin side, to blunt the edge of the north winds from the Savoy
+Alps; and in the direction of Nice, the south-west winds must be
+concentrated and driven up the mountain avenue of Tende with the roar of
+artillery. I can, therefore, easily credit Beaumont's account, that
+many mules are annually lost in consequence of the tempestuous weather
+on the Col. We did not, however, taste any of the mule-hams at the
+cabaret, which, according to that writer, are afforded to the frugal
+natives by these casualties, but contented ourselves with a spoonful of
+brandy, and a taste of their good brown bread. Had our stomachs been
+desperate, other refreshments, I believe, were to be had.
+
+The view to the north from this "raw and gusty" ridge affords a more
+striking idea of height and space combined, than any other prospect with
+which I am acquainted; though not on the whole so imposing as the first
+glimpse of the Swiss side of the Simplon. The eye is carried directly
+over two or three lower peaks of the Col, grinning with snow drifts, to
+the great range of Alps south-west of Mont Cenis, which appear hanging
+in mid air like the domains of a cloud-king; their jagged and glittering
+tops distinctly defined, but their bases melting into the hazy abyss
+which the plain of Piedmont presents.
+
+As far as I can estimate, we were about five hours in performing the
+ascent from Tende. Two more hours took us to Limone, at a jog trot, down
+a zigzag road, less abrupt in its turns than that on the other side. At
+Limone the post-road to Turin begins. The post-house is a tolerably good
+inn: the douaniers, the most troublesome we had yet met with, refusing
+to compound for the customary donation, and asking for money when their
+search was ended. We had, therefore, the sweet revenge of first watching
+them as pick-pockets, and next refusing them as beggars.
+
+To Coni fifteen miles; the first seven or eight through a beautiful
+valley fringed with chestnut woods; every thing, however, appeared
+diminutive, as our eyes had not yet recovered the strain which the
+enormous scenery of the Col had occasioned. In this fine open valley,
+goitres abound as much as near Sion; this malady, therefore, cannot be
+attributed, as some think, to the stagnation of air.
+
+Coni, a neat arcaded town, deserves mention for the beauty of its
+situation, and the fine Alpine panorama which it commands. The
+glittering pinnacle of Monte Viso, is the most striking feature through
+this and the following day's journey.
+
+June 5.--Breakfasted at Savigliano, a large flourishing town; slept at
+Carignan, and reached Turin to breakfast next day.
+
+June 6.--The best of Turin is seen in the general survey of the town and
+its princely environs, particularly on the Moncaliere side. Our
+principal amusement was derived from Zuchelli's masterly performance at
+the Opera Buffa. The plot of the piece turned partly on the
+discomfitures and discontents of a supercilious English dandy, which
+part this singer performed with an immoveable countenance, which kept us
+in a roar of laughter, his grave rich toned bass voice giving a double
+effect to the solemn absurdity of the character. For the sake of
+avoiding open offence to our countrymen, the hero was styled a Danish
+count; but the portrait was perfect to the very tail of the coat, and
+could not be mistaken, and the countenances of some of his prototypes in
+the next box showed, that the satire, fair and gentlemanly as it was,
+cut deeper than the awkward puppet-show of "Les Anglaises pour rire."
+The Neapolitan character was handled more unmercifully in the part of a
+guttling, fulsome old coxcomb, as cowardly as the Dane was quarrelsome.
+
+Milan, its inimitable cathedral, and its other curiosities, have, I am
+aware, been well-trodden ground for some years. No one, however, appears
+to notice the courier's little spaniel in the Archduke Rainier's hall,
+who has watched for his master's return from Russia more than a year
+without stirring from his mat, and whom the good-natured Viceroy feeds
+and protects without allowing him to be disturbed. I hope he will find a
+place in some future animal biography, for the credit of his species. As
+to the splendid Fête Dieu, which we just arrived in time to witness,
+with its military, civil, and ecclesiastical pageantry,--the beggar-boys
+plucking the guttering wax from the long tapers of the priests, and the
+priests occasionally singeing their noses in return, I could no more
+undertake to describe, than to sort a bag of gaudy feathers of different
+birds.
+
+The best companion over the Simplon with which I am acquainted, is a
+little French tract, written, I think, by a M. Mallet, and touching
+slightly, but sufficiently, on all subjects of interest connected with
+that stupendous route. The short account which it gives of the life of
+Cardinal Borromeo may be read through while walking up the hill of Arona
+to visit his colossal statue, which deserves a higher rank than perhaps
+it holds, either as a work of art or an achievement of labour. The
+attitude of the figure is easy and graceful, and the artist has managed
+the flowing cardinal's robe with great taste. There is also an
+expression of benevolence and majesty in the countenance and extended
+hand, suitable to one's conceptions of this apostolic character, who
+seems looking and waving a blessing on his native Arona. The height of
+the figure and pedestal is stated at 104 feet; but the effect of its
+grace and proportion renders this difficult of belief, until you look
+back at the distance of two miles on the road to Baveno, and see it like
+a walking giant overtopping the neighbouring woods by more than the head
+and shoulders.
+
+With this noble statue ends my admiration of Borromean taste: for it is
+not to be borne that the Isola Bella, which nature intended as a central
+finish to such a fairy land as the Lago Maggiore, should have been
+tortured into a piece of confectionary less elegant than the good taste
+of Gunter or Grange would have devised as the centre of a bowl of lemon
+cream. The Isola Madre, it is true, is beautiful; for no Italian
+landscape gardener has yet assailed it with his line and rule.
+
+Our welcome into Switzerland was novel, but pleasing to lovers of
+animals. Several herds of cattle met us on our road to Brieg,
+accompanying their masters to the mountain chalets, and fairly beset us
+with their attentions. The cows crowded and shouldered each other to be
+scratched; one large goat; slipping under their legs, put her head under
+my arm, and took my hand in her mouth; and a whole flock of sheep turned
+round and ran after us in order to obtain more notice. I had no idea
+before that any animal but the dog might be tamed to such a degree of
+instinctive tact, as to perceive whether or not its caresses will be
+acceptable to a stranger; and I am convinced, that the celebrated Ritson
+might have made more converts to his Braminical system by importing and
+exhibiting a Swiss flock, than by writing a book against animal food,
+and classing eggs as a vegetable succedaneum.
+
+It would be as superfluous to describe the well-known ground of
+Switzerland, as that of Cumberland; and indeed when once within sight of
+Geneva, one is almost at home. One and one only stage seems to remain,
+more desirable still.
+
+    "Cum peregrino,
+    Labore fossi venimus larem ad nostram,
+    Desideratoque acquiescimus lecto."
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+BOOKS PUBLISHED
+
+BY
+
+JAMES CAWTHORN, COCKSPUR STREET.
+
+
+ITINERARY OF PROVENCE AND THE RHONE, made during the Year 1819, By JOHN
+HUGHES, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford: Illustrated by the following
+Views, engraved in the line manner from Drawings by Dewint, by W.B.
+Cooke, G. Cook, and J.C. Allen. Royal Quarto or Imperial Octavo. Isle of
+St. Marguerite, the Prison of the Masque de Fer--Château
+Rochepot--Lyons--Lyons Cathedral--Mont Blanc from a height above
+Lyons--Tower of Mauconseil, Vienne--Château La Serve--Valence and
+Dauphine Mountains--Montelimart--Château Grignan, Two Views--Castle of
+Montdragon--Triumphal Arch at Orange--Avignon, Two Views--Aqueduct of
+Pont du Gard--Castle of Beaucaire and Bridge of Boats--Tarascon--Arch
+and Mausoleum at St. Remy--Orgon--Bay of Marseilles--Cannes, where
+Buonaparte remained the night of his landing from Elba, and where Murat
+sheltered when he fled from Naples, Two View--Maritime Alps, from the
+Castle of Nice--Castle of Tende.
+
+*** This Work is sold with or without the Illustrations.
+
+     "I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+     journal of a tour in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+     of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar,--in which he gives
+     such an animated and interesting description of the Château
+     Grignan, the dwelling of Madame de Sevigné's beloved daughter, and
+     frequently the place of her own residence, that no one who ever
+     read the book would be within forty miles of the same, without
+     going a pilgrimage to the spot. The Marquis smiled, seemed very
+     much pleased, and asked the title at length of the work in
+     question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An Itinerary of
+     Provence and the Rhone made during the Year 1819, By John Hughes,
+     A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'--observed, he could now purchase no
+     books for the château, but would recommend that the Itineraire
+     should be commissioned for the library to which he was abonné in
+     the neighbouring town."--_Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward_.
+
+     "The tower of Mauconseil must have been very difficult to express;
+     for the water on the right is between a light coloured stone-quay
+     and the tower itself, also very bright; yet the artist, W.B. Cooke,
+     has contrived to give it a fine and natural transparency entirely
+     in keeping with the scenery around. The second is a simple and
+     lovely landscape, with a sky exquisitely managed: but Avignon is
+     still a greater favourite with us. The rich architectural
+     structures on one hand, the silvery river, the picturesque bridge,
+     the distant Alps of Dauphiné, and the little bit of rustic scenery
+     on the foreground of the left, all combine to render this a very
+     charming view; and Mr. Allen has great merit in executing it as he
+     has done. The Château Grignan is of a different and darker
+     character, and an extremely interesting performance. Upon the
+     whole, the lovers of elegant art will find this publication well
+     entitled to their attention."--_Literary Gazette_, No. 309.
+
+A JOURNEY THROUGH ALBANIA and other Provinces of TURKEY in Europe and
+Asia, in Company with the late Lord Byron; including a Life of Ali
+Pasha, and illustrated by Views of Athens, Constantinople, and various
+other Plates, Maps, &c. By JOHN CAM HOBHOUSE, Esq. M.P. Second Edition,
+with Corrections. 2 vols. 4to. 5l. 5s. boards.
+
+     "Both the general reader and the scholar may look for no small
+     portion of information and amusement from the present volume. The
+     work itself will have a standard place in all Collections of
+     Voyages and Travels; a place which it will fully merit, by the
+     industry and ardour of research conspicuous throughout, as well as
+     by the spirit vivacity and good sense of the general
+     narrative."--_Quarterly Review_, XIX.
+
+     "The narrative which he has produced bears unquestionable marks of
+     a curious, capacious and observant mind; and the same may be said
+     of the poetical production of his friend Lord Byron, who
+     accompanied him on his Travels. As Reviewers are sometimes charged
+     with a propensity to cavilling, we will not close these
+     introductory remarks without declaring in round terms in justice to
+     Mr. Hobhouse, and in vindication of ourselves, that we have
+     received as much pleasure and instruction from the perusal of these
+     Travels as from that of any others which have ever come before us,"
+     &c. &c.--_British Review_, No. IX.
+
+HORÆ IONICÆ, descriptive of the Ionian Isles and Part of the adjacent
+Coast of Greece, together with other Poems. By WALLER RODWELL WRIGHT,
+Esq. Third Edition. 7s 6d. boards.
+
+    "Wright?[58] 'twas thy happy lot at once to view
+    Those shores of glory, and to sing them too;
+    And sure no common muse inspired thy pen
+    To hail the land of gods and godlike men."
+
+[Footnote 58: 'Mr. Wright, late Consul General for the Seven Islands, is
+author of a very beautiful Poem just published: it is entitled Horæ
+Ionicæ, and is descriptive of the Isles and the adjacent Coast of
+Greece.'--_Lord Byron's English Bards_.]
+
+AN HISTORICAL SKETCH of the LAST YEARS of the REIGN of GUSTAVUS the
+FOURTH, late KING OF SWEDEN, including a Narrative of the Causes,
+Progress, and Termination of the late Revolution; and an Appendix
+containing Official Documents, Letters, and Minutes of Conversations
+between the late King and Sir John Moore, General Brune, &c. &c. 10s.
+6d. boards.
+
+BEAUTIES of DON JUAN; including those Passages only which are calculated
+to extend the real fame of Lord Byron. 10s. 6d.
+
+     "This is a very captivating volume with all the impurities of Don
+     Juan expurgated, and yet displaying a galaxy of connected lustre,
+     which is well calculated to throw a halo of splendour round the
+     memory of Lord Byron. It may with perfect propriety be put into
+     female hands, from which the levities and pruriences of the entire
+     poem too justly excluded it in spite of all its charms of
+     genius."--_Literary Gazette_, 599.
+
+     "We cannot conclude our observations without again congratulating
+     the Compiler upon the success which has attended his labour, and
+     strongly recommending the work to those who desire that the female
+     branches of their family should participate in the beauties of this
+     modern Prince of Poesy."--_Public Ledger_.
+
+AN ACCOUNT of the EMPIRE of MOROCCO and the DISTRICT of SUSE, compiled
+from Miscellaneous Observations during a long Residence in and various
+Journies through those Countries. To which is added, an interesting
+Account of TIMBUCTOO, the great Emporium of Central Africa. By J.G.
+JACKSON, Esq. Quarto. Second Edition. 2L. 12s. 6d. boards.
+
+     "The observations which he has himself made upon these parts, and
+     the notices which he has collected respecting the interior from
+     native travellers, form a work of considerable value both in a
+     commercial and literary view, and leads us to rejoice that
+     merchants who have resided in foreign countries are beginning more
+     and more to communicate information on their return home," &c.
+     &c.--_Edinburgh Review_.
+
+MELANGES et LITTERATURE D'HISTOIRE de MORALE et de PHILOSOPHIE, par
+COMTE D'ESCHERNEY. 3 vols. 1l. 1s.
+
+THE WONDERS of a WEEK AT BATH, in a Doggrel Address to the Hon. T.
+S----, from F. T----, Esq. of that City. Price 7s. boards.
+
+     It contains a satirical description of the present style of life
+     and amusements at Bath, with delineations of some individual
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+     satire not wanting in vivacity," &c. &c.--_British Critic_.
+
+MEMOIRS of the LIFE of MRS. ELIZABETH CARTER, with a New Edition of her
+Poems. By the Rev. MONTAGU PENNINGTON, M.A. 2 vols. 8vo. Second Edition.
+10s. 6d. boards.
+
+TRAITS and TRIALS; a Novel. 2 vols. 14s. boards.
+
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+
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+     perform Ourika, but did not like her appearance in the glass, and
+     refused the character. Such an event, like Mad. George's insult,
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+
+
+THE LAY of the SCOTTISH FIDDLE; a Poem in Five Cantos. 7s. 6d. boards.
+
+     "I believe that the nature of this American Poem was known to the
+     proprietor of the Quarterly Review. So far as it was a burlesque on
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+     his utmost influence with me to obtain it for him, and his Lordship
+     wrote a most pressing letter upon the occasion. He asked me to let
+     Mr. Murray, who was in despair about it, have the publication of
+     this Poem as the greatest possible favour."--_Dallas's
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+
+ADRASTUS; a Tragedy: AMABEL, or the Cornish Lovers; and other Poems. By
+R.C. DALLAS, Esq. 7s. 6d. boards.
+
+ANECDOTES, hitherto _unpublished_, of the PRIVATE LIFE of PETER THE
+GREAT, on the Authority of Mons. Stehling, Member of the Council of
+State to the EMPRESS CATHARINE, and Translated from the French of The
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+      The Project Gutenberg eBook of Itinerary Of Provence &amp; The Rhone Made During The Year 1819, by Hughes, by John Hughes, M.A..
+    </title>
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+<pre>
+
+Project Gutenberg's Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone, by John Hughes
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone
+       Made During the Year 1819
+
+Author: John Hughes
+
+Release Date: March 24, 2007 [EBook #20891]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ITINERARY OF PROVENCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://dp.rastko.net
+(Produced from images of the Bibliothèque nationale de
+France (BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<p class="c">Hughes</p>
+
+<p class="c">South of France</p>
+
+<p class="c"><span class="smcap">only two hundred and fifty copies printed.</span></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+
+<p class="bq">"&mdash;&mdash;I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+journal of a tour made in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar&mdash;in which he gives such an
+animated and interesting description of the Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, the
+dwelling of Madame de Sevign&eacute;'s beloved daughter, and frequently the
+place of her own residence, that no one who ever read the book would be
+within forty miles of the same without going a pilgrimage to the spot.
+The Marquis smiled, seemed very much pleased, and asked the title at
+length of the work in question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An
+Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone made during the year 1819, by John
+Hughes, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'&mdash;observed, that he could now
+purchase no books for the Ch&acirc;teau, but would recommend that the
+Itineraire should be commissioned for the Library to which he was abonn&eacute;
+in the neighbouring town,"&mdash;<i>Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward</i>.</p>
+
+<p class="c">Thomas White, Printer, Johnson's Court.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>ITINERARY</h2>
+
+<p class="c">OF</p>
+
+<h1>PROVENCE &amp; THE RHONE,</h1>
+
+<h3>MADE DURING THE YEAR 1819.</h3>
+
+<h2>BY JOHN HUGHES, M.A.</h2>
+
+<h3>OF ORIEL COLLEGE OXFORD.</h3>
+
+<p class="c"><img src="images/001.png" alt="ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE NEAR CANNES AND PRISON OF MASQUE DE FER." />
+<br /><span class="smcap">isle of s</span><sup>T</sup> <span class="smcap">marguerite near cannes and prison of masque de fer.</span></p>
+
+<p class="c">SECOND EDITION.<br />
+LONDON:<br />
+JAMES CAWTHORN.<br />
+MD.CCCXXIX.</p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2>PREFACE.</h2>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">It</span> has been the Author's object to render the following volume a
+companion to persons visiting the country described. He has therefore
+not so much studied to compile from known books of historical reference,
+as to answer those plain and practical questions which suggest
+themselves during an actual journey, and to enable those whose time is
+limited, and who wish to employ it actively, to form the necessary
+calculations as to what is to be seen and done. The best points of view,
+and the parts which may be passed over rapidly, are therefore specified,
+as well as the places where good accommodation are to be expected, or
+imposition to be guarded against.</p>
+
+<p>The subjects of the Illustrations will be mentioned in the course of the
+Itinerary, for the information of collectors, of whose notice it is
+trusted they will be rendered worthy by the well-known talents of Mr.
+Dewint and the Messrs. Cookes.</p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="toc" id="toc"></a>CONTENTS.</h2>
+<table summary="toc" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="5">
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_I"><span class="smcap">Chap. I.</span>&mdash;Paris to Rochepot</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_II"><span class="smcap">Chap. II.</span>&mdash;Rochepot to Lyons</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_III"><span class="smcap">Chap. III.</span>&mdash;Lyons</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_IV"><span class="smcap">Chap. IV.</span>&mdash;Lyons to Montelimart</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_V"><span class="smcap">Chap. V.</span>&mdash;Ch&acirc;teau Grignan</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_VI"><span class="smcap">Chap. VI.</span>&mdash;Orange&mdash;Avignon</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_VII"><span class="smcap">Chap. VII.</span>&mdash;Avignon&mdash;Murder of Brune&mdash;H&ocirc;pital des Fous&mdash;Mission of 1819</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_VIII"><span class="smcap">Chap. VIII.</span>&mdash;Pont du Gard&mdash;Nismes&mdash;Montpelier&mdash;Cette</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_IX"><span class="smcap">Chap. IX.</span>&mdash;Tarascon&mdash;Beaucaire&mdash;St. Remy&mdash;Orgon&mdash;Lambesc</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_X"><span class="smcap">Chap. X.</span>&mdash;Aix&mdash;Marseilles</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_XI"><span class="smcap">Chap. XI.</span>&mdash;Ollioules&mdash;Toulon</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_XII"><span class="smcap">Chap. XII.</span>&mdash;Frejus&mdash;Cannes&mdash;Isle of St. Marguerite&mdash;Antibes</a></td></tr>
+<tr><td><a href="#CHAP_XIII"><span class="smcap">Chap. XIII.</span>&mdash;Nice&mdash;Col di Tende&mdash;Conclusion</a></td></tr>
+</table>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Page 1]</a></span></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3>AN</h3>
+<h3>ITINERARY,</h3>
+
+<h3>&amp;c.</h3>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_I" id="CHAP_I"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. I</a></h2>
+
+<h3>PARIS TO ROCHEPOT.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">No</span> one, I imagine, ever yet left an hotel in a central and bustling part
+of Paris, without feeling the faculty of observation strained to the
+utmost, and experiencing a whirl and jumble of recollections as little
+in unison with each other as the well known signs of that whimsical
+city, the <i>B&oelig;uf &agrave;-la-mode</i>, (with his cachemire shawl and his ostrich
+feathers) and the <i>Mort d'Henri Quartre</i>. The contrasts and varieties of
+the grave and gay, the affecting and the burlesque, the magnificent and
+the paltry, which exist and may be sought out in abundance in every
+great capital, are perhaps more vividly concentrated at Paris than any
+where else, and brought with less trouble under the eye of those whose
+spirits or leisure may not allow them to mix in society. In<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span> London
+every thing wears a busy uniform exterior, varied only by the apparition
+of a Turk, a Lascar, or a Highlander; and home appears to be the place
+reserved for the development of character: but in Paris, from the
+fashion of living almost in public, and the freedom which every one
+enjoys of following his own taste in dress or amusement without notice,
+the history of most individuals appears to a certain degree written on
+their exterior; and a morning's walk brings you in contact with all the
+diversities of character which rapidly succeeding events have created.
+The old beau, with the identical toupet of 1770; the musty, moth-eaten
+nondescripts sometimes seen at the mass of Notre Dame, which remind you
+of a still earlier period; the faded royalist, with a countenance
+saddened by the recollection of former days; the ex-militaires, whose
+looks own no friendship with "the world or the world's law;" the old
+bourgeois riding in the same roundabout with his grandchildren, and
+enjoying the <i>jeu de bague</i> as cordially,&mdash;revolve in succession like
+the different figures in a magic lantern, while the place of Punch and
+Pierrot is supplied by a host of laborious drolls and <i>gens &agrave;
+l'incroyable</i>. The various members of this motley assemblage appear also
+more distinct from each other, as connected in the recollection with
+places so strongly marked by historical events, or bearing in themselves
+so peculiar a character:&mdash;the place Louis Quinze, the grim old
+Conciergerie, the deserted Fauxbourg St. Germain, with the grass<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>
+growing in its streets; the Place de Carousel, the Boulevards, and the
+Catacombs, the Palais Royal and the Morgue.</p>
+
+<p>To attempt, however, to say any thing new of a place so well known and
+so fully described as Paris, would be as superfluous as to write the
+natural history of the dog or cat. The peculiarities of such animals are
+continually striking one in new and amusing points of view; but verbal
+delineation has already done its utmost in acquainting us with them. In
+like manner, every thing relating to Paris, and illustrative of it at a
+period of interest which probably will not arise again for centuries,
+has been already made known in Paul's admirable letters, in poor Scott's
+powerful but unmerciful satire, and finally in a host of books,
+booklings, and bookatees, teaching us how to spend any period of time at
+Paris from three to three hundred and sixty-five days; how to enjoy it,
+how to eat, drink, see, hear, feel, think, and economise in it. Kotzebue
+has devoted sixty pages to its bon bons and savories; others more
+modestly give you only a diary of their own fricasseed chicken and
+champagne, and information of a still lower sort is supplied by the
+delectable Mr. Hone, for the instruction of our Jerries and Corinthian
+Toms. I shall commence dates, therefore, from the 26th of April, on
+which day we quitted the H&ocirc;tel de l'Europe, Rue Valois, not sorry to
+obtain a respite from sounds and sights.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Though in such a country as Tuscany, where every furlong of ground
+affords a new and rich subject for the pencil, the voiture mode of
+travelling is preferable to posting; yet no one, I think, would
+recommend it in traversing the tedious interval which separates Paris
+from the southern provinces. We had adopted this species of conveyance
+from the idea that it would afford more leisure for observation to those
+of the party to whom France was new; but we found in reality that by
+subjecting us to a dependence on hours, it diverted our attention from
+those places where we might have spent half a day to advantage, and
+familiarized us only with one branch of knowledge,&mdash;the merit and
+demerit of most of the inns on the roads, whose characters I shall not
+fail to give as we found them. Homely as this species of information may
+be, I have often regretted the want of it beforehand; and concluding
+that others may be of the same opinion, I shall therefore afford it as
+far as I am able: premising, that it is as well not to vary, on this or
+any other road, from the practice of ascertaining beforehand the rate of
+the aubergiste's charges. The traveller's first impulse certainly is to
+save himself trouble, by paying whatever is demanded, and not to expend
+time and attention on a series of petty disputes, which make no great
+difference in his travelling expenses. There is, however, in all or most
+of those who are fitted to conduct the business of life, a feeling of
+shame at being outwitted even in trifles, which naturally rebels<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
+against this easy mode of proceeding, and inclines one rather to take
+the trouble of asking a few questions, than to be laughed at as a <i>grand
+seigneur</i> by a cunning landlord. This trouble after all may be taken by
+a servant, and need not subject the master to the necessity of entering
+every inn like an angry terrier, with his bristles up and ready for
+battle; and the settlement of preliminaries does not lead to any want of
+attention on the part of the people of the inn.</p>
+
+<p>We neglected this precaution at Essonne, where we breakfasted on leaving
+Paris, and where accordingly we paid about double the charge which
+Tortoni or the Cafe Hardy would have made. It appears, in truth, that at
+the Croissant d'Or, as at the Emperor Joseph's memorable German inn,
+"though eggs are not scarce, yet gentry are."</p>
+
+<p>The distance from Paris to this place is about 24 miles: the road of
+course excellent, as is uniformly the case in the route to Chalons; but
+the only thing during the stage which remains on my recollection, is an
+obelisk inscribed, "Dieu, le Roi, et les dames;" a melange perhaps
+compounded in compliment to Louis XV. who greatly improved a part of
+this road, which was once nearly impassable. Corbeil, a neat flourishing
+town within half a mile of Essonne, and possessing large cotton
+manufactories, derives some interest from the celebrated siege it
+sustained during<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span> the war of the league. Two miles beyond Essonne we
+remarked, at a short distance to the right, Ch&acirc;teau Moncey, once the
+seat of the gay and brilliant Duke de Villeroi and his descendants; and
+on a hill to the left, Ch&acirc;teau Coudray, the former residence of the
+Prince de Chalot. Both the possessors of these estates were guillotined
+during the reign of terror, and their places are filled by Marechal
+Jourdan, and some <i>nouveau riche</i>, whose very name the peasants seemed
+never to have heard, or to have forgotten from want of interest.</p>
+
+<p>We found the H&ocirc;tel de la Ville de Lyon at Fontainebleau a good inn, and
+fair in its charges. The old palace, though not intrinsically worth a
+visit in point of architecture, yet conveys one of those "sermons in
+stones," in which the Fauxbourg de St. Germain so much abounds; and
+presents also more pleasing recollections of Louis Quatorze (a prince
+possessing many of the good points of the <i>bon Henri</i>) than the
+bombastic personification of him as Jupiter Tonans, in the palace of
+Versailles, which is on a par as a painting with Tom Thumb as a tragedy.</p>
+
+<p>April 27.&mdash;To Fossard, eighteen miles: the first six through the forest,
+just sufficiently sylvan to suffer by a comparison with that of Windsor.
+At the end of two more miles we crossed the valley, in which is situated
+the town of Moret, to which is attached a history equally curious, as
+Anquetil observes,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span> with that of the Iron Mask. The following is the
+extract from the Duke de St. Simon's Memoirs, which he introduces as
+relative to it.</p>
+
+<p>"Il y avoit &agrave; Moret, petite ville aupr&egrave;s de Fontainebleau, un petit
+couvent, o&ugrave; &eacute;toit profess&eacute; une Mauresse inconnue, et qu'on ne montroit a
+personne. Bontemps, Gouverneur de Versailles, par qui passoient les
+choses du secr&egrave;t domestique du roi, l'y avoit mise toute jeune, avoit
+pay&eacute; une dot assez considerable, et continuoit &agrave; lui payer une grosse
+pension tous les ans. Il avoit attention qu'elle e&ucirc;t son necessaire, que
+tout ce qu'elle pouvoit desirer en agr&eacute;mens et douceurs, et qui peut
+passer pour abondance pour une religieuse, lui fut fourni. La reine y
+alloit souvent de Fontainebleau, et prenoit grand soin du bien-&ecirc;tre du
+couvent; et Mad. de Maintenon apr&egrave;s elle. Ni l'une ni l'autre ne prenoit
+de cette Mauresse un soin direct, et qui peut se remarquer. Elles ne la
+voyoient m&ecirc;me toutes les fois qu'elles alloient au couvent, mais elles
+s'informoient curieusement de sa sant&eacute;, de sa conduite, et de celle de
+la superieure &agrave; son egard. Quoiqu'il n'y e&ucirc;t dans cette maison personne
+d'un nom connu, Monseigneur (le Dauphin) y a &eacute;t&eacute; quelquefois; les
+princes, ses enfans, aussi; et tous demandoient et voyoient la Mauresse.
+Elle &eacute;toit dans un couvent avec plus de consideration que les autres, et
+se prevaloit fort des soins qu'on prenoit d'elle, et du myst&egrave;re qu'on en
+faisoit. Quoiqu'elle ve&ccedil;ut tr&egrave;s-religieusement, on s'appercevoit bien
+que<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> sa vocation avoit &eacute;t&eacute; aid&eacute;e. Il lui echappoit une fois, entendant
+Monseigneur chasser dans le for&ecirc;t, de dire negligemment, 'c'est mon
+fr&egrave;re qui chasse.' On dit qu'elle avoit quelquefois des hauteurs, que
+sur les plaintes de la superieure, Mad. de Maintenon alla un jour expr&egrave;s
+pour t&acirc;cher de lui inculquer des sentimens plus conformes a l'humilit&eacute;
+religieuse; que lui ayant voulu insinuer qu'elle n'&eacute;toit pas ce qu'elle
+croyoit, elle lui repondit, 'Si cela n'&eacute;toit pas, Madame, vous ne
+prendriez pas la peine de venir me le dire!' Ces indices ont fait
+conjectures qu'elle &eacute;toit fille du roi et de la reine, et que sa couleur
+l'avoit fait sequestrer, en publiant que la reine avoit fait une fausse
+couche."</p>
+
+<p>In addition to this extract, Anquetil adds, "En effet, la fantaisie de
+garder devant ses yeux une naine monstreuse (her favourite negress
+mentioned previously), peut faire conjecturer que Marie Ther&egrave;se n'aura
+pas &eacute;t&eacute; assez exacte &agrave; detourner ses regards d'objets qu'une femme
+prudente doit s'interdire; qu'elle les aura fix&eacute;s sur les negres que le
+progr&egrave;s du commerce maritime commen&ccedil;oit de rendre communs en France; et
+que de l&agrave; sera venue la couleur de cette infortun&eacute;e, qu'il aura fallu
+cacher dans un clo&icirc;tre. Cette Mauresse et l'homme au masque de fer sont
+les deux myst&egrave;res du regne de Louis XIV. Le redacteur des Memoires de
+St. Simon dit qu'elle est morte &agrave; Moret en 1732, et que son portrait
+&eacute;toit encore en 1779 dans le cabinet de l'abbesse, d'o&ugrave;,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> quand cette
+maison a &eacute;t&eacute; r&eacute;unie ou Prieur&eacute; de Champ Ben&ocirc;it &agrave; Provins, il a pass&eacute;
+dans le cabinet des antiques et curiosit&eacute;s de l'abbaye de St. Genevieve
+du Mont &agrave; Paris, o&ugrave; il est encore. On lit au bas de ce portrait, ces
+mots, Religieuse de Moret." Such are the words of the extract relative
+to this singular person.</p>
+
+<p>The H&ocirc;tel de Poste, (as it chooses to style itself) at Fossard, is a
+dismal pot-house; and the people possess none of that good humour and
+alacrity which cover a multitude of faults. Having swallowed some of
+their gritty coffee, which might have been very delectable to the palate
+of a Turk, we walked about a mile and a half to the bridge<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a> of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, on which John Duke of Burgundy was murdered by
+Tannegui de Chastel, in the presence, and probably with the connivance
+of the Dauphin, afterwards<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span> Charles VII. Near this spot we remarked a
+small mass of ruins, the only remains of the once magnificent Ch&acirc;teau
+Varennes. Its former owner, the Duke de Ch&acirc;telet, as we were informed by
+some market-people, resided for six months in the year at this seat,
+maintaining or employing most of the poor within his reach, and
+entertaining his peasantry with a weekly dance at the Ch&acirc;teau. Like many
+others, he fell a victim to the guillotine during the reign of terror;
+his lands, with the exception of a portion recovered by his heirs, were
+alienated, and the fragment which we observed was the only part of his
+residence left standing. From the tone and manner in which the French
+peasantry appear to speak of these very common occurrences, I should
+judge that the effects of the revolution have not yet eradicated that
+"subordination of the heart," which is natural among a simple and
+industrious people, and which nothing but very gross neglect or
+misconduct on the part of their superiors, or the unchecked licence of
+political quacks, can destroy. Most of the ravages in question might no
+doubt be traced to bands of plunderers, organized from the most
+desperate and notorious characters in many different parishes, and
+sufficiently countenanced by the revolutionary tribunals to overawe the
+peaceable and unarmed mass of the population, whom it would be hardly
+fair to confound with them. Let us fancy for a moment, how quickly,
+under similar political circumstances, a moveable Spencean brigade
+might<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> be collected in any district of England from poachers,
+sheep-stealers, gypsies, incendiaries, and those whose latent love of
+mischief might be drawn out by proper encouragement, and we may find
+reason not to condemn the French peasantry in general, as sharers in the
+outrages which they probably abominated, but could not prevent.</p>
+
+<p>From Fossard to Sens, 21 miles: the country uninteresting as far as
+Pont-sur-Yonne. Chapelle de Champigny affords a tolerably exact idea of
+a Spanish village; each farm-house and its premises forming a square,
+inclosed in blank walls, and opening into the street by folding gates,
+with hardly a window to be seen. From Pont-sur-Yonne to Sens, the road
+becomes more cheerful; and its fine old cathedral forms a good central
+object in the valley, along which the Yonne is seen winding. The
+principal inn at Sens being full for the night, we found neat and
+comfortable accommodations, with great civility, at the Bouteille.
+Whether there be any object worthy of notice in this cheerful little
+city, besides its cathedral, I do not know; but the latter possesses
+works of art which deserve an early and attentive visit. Nothing can be
+more minutely beautiful than the small figures and ornaments on the tomb
+of the Cardinal du Prat, which is sufficient in itself to give a
+character to any one church. But the grand object of interest is a large
+sepulchral group in the centre of the choir, to the memory of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> the
+Dauphin and his consort, the parents of Louis XVI. The grace and
+classical contour of this monument, which is executed by the well-known
+Nicholas Coustou, would excite admiration even in the studio of Canova,
+while the deep tone of genuine feeling displayed, particularly in the
+figure of Hymen quenching his torch, is worthy of the chisel of our own
+Chantry. Somewhat might perhaps be owing to an evening light, which cast
+strong mellow shades on the figures, and gave an effect of reality to
+the fine white marble of which they are composed; but their merits are
+very striking, and are quite unalloyed by the graphic bombast of which
+the most able French artists have been with too much truth accused. The
+character of the Dauphin, whose exemplary life in the midst of a corrupt
+court, was a tacit reproof which his haughty father could ill brook, is
+well known.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Ostendunt terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultr&acirc;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Esse sinunt.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>He was snatched in the flower of his age, in the year 1765, from an evil
+which was even then brooding, and which might have brought his grey
+hairs to a bloody end at a more advanced period: and his consort
+survived him about a year and a half. "They were lovely and pleasant in
+their lives, and in their deaths they were not divided." The latter
+monument, as well as others of inferior merit, owed its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> preservation
+from revolutionary fury to the conduct and firmness of Mons. Menestrier,
+an avocat, and mayor of Auxerre during the reign of terror. <i>Ce brave
+homme</i> (I like the old sacristan's term of <i>brave homme</i>, as it is one
+of the few untranslateable French words) flew to the cathedral at the
+moment that a horde of brigands had entered it to commence the work of
+mutilation; and, seconded by nothing but his known character for
+resolution, and an athletic person, fairly intimidated and turned them
+out for the time. Losing not a moment, he removed to a place of safety
+the Dauphin's monument, the avowed object of their vengeance, before a
+second visit took place; and desirous also to preserve a fine bas relief
+which stands in another part of the church, representing St. Nicholas
+portioning three orphan girls, he engraved on the wall under it an
+inscription to Benevolence in the republican style, which produced the
+desired effect. Not very long afterwards he fell a victim to a fever
+caught by over-exertion in advocating the cause of a poor family; and
+his wife survived him only a few days, exhibiting an humble copy of the
+conjugal affection of those whose memorials her husband had so loyally
+preserved. Whether to give full credit or not to the old sacristan's
+narration, I do not know; but it appears more probable that even so
+large a monument was removed piecemeal at short notice, than that the
+malice of the brigands would have allowed it to stand unhurt; and there
+is besides an ingenuity and presence of mind shown in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span> preservation
+of St. Nicholas, quite consistent with the character of M. Menestrier,
+as described by the old man. Had the latter felt that inclination to
+romance, which is not uncommon among his brethren, he would probably
+have adopted the hacknied legend, that both monuments were miraculously
+secreted from the eyes of the marauders.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>April 28.&mdash;To Joigny, where we breakfasted, twenty-one miles. Passed
+through Villeneuve, a decayed old town, with two singular gateways. Even
+this place emulates Paris in the possession of a Tivoli, which, in the
+present instance, consisted of a walled square of court-yard (for garden
+it could not be called), measuring about thirty yards by twenty, and
+overshadowed by poplars from three to four feet high: a most pleasant
+representative, in truth, of the wild olive woods, the sequestered
+waterfalls, and the classical ruins of the original Tivoli.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">Domus Albunese resonantis,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Et pr&aelig;ceps Anio, et Tiburni lucus.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>On leaving Joigny, a neat pleasant town, extending in one wide street
+along the Yonne, and crowned by a handsome ch&acirc;teau, left unfinished by
+the Due de Villeroi, we reached the heart of the wine district of
+Burgundy. The country here assumes the appearance of a garden, both from
+the steep and regular form of the hills, which exactly resemble the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
+Dutch slopes in old-fashioned gardens, and from the high state of
+culture to which their thin gravelly soil is brought. The hoe and the
+pruning-knife seem never at rest, and not a weed is to be seen; while
+the slightest portion of manure dropt on the high road becomes a prize,
+if not an object of contention, to the nearest vignerons. The air of
+cheerfulness and beauty, however, which we annex to our notions of high
+cultivation, is wholly wanting. The appearance of the vines was that of
+sapless black stumps, about thirty inches high, and pruned so as to
+leave only four or five eyes; and though the subject of poverty is too
+serious to joke on, the withered and stunted appearance of the country
+people exactly corresponded to that of these dry pollards. I trust that
+we were in some degree deceived by their natural ugliness, and that hard
+labour and scanty profits are not the only reasons which render their
+<i>tout ensemble</i> such a contrast to the healthy robust looks of the
+Normans and Picards, whose very horses show the effects of their
+abundant corn harvests.</p>
+
+<p>From Joigny to Auxerre, twenty-one miles. We arrived too late to visit
+the interior of the cathedral, which was not mentioned to us as
+containing any thing remarkable. Its exterior, however, is fine and
+venerable, and affords a beautiful evening study, viewed from the
+opposite bank of the Yonne, about half a mile on the Vermanton road. The
+rest of the town, seen from this point, is broken into fine masses<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> of
+conventual and other old buildings; and the river and bridge complete a
+landscape very well worthy of an accurate sketch.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>The excellence of the H&ocirc;tel de Beaune, at Auxerre, "tenu par Boillet,
+gendre Mineau," as his cards inform us, deserves notice. This is one of
+those palm-islands among a desert of dirty pothouses, most treacherously
+adapted to lure onward a certain class of fair weather pilgrims, whom
+one wonders to meet with beyond Paris, and whose dolorous complaints of
+thin milk and large coffee-spoons, have afforded me no small amusement
+in casual rencounters. The most fastidious, however, of this class of
+smelfungi, would find but little to carp at under the roof the civil Mr.
+Boillet; and would do well to lay in a stock of comfortable
+recollections in this place, on which to feast as far as Chalons; for
+the interval between Auxerre and the latter city will prove but a dreary
+one to a traveller of the gastronomic school.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>The general air of Auxerre is ancient and respectable; but conveys no
+ideas of populousness or commerce. In the opinion, however, of an old
+sub-matron of the Enfans Trouv&eacute;es (who looked over my shoulder while
+sketching, and whom, by way of something to say, I ignorantly
+complimented on her fine family of grandchildren), there is nothing, or,
+according to Malthus, much to complain of in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span> the former respect. "Ah,
+Monsieur, que voulez vous? ce sont les militaires, ils vont par &ccedil;i, ils
+vont par l&agrave;, et puis&mdash;voil&agrave; des enfans, et o&ugrave; chercher les peres?"</p>
+
+<p>April 29.&mdash;To Vermanton, our first stage, eighteen miles: a succession
+of fine vineyards and square steep hills, such as Uncle Toby might have
+constructed for his amusement, with Gargantua for an assistant instead
+of the corporal. About six miles short of Vermanton, at the bottom of a
+long descent, we remarked Cravant, a little town to the right, fortified
+in an ancient and picturesque manner, and which, the peasants said, had
+been the seat of much fighting in days of old. Our informant was
+ploughing in a fierce cocked hat, with a team composed of a cow and an
+ass. Query, might not cocked hats, which appear to our ideas an
+exclusively military costume, have originated in such countries as
+these, among the vine-dressers? who flap down the sides alternately, in
+a manner that shows they understood the true use of them as a parasol.
+Vermanton is a small obscure place, affording an inn slovenly enough,
+though not glaringly bad.</p>
+
+<p>From hence to Lucy le Bois, where the horses were baited, fifteen miles.
+A pretty sequestered valley occurs about three miles beyond Vermanton;
+but the whole of the road, like that of the day before, may be travelled
+in the dark without any loss:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> the best part of it consists of a distant
+view of the vale and town of Avalon, backed by the Nivernois hills. In
+the old French Fablieux, the valley of Avalon is selected as the spot
+where a fairy confined Sir Lanval, her mortal lover; but whether the
+French Avalon, or the beautiful vale of Glastonbury was meant, appears
+doubtful, as the latter formerly bore the same name. There is a
+resemblance between the two districts, which amounts to an odd
+coincidence, particularly with regard to one of the Nivernois hills in
+the back ground, which presents a strong likeness of Glastonbury Tor. We
+should have passed through Avalon, but for a trick of the voiturier, who
+took a cross road to avoid paying the post duty there, and save his
+money at the expense of our bones. For this manoeuvre he might have been
+severely punished, had we chosen to interfere.</p>
+
+<p>From Lucy le Bois to Rouvray, where we slept, the level of the country
+becomes gradually more elevated, and its general features much more
+English, consisting of corn, woody copses, and pastures full of
+cowslips. I cannot say, however, that we found any thing to remind us of
+England at the detestable inn where we were quartered for the night, and
+have no doubt but that Lucy le Bois or Avalon would have afforded
+somewhat much better. The only civilized person was a large black
+baker's dog, who, like Gil Blas's first travelling acquaintance, seemed
+free of the house, and did the honours of the supper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> to us with an
+assiduity as disinterested, "Ah, messieurs," said his civil master, when
+we stept across the street in the morning, to return the dog's visit in
+form, "je suis charm&eacute; que vous trouvez l'Abri si beau; je suis au
+desespoir qu'il ne soit pas chez lui a present, mais je vais le chercher
+partout afin qu'il vous fasse ses hommages." The good man could not have
+spoken of a favourite son with more unsuspecting complacency.</p>
+
+<p>April 30.&mdash;To Saulieu, where we breakfasted at a tolerably good inn,
+fifteen miles: the morning intensely cold, and one of those white frosts
+on the ground, which so much endanger the vintage at this season. We
+observed, however, no vineyards on the elevated ridge of country along
+which we were travelling, and which was perfectly English. A respectable
+old ch&acirc;teau, with a rookery, quick hedges, and extensive woods, thick
+enough for a fox covert, kept up the illusion agreeably. This style of
+ground continues beyond Saulieu; and between the latter place and Arnay
+le Duc, eighteen miles farther, its features are not unromantic. One or
+two castles of a very baronial air occur; the first of which, reduced to
+ruins, is visible at about a mile beyond Saulieu, occupying an insulated
+hill at some distance from the road, and much resembling the remains of
+an Italian freebooter's stronghold. Another, situated at the head of a
+glen, about six miles farther on, and overlooking a small village, is
+more perfect and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span> striking in its appearance. It is the property, as we
+were informed, of the widow of M. Fenou, a royalist, who, during the
+revolution, stood a siege within its walls equal to that of
+Tillietudlem, repulsing a strong body of republicans with considerable
+loss. Buonaparte subsequently recalled M. Fenou, with the grant of a
+free pardon; and the estate was, in the course of things, restored to
+his widow. Such, as far as we could collect from the account of our
+informant, was the history belonging to Ch&acirc;teau Torcy la Vachere, which
+bears some resemblance, in situation and general outline, to Eastnor
+Castle, the seat of the Earl of Somers, at the foot of the Malvern
+hills.</p>
+
+<p>Arnay le Duc, a town situated on commanding ground, where we slept,
+boasts of an earlier celebrity, having been the scene of one of Admiral
+de Coligni's victories. It possesses several convents, now private
+property, and one or two fragments of building of a peculiarly
+antiquated style. Among these I particularly remarked an old iron-shop,
+supposed, as a bourgeois informed me, to be more than seven hundred
+years old, and which seems to have communicated with the ancient walls
+as a guard-house. While busied in sketching this singular relic, we were
+saluted gracefully by an old chevalier de St. Louis, who was passing,
+and whose distinguished air would have become the person of Coligni
+himself. On casually inquiring the name of this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span> gentleman, we learnt
+that he had been one among the many imprisoned during the reign of
+terror, and would have fallen by the guillotine, had the fall of
+Robespierre happened four-and-twenty hours later. This, it must be
+owned, is a trite and common story; but it is, perhaps, by the very
+triteness and frequency of such hair-breadth escapes, more than by any
+other circumstance, that the extent and ferocity of the revolutionary
+massacres are brought home to the imagination. The appointed victims,
+whom the delay of a day or an hour preserved from destruction at this
+crisis, still survive in all parts of France, like widely-scattered
+land-marks, to remind one of the numbers swept away in the previous
+deluge of murder.</p>
+
+<p>May 1.&mdash;To Rochepot twenty-one miles. We were not sorry to leave the
+H&ocirc;tel de Poste, at Arnay le Duc, which, with higher pretensions than the
+inn at Rouvray, only differs from it in the ratio of "dear and nasty" to
+"cheap and nasty;" and to commence a stage which promised more to the
+eye than any part of our former route. The country still continues to
+rise in this direction, and soon assumes the air of an extensive forest
+or chase, enlivened by half-wild herds of cattle, and opening into green
+glades and vistas of distant ranges of hills. At Ivry, we wound up a
+steep hill; the summit of which, a wide naked common, might match most
+parts of Dartmoor in height and bleakness. I had observed heaps<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span> of
+granite and micaceous stone at a much lower elevation in the course of
+the day before; and conclude that we were now on one of the highest
+inhabited points which occur in the interior of France. We had not
+leisure to walk to a telegraph on the right, which, to judge from the
+occasional glimpses which we had, must command a splendid map of the
+country near Autun. It had been recommended to us to take the route to
+Chalons through the latter town, as affording the most objects of
+interest; but, on the whole, I doubt whether that which we had adopted
+as the least circuitous, be not also preferable, as possessing the
+striking panoramic point to which we had climbed. After two or three
+more miles over an expanse of parched turf, we reached what geologists
+would call the bluff escarpment of the stratum. The descent before us
+was so precipitous, as to leave us at first at a loss to make out how
+the road could be conducted down it: and the prospect which burst upon
+us in front, had apparently no limit but the power of human vision.
+Beyond the foreground, which was formed by a series of rocky glens
+diverging from below the point on which we stood, the immense vale of
+the Saone extended like a bird's-eye view of the ocean, its relative
+distances marked by towns and villages glittering like white sails.
+Above the flat line of haze, which, at the first glance, appears to
+terminate the prospect at the distance of sixty miles, or more, we
+distinguished a faint blue outline of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> lofty mountains, which must have
+been the barrier separating France from Switzerland; and, as occasional
+gleams of sunshine broke out, the glittering and jagged lines of a
+barrier still more distant, and apparently hanging in mid air, became
+distinctly visible. Among these I recognised, at last, the features of
+Mont Blanc, in whose peculiar outline I could not be mistaken, and
+which, according to the map, cannot be less than 110 or 120 miles
+distant, in a direct line from the Montagne de Rochepot. It is, perhaps,
+not necessary to be a mountaineer, like Jean Jacques, by birth and
+education, in order to feel the peculiar expansion of mind, which he
+describes as caused by breathing mountain-air, and contemplating
+prospects like this of which I speak.<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> A boundless plain, and enormous
+mountains, such as the Alps, whether viewed individually, or contrasted
+with each other, are objects not physically grand alone, but affording
+also food for deep and enlarged reflection. The mind, while expatiating
+over the mass of feelings and projects, of hopes and fears, which are
+passing within the limits of the wide map below, feels the nothingness
+of the atom which it animates, and the comparative insignificance of its
+own joys and griefs in the scale of creation, and retires at last into
+itself, sobered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> into that calm state which is so favourable to the
+formation of any momentous decision, or the prosecution of a train of
+deep thought. A moment's glance changes the scene from culture and
+population to the silence and solitude of a dead icy desert; from the
+redundancy of animal and vegetable life to its "solemn syncope and
+pause." The ideas of obscurity, danger, and infinity, all powerful and
+acknowledged sources of the sublime, are excited at the view of a range
+of frozen summits, cold, fixed, and everlasting as the imaginary nature
+of those destinies, with whom a noble bard has peopled them; alternately
+glittering in sunshine, and enveloped in clouds, and from the well-known
+effects of haze and distance, appearing suspended in the air in their
+full dimensions and relative proportions. The imagination dwells upon
+the appalling hazards peculiar to their few accessible parts, and on the
+almost total extinction of life and animal powers, which is the penalty
+of a few hours sojourn there. And here again, too, the mind is forcibly
+impressed with the utter helplessness of the speck of dust which it
+inhabits, and that momentary dependence on Providence, which must be so
+convincingly felt in traversing such regions. Ascending in the scale of
+comparison, it may reflect, that these gigantic forms, which fill the
+eye at a distance at which cities and pyramids would fade into
+imperceptible specks, are but excrescences on the face of that earth,
+which itself is but an atom in the map of the universe. But I am
+wandering<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> from my subject, and from the route, which, in this quarter,
+is somewhat precipitous. I shall, therefore, only remark what has
+frequently struck me as not an improbable conjecture, that Milton might
+have formed his splendid conception of the icy region of Pand&aelig;monium
+from some of these colossal ranges of Alps with which his eye must have
+been familiar, seen through the vistas of a stormy sky. In the
+well-known passage which I shall take the liberty of quoting, one seems
+to recognise the deep drifts of snow, and the blue crevasses which
+abound in such a spot as the Mer de Glace, as well as the castellated
+peaks and glaciers which border on it, and the biting atmosphere which
+prevails among their summits.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Beyond this flood a frozen continent<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of ancient pile; or else deep snow and ice,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Twixt Damiata and Mount Casius old,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Where armies whole have sunk: the parching air<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span></p>
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_II" id="CHAP_II"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. II</a></h2>
+
+<h3>ROCHEPOT TO LYONS.</h3>
+
+
+<p>"<span class="smcap">Mon</span> Dieu, ma fille," says Madame de Sevign&eacute; in one of her letters to
+Mad. de Grignan, "que vous avez raison d'etre fatigu&eacute;e de cette Montagne
+de Rochepot! je la hais comme la mort; que de cahots, et quelle cruaut&eacute;
+qu'au mois de Janvier les chemins de Bourgogne soient impracticables!"
+Allowing this to have been the case in her days, I can hardly wonder
+that even Mad. de Sevign&eacute; was insensible to the magnificence of the
+prospect from this elevated point; and thought only of the safety of her
+neck. No danger however exists at present, as the road descending to
+Rochepot is good, and judiciously conducted down the brow of the hill;
+though the nature of the ground gives no very pleasing idea of what it
+must have been as a cross-country track. The inn also at Rochepot,
+situated at the junction of four roads, is clean and comfortable. A
+household loaf, weighing not less than thirty pounds, stood on the table
+to welcome us on our arrival, and we saw for the first time straw hats
+bearing a full proportion to it, the rim of which equalled in size a
+moderate umbrella.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>After breakfast we visited the ruined castle of Rochepot,<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> on which we
+had at first looked down, but which, seen from the village, bears a
+strong resemblance to Harlech Castle in North Wales, both in its form,
+and its position upon a commanding rock. We found upon inquiry that it
+had been tenanted at a much later period than its appearance would have
+led us to suppose. M. Blancheton, the proprietor, had made it his chief
+residence some thirty years ago, and kept it up in a style imitating as
+nearly as possible its ancient feudal grandeur. At the Revolution
+however it was forfeited, and has since been sold twice; but though each
+purchaser has pulled down a part, and sold the materials, enough still
+remains to give a perfect idea of its former strength and massiveness.
+M. Blancheton now resides, as we were informed, near Beaune, regretted
+as a <i>bon seigneur</i> by his poorer neighbours, whom he has not visited
+since the demolition of his paternal seat. "It would break his heart,"
+said a poor old woman, "to see it as it now is." I could not help
+thinking of Campbell's "Lines on visiting a spot in Argyleshire," which
+bear the impress of a real occasion of this sort.</p>
+
+<p>From Rochepot to Chalons-sur-Saone, eighteen miles; commencing with a
+steep hill, to the left of which winds a rocky valley of a singular
+description,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> cultivated to the very top of the abrupt heights which
+surround it, and so bare of soil, that the eye is surprised by the
+flourishing state of its corn and fruit-trees. The heat reflected from
+the rocks upon the thin gravel which supports its vineyards, must boil
+their juices to a liqueur; at least such was its effect on ourselves,
+while winding along a series of these natural forcing-houses, through
+which the road is conducted into the great plain of Chalons. From the
+ridges which border these valleys, the wide extent of the latter, and
+its border of Alps, are visible, though not so finely as from the
+elevation which we had descended. "Mont Blanc, the monarch of
+mountains," was however more plainly discernible than before, like a
+thin distinct fabric of vapour, with his "diadem of snow faintly lighted
+up by the sun;" and I never recollect to have seen this white-headed
+patriarch of the Alps before in any position which gave so fully the
+effect of his enormous height, I will not even except the spot near
+Merges, where from a gap in the intervening mountains, he appears almost
+to rest his base upon the lake of Geneva.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>On emerging from the hilly country near Rochepot, the road to Chalons
+passes along a dead flat, cheerful from its richness, but rather
+monotonous. To the right, we looked back upon a semicircular range of
+well wooded hills, in front of which, on an eminence, stands a stately
+old ch&acirc;teau belonging to the Count de Rouilly. It answers very much to
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span> beau ideal of what a French ch&acirc;teau ought to be, but seldom is. I
+say "ought to be," premising that most of us have formed our first ideas
+of French ch&acirc;teaux, from those works of imagination which endow such
+places so liberally with gothic architecture and haunted woods. The
+mansion of the Count de Rouilly would not greatly disappoint a reader of
+Mrs. Ratcliffe's romances; and bears a strong resemblance to Westwood,
+near Ombersley, in Worcestershire, the seat of Sir John Packington,
+which is said to have been once a conventual building.</p>
+
+<p>With no small pleasure did we arrive at the handsome town of Chalons,
+our patience being nearly exhausted by the tiresome running base with
+which our Noah's ark accompanied the driver's abuse of his clumsy grey
+mares. <i>Grand chameau, sacre vache</i>, and <i>canaille</i>, where the most
+genteel and decent terms with which he favoured them, and his
+perverseness was in proportion. For this precious commodity, selected I
+should conceive from the most consummate ragamuffins on the road, we
+were indebted to Mons. Picon, a master voiturier at Paris, who imposed
+on us both as to the number of horses, and the length of time in which
+we were to be conveyed to Chalons.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Hic niger est; hunc tu, Romane, caveto."
+</p><p>
+Having met with a respectable voiturier, named<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span> Veroux, who conveyed us
+admirably from Calais to Paris, my habitual distrust of this class of
+gentry had relaxed just at the wrong time, for the benefit of M. Picon.</p>
+
+<p>If cities are to be estimated by their appearance of neatness and
+opulence, Chalons deserves to be marked on the map in more capital
+letters than the imposing names of Sens or Auxerre. To no town indeed
+does it bear a greater resemblance than to Tours, both from the modern
+air of its houses, and from its noble river, adapted for every purpose
+of internal commerce. The H&ocirc;tel des Trois Faisans is also an excellent
+inn, and, like that at Auxerre, sufficiently well frequented to find no
+account in these little beggarly impositions which are practised at
+inferior places.</p>
+
+<p>May 2.&mdash;We walked before breakfast to St. Marcel, a village about a mile
+from Chalons, to visit the church and monastery where Abelard, after his
+removal from Cluni, died and was buried. Our excursion however only
+answered in affording us an hour's healthy exercise; for the monastery
+has been destroyed, and the church stript of what ornaments it
+possessed, during the time of the Revolution; and the monument of
+Abelard is removed to Paris. Nor does the town of Chalons itself,
+handsome and cheerful as it is, present any food for the pencil, the
+more particularly as its flat situation offers<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span> no favourable point of
+perspective. The spot from which its stately quay, and its stone bridge
+ornamented with obelisks, are seen to the most advantage, is about a
+mile down the river;&mdash;in fact from the deck of the coche d'eau, in which
+we embarked at noon for Lyons. This excellent conveyance is a large
+covered boat, towed at the rate of six miles an hour by four
+post-horses, or, when necessary, by six; and performs the journey from
+Chalons to Lyons, a distance of about ninety miles, in twenty-eight or
+thirty hours, affording ample time for rest and refreshment at a line of
+inns of a superior description. The reasonable amount of the fare paid
+by each person at the bureau des diligences, (nine francs fourteen sous)
+might induce a fastidious or inexperienced traveller to form an
+indifferent idea both of the company and accommodations of the coche
+d'eau. Both however appear unexceptionable in their way, as this is the
+mode of conveyance adopted for the royal mail, and as generally
+preferred for the sake of comfort and expedition, as the Margate or
+Glasgow steam-boats. It affords the range of a tolerably spacious deck,
+and a couple of cabins, to which the passengers may retire in inclement
+weather. Had it indeed been less convenient or agreeable, we should have
+found it a blessed respite after the rumbling tub of penance in which we
+had been cooped. Indeed, the abuse which our voiturier had vented on the
+<i>desagremens et disgraces</i> of the coche d'eau, in order to secure
+himself our company to Lyons, had determined us<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span> on trying this
+conveyance; for the habit of lying is so constant and inveterate in this
+class of fellows, as to possess all the advantages of truth; inasmuch as
+you have only to believe the direct contrary of what they say. The only
+inconvenient and perplexing liars are those who sometimes speak truth by
+accident; and their fictions moreover are seldom extravagant enough to
+afford the amusement created by romancers of the former class; among
+whom I may reckon a beggar, who beset us on the quay of Chalons,
+maintaining in a strong French accent, that he was the son of a carman
+of Thames-street, in the parish of St. George Hanovre, and had only been
+a few months in France.</p>
+
+<p>The <i>&eacute;lite</i> of our company consisted of a tall well-looking officer,
+wearing the croix d'honneur; a shrewd old Proven&ccedil;al merchant, to whom we
+were indebted for much valuable travelling information; two young
+friends, one of whom sang very agreeably and unaffectedly, and the
+other, a lively French Falstaff ate and talked enough for both; and
+last, not least, an old gentleman of the name of C. travelling to his
+campagne in Languedoc, whose arch quiet manners answered very much to my
+idea of the imaginary Hermite en Province. At Tournus, we took in a host
+of additional passengers, not so polished, but unobtrusive and
+well-behaved. I question however, whether, in the event of a rainy day,
+we should have found this mode of travelling very desirable; as the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
+common cabin is but small in proportion to the number of persons capable
+of being accommodated on deck. There is indeed a smaller cabin
+adjoining, which, though the exclusive right of the diligence passengers
+from Paris, is usually shared by them with the rest. It is distinguished
+by the words over the door, "Chambre de Pairs," which some wag had
+altered into "Chambre des Paris," or the Upper House, inscribing the
+other cabin with his pencil as the Chambre des Deput&eacute;s.</p>
+
+<p>Many a person fond of indulging in classical reveries, and not aware of
+the real breadth of the Clitumnus, may have formed a very spacious idea
+of that celebrated stream, and longed to contemplate its wide reaches
+from the foot of its well-known temple. As however the Clitumnus is in
+this identical spot, not broader than what a Yorkshire farmer would call
+"a bonny beck," and a Yorkshire fox-hunter would ride at without
+hesitation, the imaginary picture of it may with real propriety be
+transferred to the Saone near Tournus, winding as it does through the
+extensive meadows of a rich champaign country, and reflecting in its
+broad blue mirror the herds of fine white cattle which we saw paddling
+in every creek. It bears a strong resemblance to many parts of the Po,
+excepting in the stillness of its current, which was so great, that it
+would have been easy while leaning over the bow of the vessel, to fancy
+the Saone into the blue sky, and the coche<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span> d'eau, into Southey's vessel
+of the Suras, or Wordsworth's &aelig;rial skiff.</p>
+
+<p>At seven in the evening we came within view of the stately towers of
+M&acirc;con, a town, to all appearance, fully equal to Chalons in size and
+opulence, and much exceeding it as a subject for the pencil. Its fine
+navigation, the general richness of the country, and the productive
+vineyards on the neighbouring hills, all unite to render it a central
+point of business and bustle. There are several inns on the quay, of a
+good appearance; but we found the H&ocirc;tel de l'Europe, to which we had
+been directed, in every respect deserving of its high reputation, and
+inferior, perhaps, to no country inn on the continent. After
+reconnoitring Mont Blanc again from the windows of the clean and airy
+bed-rooms to which we had been shown, we dined at the table d'h&ocirc;te,
+which was served within a quarter of an hour after the arrival of the
+coche. Among the more polished company present, I was not a little
+diverted by some scattered specimens of the French gentleman-farmer,
+present for the express purpose of wallowing for once in a dinner drest
+by the Duc d'Angouleme's ci-devant cook; fat and well-clad; their
+countenances wearing a sort of awkward purse-proud defiance to the cool
+sarcastic look with which the Parisian travellers eyed them; and their
+conscious shame struggling with the desire to appropriate all the good
+things before them. Numps, in the well-known<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span> old tale, was but a type
+of these honest personages, who seemed to be considered as "de trop" by
+the majority. In spite of the mixtures (I do not mean those made in the
+stomach) which must necessarily take place on these occasions, and
+allowing for the English prejudice in favour of privacy, there are
+advantages in dining at all French table d'h&ocirc;tes, frequented by
+tolerable company. To the epicure it ensures better fare and attendance
+than he can command by any other means, as the landlord and his
+attendants feel both their credit and interest concerned in displaying
+the most alacrity, and producing the greatest variety of dishes before a
+large party; while chance customers, after waiting for a long hungry
+interval, may have to encounter tired waiters, and partake of the
+tossed-up leavings of this very table d'h&ocirc;te;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Which, certainly, these gentlemen must own,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Is much more dignified than entertaining,<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>as Colman pleasantly saith. There is a better and more satisfactory
+reason for this practice, which is, that it affords the best opportunity
+of ascertaining those points of local knowledge, which at once give an
+interest to the district through which you are travelling, and instruct
+you in the best methods of doing and seeing every thing. A Frenchman's
+manners and acquirements ought never to be judged of by his travelling
+suit, which is always avowedly the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span> refuse of his wardrobe; and the
+importance which he is apt to attach to everything connected with his
+own town or district, if it leads to ridiculous minuteness, at least
+insures the accuracy of his details. The marked civility and attention
+of the French to strangers is too well known to be commented on,
+particularly to those who pay them the compliment of acquiescing in
+their national customs. I think I never saw the temper of French
+travellers thoroughly ruffled but on one occasion, when a shabby-looking
+Englishman and his gawky son, who had arrived in a cabriolet, made a
+fruitless attempt to exclude a large diligence party from any share in
+the table and fire of a country inn. Had they been contented to make
+their bread-and-butter arrangements in concert with the party, which
+included a member of the chamber of deputies, and a young officer, their
+company would have been considered as a pleasure.</p>
+
+<p>May 3.&mdash;We embarked at five o'clock in the morning, in the face of a
+very strong gale, which rendered six horses necessary, and tempted us to
+wish for warmer clothing. The morning, however, was beautifully clear
+and bright; and Mont Blanc, which is perceptible even from the low level
+of the river, was without a cloud. To the right, the Beaujolois hills,
+at the foot of which M&acirc;con stands, accompanied us as far as Trevoux,
+presenting an outline not unlike that of our own Malverns; but more
+varied and rich, as well as occasionally more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span> lofty, and sprinkled with
+thousands of white farm-houses and villas: many of the parts are
+similar, and almost equal, to the hills which front Florence on the
+Fiesole side.</p>
+
+<p>At noon we stopped to breakfast, or rather dine, at Trevoux. Here the
+Beaujolois hills (or, at least, a range which runs in an uniform line
+with them) recede, and conduct the eye to a distant vista of higher
+mountains, toward the south; while, to the left, the river takes a
+sudden turn among the steep but cultivated sides of the Limonais. This
+curve brought us all at once upon such a green sunny nook, as might have
+served for the hermitage of Alexander Selkirk, in the island of Juan
+Fernandez; in the centre of which stands Trevoux, crowned by the ruins
+of an old castle, and overlooking the beautifully fertile valley which
+skirts the foot of the Limonais hills. From its situation, and the form
+and disposition of its houses, piled tier above tier to the top of a
+woody bank, Trevoux affords a perfect idea of a little Tuscan town. The
+H&ocirc;tel du Sauvage, and the H&ocirc;tel de l'Europe, are equally well
+frequented; and, like Oxford pastry-cooks, take care to employ the fair
+sex as sign-posts to their good cheer. Each inn has its couple of
+waiting-maids stationed at the waterside, in the costume of
+shepherdesses at Sadler's Wells, full of petits soins and agr&eacute;mens, and
+loud in the praises of their respective hotels. By these pertinacious
+damsels every passenger is sure to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span> dragged to and fro in a state of
+laughing perplexity, like Garrick, contended for by the tragic and comic
+muse, in Sir Joshua's well-known picture; nor do their persecutions
+cease, till all are safely housed. We went to the H&ocirc;tel de l'Europe,
+whose table may be supposed not deficient in goodness and variety, from
+the specimen of one man's dinner eaten there. I shall enumerate its
+particulars, without attempting to decide on the question so often
+canvassed, whether our neighbours do not exceed us in versatility and
+capacity of stomach. Our young Falstaff then (for it was he of whom I
+speak), ate of soup, bouilli, fricandeau, pigeon, b&oelig;uf piqu&eacute;e, salad,
+mutton cutlets, spinach stewed richly, cold asparagus, with oil and
+vinegar, a roti, cold pike and cresses, sweetmeat tart, larded
+sweetbreads, haricots blancs au jus, a pasty of eggs and rich gravy,
+cheese, baked pears, two custards, two apples, biscuits and sweet cakes.
+Such was the order and quality of his repast, which I registered during
+the first leisure moment, and which is faithfully reported; and, be it
+recollected, that he did not confine himself to a mere taste of any one
+dish. Perhaps I may be borne out by the experience of those who have had
+the patience to sit out an old Parisian gourmand, by the help of coffee
+and newspapers, and observed him employed corporeally and mentally for
+nearly two hours, digesting and discriminating, with the carte in one
+hand, and his fork in the other. The solemn concentration of mind
+displayed by many of these personages is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span> worthy of the pencil of
+Bunbury; and though French caricaturists have done no more than justice
+to our guttling Bob Fudges, I question whether they would not find
+subjects of greater science and physical powers among their own
+countrymen. On our return to the coche d'eau, our fat companion lighted
+his cigar, and hastened to lie down in the cabin, observing, "Il faut
+que je me repose un peu, pour faire ma digestion;" and Monsieur C.,
+instead of leaving him quietly in his state of torpidity, like a boa
+refreshed with raw buffalo, began to argue with us on the superior
+nicety of the French in eating. "Nous aimons les mets plus delicats que
+vous autres," quoth he; at which we laughed, and pointed to the cabin.
+We found, upon explanation, however, that Mr. C., though well-informed
+in general upon the subject of English customs, entertained an idea not
+uncommon in France, viz. that we always despatch the whole of those
+hospitable haunches and sirloins, which appear at an English table, at
+one and the same sitting: with this notion, his observation was
+certainly natural enough.</p>
+
+<p>From Trevoux, the Saone winds between narrow, steep, and picturesque
+banks as far as Lyons, near which place they close in upon its channel,
+exhibiting more varieties of rock and wood than before. For the good
+taste displayed by the rich Lyonnais in their villas and gardens, which
+began to peep upon us at every step, I cannot in truth say much; but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>
+our French companions, who had overlooked the merely natural beauties of
+the country, found much to commend in these little vagaries of art. A
+lively bourgeoise, on whom we stumbled the next day behind the counter
+of a glove-shop, ran up, openmouthed, to explain to us the beauties of
+one of their show spots, in view of which a sudden turn of the river was
+just bringing us. A conspicuous inscription on a large vulgar-looking
+house painted red and yellow, informed us that it was styled the
+"Hermitage du Mont d'Or." In the space of not quite an acre of ground,
+on the side of a wooded hill of the highest natural loveliness, the
+proprietor had contrived to commit a host of the most outrageous and
+fantastical absurdities, which were hailed with a smile from Mons. C.,
+and a burst of approbation from the rest of the party. At the top of the
+hill were four scattered pillars of different diminutive forms, with
+gilt balustrades; all painted with gaudy colours, and none large enough
+for a moderate tea-garden, or sufficiently solid to have resisted the
+point-blank stagger of a drunken man. Lower down were two holes in the
+rock, which, from their size and appearance, I should have taken for a
+rabbit-burrow and a badger's earth, but for the young lady's joyous
+exclamation&mdash;"Ah! voil&agrave; les hermitages. Messieurs, il y a deux hermites
+l&agrave;-dedans." "&Agrave; la bonne heure, Mademoiselle; ils sont vivans, sans
+doute"&mdash;. "Mais pour cela&mdash;pas absolument&mdash;c'est que&mdash;ils sont de cire,
+voyez vous, mais d'une beaut&eacute;! ah, c'est une<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span> chose &agrave; voir!" Then came
+an inclosure so thickly studded with pillars of different sizes, as to
+resemble a Mahometan burying ground. "Vous y trouverez des inscriptions
+de toute esp&egrave;ce, et l&agrave; vous voyez la colonne de Trajan." This was a
+wooden obelisk about ten feet high, painted white, at the base of which
+ROME was written in large black letters, occupying the whole of one
+side. Immediately above the house stood a small wooden building, with a
+red and white dome, and pillars and windows painted on the sides. The
+name COSMORAMA, which took up half the height of the side fronting us,
+still left us in doubt as to its use or intention; and our fair cicerone
+could no more explain the nature of her favourite building, than
+Bardolph could the meaning of the word "accommodate." "Eh, Monsieur,
+c'est ce qu'on appelle Cosmorama; je ne saurois vous dire precisement;
+peut-&ecirc;tre il y a des b&ecirc;tes sauvages;&mdash;ou&mdash;quelque chose de gentil, voyez
+vous&mdash;mais enfin c'est un Cosmorama." "Mais voil&agrave; ce qui est vraiment
+joli," resounded on all sides; and so general and good-humoured was
+their admiration of this rickety bauble, that we did our best to
+acquiesce in it. After all, we could admire, without any breach of
+sincerity, the natural beauties of this spot, which very much resembles
+the more open parts of the glen where Matlock is situated, and which all
+these abominations could not entirely deface. How to account for this
+perversion of eye in a people of sensibility and taste, I am rather at a
+loss; but this last<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span> is by no means a singular instance. "Bient&ocirc;t vous
+allez sortir de ces tristes bois," compassionately observed a very
+gentleman-like officer, with whom we had fallen in during a stage of
+beautiful forest scenery; and not a soul in a voiture which breakfasted
+in the salle &agrave; manger at Rochepot, could understand why we stopped to
+admire the distant prospect of the Alps. Not to multiply instances of
+the indifference to the beauties of simple nature, which will, I think,
+be allowed to exist in the French, as contrasted with ourselves, I am
+inclined to extend the line of distinction still farther, and to affirm,
+that this deficiency in taste appears generally to distinguish the
+Teutonic from the Southern blood. It is no exaggeration to say, that for
+one French or Italian traveller in Switzerland, twenty English, or ten
+Germans, may be reckoned. The French taste in landscape gardening is
+well known, and that of the Italians<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> is but a shade or two better:
+witness the detestable baby-house with which they have defaced one of
+the finest scenes in the world, and which they distinguish, <i>par
+excellence</i>, as the Isola Bella; to say nothing of a host of similar
+instances, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span> contrasted with our own Longleat and Rydal Park.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>The fairest account of the matter, perhaps, is, that this inferiority in
+one branch of taste may result from a difference of temperament in our
+lively southern neighbours, which, in other respects, has its
+advantages. Restless, acute, and loquacious, they delight more naturally
+in those objects which remind them of the "busy hum of men:" and,
+whatever the force of circumstances may have effected in particular
+cases, it may be safely asserted, that the diplomatist and man of the
+world is the indigenous growth of France and Italy, while the powers of
+abstraction and meditation exist more naturally in English and German
+minds, inducing the love of solitary nature.</p>
+
+
+
+<p>The styles of Claude, who was a German by birth, and of our own Wilson,
+are strongly contrasted with that of Vernet, as illustrative of the
+present subject. In the admirable paintings of the latter, bustle and
+motion are generally the characteristics of the scene represented, and
+the features of nature seem intended to be subordinate to some human
+action which is going on. In the pictures of Claude, the combinations of
+scenery are every thing, and the figures nothing, or rather, merely
+introduced to illustrate and harmonize with the effect which the
+landscape itself is to produce: and nothing is allowed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span> to disturb the
+repose and serenity of the whole. Of Wilson, who delighted more in
+storms and convulsions of nature, it may be said, that his figures, also
+are merely subordinate to the effect of a dashing sea, a thunder-cloud,
+or a forest waving and crashing with the wind; and that they are not
+strongly enough marked to interrupt the eye in the contemplation of
+these objects. Gaspar Poussin, I must own, is an instance that a French
+painter can understand and represent the deep repose of nature; but the
+style of Poussin is certainly not that of the French school in general,
+nor that of Salvator to be considered as establishing a rule by which to
+judge of Italian taste.</p>
+
+<p>Mais revenons &agrave; nos moutons. We were surprised to observe how much our
+fellow-passengers interested themselves about the characters of the
+royal family of England. Several of its members underwent a free review,
+though not an ill-natured one; but all who spoke of our late queen
+Charlotte, did her more justice than has, perhaps, been done in England,
+and particularly praised the purity of her court, and the excellent
+domestic example which her private life afforded to Englishwomen in
+general. On this point we cordially agreed with them; but our sly
+acquaintance, Mons. C., was not disinclined to lead us to ground more
+debateable, and lay a trap for our national vanity. The master of the
+vessel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span> had a wooden leg, which led to the subject of artificial limbs,
+and the perfection to which the art of making them had arrived in
+England. We accidentally mentioned the case of Lord Anglesey. "Et qui
+est ce Lord Anglesey?" said M.C., looking archly. "Un de nos plus grands
+seigneurs, Monsieur." Still he persisted in inquiring how he lost his
+leg. "C'&eacute;tait in Flandres." "Ah, vous voulez dire &agrave; Vaterloo, n'est ce
+pas?" said the old gentleman, with a smile, not displeased to observe
+the motive of our hesitation. He would not allow us to use the word
+<i>emprunter</i>, as applied to the conduct of his countrymen, with regard to
+the Louvre collection, "Non, <i>voler</i>, voil&agrave; le mot." The little
+bourgeoise, who had lionized the Hermitage du Mont d'Or so eloquently,
+grew very communicative on the strength of the display which she had
+made, and M.C.'s good humour; and volunteered her sentiments on the
+folly of reflecting too deeply, observing, that all but the old ought to
+banish the idea of death and such dismal bugbears from their minds.
+"Mais, songez, Mademoiselle," quoth he, interrupted in some observation
+rather better worth hearing, "que tout le monde ne poss&egrave;de pas votre
+force de caract&egrave;re;" a compliment to which the young lady assented with
+a grateful curtsy.</p>
+
+<p>By the time F. had finished his sleep and digestion, as he had proposed
+to do, and learned<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span> "Pescator dell' Onda," by repeated trials and
+lessons, we arrived at the Pierre Incise, at the corner of which the
+Saone enters Lyons. Tradition says that this spot, which reminded me of
+St. Vincent's rocks, near Clifton, derives its Latinized name from the
+great work performed by Agrippa in cutting through the solid rock, and
+enlarging the channel of the river. The site of the castle of Pierre
+Incise, formerly a prison, and destroyed at the Revolution, is still
+visible on a strong height overhanging the river to the right; the
+bottom of which appears to have been cut away artificially.</p>
+
+<p>On another height, to the left, stands an old fort; on passing which, an
+abrupt turn of the Saone brought us into the centre of dirt, bustle, and
+business. Its course becomes in a moment confined between masses of
+tall, smoky, old houses, and its azure colour stained by party-coloured
+streams from dyers' shops, and a thousand other abominations, which
+would defy the pen of a Smollett to describe, and all the breezes from
+the Alps to purify. There are several bridges in this quarter, mostly
+appearing from their paltry and irregular character, to have been
+erected on some sudden emergency; from these, however, the noble Pont de
+Tilsit, near the cathedral, claims an exception. Long before we
+approached this last bridge, however, the boat reached the diligence
+office, and our porter dived<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span> with us to the left, through a succession
+of courts and streets as high and gloomy as the cavern of Posilipo. We
+emerged into the Place de Terreaux, and took up our quarters opposite to
+the H&ocirc;tel de Ville, a formal, but fine old building.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_III" id="CHAP_III"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. III</a></h2>
+
+<h3>LYONS.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Every</span> traveller on his first arrival at a large place of any interest,
+and where his time is limited, must have experienced a difficulty in
+classing and forming, as it were, into a mental map, the various objects
+around him, and in familiarizing his eye with the relative position of
+the most striking features. To meet this difficulty, I should advise any
+one visiting Lyons, to direct his first walk to the eastern bank of the
+Rhone, and after crossing a long stone bridge called the Pont la
+Guillotiere, to follow the course of the river for about a mile along
+the meadows, towards its junction with the Saone. From this point of
+view, Lyons really presents a princely appearance.<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> The line of quays
+facing the Rhone, and which constitute the handsomest and most imposing
+part of the city, extend along the opposite bank in a lengthened
+perspective, in which the H&ocirc;tel Dieu and its dome form a central and
+conspicuous feature. In the back ground, the heights which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span> divide the
+Rhone and Saone from each other rise very beautifully, covered with
+gardens and country seats. More to the left, and on the other side of
+the Saone, the hill of Fourvi&egrave;res (anciently Forum Veneris) presents a
+bold landmark, and forms a very characteristic back-ground to the city.
+Instead of continuing his walk towards the junction of the Rhone and the
+Saone, which possesses nothing worthy of notice, I should recommend the
+traveller to re-cross the Pont la Guillotiere, and make for this
+eminence. In his way he may pass through the Place Louis le Grand,
+formerly the Place de Bellecour, of the architecture of which the
+Lyonnais are very proud, and which is a marked spot in the revolutionary
+history of Lyons. Though on a costly and extensive plan, its proportions
+want breadth, and are too much frittered away to convey the idea of
+grandeur or solidity; and the inscription Vive le Roi, which occupies a
+place on two of its sides, in enormous letters, assists in giving it the
+air of a temporary range of building for a loyal f&ecirc;te. Not so the
+beautiful<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> Pont de Tilsit, by which you cross the Saone soon
+afterwards. This bridge, built by Buonaparte, to commemorate the treaty
+of Tilsit, unites elegance, solidity, and chasteness of design in a very
+great degree. Some of the stones, which I measured, are eighteen feet in
+length, and proportionably large, and altogether it reminded me of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
+Waterloo bridge upon a smaller scale, and divested of its columns. The
+cathedral, which stands on the other side of the Saone, nearly at the
+foot of this bridge, is a venerable black old building of great
+antiquity, and though far inferior to those of Beauvais, Tours,
+Abbeville, or Rouen, in its general outline, possesses many detached
+parts of rich and curious architecture. It bears no marks of the
+devastation which it suffered in the Revolution, or during the late war,
+when, as we were told, the Austrians stabled their horses in it. Much of
+its repair has been owing to Cardinal Fesch, the late archbishop. The
+windows, rich as they are, have a gloomy effect, from being entirely
+composed of painted glass; and prevented us from distinguishing much
+very clearly. A statue of John the Baptist, however, crowned with
+artificial roses, should not be forgotten. A considerable part of the
+old town of Lyons lies on this side of the Saone; but as it will not
+repay the trouble of exploring, the traveller will do well to proceed
+immediately, or rather climb, to the church of Notre Dame de Fourvi&egrave;res.
+The fame of peculiar sanctity which this church enjoys, attracts many
+daily visitors from Lyons, though from its situation, it reminds one of
+the chapel in Shropshire, which as country legends tell, "the devil
+removed to the top of a steep hill to spite the church-goers." The
+continual resort of all ranks hither has attracted also a host of
+beggars, who have taken their stations in the only footway leading up<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
+to the church, some singly, some in parties, every four or five yards,
+and all besetting you in full chorus. The same cause has drawn to the
+terrace in front of the church a seller of Catholic legends, who to suit
+all tastes, mingles the spiritual, the secular, and the loyal, in his
+profession. The legend of St. Genevieve, Le Testament de Louis XVI.,
+L'Enfant Prodigue, Damon and Henriette, Judith and Holofernes, and Le
+Portrait du Juif ambulant, might all be bought at his stall, adorned
+with blue and red wood-cuts. Poor Damon cut but a sorry figure in this
+goodly company; for though adorned with a crook secundum artem, he
+looked more rawboned and ugly than Holofernes, and more villainous than
+the wandering Jew: fully justifying the scorn with which the
+stiff-skirted Henriette seemed to treat him. It is almost misplaced
+however to enumerate such follies in a place, which on a fine day
+presents perhaps one of the most varied and magnificent views in the
+world: and which a person who had only an hour to spare in Lyons, ought
+to visit, to the exclusion of every other object of curiosity. By
+changing one's position from the terrace of the church to some rude and
+imperfect remains of Roman masonry on the western side of it, a complete
+panorama of the surrounding country is obtained. The Rhone and Saone are
+both seen inclining towards each other from the north and north-east,
+like the two branches of the letter Y; the former issuing like a narrow
+white thread from the distant gorges of the Alps,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span> and widening into
+broad reaches through the intermediate plain; and the latter issuing
+suddenly from among the hills of the Mont d'Or: till after inclosing the
+peninsula in which the principal part of Lyons is situated, and which
+lies like a map under your feet, they unite towards the south; and the
+broad and rapid body of water formed by their junction, loses itself at
+length among ranges of hills surmounted by Mont Pilate, a lofty mountain
+near Valence. Towards the east, north-east, and south-east, the view is
+of the same description as that from Rochepot; a wild chain of Alps seen
+over a plain of great extent and richness. In a western direction, the
+broad hilly features of the adjoining country are enlivened by a
+continual succession of vineyards, woods, gardens, and villas of all
+sizes, absolutely perplexing to the eye from its undulating richness:
+with which the sober gray of distant ranges of mountains contrasts well.
+One cannot form a better idea of this part of the view, than by fancying
+the most hilly parts of the country near Bath, clothed in a lively
+French dress; the only deformity of which consists in the high stone
+walls that enclose every tenement, and whose long white lines cut the
+eye unpleasantly. Most persons can point out the Ch&acirc;teau Duchere, which
+is visible from this spot at the distance of about a mile on the
+north-west side, and was the scene of a sharp action between the French
+and Austrians in 1814.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span></p><p>If an hour or two of leisure remain after this walk, they may be filled
+up by a visit to the public library and the Palais des Arts. The former
+contains, they say, ninety thousand volumes, rather an embarrass de
+richesses to a hurrying traveller. I confess I was more amused by the
+importance with which the little old woman, who acted as concierge,
+talked of the "esprit mal tournu de Voltaire." The latter building
+adjoins the H&ocirc;tel de Ville, in the Place des Terreaux, the scene of one
+of the revolutionary fusillades. It contains, besides, several good
+pictures hung in bad lights, a large collection of Roman altars and
+sepulchral monuments, arranged in a cloister below, which serves as the
+exchange; and a cabinet of Roman antiquities found in the environs. The
+H&ocirc;tel de Ville itself is a massy stone building, a good deal in the
+taste of the Tuileries, and containing two fine statues of the rivers
+Rhone and Saone, which deserve notice. Whether the interior of Lyons can
+boast of any thing else worth notice I know not, but from the specimen
+which we had, too minute a survey of it can hardly be edifying to any
+one but a scavenger; and no single building can be named of any
+particular beauty, though its masses of tall well-built houses are
+imposing at a distance. To complete the short general survey of Lyons,
+which I mentioned, another not very long walk will suffice; traversing
+first the fine line of quays which front the Rhone, from the Pont la
+Guillotiere to the Quai St. Clair. From this point ascend the highest
+part of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span> the city, called the Croix Rousse, and inquire for a place
+called Ch&acirc;teau Montsuy, which stands bordering upon its outskirts, and
+is best described as the most elevated spot on this line of heights.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a>
+From hence the view of Mont Blanc and the vale of the Rhone is
+peculiarly fine on a bright evening; and the whole prospect as rich and
+extensive as that from Fourvi&egrave;res. Beware of being persuaded by the
+laquais de place to visit La Tour de la belle Allemande, which is one of
+their show spots, and so called from some old legend of the imprisonment
+of a German lady. The view from Ch&acirc;teau Montsuy must, from the nature of
+the ground, be just the same, or, perhaps, even superior: and, what is
+more to the purpose, the Baroness de Vouty, in whose garden this old
+tower stands, seldom admits either Lyonnese or strangers to see it. On
+descending from the Croix Rousse, cross the Rhone by the Pont Morand,
+the wooden bridge next to that of La Guillotiere. Near the foot of this
+bridge is situated a large open space of ground, called Les Brotteaux,
+where the most atrocious of the revolutionary massacres took place. The
+site of the fusillade, by which two hundred and seven royalists perished
+at one time, is marked by a large chapel, dedicated to the memory of the
+victims, in the erection of which they are now proceeding. Three only
+are said to have escaped from this massacre, and to be still<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span> living.
+One of them finding his cords cut asunder by the first shot that reached
+him, escaped in the confusion, and plunging amid the thick bushes and
+dwarf willows which bordered upon the Rhone, baffled the pursuit of
+several soldiers. There is nothing remarkable in the appearance of the
+Brotteaux at present; but no true lover of his country ought to neglect
+visiting a spot associated with such warning recollections. One of the
+stanzas inscribed by Delandine on the cenotaph of his countrymen (which
+has been removed to make room for the chapel above mentioned), expresses
+briefly, and much in the spirit of Simonides's well known epitaph on the
+Spartans, the impressions conveyed by the sight of this Aceldama:</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Passant, respecte notre cendre;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Couvrez la d'une simple fleur:<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">&Agrave; tes neveux nous te chargeons d'apprendre<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"Que notre mort acheta leur bonheur."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>This passage is, indeed, prophetic of the salutary effects of a lesson,
+which these and a thousand more voices from the tomb will proclaim to
+future ages; if, indeed, future ages will believe, that a<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a> dastardly
+stroller was allowed to glut his full vengeance on the kindred of those
+who had hissed him from their stage, and to vow in a fit of wanton
+frenzy, that an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span> obelisk only should mark the site of the second city in
+France; that he found himself seconded in this plan of destruction by
+thousands of hands and voices; that one citizen was executed for
+supplying the wounded with provisions, another for extinguishing a fire
+in his own house; and that when these pretexts failed, such ridiculous
+names as "quadruple" and "quintuple counter-revolutionist" were invented
+as terms of accusation. Such facts as these, written in the blood of
+thousands, furnish a strong practical comment on the consequences of
+anarchy, and the uncompromising firmness which should be displayed in
+checking its first inroads; the nature of which was never more
+eloquently or instructively described than in Lord Grenville's words.</p>
+
+<p>"What first occurred? the whole nation was inundated with inflammatory
+and poisonous publications. Its very soil was deluged with sedition and
+blasphemy. No effort was omitted of base and disgusting mockery, of
+sordid and unblushing calumny, which could vilify and degrade whatever
+the people had been most accustomed to love and venerate. * * * * * * *
+And when, at last, by the unremitted effect of all this seduction,
+considerable portions of the multitude had been deeply tainted, their
+minds prepared for acts of desperation, and familiarized with the
+thought of crimes, at the bare mention of which they would before have
+revolted, then it was that they were encouraged to collect<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span> together in
+large and tumultuous bodies; then it was that they were invited to feel
+their own strength, to estimate and display their numerical force, and
+to manifest in the face of day their inveterate hostility to all the
+institutions of their country, and their open defiance of all its
+authorities."</p>
+
+<p>A vivid description this, and strikingly applicable to the operations of
+that evil spirit which is still at work, with less excuse and
+provocation than France could plead for her atrocities. Such are the
+first and second acts of the drama of modern sedition; the fifth is well
+delineated in a tract by M. Delandine, the public librarian of Lyons in
+1793, as introduced in Miss Plumtre's Tour in France. This interesting
+narrative, intitled "An Account of the State of the Prisons at Lyons
+during the Reign of Terror," bears a character of truth and feeling,
+which bespeaks him an eye-witness of the horrors he describes. Torn from
+his family without any assignable cause, and imprisoned in the hourly
+expectation of death, his own apprehensions seem at no time to have
+absorbed his interest in the fate of his suffering friends; and to their
+merit and misfortunes he does justice in the verses before alluded to.
+The following is a free translation of them.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span></p>
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Oft, Lyonnese, your tears renew<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To those who died upon this spot;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Their valour's fame descends to you,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">In life, in death, forget them not.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Here calm they drew their parting breath,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Soul-weary of their country's woes,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Here, fearless, in the stroke of death<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Met honour,&mdash;victory,&mdash;repose.<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Pilgrim, revere their dust, and strew<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">One flow'ret on this lowly tomb;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Then say unto thy sons, "For you,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"Children of France! they braved their doom."<br /></span>
+</div><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Thou fatal, hallow'd spot of earth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Immortal shrines shall mark thy place!<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Alas! what genius, valour, worth,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lie mouldering in thy narrow space!<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Within less than half an hour's walk of the Brotteaux, and on the same
+side of the river, stands the Ch&acirc;teau la Motte, in which Henry IV.
+received Mary de Medicis as his bride. The way thither is best found by
+following the street leading to the Turin road for about a mile, when a
+turn to the right, not far from the junction of the road to Vienne,
+brings you in the course of a few minutes to the castle. When seen at a
+distance either from the Croix Rousse or Fourvi&egrave;res, its four turrets
+and a watch-tower give it an air of grandeur consistent with its former
+history, and distinguish it from the adjoining suburb. In a nearer point
+of view, indeed, its patched and dilapidated appearance shows the vain
+attempts which have been made to repair the ravages of the Revolution.
+At that period it belonged, as we were informed, to M. de Verres, a
+brave<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span> royalist gentleman, whose activity against the Revolutionists
+drew their marked vengeance upon himself and his possessions. At the
+time of the siege of Lyons, he garrisoned the Ch&acirc;teau la Motte with a
+strong detachment of chasseurs; and, as a peasant informed us, "fought
+like a devil incarnate," obstructing the operations of the sans-culotte
+army materially, and retarding their success against Lyons by his
+obstinate resistance. The position of his extensive premises, detached
+from the rest of the suburb, and surrounded with a wall, added to the
+advantage of a gently rising ground, must have enabled him to prolong
+the contest with effect. His fate was like that of so many other loyal
+and intrepid Lyonnese: being forced at last to surrender, he underwent,
+as may be supposed, a very summary trial, and was shot on the Brotteaux,
+in sight of the distant turrets of his own house. The property was
+confiscated, and great part of the ch&acirc;teau pulled down; but fortunately
+the round tower, containing Henry the Fourth's bed-room, still remains,
+rather owing in all probability to the ignorance of the Jacobins, than
+their good will. A part of the estate has been restored to his daughter,
+Mad. d'A., together with the ch&acirc;teau, which she inhabits; but I have
+reason to fear this part is but an inconsiderable one. Observing us
+wandering round the ch&acirc;teau with an air of curiosity, she politely sent
+to invite us to walk in. The room in which she was sitting opened upon a
+terrace, commanding a fine view down the Rhone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span> towards Mont Pilate; and
+its interior was decorated with a few specimens of magnificent old
+furniture, which contrasted strongly with the air of desolation visible
+throughout. Two fauteuils of rich crimson velvet, with massy gilt
+frames, and two commodes inlaid and ornamented with brass, seem all the
+remains of the splendour of this once royal residence. From hence we
+visited Henry's apartment, which occupies the middle story of a large
+turret. It commands a fine view of Lyons and its noble environs; and the
+ceiling and walls bore some remains of the golden fleurs-de-lys on a
+blue ground, which had once ornamented them. Nearly the whole, however,
+had been white-washed during the Revolution; and on the advance of the
+Austrians, in 1814, the whole building suffered more by the hands of the
+combatants, than during the former sanguinary times. "Cependant il est
+bien connu," as Mad. d'A. answered with a proud smile, when we expressed
+our surprise at having found a well dressed person who could not direct
+us to Ch&acirc;teau la Motte. It may claim, indeed, to be well known to every
+good Frenchman, both from its former and latter history. It is singular,
+that in the course of the same day we should receive attentions from two
+persons, both of whom had lost their dearest friends in the carnage
+which followed the siege of Lyons. While I was sketching Mont Blanc and
+the course of the Rhone from the environs of Ch&acirc;teau Montsuy, a tall
+genteel old man, looking very like a Castilian, accosted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span> us civilly,
+and, having peeped over my shoulder for a moment or two, invited us into
+his garden, which commanded the same view in a much superior manner. His
+sister-in-law, who was walking with him, had, he informed us, lost her
+husband and son in the fusillade. Yet, perhaps, when we consider the
+extent of the havoc, it would seem more singular to find a family who
+had not suffered, nearly or remotely, from its consequences.</p>
+
+<p>In returning over the Pont la Guillotiere, we were led to remark the
+probable antiquity of its construction. The centre still retains the
+drawbridge; and the whole fabric appears to have been widened, when
+wheel carriages came into fashion, with a supplementary parallel slice,
+riveted on to it by iron bolts. This expedient rather reminded me of a
+story which I had heard in my infancy, of a prudent housewife, who first
+roasted half a turkey for the family dinner, and when it had been twenty
+minutes on the spit, sewed on the remaining half to welcome an
+unexpected guest.</p>
+
+<p>Our excursion on the Saone had in every respect answered so well, that
+we were tempted to make inquiry whether the Rhone was also practicable
+as far as Avignon. Learning, however, that this mode of conveyance was
+seldom resorted to, and not liking the appearance of the passage-boats
+which we saw, we concluded, and found afterwards, that there were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>
+sufficient objections against it, excepting to those who wish to save
+time and expense. The rapidity of the current, and the violence and
+uncertainty of the winds which prevail upon the Rhone, render it
+necessary to employ a very skilful boatman; and, in a picturesque point
+of view, as much is lost by the intervention of the high banks of the
+Rhone, which shut out the distant parts of the landscape, as is gained
+by the perpetual accompaniment of water as a foreground. On the whole,
+we found reason to prefer the land route by Vienne and Valence, for
+which our arrangements were made accordingly.</p>
+
+<p>I think it is an observation of Cowper, that</p>
+
+<p class="c">"God made the country, and man made the town;"
+</p>
+<p>
+and not even the centre of Lombard-street itself affords a truer
+illustration of the sentiment, than this town of mud and money,
+contrasted with its beautiful environs. The distant view of Lyons is
+imposing from most points; but the interior presents but few objects to
+repay the traveller for its closeness, stench, and bustle (not even good
+silk stockings). Its two noble rivers have had no apparent effect in
+purifying it, nor the easterly winds from the Alps, which stand in full
+sight, in ventilating its narrow smoky streets: and though usually
+considered the second city of the empire in wealth and importance, the
+houses and their inhabitants appear marvellously<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span> inferior to Bordeaux
+and the Bordelais in the air of neatness and fashion which might be
+expected to mark this distinction. In every thing relating to Bordeaux
+there is an easy elegant exterior, which conveys the idea of an
+independent and frequented capital of a kingdom, and an eligible
+residence; whereas Lyons bears the obvious marks of its manufacturing
+origin, defiling, like our own Colebrook Dale, a lovely country by its
+smoke and stench, and leaving hardly one of the five senses unmolested.
+Those fine buildings of which it can boast, take their place amid the
+general mass, like a fastidious courtier in low company,</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Wondering how the devil they came there."
+</p>
+<p>
+Whereas the elegant theatre of Bordeaux appears just in its proper
+situation, and supported by suitable accompaniments of well-dressed
+people and airy streets. After the sight of the H&ocirc;tel Dieu, a standing
+proof that the Lyonnese can employ their money laudably and well, I will
+not pretend to judge whether there is any truth in the charge of avarice
+brought against them, and which Voltaire slyly admits in a professed
+eulogium on Lyons. There are other reasons accounting in a degree for
+its inferiority to Bordeaux in appearance, and the sordid impression
+which it leaves on the mind. In the first place, to judge from the
+innumerable quantities of villas of all sizes within reach of the town,
+it seems that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span> the rich Lyonnese appreciate their fine environs as they
+deserve, and consider the country as the scene of display and enjoyment,
+while they treat Lyons as a mere counting-house. On the contrary, the
+villas in the neighbourhood of Bordeaux appear comparatively few, and
+business and pleasure to unite in the town itself. The imagination also
+may have some share in giving the preference, particularly after
+reading<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a> M. de Ruffigny's tirade against his infantine life in the
+silk mills of Lyons. One fancies the merchant conversant with a higher
+and less sordid class of persons and details than the master spinner,
+and vineyards more agreeable objects than dying-houses and treddles. Be
+this as it may, appearances are certainly in favour of Bordeaux as the
+second city in France.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_IV" id="CHAP_IV"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. IV</a></h2>
+
+<h3>LYONS TO MONTELIMART.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May</span> 7.&mdash;From Lyons to St. Symphorien, our breakfast-stage, twelve miles.
+For the first seven, the outskirts of Lyons, extending along the western
+bank of the Rhone, continue to exhibit one unvarying appearance of
+wealth and population. The Archbishop's palace, which stands about two
+miles out of the city, on a hill overlooking the river, does not add
+much to the beauty of the country, as it strongly resembles a large
+manufactory. St. Symphorien, a neat small town, marked by a ruined
+watch-tower to the left of the road, possesses no inn at which a
+tolerable breakfast can be procured; but we fared well, in this respect,
+at a coffee-house in the middle of the town, situated under the Mairie.
+To Vienne, nine miles more. During this stage, the Alps become again
+visible in full majesty, from a high terrace overlooking a range of
+woody rising ground; and extend as far as the eye can reach from north
+to south. Mont Blanc and Monte Viso, the Gog and Magog of this gigantic
+chain, preserve their pre-eminence; the distant pyramid of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span> latter,
+which shoots into the clouds like the Peak of Teneriffe, from a cluster
+of lower mountains, contrasting with the massy dome of the former. From
+its figure and position in the map, I judged it could be no other than
+Monte Viso, which is so strikingly conspicuous on the road from Coni to
+Turin. Mont Pilate, towards the foot of which the Rhone wound to the
+right, sinks into utter insignificance when compared with these Alps,
+though of a height and grandeur which would render it a leading feature
+in Wales or Cumberland. It is considered in this neighbourhood as stored
+with rich specimens of botany, and its appearance, much less scorched
+and barren than the mountains of a southern climate usually are, renders
+this probable.</p>
+
+<p>The view of Vienne, as you descend into the narrow green valley in which
+it is situated, crowned by the dark ruins of an old Roman castle, and
+watered by a deep and rapid reach of the Rhone, combines beauties
+calculated to please all tastes. On the opposite side of the river,
+overlooking the ruins of a bridge with which it probably once
+communicated as a guard-house, stands a tall, square, Roman tower,
+called the Tour<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> de Mauconseil. The legends of the country affirm,
+that this was the abode of Pontius Pilate,<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> and that, in a fit of
+despair and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span> frenzy, he threw himself from its windows into the Rhone,
+where he perished. This point the good Catholics must settle as they can
+with the Swiss, who maintain that he drowned himself in a little Alpine
+lake on the mountain which bears his name; and that the storms by which
+it is frequently agitated are occasioned by the writhings of his
+perturbed spirit. Nothing shows more forcibly the power of association
+in minds not capable of discriminating, than that the name of a man so
+obviously a reluctant instrument in the hands of God, and who declared
+by a public act his abhorrence of the part he was forced to act, should
+be selected as synonymous to every thing fiendlike and murderous.</p>
+
+<p>The cathedral of Vienne was shut, and its external appearance did not
+tempt us to make further inquiries; but we were directed to a Roman
+temple, which, like that at Nismes, is called the Maison Carr&eacute;e. It can
+only boast of the remains of lofty pilasters, and the marks of what was
+once an inscription; and the inside being converted into a
+paltry-looking palais de justice, will hardly repay the trouble of
+waiting for the concierge. We departed from Vienne with too unfavourable
+an impression of its dirty inn, and of the place in general, to render
+us desirous of spending the night there. The squalid, dispiriting
+appearance of the town itself, indeed, forms a strong contrast both to
+the fine country in which it stands, and the capital letters which
+decorate its name in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span> map of France. Instead of loitering in its
+smoky, desolate streets, while horses are changing, I should recommend
+the traveller to walk on and await their arrival at the Aiguille, an old
+Roman monument so called, which stands close to the road on the right,
+within about a mile of the town. This singular pyramidical relic
+commands a beautiful view of the Rhone, winding into the sequestered
+vallies at the foot of Mont Pilate; and the variety of coins and other
+small relics, found there, indicate the ancient boundaries of the city
+as extensive, and comprising both this building and the temple
+above-mentioned; The inhabitants, forgetting that a person once set
+afloat "in the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone," would probably find no
+grave but the gulf of Lyons, have denominated this building the tomb of
+Pilate.</p>
+
+<p>Near Vienne the country of silk-worms begins, every tree almost being a
+mulberry; and on the steep hills, which inclose the channel of the Rhone
+during two days journey from this town, the celebrated Cote-Roti wine is
+chiefly produced. The vineyards are in the highest state of cultivation;
+and, as in Burgundy also, the nature and position of the soil seem to
+operate as a forcing-wall upon the vines, which had, at this early
+season, made immense shoots from their knotty close-pruned stumps. Here
+I frequently observed the industrious expedient practised in many parts
+of Valencia and Catalonia.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span> On the steepest parts of the hills, terraces
+above terraces, of loose stones, are built to secure and consolidate the
+scanty portion of earth which would otherwise be washed away from the
+roots of their vines by the first winter storm; and not a spot is
+neglected, however unpromising and difficult of access, where a
+barrow-full of mould can be raked together, and increased by
+hand-carriage. One cannot witness such industry without wishing that it
+could procure more of the comforts of life; but here, as in Burgundy,
+the exertions of the inhabitants seem hardly repaid by a bare
+subsistence, if one may judge by the general appearance of their houses
+and persons. Those travellers who have not yet learned to button
+themselves up in total indifference, will find, that the interest and
+pleasure derived from a tour depend on nothing more than on the apparent
+well-being of those whom they see around them. It is this circumstance
+which, viewed in the mind's eye, throws a perpetual sunshine over the
+fine scenes of Tuscany and Catalonia, and lends a charm even to the flat
+uninteresting corn-fields of Picardy. The absence of it, on the
+contrary, disfigures the finest scenes in the south of Italy, and causes
+Naples, the most delightful spot on earth, perhaps, for situation and
+climate, to dwell on the recollection like a whited sepulchre, a gilded
+lazar-house of helpless and incurable wretchedness. A Roman beggar,
+glaring at you from the arches of a ruined temple, like one of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span> Salvator
+Rosa's Radicals, with a look at once abject and ferocious, may be,
+perhaps, a characteristic accompaniment to the scene; but the active,
+erect walk, the frank countenance, and cheerful salutation of a peasant
+of the Val d'Arno, leave a more pleasing recollection on the mind, as
+connected with the ideas of comfort, manliness, and independence.</p>
+
+<p>About five miles from Vienne, we ascended a steep hill to the left,
+leaving on the opposite side of the Rhone a well-wooded ch&acirc;teau,
+belonging to a Mons. d'Arangues; which forms a good accompaniment to the
+view of Mont Pilate. By the road side was a very primitive mill, near
+which we saw a woman sifting corn as we walked up the hill. The corn is
+laid in the circular trough, and ground by a stone revolving round the
+shaft in the centre; which is probably worked by an ass. Such little
+circumstances as these frequently remind us more strongly of the change
+of place, than the difference of language and costume, which we are
+prepared to witness in the different provinces of a wide empire.
+Nothing, for instance, forms a stronger or more distinct feature in
+one's recollections of the south of France, than the enormous remises
+which are annexed to every paltry inn on the road from Lyons to the
+southward, and which serve both as warehouse and stable to the hosts of
+stout Proven&ccedil;al carriers, who travel with wine, oil, and merchandise to
+the interior.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span> The remise at Vienne was sixty feet square, without
+compartment; its roof-timbers were worthy of Westminster Hall, and for
+its folding doors</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The gates wide open stood,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">That with extended wings a banner'd host,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Under spread ensigns marching, might pass through,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With horse and chariots ranked in loose array;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">So wide they stood!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Independent of the uses to which these capacious buildings are properly
+applied, they furnish the most agreeable place for rest and refreshment,
+during the heat of the day, being, as the traveller will frequently
+experience, the coolest and the sweetest place belonging to the inn.</p>
+
+<p>During the rest of our day's journey, nothing occurred worthy of
+attention, until the descent into Peage de Rousillon, where we slept.
+Here the Rhone, of which we had lost sight, again appears winding
+through the broad rich valley which opens at the foot of the hill; and
+Mont Pilate also, after you have lost sight of it for the last seven or
+eight miles, and expect to see it behind you, again makes its appearance
+at a distance seemingly undiminished. So difficult is it to judge of the
+real bearings of objects in this clear air, which in fact is less
+favourable to the display of the grander features of nature, than our
+own misty Ossianic climate.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>Our inn at Peage de Rousillon, although the only place in the
+neighbourhood at which we could have slept in any comfort, somewhat
+resembled, in its general style, those recorded in Don Quixote, and
+afforded similar adventures. In the midst of our supper, (which was by
+no means a bad one of the kind), in burst a fat German woman in a
+transport of fury, who thought herself ill-used in the allotment of the
+rooms; squabbling in a very discordant key with the landlady, who
+followed her "blaspheming an octave higher." Both were apparently
+viragos of the first order, and the keen encounter of their wits was so
+loud, that we turned a deaf ear to the German's appeal, and insisted on
+their choosing another field of battle. Battle however was the order of
+the day, or rather night, for both myself and my servant were roused in
+the middle of the night to put a stop to a drunken quarrel on the
+staircase, which we effected by ordering down stairs the Maritornes, who
+proved the bone of contention. The H&ocirc;tel du Grand Monarque, is evidently
+on a par with that class of inns in our English country towns, which
+bear the royal badge of the George and Dragon, through some fatality
+attendant on high names and dignities.</p>
+
+<p>From Peage de Rousillon to St. Vallier, you traverse eighteen miles of
+flat road, only enlivened by the hills to the right of the Rhone, which,
+becoming gradually more rocky and abrupt, meet at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span> length with a
+corresponding barrier on the left, and enclose the river in a narrow
+valley. Just beyond its entrance, which we had distinguished from above
+Peage de Rousillon, stands the town of St. Vallier, where the conducteur
+intended that we should breakfast. The H&ocirc;tel de Poste is a most dismal
+hole indeed, in every respect, and no appearance of any other inn: but
+soon after we learnt by experience, that wherever there is a caf&eacute; of
+tolerable appearance, it affords a much better chance for breakfast than
+any inn of the same rank. Neatness is the more the trade of the
+caf&ecirc;tier, and his notions of breakfast much more English, than those of
+the inn-keeper, who is usually put completely out of his way by our
+habits.</p>
+
+<p>"Eh! Messieurs," said a well-dressed bourgeoise, who saw us sauntering
+about near the door of her shop, "vous irez sans doute voir notre beau
+ch&acirc;teau: il fut donn&eacute; par Jean de Poitiers au premier Seigneur de St.
+Vallier, et il a descendu jusqu'&agrave; Mons. de St. Vallier l'actuel
+proprietaire." Nothing could be more acceptable to idle wanderers than
+this information, and off we set at a round pace up a most filthy
+street, according to our directions; our heads full of crenelles,
+pont-levis, donjon, fosse, and the proper etceteras. I am not sure that
+we did not half expect to meet M. de St. Vallier himself, (a good
+baronial name) cap-a-pie at the barbacan gate, his lance in rest, and
+his visor down, like Sir Boucicault,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span> or the Lord de Roye, or the
+doughtiest of Froissart's heroes. A long white-washed mud wall, with
+green folding gates, began somewhat to cool our Gothic
+enthusiasm&mdash;. "Perhaps the portcullis was destroyed at the Revolution." A
+bell hung at the gate. "Pshaw, it ought at least to have been a
+bugle-horn." When we had rung, instead of sounding a blast, not a dwarf,
+but a slipshod dirty girl, not much bigger, opened the door cautiously.
+"Il ne faut pas entrer: Monsieur ne permet personne de voir le ch&acirc;teau."
+We made involuntarily two steps forward; when lo! the end of a modern
+house, with a pea-green door and sash windows, and a shrubbery of lilacs
+interspersed with Lombardy poplars, blasted our sight. No longer
+ambitious of pursuing the lord of St. Vallier in flank, we hoped at
+least that a front view of his castle from the road to Avignon might
+afford some remains of feudal splendour. Off we set accordingly, and
+emerging from the dirty town as quickly as possible, beheld on turning
+round!&mdash;a large modern front, in the full smile of complacent ugliness,
+with a Grecian portico, not of masonry, but of red and yellow paint &agrave; la
+Lyonnaise; the whole edifice quite worthy of the Hermitage du Mont d'Or.
+The two short round towers on the sides might have been originally
+Gothic; but if really so, they had been most effectually disguised by
+white-washing, and new tiled tops, which very much resembled Grimaldi's
+red cap and his whited face. In front of the windows, instead of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span> the
+sweeping lawns and dark avenues of which Mrs. Ratcliffe is so liberal,
+stood a large close-pruned vineyard, inclosed by a high white wall; at
+one end of which, and facing the front of his red and yellow ch&acirc;teau, M.
+de St. Vallier had built a red and yellow summer-house, with green
+shutters, to keep it in countenance. Very much diverted at our ludicrous
+disappointment, we sauntered along the road, which followed the course
+of the Rhone. At two miles distance, just where the river winds with a
+broad and rapid sweep into a woody gorge, with one blue mountain peeping
+over it, a black venerable old ruin, with turret and watch-tower, and
+every thing to render it complete, stood cresting an abrupt rock which
+hung over the river. Nothing, said I, shall persuade me that this castle
+is not the genuine gift of John of Poitiers, and the real object of our
+search. Down we sat at all events to sketch it, and meeting by good
+fortune a communicative young officer on the road, we learnt that this
+castle, called<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> Ch&acirc;teau la Serve, had in reality been the residence
+of the lords of St. Vallier; that many years ago it had been reduced by
+an accidental fire to its present state, and was finally wrested from
+the family at the Revolution. Of the present Ch&acirc;teau St. Vallier, and
+the estate annexed, they have remained in uninterrupted possession; and
+all admirers of the Gothic must rejoice that the ruin has been
+purchased<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span> by the commune of La Serve: for, standing as it does within
+view of the new ch&acirc;teau, no doubt it would have been brought to the
+state of that delectable domicile by the aid of the trowel and
+paint-brush.</p>
+
+<p>From La Serve to Tain, the same style of country continues, without much
+alteration. The utmost exertions of the inhabitants seem necessary to
+struggle against the stony ungenial nature of the soil; and a black
+storm which was rolling to the right over Mont Pilate, appeared to
+menace the scanty crops of vines which their labour had produced. In
+every hamlet we heard the bells ringing, and saw the poor peasants
+crowding to the church to put up prayers against the coming hail, which
+at this season of the year is peculiarly fatal. If this be a
+superstition, it is surely not a contemptible or uninteresting one to
+witness: nor can one wonder at the influence gained over peasants thus
+instructed to associate Heaven with their daily hopes and fears. To our
+great satisfaction, after two or three vivid flashes of lightning, the
+clouds broke away to the north-west, and a light rain fell partially,
+more beneficial to the parched vineyards than hurtful to the hay, which
+even at this early season was in great forwardness in most places. On
+the whole, I should say that the district lying fifty miles south of
+Lyons, is a month more early than our own in point of climate and
+productions.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>At Tain, the Rhone forces for itself a narrow passage into the vale of
+Valence, from among the rugged skirts of Mont Pilate, leaving on the one
+side Tain, and on the other Tournon; both backed by strong heights,
+which seem to guard the entrance of the defile. The situation of Tournon
+is striking, and very much corresponds with the ideas which one forms of
+a strong baronial hold upon the Rhine. A large portion of the
+precipitous hill which commands it, is connected with the town by a
+broken line of grim old walls and towers, which betoken the former
+importance of this position. Its castle, a building of a heavy
+conventual style of architecture, and standing on a fortified terrace,
+formerly belonged to the Prince de Soubisc, but is now converted, as we
+were informed, into a prison. To this purpose it is well adapted, as a
+leap from one of the round towers which breast the river at the angles
+of its terrace, would be fatal; and the character of despotism impressed
+on its walls seems to say, that in former times its uses were not very
+different. The resemblance indeed which it bears to the Ch&acirc;teau
+d'Amboise on the Loire, the scene of the Duke de Guise's murder, may
+possibly assist its effect on the imagination.</p>
+
+<p>On issuing from this gloomy but not uninteresting spot, the eye opens
+upon an extensive prospect, rich in many of those features which we find
+scattered through the works of Claude and Salvator. To the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span> right, the
+hills which hung<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> over the road to Tain, recede into a long
+perspective, terminated in the distance by a ruined castle on a
+pyramidical rock, near Valence; and the Rhone, following the same
+direction, winds away from the road in a slower and wider current than
+before. To the left, the outskirts of the Dauphin&eacute; Alps form a
+singularly wild and fantastic barrier, sometimes rising in abrupt
+pinnacles, and sometimes rent as if by an earthquake into precipices of
+some thousand feet of sheer perpendicular descent. The vale inclosed
+between these rough walls, and in the centre of which the Isere unites
+itself to the Rhone, appears a perfect garden in point of richness,
+cheerfulness, and high cultivation. We crossed the Isere, a strong and
+rapid stream, by a ferry, for our Itineraire, with its usual accuracy,
+forgot to mention that the bridge of which it speaks was broken down by
+Augereau on the advance of the Austrians. Within two or three miles of
+Valence, a rising ground, fringed with scattered oak underwood, affords
+a more distinct and striking semicircular view of the mountains to the
+left; and glimpses of others yet more distant, bordering an immense
+plain, through which the Rhone takes its course towards Avignon.</p>
+
+<p>As we approached Valence, the ancient Civitas Valentinorum, we again
+observed the ruined castle<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span> which we had at first remarked, called
+Ch&acirc;teau Crussol. It stands on a conical cliff on the opposite side of
+the river, overlooking the town at about two cannon-shots distance. On
+inquiring into the history of this eagle's nest, we found that it had
+been in days of yore the fortress of a petty free-booting chieftain, who
+kept the inhabitants of Valence in a perpetual state of war and
+annoyance; a history which almost appears fabricated to suit its
+appearance and character. It bears a very strong resemblance, in point
+of situation, to the ruin within a mile of Massa di Carrara; which the
+tradition of the peasants assigns as the abode of Castruccio Castracani,
+the scourge of the Pisans. Seeing it relieved by a gleam of sunshine
+from a dark evening cloud behind it, we could fancy, without any great
+effort of imagination, that, like the bed-ridden Giant Pope in honest
+John Bunyan, it was grinning a ghastly smile of envy at the prosperity
+which it could no longer interrupt. Or, if this idea should seem
+extravagant, at least the two opposite neighbours present as lively a
+personification as stone and mortar can afford, of their respective
+inhabitants; the town of Valence flourishing in industrious
+cheerfulness, and the castle domineering, savage, poverty-stricken, and
+formed only for purposes of plunder and mischief.</p>
+
+<p>In the suburbs of Valence we found an excellent inn, called the Croix
+d'Or, worthy to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span> be recommended both for comfort, civility, and fair
+charges. A walk into the town of Valence itself has very little in it to
+repay the traveller, with the exception of the Champ de Mars, a sort of
+public garden bordering on the Rhone. Certainly no place ever united
+such a degree of dirt and closeness to so smiling an exterior. Its old
+Gothic walls still remain, and the streets therefore are probably built
+on the same scale as in those times when they crowded together for
+security against feudal aggressors.</p>
+
+<p>May 9.&mdash;To Loriol five miles. The road passes through a country as
+beautiful and diversified as before, seldom deviating above a mile or
+two from the course of the river: corn and hay-fields, the latter fit
+for cutting, mulberry, almond, and fig-trees, cover every inch of
+ground. About a mile before we reached Loriol, and just after passing a
+small town called Livron, we crossed the Drome, over a noble bridge of
+three arches, constructed of a rough sort of whitish marble, and
+reminding us somewhat of a reduced section of the Strand bridge. Its
+massy solidity is not misplaced, as a view up the mountain glen to the
+left of it convinced us. Though the river was at this time low, the
+immense extent of dry beds of gravel showed what its volume and force
+must be when swoln by rain; and the cluster of gloomy mountains which
+close the valley from whence it issues, seem the perpetual abode of
+storms. In one of them I recognised the Montagne de Midi,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span> whose form is
+so remarkably perpendicular when seen from Tain; and altogether, I have
+no idea of forms more wild and extraordinary upon so large a scale. The
+rocks of St. Michel, in Savoy, near St. Jean de Maurienne, are a
+miniature resemblance of them; but a better idea as to size and
+wildness, may be formed by those who recollect the mountains of Nant
+Francon, in Wales, and can imagine them not yet settled into place,
+after the first confusion of the Titanic war.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Scilicet, atque Oss&acirc; frondosum involvere Olympum;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Ter pater exstructos dejecit fulmine montes."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The view is worth several hours of an artist's time, and its effect is
+considerably increased by a solitary tower, resembling a moss-trooper's
+abode, which stands in the middle distance. It is called, as we
+understood, the Ch&acirc;teau de Crest, and is the relic of a state prison. On
+passing a corner of rising ground this wild valley disappears, and the
+same rich and cheerful country as has been already described
+recommences. The same unbroken rocky barrier bounds the Rhone on the
+right, while in front numberless peaks of very distant mountains become
+visible over the plain through which its windings are traced.</p>
+
+<p>The neat-looking inn at Loriol probably affords<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span> better breakfasts than
+the caf&eacute;, which, in spite of its neat outside, is dirty and imposing, an
+exception to the usual rule.</p>
+
+<p>To Montelimart fifteen miles: the first three we walked, and rested on a
+rising ground, commanding in each direction a long day's journey through
+this fine district. Our walk perhaps made us relish the more a bottle of
+the vin du pays, which Derbieres, a little village a mile or two farther
+on, afforded; but I have no doubt that worse is sold in Paris at seven
+or eight francs a bottle, under the name of pink champagne: it is at
+least worth the while of any thirsty traveller to try the experiment, if
+it were merely for the sake of the civil old landlady of the little inn.
+We could obtain no information from her respecting the history of a
+singular ruin on the opposite side of the river, excepting that it was
+called Ch&acirc;teau Crucis, and about seven hundred years ago was an abbey.
+Somewhat beyond this black pile stand two or three pyramidical rocks,
+projecting from the general line of hills, the same probably which the
+French Itineraire mentions as commanding a celebrated view, and
+exhibiting in themselves a geological curiosity. I doubt, however,
+whether any person would do well to cross the Rhone to explore them,
+upon the mere credit of that wise octavo.</p>
+
+<p>Montelimart is a large old town, the ancient<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span> fortifications of which,
+as of Valence, remain in perfect preservation. The approach to it from
+Loriol gives by no means so favourable an idea of it as it deserves; and
+to estimate its beauties fully, it is necessary to visit the citadel,
+now used as a prison, which stands on a height above the town.<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> The
+view which it commands is uniformly mountainous in the back grounds, and
+flat and rich in its nearer details; but the finest part of it is
+towards the east. The snowy Alps near Grenoble, and the line of
+mountains from whence the Drome issues, and at whose foot Ch&acirc;teau
+Grignan is situated, are its prominent features; and the little
+farm-houses and tufts of trees in the rich pasture grounds which
+intervene, seem disposed by the hand of a painter.</p>
+
+<p>Not to omit the luxuries of the palate as well as those of the eye, it
+is worth while to procure at Montelimart a wedge or two of the nogaux,
+or almond-cakes, which Miss Plumptre so particularly recommends. The
+genuine sort is as glutinous as pitch, and made in moulds, from whence
+it is cut like portable soup; and the makers at Montelimart, like the
+rusk-bakers of Kidderminster, have, I understand, refused a large sum
+for the receipt. Another of the good things of Provence, to which Miss
+Plumptre's Tour introduced us, was the confiture de menage, or fruit
+boiled up with grape juice instead of sugar.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span> This is a preserve which
+you meet with in most of the commonest inns, but which is so easily made
+and little esteemed, that they do not bring it without a particular
+order. It is very much like asking for treacle at an English inn;
+nevertheless I, for my part, felt obliged to the fair tourist for an
+information which has served to mend many a bad breakfast; and a bad
+breakfast, as the world doth know, is the stumbling-block, or the
+grumbling-stock, of most Englishmen, travelled or untravelled.</p>
+
+<p>The inn at Montelimart is excellent; but Madame must not be left to make
+her own charges. We should, however, have parted from her in good
+humour, had not her avarice affected persons less able to help
+themselves. The poor maid, who appeared jaded to the bone, confessed
+that her mistress detained half her etrennes, and I have reason to
+believe that she spoke truth.</p>
+
+<p>To the classical ground of Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, which we visited next day, I
+shall devote a separate chapter.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_V" id="CHAP_V"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. V</a></h2>
+
+<h3>CH&Acirc;TEAU GRIGNAN.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May</span> 10.&mdash;This was the day of the greatest interest and fatigue which we
+had as yet passed; and moreover afforded us a tolerably accurate idea,
+at the risk of our bones, of the nature of French crossroads. Having
+understood that the road from Montelimart to Grignan was inaccessible to
+four-wheeled carriages, we set off at four in the morning in a patache,
+the most genteel description of one-horse chair which the town afforded.
+Let no one imagine that a patache bears that relation to a cabriolet
+which a dennet does to a tilbury; for ours, at least, would in England
+have been called a very sorry higgler's cart. The inside accommodations
+were so arranged, that we sat back to back, and nearly neck and heels
+together, after swarming up a sort of dresser or sounding-board in the
+rear, which afforded the most practicable entrance. "Mais montez,
+montez, Messieurs, vous y serez parfaitement bien,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span> quoth our civil
+conducteur, haranguing, handing, and shoving at the same time. The
+alacrity with which he and his merry little dog Carlin did the honours
+of the vehicle, and the stout active appearance of the horse (to say
+nothing of the whim of the moment, and the fine morning), reconciled us
+to a mode of conveyance no better than that which calves enjoy in a
+butcher's cart; and for the first few miles we forgot even the want of
+springs.</p>
+
+<p>After travelling a league or two, the road began to wind into the
+outskirts of the range of mountains which we had first seen from Tain,
+and reminded us, in its general features, of some of the most
+sequestered parts of South Wales. The soil is generally poor, but
+derives an appearance of verdure and cheerfulness from the large walnut
+and mulberry-trees which shade the road, and the stunted oak copses
+through which it occasionally winds. We passed an extensive pile of
+building, of a character which we had not before observed, consisting of
+a number of small awkwardly-contrived rooms, without any uniformity,
+piled like so many inhabited buttresses against the outside and inside
+of a circular wall. This, it seems, is the property and habitation of
+one person, a M. Dilateau; but it certainly has more the appearance of
+the residence of a whole Birkbeck colony, each back-settler established
+in his own nook, amid the contents of his travelling waggon. A little
+farther, on the summit of a bare<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span> rocky ridge to the left, stands a
+castle of a more Gothic character, but equally uncouth and comfortless.
+It was demolished, as we understood, at the time of the Revolution; but
+in its best days must have been but a wretched residence, as no trace
+remains within many hundred yards of it, of any soil where tree or
+garden could have stood. To the genuine admirers of Mad. de Sevign&eacute;,
+however, even these cheerless mountain holds present an interesting
+object, as having been peopled by the honest country families whose
+ceremonious visits to Grignan afforded her many a good-natured
+laugh.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a> Or to treat the Ch&acirc;teau Race-du-fort (for such we understood
+to be the name of this last castle) with more respect, we may fancy its
+proprietor sallying forth, like old Hardyknute, at the head of his armed
+sons and servants, to join the seven hundred country gentlemen who
+volunteered their services, with the Count de Grignan at their head, in
+besieging the rebellious town of Orange.</p>
+
+<p>We found it necessary, both from common consideration for the
+patache-horse, and our own necks, to walk up the two miles of steep
+ascent, which occur after passing this last castle. On the top of the
+hill all vegetation appears to cease, excepting a few shrubby dwarf
+firs, and a profusion of aromatic plants, such as juniper, lavender,
+southernwood, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span> wild thyme, which delight in the stony hot-bed
+afforded by the interstices of disjointed rocks. The view from the high
+table of ground to which we climbed at length fully repaid our
+exertions, and may be almost compared, for extent and beauty, to those
+from the church of Fourvi&egrave;res, and the Montagne de Rochepot. Towards the
+north we surveyed not only the valleys of Montelimart and the Drome, but
+nearly the whole of the route of the three preceding days, bordered on
+the one side by the abrupt and lofty mountains, from which the latter
+river takes its source, and on the other by the steep banks of the
+Rhone. On proceeding a little farther, over a road which consisted of
+the native rock in all its native inequality, we caught sight of the
+Comtat Grignan, and the great plain of Avignon, into which that district
+opens in a south-western direction, flanked on the east by a colossal
+Alp, called Mont Ventou, on whose long ridge traces of snow were still
+visible. In the centre of the Comtat,<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a>Ch&acirc;teau Grignan is easily
+distinguished by the grandeur of its outline and proportions, and the
+tall insulated rock on which it stands, somewhat resembling that on
+which Windsor Castle is situated, though inferior in size. Its effect is
+somewhat heightened by several other smaller crags at different
+distances, which thrust themselves through the scanty stratum of soil,
+each crowned with a solitary tower, or little<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span> fortalice. In the feudal
+days of the Adhemars, ancestors of the Grignan family, who possessed the
+whole of the Comtat, these were probably the peel-houses, or outposts,
+of the old Ch&acirc;teau, in the quarter from which it would have been most
+exposed to attack. The Ch&acirc;teau Race-du-fort was, in all likelihood, also
+the key of the mountain glen leading to the hill which we were
+descending, and formed the line of communication with Montelimart, which
+was formerly included in the family territory. The records on this
+subject trace the foundation of the lordship of Grignan up to the days
+of Charlemagne, who is said to have created Adhemar,<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> one of his
+paladins, Duke of Genoa, as a reward for having re-conquered Corsica
+from the Saracens. Adhemar having fallen in a second expedition against
+the same enemy, his children divided his possessions: the elder
+remaining Duke of Genoa, another possessing the towns of St. Paul de
+Trois Ch&acirc;teau et Mondragon; and a third, the sovereignty of Orange. A
+fourth possessed the town of Monteil, called after him Monteil Adhemar,
+or Montelimart; and in 1160, the emperor Frederic I. granted to Gerard
+Adhemar de Monteil, his descendant and heir, the investiture of Grignan,
+with many sovereign rights, such as that of coining money. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span> was to
+this noble family that the Count de Grignan, whose third wife was the
+daughter of Madame de Sevign&eacute;, traced his blood and inheritance in a
+direct line.</p>
+
+<p>As we reached the level of the plain, and approached the castle, its
+commanding height and structure seemed completely to justify Mad. de
+S.'s expression to her daughter, "Votre ch&acirc;teau vraiment royal." Few
+subjects certainly ever had such a residence as this; which, though
+reduced to a mere shell by the ravages of the Revolution, still seems to
+bespeak the hospitable and chivalrous character of its former possessor.
+It rises from a terrace of more than a hundred feet in height, partly
+composed of masonry, and partly of the solid rock. The town of Grignan,
+piled tier above tier, occupies a considerable declivity at the foot of
+this terrace, and communicates with the castle by a road which winds
+round the ascent, and terminates in a massy gateway.</p>
+
+<p>On entering the town, we were directed to the Bons Enfans, kept by a man
+of the name of Peyrol; which, contrary to the expectations we had
+naturally formed of an inn not much frequented, provided us with a
+breakfast, which even the editor of honest Blackwood would delight to
+describe in all its minuti&aelig;, for it was quite Scotch in variety and
+excellence, and served up with great cleanliness. It<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span> may be well to
+remark, that as far as I could judge from the appearance of the rooms, a
+family might spend two or three days here without sacrificing their
+comfort to their curiosity, and would be as well off as at the Quatre
+Nations at Massa, or the Tre Maschere at Caffagiolo, the models of
+little country inns. Our host, we found, was entrusted with the
+privilege of showing the castle by the Count de Muy, in whose family he
+had been a servant; and he accordingly accompanied us in our visit
+thither. On gaining the level of the terrace, we found the wind, which
+had been imperceptible in the town, blowing with such force, as to
+account for<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> Mad. de Sevign&eacute;'s fears lest her daughter should be
+carried away from her "belle terrasse" by the force of the Bise. Persons
+travelling to the south of France for the sake of health, should be
+particularly on their guard against this violent and piercing wind, as
+well as that called the Mistral; both of which are occasionally
+prevalent in this country at most seasons of the year, and render warm
+clothing adviseable. I shall quote, as illustrative of the power with
+which the Bise blows, an extract from a letter by an intelligent
+traveller,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span> written previous to the destruction of Ch&acirc;teau Grignan: "En
+faisant le tour du Ch&acirc;teau, je remarquais avec surprise que les v&icirc;tres
+du cot&eacute; du nord &eacute;taient presque toutes bris&eacute;es, tandis que celles des
+autres faces &eacute;taient enti&egrave;res. On me dit, que c'&eacute;tait la Bise qui les
+cassait; cela me parut incroyable; je parlai &agrave; d'autres personnes, qui
+me firent la m&ecirc;me reponse: et je fus enfin forc&eacute; de le croire. La Bise y
+souffle avec une telle violence, qu'elle enleve le gravier de la
+terrasse, et le lance jusqu'au second &eacute;tage, avec assez de force pour
+casser les v&icirc;tres." From the violence of the Bise wind this morning, and
+my subsequent experience of its force at Beaucaire, I have but little
+difficulty in believing this account; and conceive that the danger of
+yielding to the occasional temptation of heat, and wearing light
+clothing, cannot be too strongly insisted on in this country. Persons,
+indeed, who have not visited the south of France, connect its very name
+with the idea of uniform mildness; but in reality, its caprices render
+it, without proper caution, a more dangerous climate than our own.</p>
+
+<p>On advancing to the balustrades of what appeared a projecting part of
+the terrace, we were surprised to find that it formed one of the towers
+of the lofty church of Grignan, on the top of which, as on a massy
+buttress, we were standing. A trap-door, formed by a moveable paving
+stone, admitted us upon the leads of the church, which are secured from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
+the effects of weather by the additional casing which the terrace
+affords. Its interior communicates with the lower rooms of the castle by
+a passage, terminating in a stone gallery, where from its height above
+the body of the church, the family could hear mass unperceived, as in a
+private oratory. The establishment of this church, founded entirely at
+the private expense of the Count de Grignan's ancestors, was very rich,
+and consisted of a deanery, twenty-one canonries, and a numerous and
+well-appointed choir. From its lofty proportions, I should suppose that
+the internal decorations had also been costly; but much mischief, we
+were informed, had been done to it during the time of the Revolution by
+the same troop of brigands which burnt the castle, and which consisted
+of the refuse of the neighbouring towns, countenanced by the
+revolutionary committee of Orange. With a natural aversion to every
+thing noble, these ragamuffins directed their outrages particularly
+against the statue of the founder of the church, whose grim black trunk
+stands in the vestibule, deprived of its head. One almost regrets that
+the figure did not possess the miraculous power of revenge which the
+corpse of Campeador<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> exerted when the Jew plucked his beard, and fall
+headlong of its own accord into the thick of its assailants. The remains
+of Mad. de Sevign&eacute;, and of the Grignan family, however, were safe from
+their violence, as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span> the adherents of the castle had taken the precaution
+of changing the position of the flat black stone inscribed with the name
+of the former, which marked the entrance of the family vault; and which
+has since been restored to its original place. The inscription on this
+stone, which stands, a little to the right of the communion-table, is
+simply, "Cy git Marie de Rabutin Chautal, Marquise de Sevign&eacute;;" the date
+of her death, April 14, 1696, annexed. Such a name, in truth, does not
+need the assistance of owl-winged cherubs, brawny Fames, and blubbering
+Cupids, those frequent appendages of departed vanity and selfishness;
+which would have been probably as repugnant to the wishes of the good
+marchioness, as inconsistent with her simple and unassuming character.</p>
+
+<p>To return to the subject of the revolution, as it affected Ch&acirc;teau
+Grignan. Miss Plumptre, a writer of much research and general accuracy,
+and whose book would furnish twenty gentlemen-tourists with good
+materials, has, I believe, been misled as to one circumstance, the
+disinterment of Mad. de Sevign&eacute;, which, as far we could ascertain by
+inquiry, never took place from causes to which I have just alluded. The
+silk wrapping-gown, the expression of the features, and the respect with
+which the brigands beheld the corpse, are circumstances which Miss
+Plumptre's French informant appears to have accumulated, "pour faire une
+sensation;" and, had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span> they taken place, our communicative guide, who was
+rather given to the melting mood, would have dwelt on them for the same
+purpose. They appear, however, to know nothing about the matter at
+Grignan, a place which Miss P. acknowledges herself never to have
+visited.</p>
+
+<p>The work of destruction was more complete in the castle than in the
+church. The Count de Muy, whose family had become possessed by purchase
+of this splendid pile of building, inhabited it for half the year, doing
+extensive good, if one may trust the partial account of his old servant,
+and maintaining a mode of living which would have done honour to a
+legitimate descendant of the Adhemars. Eighty-four lits de ma&icirc;tre, and
+servants' beds in proportion, were made up, we understood, during a
+visit paid to the count by the present king, then Count of Provence.
+These hospitable doings, however, were not to last long. The
+revolutionists broke into the castle, and having pillaged it of whatever
+they could turn to any use, burnt the remainder of the furniture,
+pictures, &amp;c., in the market-place, to the amount of 20,000 francs. One
+fellow, now residing at Montelimart, had the good taste to select for
+his share the dressing-glass and writing-table known as those of Mad. de
+Sevign&eacute;. The castle, which they set on fire, continued burning for two
+or three days: yet such was the solidity and goodness of the masonry,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>
+that an imposing mass still remains, sufficient to give an idea of what
+it must have once been.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">"Qualem te dicam bonam<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Antehac fuisse, tales cum sint reliqui&aelig;!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>As the terrace remains uninjured, and many of the walls are still
+perfect, the castle might be rendered again habitable at a comparatively
+reasonable expense. But the Count de Muy is seventy, has no children,
+and has lost 25,000 pounds per annum by the revolution; a combination of
+circumstances not very favourable to the spirit of improvement. "C'est
+l&agrave;," said Peyrol, pointing out a small house at the foot of the terrace,
+"c'est l&agrave; que demeure l'homme d'affaires de M. le Comte; il y vient tous
+les ans pour peu de jours; moi je lui fais son petit morceau; et souvent
+je le vois se promener sur cette belle terrasse, les larmes aux yeux;
+c'est que Monsieur aimait passionnement ce beau ch&acirc;teau. Ah, mon Dieu!
+&ccedil;a me fait pleurer; moi qui ai tout perdu; ma place, mon bon ma&icirc;tre, et
+puis je gagne le pain ici avec beaucoup de peine: cette pauvre ville est
+ab&icirc;m&eacute;e; nous avons perdu tous nos droits, notre bailliage, notre cour de
+justice, tout, tout&mdash;" &amp;c. Our host had apparently imbibed all his
+master's enthusiastic respect for the house of Grignan; for, finding
+that we had purposely deviated from our route to behold the residence of
+Mad. de Sevign&eacute;, his delight and loquacity appeared to know no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span> bounds.
+The space of years, and the succession of owners from the time of the
+good Marquise and her son-in-law, to that of his own master, seemed to
+have no place in his mind. He had her letters by heart, I believe, for
+he quoted them with great volubility and correctness, a-propos to almost
+every question which we asked; and seemed fairly to have worked himself,
+by their perusal, into the idea that he had seen and waited on her.
+"C'est ici qu'elle dormait; voil&agrave; le cabinet o&ugrave; elle &eacute;crivait ses
+lettres; c'est ici qu'elle prisait ses belles id&eacute;es." Nothing indeed
+could be more delightful, or more calculated to inspire fine ideas, than
+the situation of the ruined boudoir into which he conducted us at these
+words. It occupies one floor of a turret, about fifteen feet in
+diameter, and opens into the shell of a large bedchamber. Its large
+croisees, which look out in three directions, command an extensive
+bird's eye view of the Comtat Grignan, surmounted by the long Alpine
+ridge of Mont Ventou, and an amphitheatre of other smaller mountains:
+and enough remained of both apartments to give a full idea of the
+lightness and airiness of their situation, and of their former
+magnificence.</p>
+
+<p>The walls, on which some gilding still remained, the stone
+window-frames, and the chimney-pieces, were still entire. From the door,
+we looked out into the long gallery<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> built by the Count de Grignan,
+and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span> communicating with different suites of handsome rooms, or at least
+their remains. We explored them as far as was consistent with safety,
+and descended to the "belle terrasse," now over-run with weeds and
+lizards, in order to take<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> another survey of the castle, and form a
+general idea of the parts which we had separately visited. Though built
+at different periods of time, each part is in itself regular and
+handsome. The two grand fronts are the north and west, the former of
+which is represented in Mr. Cooke's first engraving of Grignan. The
+eastern part, facing Mont Ventou, is in a more ornamental style of
+architecture, somewhat resembling that of the inside square of the
+Louvre.<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> The southern part, affording a view of Mad. de Sevign&eacute;'s
+window, and of the collegiate church founded by the family, is
+represented in the second engraving, the subject of which was sketched
+on the road to La Palud, whither we were bound for the night. In our way
+thither, we made a short detour, accompanied by our host, to the Roche
+Courbiere, a natural excavation on the rock, within sight of the
+terrace, and to the left of the road. This cool retreat, it may be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>
+recollected, was discovered and chosen by Mad. de Sevign&eacute;, as a sort of
+summer pavilion; and was embellished by the Count de Grignan with a
+marble table, benches of stone, and a stone bason, which collected the
+filterings of a spring that took its source from this cavern. I have
+since seen a drawing made previous to the Revolution, which confirms
+Peyrol's account. Even this modest hermitage, however, was not spared by
+the systematic spite of the brigands who destroyed the castle. Only one
+stone bench remains; the table and bason are demolished, and the spring
+now oozes over the damp floor as it did in a state of nature. On
+returning from this spot to the road, we crossed an open common field on
+the south side of the castle, planted with corn, and apparently of a
+better quality than the land in its vicinity. "Voil&agrave; le jardin," said
+our guide; "c'&eacute;toit l&agrave; o&ugrave; il y avoit de ces belles figues, ces beaux
+melons, ce delicieux. Muscat dont Madame parle." The fine trees, which
+marked the limits of the garden, have all been cut down and burnt, with
+the exception of a row of old elms on the western side, forming part of
+the avenue which flanked the mail, or ball-alley, a constant appendage
+in days of old to the seats of French noblemen. The turf of the mail is
+even and soft still, and the wall on both sides tolerably perfect&mdash;"And
+now, Messieurs," said mine host, "you may tell your countrymen, that you
+have walked in the actual steps of the Marquise. C'est ici qu'elle
+jouoit au mail avec cette parfaite grace&mdash;et<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span> M. le Comte aussi&mdash;ah!
+c'&eacute;toit un plaisir de les voir." We hardly knew whether to laugh at, or
+be interested by the comical Quixotism of this man, who I verily believe
+had, by dint of residence on the spot, and thumbing constantly a dirty
+old edition of Madame's letters, worked himself up to the notion that he
+had witnessed the scenes which he described. We were induced, in the
+course of our walk, to inquire somewhat into his own history, which
+appeared rather a melancholy one, though common enough in the times
+through which he had lived. About a week after the pillage and
+destruction of Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, he was denounced as a royalist, and
+immured in the prison of Orange, in company with several gentlemen of
+the neighbourhood, acquaintances of his master. By means of a friend in
+the town, (for they were not all devils at Orange, as he emphatically
+assured us), he was enabled to procure a few common necessaries, to
+improve the scanty prison allowance of some of the more infirm; but his
+charitable labour soon ceased, for all were successively dispatched by
+the guillotine in a short space of time. In the course of three months,
+378 persons perished by decree of the miscreants composing the
+Revolutionary tribunal at Orange, whose names were Fauvette, Fonrosac,
+Meilleraye, Boisjavelle, Viotte, and Ben&ocirc;it Carat, the greffier. One of
+their first victims was an aged nun of the Simiane family, canoness of
+the convent of Bollene, accused of being a counter-revolutionist; so
+lame and infirm,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span> that her executioners were forced to carry her to the
+scaffold. Madame d'Ozanne, Marquise de Torignan, aged ninety-one, and
+her grand-daughter, a lovely young woman of twenty-two, perished in the
+same massacre. The personal beauty of the latter, which was much
+celebrated in the neighbourhood, had interested one of the brigands of
+Orange in her fate, who promised to exert his influence with the council
+of five, to save the life of the grandmother, on condition of receiving
+the hand of Mademoiselle d'Ozanne. The poor girl overcame her horror and
+reluctance for the sake of her aged relative, and promised to marry this
+man on condition of his success in the promised application. The life,
+however, of so formidable a conspirator as a superannuated and dying
+woman, was too great a favour to be granted even to a friend; and the
+only boon which he could obtain was the promise of Mademoiselle
+d'Ozanne's life, in consideration of her becoming his wife. "Eh bien! il
+faut mourir ensemble;" was her answer without a moment's deliberation,
+and next day, accordingly, both the relatives perished on the same
+scaffold. Poor Peyrol himself, after expecting the fatal <i>Allons</i> for
+many a morning, was at length relieved from his apprehensions by the
+fall of Robespierre, and obtained his release, on condition of serving
+in the army. After fighting for four years, with a cordial detestation
+of the cause in which he was engaged, he was disabled for the time by a
+severe wound, and obtained leave to return<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span> to Grignan, where he settled
+in the little inn; but the most severe blow of all was yet in store for
+him; for his wife died not long after, leaving him with five children.
+"Ainsi vous voyez, Monsieur, que j'ai connu le malheur. Au reste, Mons.
+de Muy m'a donn&eacute; la clef de ce ch&acirc;teau, et cela me vaut quelque chose;
+car il y a du monde qui viennent quelquefois le voir." Then, relapsing
+into his habitual strain of complaint, he ended with, "Oh mon pauvre
+cher ma&icirc;tre! ce beau, ce grand ch&acirc;teau! ah, j'ai tout perdu!" One bright
+moment, however, as he exultingly remarked, occurred during his
+compulsory service in the army; for it so chanced that he was one of the
+guard on duty during the execution of his former oppressor, Fauvette.
+"Moi &agrave; mon tour je l'accompagnois a cet echafaud o&ugrave; il m'auroit envoy&eacute;;
+il avoit la mine triste, un fleur de jasmin &agrave; la bouche; ma foi, &ccedil;a ne
+sentoit pas bon pour lui."</p>
+
+<p>Such is an exact transcript of our communicative host's conversation,
+which, notwithstanding the suspicion with which I regard the prattle of
+foreign guides, seemed to me not so much a well-conned lesson, as the
+genuine overflowing of such a disposition as honest Thady M'Quirk's. His
+interest in the persons and events of which he spoke, appeared as warm
+and genuine as his <i>na&iuml;vet&eacute;</i> was amusing and we took leave of him with a
+strong feeling of good will towards himself and his little clean inn.</p>
+
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span></p><p>It is as needless to apologize for devoting a whole chapter to local
+circumstances connected with Madame de Sevign&eacute;'s life, as it would be to
+detail the well-known social virtues which have erected this amiable and
+unpretending woman into a sort of household deity in the eyes of so
+large a class of persons, while the Lauzuns, the Montespans, and other
+gay and brilliant favourites of that period, are only recollected with
+disgust.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_VI" id="CHAP_VI"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. VI</a></h2>
+
+<h3>ORANGE&mdash;AVIGNON.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">Our</span> road to La Palud lay along the rocky vale first discovered from the
+heights above Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, which in fact is not so much a vale as a
+high plateau of ground enclosed between hills, like many parts of
+Castille. To the latter country, indeed, the Comtat Grignan bears a
+striking resemblance in the characteristic features which prevail
+through the greater part of it. The insulated grey rocks have forced
+themselves through the starved soil, like projecting bones; the parched
+fields are more full of pebbles than corn; and the stunted evergreen
+oaks, with their diminutive tough leaves of a dingy grey, though well
+enough adapted to the inhospitable ground in which they grow, present an
+appearance quite repugnant to our English ideas of verdure and
+vegetation. The immediate neighbourhood of Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, indeed,
+seems tolerably fertile, but it is difficult nevertheless to conceive
+from whence the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span> adequate supplies for the Count's immense table were
+procured, or how the feudal contributions of such a country could have
+supported in earlier days the number of castles and towers, whose ruins
+we saw on the summits of every detached rock. These, from their
+resemblance to the "antiguas obras de Moros," which the muleteers used
+to point out, presented another feature strongly reviving my Spanish
+recollections. In the days of romance, this country must have been the
+Utopia of Troubadours, where each might in the compass of a short walk
+have taken morning draught, breakfast, nooning, dinner, and supper, at
+the strong holds of different barons. The first of these fortalices,
+called Chamaret le Maigre, presents a striking landmark from the town of
+Grignan; but, on a nearer approach, consists of little more than a tall
+slender tower upon an insulated rock; the rest is in ruins. At a short
+distance beyond this spot stands Montsegur, a little old fortified town
+upon a hill, which, from its name and appearance, may have been one of
+those cradles of civil liberty, where the "bon homme Jacques" first
+found refuge from his haughty feudal oppressors. A ruin of a more lordly
+description close to it, is called, as we understood, the Ch&acirc;teau
+Beaume: but the number of less important ruins, which occurred in this
+day's journey, is too great to admit of a particular description. A turn
+to the right between a couple of commanding heights, brought us out of
+this barren country into the wide and fertile plain of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span> the Rhone, and
+under the walls of St. Paul de Trois Ch&acirc;teaux, the ancient Augusta
+Tricastinorum. From the respectable appearance of this town, we
+conceived ourselves in the high road to La Palud, and likely to be soon
+indemnified by dinner and rest, for the joltings of the day; but our
+driver, instead of taking the proper direction, lost himself in a series
+of inextricable cross roads, which terminated in a quagmire. In this
+slough of despond the unfortunate patache, from which we had descended,
+might have stuck for ever, but for the assistance of two shepherds, as
+wild in their attire, and as civil, as Don Quixote's friendly goatherds.
+By dint of their exertions and those of the floundering and groaning
+horse, the vehicle, which was too deeply imbedded in the muddy ruts to
+dread an overturn, was dragged out by main force; the driver sometimes
+wringing his hands in King Cambysses' vein, and sometimes strenuously
+applying his shoulder to the wheel. A franc or two dismissed our
+bare-legged friends grinning to their very earrings, and we pursued our
+road without further interruption, quite satisfied with this specimen of
+the loamy fatness of the soil. From the experience of this day, I
+certainly should recommend no one to make the detour to Grignan in a
+wheeled carriage of any sort. An active person might accomplish on foot,
+before breakfast, the whole distance from Montelimart to Grignan, and
+might reach St. Paul de Trois Ch&acirc;teaux, or perhaps La Palud, by night;
+but even lady travellers would find less<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span> fatigue in hiring
+saddle-horses and mules from Montelimart, than in being bumped at the
+rate of two miles and a half per hour, over roads which frequently seem
+a jumble of unhewn paving-stones. We afterwards understood that there
+was a direct road from Grignan to Orange, which would have saved us some
+distance, and could not have been worse than that which we travelled
+this evening.</p>
+
+<p>At La Palud we found the servants and voiture established in the second
+inn, the name of which I forget. The accommodations, however, were
+decent and comfortable, and the charges moderate: and, on the whole, the
+appearance of this inn was nearly, or quite as good as that of the H&ocirc;tel
+d'Angouleme. The people of the latter house, to which the servants were
+originally directed, concluding that they had positive orders to await
+us there, persisted in demanding a price for every thing which more than
+doubled any charge yet attempted; an instance of pertinacious rascality
+which it is not amiss to mention, and which would have diverted us by
+its very absurdity, had we not been too tired to find amusement in any
+thing but supper and beds. In the course of this day and the next, we
+heard, for the first time, the Proven&ccedil;al patois, which seems a bad
+compound of French, Spanish, and Italian, with an original gibberish of
+their own. As far, indeed, as a slight and partial observation enables
+me to judge, I have been much struck by a similarity which the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span>
+inhabitants of the Mediterranean coast bear to each other in language
+and character, a similarity so great, as to lead one to suppose them
+descended from the same original stock. The same savage originality of
+manner, (accompanied frequently by much good-humour and civility), the
+same extravagance of gesture, which seems the overflow of bodily vigour
+and animal spirits, the same red cap, and lastly, the same villainous
+compound of languages, mixed up in discordant cadences and terminations,
+appear to distinguish the inhabitants of Provence, Languedoc, Naples,
+and Genoa, and last and noblest of all, the Catalans.</p>
+
+<p>May 11.&mdash;To Orange eighteen miles, through the same rich and extensive
+plain, from which the barrier of hills that accompanied us before,
+receded to a considerable distance; but which is still interrupted and
+broken occasionally by rocks of the wildest and most abrupt shape
+possible, with the addition in general of a frowning castle in ruins.
+The little towns of Montdragon<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> and Mornas, which we passed this
+morning, are each situated under heights of this description. The castle
+of the former, of which a plate is given in Mr. Cooke's work, I think
+even superior to that of Caerphilly, in South Wales, in the "awsome
+eyriness," as a Scotsman would express it, with which its detached
+masses are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span> grouped. The castle of Mornas is not so remarkable, but the
+rocks on which it stands are very striking; for if they have any
+inclination out of the perpendicular, it is rather towards than from the
+road. It is indeed impossible, when you stand under the shade of this
+lofty barrier, and look up to the clouds drifting over it, to fancy that
+it is not in the act of toppling down upon your head. We had not as yet
+emerged from the land of castles, for, as in yesterday's route, almost
+every little town possessed some vestige of ancient fortification, a
+silent testimony to the peaceful virtues of "the good old days." The
+heat of the weather at this comparatively early season of the year,
+induced us to congratulate ourselves that we had not chosen a month, or
+even a fortnight later, for our excursion, particularly as the
+mulberry-trees, which in this thrifty country form almost the only
+shade, were beginning to lose their covering of leaves. Every where we
+met women and children carrying ladders, shaped exactly like those used
+by cocks and hens in roosting, or perched high in trees, stripping them
+for the food of the silk-worms. The natural gracefulness of the mulberry
+foliage is entirely destroyed by the unmerciful pruning and pollarding
+which it undergoes in this country, in order to concentrate it for
+gathering. Very little fruit, and that small and tasteless, is produced
+from these cabbage-cut trees; a circumstance which I mention to prevent
+disappointment, since, no doubt, many a gentle traveller may indulge, as
+I confess to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span> have done, the luxurious hope of feasting on this fruit in
+perfection under every hedge-row in Provence. Another month would have
+rendered the heat of the country insufferable, and stript it of much of
+its beauty, by reducing to bunches of bare poles those trees which still
+continued to afford verdure and finish to the prospect.</p>
+
+<p>Within a few miles of Orange we crossed the river Aigues by a handsome
+stone bridge, commanding a magnificent view of Mont Ventou. This
+mountain seems the most conspicuous landmark in the part of France which
+we were traversing, continuing visible as it does for two or three days
+journey with very little alteration of outline. To judge from its
+situation on the map, it could not be less than twenty-five or thirty
+miles from the place where we stood, though from the deception caused by
+its enormous length and height, and not uncommon in mountain scenery, it
+appeared accessible in a walk of two or three hours. I well remember, as
+an instance illustrative of this deception, the surprise of a Berkshire
+servant at Capel Curig, when informed that he really could not take an
+evening's walk to the top of Snowdon after littering up his horses, and
+return to supper. The effect in question is increased, and rather to the
+detriment of picturesque beauty, by the less hazy atmosphere of southern
+countries; but I never recollect so strong an instance of it, as in the
+view of Mont Ventou of which I am speaking.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span> I was struck also by its
+great similarity to drawings which I had seen of &AElig;tna from the Catanian
+coast, as well its outline, as the manner in which it rises from a
+cluster of satellite hills into the borders of the snowy region. Several
+scattered snow-ridges were visible near its top, contrasting curiously
+with the effect of the sun's rays reflected from its sides, which,
+instead of Campbell's picturesque "cliffs of shadowy tint" appeared a
+red-hot stony mass, and might be fancied by a slight effort of
+imagination, into &AElig;tna covered with an eruption of burning cinders.</p>
+
+<p>The approach to the celebrated arch of Orange, commemorating Marius's
+victory over the Cimbri, is marked by an avenue of Lombardy poplars
+which line the high road. The classical and sombre stone pine, which
+gives so striking an effect to the tomb of the Scipios (as it is styled)
+near Tarragona, would have been more in character as an accompaniment to
+this proud monument also; but since the days of<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> Alpheus and his red
+silk stockings, the taste for <i>quelque ch&ocirc;se de gentil</i> has constantly
+poisoned those classical associations of which the French are so fond.
+The grave Patavinian is still designated by the tom-tit appellation of
+Tite Live; and the majestic arch, whose history would have been so well
+illustrated by his lost annals, is tricked out with a poplar avenue,
+like a summer-house on Clapham-common.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span></p>
+<p>The townsmen of Orange, however, deserve credit for the substantial
+style in which they have repaired one end of it, to prevent farther
+dilapidation, and for the manner in which the road is diverted from it
+on both sides in a handsome sweep, leaving a green space in the middle,
+in which the arch stands. We returned to it immediately after breakfast,
+and our second impressions were fully equal to the first. As<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> a work
+of art, it is certainly worthy of one of the proudest places in the
+Campo Vaccino, though of course its effect is more striking in the
+neighbourhood<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> of the victory which it commemorates. The bas relief
+on the side facing Orange, would not be unworthy of a place between the
+well-known statues of Dacian captives, which ornament the arch of
+Constantine. Different as were their respective &aelig;ras, the stern
+thoughtful dignity of the barbarian chiefs, and the spirit which
+animates</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The fiery mass<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Of living valour, rolling on the foe,"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>as represented in the battle of Marius, appear to have been conceived by
+the same powerful mind, and embodied by the same master hand. The same
+chastened energy and unaffected greatness of design which characterizes
+the poetry of Milton,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span> the painting of Michael Angelo, and the music of
+Handel, is conspicuous in both. The bas relief which I have mentioned
+forms the principal ornament of the arch; but the trophies, the rostra,
+&amp;c. which appear in other parts, are in a style of simple and
+soldier-like grandeur corresponding with its character and the
+achievement which it commemorates. I do not pretend to consider this
+monument as comparable on the whole to the arch of Constantine; but
+still it is of a very different school of art from that which produced
+the arch of Severus. On the bas relief representing Marius's victory,
+one might fancy the most high born and athletic of Achilles's Myrmidons
+in the full "tug of war;" whereas the swarms of crawling pigmies which
+burlesque the triumph of Severus might be supposed the original Myrmidon
+rabble, just hatched, as the fable reports, from their native ant-hills,
+and basking in the sun like so many tadpoles.</p>
+
+<p>The Roman colony of Orange, to judge from the relative positions of the
+arch and circus, must have been very considerable, and have occupied a
+far larger space than the present town. The arch stands detached from
+its entrance, as I mentioned, on the Lyons' side, and the circus at the
+extreme end, in the direction of Avignon; yet the former we may suppose
+to have joined on to the ancient town, and the latter to have stood in
+the same central position which the Colosseum occupied in Rome. Of the
+circus nothing now remains but the chord of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span> semicircle, or, to
+express it more familiarly, the straight line of the D figure, in which
+it was built. As far as I could guess, from pacing the length of this
+enormous wall, encumbered and buttressed as it was by dirty shops, it is
+in length nearly or quite a hundred yards, and of a height
+proportionate. The point of view from which it appears to the most
+advantage, is on the road to Avignon, about two or three furlongs out of
+the town. When viewed in this direction, it stands with a commanding air
+of a grim old Roman ghost among a group of men of the present day;
+forming, by its blackness and colossal scale of proportions, a striking
+contrast to every thing around it, and overtopping houses, church-tower,
+and every thing near, excepting a circular hill at the foot of which it
+stands. The latter is marked as the position of the ancient Roman
+citadel by the remains of tower and wall, half imbedded in turf, which
+surround it: and one veteran bastion still stands firm and unbroken, in
+a position facing the Circus, its companion through the silent and
+ruinous lapse of so many centuries. Without the affectation of decrying
+well-known and celebrated monuments of antiquity, or the wish to put any
+thing really in comparison with the ruins of ancient Rome, I must still
+own, that the unexpected view which I caught of the citadel and Circus
+from this position, realized more strongly to my mind the august
+conceptions so well expressed in Childe Harold, than any view in Rome
+itself, hardly excepting the Colosseum.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">O'er each mouldering tower<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Dim with the mist of years, grey flits the shade of power.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The stanza concluding with these lines involuntarily occurs to the mind,
+while viewing Orange in the direction of which I now speak; and the
+lofty visions of the noble author, which are, perhaps, too over-wrought
+and ideal to harmonize with the sober contemplations of the closet, seem
+in this spot to assume "a local habitation and a name." Undoubtedly they
+ought to do so more particularly at Rome, and would so in every
+instance, but that much of the effect of the "Eternal City" is lost from
+the deserved eminence in which we know it to stand, and the consequent
+familiarity which we have acquired with it through the works of Piranesi
+and innumerable other artists. Thus its very celebrity lessens its
+effect, as the commendations bestowed on a celebrated beauty frequently
+occasion disappointment. The <i>on admire ici</i> of the well-bound
+Itineraire, the elaborate descriptions of Vasi, and the <i>Ecco Signore</i>
+of your obliging cicerone, produce the same effect upon the mind, which
+the mistaken attentions of Koah, the South Sea priest, did on the
+stomach of Captain Cook. The meat was good, but honest Koah spoiled its
+relish by proffering it ready chewed; and in the same manner, the effect
+of what is really most admirable in nature and art is weakened by the
+impertinent obtrusion of ready-made ecstasies. It is no reflection on
+human perverseness to say, that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span> every one has his own way of admiring,
+and loves to feel and observe for himself; as well as to chew with his
+own teeth. For my own part, I never could appreciate the stupendous
+beauties of Rome as I wished, until I managed to abstract myself from
+the notion that I was come to admire as thousands had done before, and
+from the recollection of the unclassical comforts of the excellent inn
+in the Piazza di Spagna. An English letter, or newspaper, is an
+excellent preparative for this purpose; and when once absorbed in the
+train of thought which it creates, the sudden transition to the mighty
+scenes before you, produces by contrast the effect which it ought to do.</p>
+
+<p>I have been led into these observations, to account for the reason why
+Orange struck me so much; a place of which I had heard and read little
+or nothing. No attentive and intelligent cicerone anticipated our
+reflections in this place; nor did the creature-comforts of a good inn
+debase our Roman reveries, though we could well have pardoned their so
+doing. Madame Ran, of the Croix Blanche, was as mean and dirty as the
+hole in which she lived; and looked as malevolent as Canidia, Erichtho,
+or any other classical witch; and as to the inhabitants of Orange,
+though the revolutionary anecdotes which we have heard of them at
+Grignan might create some prejudice to their disadvantage, I think, in
+truth, that I never beheld a more squalid, uncivilized,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>
+ferocious-looking people. A grin of savage curiosity, or a cannibal
+scowl, seems almost universally to disfigure features which are none of
+the best or cleanest; and their whole appearance is as direct a contrast
+as can well be imagined, to the hale, honest Norman, or le franc Picard,
+as he is proverbially styled. We turned our backs upon them with
+pleasure, after casting back one lingering look at the noble old Circus;
+and soon found ourselves in the centre of the extensive plain in which
+Avignon stands. The forwardness of the climate, and the skilful system
+of irrigation pursued here, afforded us, at this early time of the year,
+the spectacle of hay-making in many places. An English farmer might be
+shocked by the rudeness of the method here pursued, the hay being mostly
+carried in sail-cloth sheets, and turned with large wooden forks. With
+respect to the former practice, I have nothing to say; but, having
+attentively observed their method of using these forks, I am confident
+that they are better adapted to the purpose of turning the hay than our
+heavy prongs of ash and iron. They are at once lighter in hand, and,
+from the length of their teeth, they take up a larger portion of hay at
+once; and must therefore be well calculated for making the most of the
+fine weather, which, in our climate, cannot always be calculated upon,
+and occasions a scarcity of working hands.</p>
+
+<p>At three or four miles from Avignon, and before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span> any other part of the
+town becomes visible,<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> the legate's palace appears conspicuously</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">Rising with its tiara of proud towers<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">At airy distance, with majestic motion;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>and a more splendid Gothic building, both as to outline and dimensions,
+cannot be imagined. On a nearer approach, a long and wide reach of the
+Rhone, winding round the base of this noble pile, and reflecting its
+figure in a deep mirror, adds greatly to its effect. In Mr. Cooke's
+work, the palace is represented nearly in this direction, from a point
+somewhat diverging to the right of the road, so as to introduce a broken
+Gothic bridge, and a part of the Roche Don, or Roche Notre Dame (for I
+believe it bears both names). The rest of the town of Avignon, placed as
+it is on a low level, affords no striking coup d'&oelig;il, from the
+direction in which we approached it: the ancient walls, however, which
+inclose its whole circumference, unbroken and perfect, and beautifully
+crenated in every part, are a very remarkable feature. I know but of one
+other instance of this continuity of Gothic wall, which occurs at
+Valencia; but the fortifications of the Spanish town, though they far
+exceed those of Avignon in dimensions and strength, fall as short of
+them in beauty. We had a full opportunity of examining the merits<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span> of
+the latter, as the police had unaccountably thought fit to shut up all
+the entrances to the town but one or two; which obliged us, on arriving
+at the foot of the walls, to add two miles more to our day's journey
+before we could reach their interior. We found the H&ocirc;tel de l'Europe,
+kept by the widow Pierron, a superior inn in every respect, both in the
+comfort and liberality of the establishment, and the cleanliness of the
+servants.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_VII" id="CHAP_VII"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. VII</a></h2>
+
+<h3>AVIGNON&mdash;MURDER OF BRUNE&mdash;HOSPITAL DES FOUS&mdash;MISSION OF 1819.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">On</span> the opposite side of the square in which our inn was situated, stands
+the H&ocirc;tel du Palais Royal, the scene of Brune's assassination. The
+account which M. Jo&uuml;y gives in the Hermite en Provence, of this horrible
+transaction, corresponds as nearly as possible with the particulars
+which we heard upon the spot. Being summoned on the restoration of Louis
+to answer the charge of treason, and having stopped with his escort at
+Avignon for the purpose of changing horses and refreshing himself, the
+marshal was recognized by the populace as one of the supposed murderers
+of the Princess de Lamballe. A ferocious mob soon assembled at the door
+of the h&ocirc;tel, broke in by force, and after deliberately shooting him,
+dragged the body to the adjoining bridge, and with every mark of
+contumely threw it into the Rhone. Such is the brief outline of the
+murder of a defenceless man, on a charge which, whether true<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span> or not,
+should have rested between God and his conscience. Jo&uuml;y may indeed be
+pardoned for commenting and enlarging on this story, though the simple
+facts address themselves more strongly to the mind, than when dressed up
+with stage effect, and must be better adapted to produce the impression
+probably desired by that author. In the detestable ruffians who
+disgraced the good cause of loyalty on this occasion, we recognize the
+same black and fiery blood which flowed in the veins of the Marseillois
+assassins of 1793, and of the fanatics of Nismes: and whose ebullitions
+render them equally hateful as friends or enemies. There are many
+strange historical discoveries which would surprise me more than to
+learn that the Moorish blood remained in this part of France
+unextirpated by the victories of Charles Martel;<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> for to a person who
+knows them only by report and casual observation, the <i>tout ensemble</i> of
+its inhabitants seems to differ totally from that of the Gascon and the
+Basque; names which, like the name of Norman, convey to the mind an
+image of frankness and gallantry.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span></p>
+<p>On the morning after our arrival, we ascended first of all the Roche
+Don, a hill enclosed within the walls of the town, and backing the
+ruined palace of the legate; being desirous, as in Lyons, to begin our
+survey from a point which might serve as a general key to the whole, and
+instruct us in the bearings of different objects. From this elevated
+spot, situated at the north-western extremity of the city, we looked to
+the east, north, and south, over a plain as rich in verdure and
+cultivation as the finest parts of Lombardy; to which the stately towers
+of the palace, and the clustering spires and battlemented walls of
+Avignon form a fine foreground. The distant hills, at the foot of which
+Vaucluse is situated, form the eastern boundary of this plain; and are
+succeeded and overtopped to the northward by a chain of the Dauphin&eacute;
+Alps, among which the long sweeping mass of Mont Ventou predominates.
+From the latter quarter the Rhone is traced winding up in a wide and
+rapid current, till it reaches the highly cultivated islands at the foot
+of Mont Don, and pursues its course with increased grandeur towards the
+southward. The neighbourhood of its junction with the Durance is marked
+in this quarter by a barrier of mountains of less height than those
+above-mentioned, but more abrupt and wild in their forms, at whose foot
+appear casual glimpses of the two rivers, winding like narrow silver
+threads into the horizon. "Vous avez pass&eacute; ce diantre de Rhone,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span> says
+Madame de Sevign&eacute;, "si fier, si orgueilleux, si turbulent; il faut le
+marier avec la Durance quand elle est en furie; ah le bon m&eacute;nage!" The
+good people of Lyons have, however, settled this point otherwise by
+their inscriptions and statues in the H&ocirc;tel de Ville, which certify this
+river-god as already married to the Saone: the Durance, therefore, can
+hold no higher rank than that of his termagant mistress, while the
+gentle, even, beneficent character of her rival, and the priority of her
+claims, suit much better with the title of wife. If it be permitted me
+to quote Mad. de Sevign&eacute; once more, I should remark, that the broken
+Gothic bridge beneath our feet, which forms so picturesque an object in
+every point of view, is the same against the piers of which Mad. de
+Grignan was nearly lost.<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> It formerly connected the Roche Don with
+the heights on the western side of the Rhone, up which the road to
+Nismes winds near Fort Villeneuve; and is well worthy of a nearer survey
+as an architectural relic. The few arches which remain have the same
+bold span and elegant lightness of design so remarkable in the
+celebrated Pont y Prydd in South Wales; and the piers, which appear
+slight at a distance, are nevertheless solid and well adapted to the
+nature of the Rhone, whose current they cut like the sharp bow of a
+canoe. Its remarkable narrowness, which hardly allows two horses to pass
+abreast, and the ancient guard-house in the centre, secured by gates on
+both sides, carry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span> the mind strongly back to those days of distrust and
+violence, which have by some been called "the good old times:"&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i3">"Ego me nunc denique natum<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Gratulor."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>At the period when the territory of Avignon was styled by the kings of
+France the "derriere du Pape," from the convenient posture in which it
+lay for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span> their correction, one may fancy the same scenes to have taken
+place on a larger scale, which are described as occurring at the bridge
+of Kennaquhair, the same struggle between secular and monastic
+authority, the same sullen important bridgeward, and the same forcible
+arguments employed by wandering troops of jackmen to effect a passage.
+In Mr. Cooke's first view of the legate's palace, this bridge appears
+projecting from the part of the Roche Don where we stood, a spot marked
+with two round buildings, like small Martello towers. The window marked
+by two birds flying directly over it, and second from the highest in the
+same tower, has acquired a bloody notoriety. From this giddy height, as
+we were informed by an inhabitant whom we met, the half-murdered victims
+of revolutionary massacre were thrown, to put an end to their
+sufferings: and their remains heaped up for a time in the square
+building which stands below, originally erected for the purpose of an
+ice-house.</p>
+
+<p>Having familiarized ourselves with the leading features of Avignon and
+its vicinity, as viewed from this commanding point, we descended into
+the town to take a more particular survey.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">Rhetor comes Heliodorus,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Gr&aelig;corum long&egrave; doctissimus.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>To translate Horace freely, our companion was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span> a rhetorician, or talker
+by profession, and the most learned of his class in extraordinary
+legends and fabrications; in other respects an useful civil fellow, with
+an Irish brogue, which his service in the French army had not been able
+to eradicate, or even weaken, and the established cicerone of the place.
+To account satisfactorily for his wooden leg and French uniform, he
+anticipated our inquiries by informing us, that he had been crippled by
+a shipwreck on the French coast, and through the recommendation of his
+friends the <i>Duchess</i> of Westmoreland and <i>Countess</i> of Devonshire,
+patronized by Louis, "who allowed him this uniform coat to wear, and two
+<i>males</i> a-day." In England, one would not have borne the sight of such a
+lying varlet another instant, but I must confess that the mere sound of
+our own language in a foreign town, disarmed our indignation, and we
+bore with the fellow, whom we found not unamusing, and from his local
+knowledge, serviceable. A very small degree of merit indeed suffices to
+open one's heart towards a fellow-countryman in a strange land; a truth
+no doubt known and acted on by knights of industry, matrimonial
+speculators, and</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Broken dandies lately on their travels."
+</p>
+<p>
+The legate's palace is now divided into barracks and a prison, and the
+nakedness of its appearance upon a nearer view make its lofty
+proportions more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span> striking. We were expressing to each other our wonder
+at its size, when our guide interrupted us with an original observation
+of his own:&mdash;"The reason of its size, sir, is quite <i>clare</i>. The pope,
+you see, always went about with such a <i>hape</i> of monks&mdash;and of nuns&mdash;and
+of all them kind of people, that the big number of rooms which you see
+could hardly hold them any how." After all, if the annals of former
+times have been truly written, the Milesian's account of this merry
+menage might be nearer the truth than he knew or suspected.</p>
+
+<p>The Papal Chapel exhibits now but few remains of its former probable
+grandeur, its inside having been defaced with the most persevering
+animosity during the Revolution, and presenting little more than a damp
+bare shell, filled with the broken remains of monumental figures.
+Headless popes and crippled cardinals lie together in heaps, mingled in
+a manner which will render it impossible to restore to each his proper
+allotment of limbs, when the projected repairs of the chapel are put in
+execution. One tomb, broken up and shattered to pieces more than the
+rest, was pointed out by the old woman as the sepulchre of La belle
+Laure, an honour which, for aught I know, may be claimed by a tomb in
+every church of Avignon. An assertion apparently still more apocryphal,
+however, is that one of the small side chapels was built by
+Constantine.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The interior of Avignon affords a much more agreeable promenade than
+that of Lyons, from the superior cleanliness of its inhabitants, and the
+moderate height of the houses. These circumstances tend to disperse the
+combinations of ill smell, and purify the thick, vapid, flagging air
+which is felt so perceptibly at Lyons. It may, perhaps, be beneath the
+dignity of a <i>printed book</i> to enumerate such circumstances as these,
+but they occupy in fact a high place in the scale of human comfort; and,
+joined to the cheapness of the necessaries of life, (which we inferred
+from the price of two or three articles of consumption,) must have their
+weight in rendering Avignon a desirable place of banishment. Banishment,
+I say; for I have no better name by which to express a prolonged
+residence abroad, especially in cases where the mind has lost its power
+of deriving amusement from trifles.</p>
+
+<p>With the exception of its fine walls, its Gothic bridge, and the
+legate's palace, Avignon possesses in itself no remarkable architectural
+feature, or fine combination of buildings. Its churches are numerous;
+but no one remarkable above the rest, as far at least as external
+appearance is concerned; and we had not time for a very minute internal
+survey. The H&ocirc;pital des Fous, however, is an establishment well
+calculated to gratify the laudable curiosity of the humane; and to judge
+from all we witnessed, may perhaps exhibit points of internal regulation
+worthy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span> the attention of professional men. Nothing indeed can exceed the
+quiet, orderly behaviour of the patients there confined, whom we found
+walking about at perfect liberty in a square court planted with trees.
+Many of them wore a certain air of content and satisfaction which could
+not be mistaken, and all seemed much gratified by the notice of the mild
+sensible ecclesiastic who accompanied us, and who presides over the
+establishment. No coercion, as we understood from him, is used, save
+restriction from walking with their fellow patients, and the restraint
+of handcuffs, when rendered necessary in cases of violent conduct. I
+particularly observed also, that he had never any occasion to exert that
+command of the eye, on which so much stress is laid as a means of
+intimidation, but passed all their little follies off with a smile, in
+which we were frequently inclined to join. One poor patient accosted us
+with high titles of nobility, dwelling on the peculiar pleasure he
+experienced from our visit; another, an old man of a very venerable
+appearance, called our attention to a dirty stone which he held in his
+hand, affirming it to be a piece of Henri Quatre's identical foot: but
+none were troublesome or obtrusive, and most appeared to be deriving as
+much enjoyment from their own little vagaries as their melancholy state
+would admit of.<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> Their apartments, built<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span> round the square, are neat
+and airy, each furnished with a bed, dressing table, and a few plain
+utensils. In one large room are a row of hot and cold baths, which are
+frequently and regularly used; and nothing, the good priest said, has
+been found to produce so desirable an effect on the mind and body as
+this custom. The rank of the patients is various; the poorer sort are
+supported by voluntary contributions; and many persons in the higher
+ranks are also placed here at their own expense, or that of their
+friends. Among others, there is a general who became deranged, as we
+were assured, on hearing of the abdication of his patron Napoleon; the
+most unequivocal instance of misplaced fidelity, which I have ever
+heard. How this poor man contrives to agree with the partizan of Henry
+IV., I am at a loss to make out: and he was not then visible to answer
+for himself. At the time of the Revolution, the estates belonging to the
+hospital were confiscated;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span> and the establishment itself would have been
+abolished, had not one of the members of the council at Avignon
+observed, half in jest, that they might possibly be one day glad
+themselves of such a retreat. It is now, as I mentioned, maintained by
+private donations, and by the salaries paid for the accommodation of the
+richer patients. The only objects of taste belonging to the institution
+are a fine altar-piece attributed to Murillo, and an ivory crucifix
+carved by Jean Guillermin, in 1659. The latter is not above two feet in
+length; but the manner in which every muscle and vein indicate
+suffering, and the mingled expression of pain and resignation in the
+countenance, place it on the footing of a statue; and I could hardly
+have supposed that a small piece of ivory-carving could do such justice
+to a sacred subject. The worthy priest dwelt, with great exultation, on
+the precautions he had taken to secure this favourite relic from
+revolutionary pillage, slightly alluding to the circumstance of having
+been forced to fly for his life to Italy, as a matter of minor
+importance to himself.</p>
+
+<p>The admirers of show houses, may find some gratification in visiting the
+hotel of M. De Leutre, the banker; which was purchased of M. Villeneuve,
+an emigr&eacute;, and contains, besides the usual etceteras of carving and
+gilding, orange-trees, and gold fish, a curious collection of prints
+representing Chinese battles, and supposed to be the only perfect
+duplicate<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span> of that in the royal collection. A sight more interesting is
+presented in the hospital of invalid soldiers, established in the place;
+1500 of whom are maintained as in-pensioners, apparently in great
+comfort. "On est bien ici," said a blind veteran, who, hearing the
+voices of strangers, invited us to walk in; and indeed most of those
+whom we saw strolling in the garden, or sitting under the shade of the
+trees, seemed very cheerful, though some of them, and those very young
+men, were dreadfully mutilated, and the loss of both legs very common.
+The two buildings which accommodate them were formerly the Convent des
+Celestins, and that of the Dames de St. Louis. Two other handsome
+convents have been converted to uses less beneficent, one being now a
+gunpowder manufactory, and the other a cannon foundery.</p>
+
+<p>In the evening we walked across the long wooden bridge adjoining our
+hotel,<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> towards the western bank of the Rhone; and the expectations
+which we had formed of the view from this quarter, were not
+disappointed. The Roche Don terminates more abruptly on the side of the
+river than in any other part, and in a manner which sets off strikingly
+the commanding height of the legate's palace. With this princely pile of
+building, the broken Gothic bridge and its guard-house, the ancient
+palace of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span> archbishop, and a portion of the battlemented walls of
+Avignon, combine to form a striking architectural group, whose unity of
+character is hardly at all broken by meaner objects; and the whole is
+well backed by Mont Ventou and the Dauphin&eacute; Alps. From this spot we
+again returned to Roche Don, a station to which every visitor of Avignon
+may return twice or thrice in the day with undiminished pleasure. In our
+way we fell in with a procession of children, the eldest of whom could
+not be more than seven years of age, in pairs, and with lighted candles
+in their hands, escorting a cross of lath and a very indifferent daub,
+which represented some female saint, and screaming in chorus with all
+their might. Those who had no candles, ran about with little dishes,
+vociferously begging money to buy some; and in spite of the respect with
+which one would wish to consider whatever fellow Christians choose to
+denominate, in pure earnest, a religious ceremony, it was impossible not
+to be reminded, by the petitions of these sucking Catholics, of Guy
+Fawkes's little votaries on the fifth of November. We thought
+involuntarily of a boy who had followed us that very morning into the
+church of St. Didier, tossing a ball in his hand, and after crossing
+himself with great gravity, immediately began his game again. Whether
+the interests of religion gain or suffer most by the familiarity with
+the ordinary business of life which it assumes in Catholic countries, is
+a point which I cannot presume to determine.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span> It is true, that it may
+frequently occasion such ridiculous scenes as those which I have
+mentioned; and our habits of mind, as Protestants, may lead us to
+conceive that such familiarity may tend to generate levity and
+indifference. On the other hand, however, amidst all the mummery which
+may mix itself up with the occasional ceremonies of the Catholic
+service, there is much worthy of commendation in the more common
+ordinances, to which alone a sensible Catholic must look for religious
+improvement. I particularly allude to the shortness and frequent
+recurrence of the mass (such as it is), and the constant access afforded
+to Catholic churches, in which some service or other appears to be
+carried on during great part of the day. These regulations are well
+adapted to take advantage of those serious trains of thought which often
+arise most forcibly at accidental times, and from unpremeditated causes.
+The attention is thus excited without being fatigued, and the privacy of
+the closet is combined with that solemnity which attaches itself to the
+house of God. It may be said, indeed, that to consult the caprices and
+associations of the human mind, is to lower the dignity of religion; but
+surely a good end must justify any means which are not in themselves
+culpable or ridiculous. The mechanic, for instance, in returning from
+his daily labour, enters an open church from accident or curiosity,
+crosses himself from habit, and is led on by the momentary feeling of
+reverence which that act must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span> generally awaken, to employ five minutes
+in his devotions, a well spent portion of time, which probably would not
+otherwise have been rescued from the business of the day, but which may
+influence his conduct during the rest of it.</p>
+
+<p>On ascending the Mont Don, we found it the scene of a graver ceremony
+than the infantine gambols which we had just witnessed. In the centre of
+the terrace facing the river, a new and highly gilt crucifix of colossal
+size has been erected at the expense of the Mission, round which a
+number of monks and inhabitants were collected on their knees, the still
+evening increasing the effect of a solemn mass which they were singing,
+and in which we heard the name of St. Paulus several times repeated.
+Several nuns, belonging to an establishment lately revived, knelt on the
+steps of the cross, enveloped in their black hoods; and the prisoners at
+the palace window united their deep tones to the chant, pausing every
+now and then to solicit the charity of passers by. Scattered at
+different distances from the cross, eight or ten separate groups of
+persons were kneeling farther off, in attitudes of the deepest
+devotional abstraction, though surrounded on all sides by sauntering
+soldiers, children playing, and groups of loungers laughing or
+whispering. The different distances at which they knelt were regulated,
+as we were told, by the degrees of penance imposed upon them, and the
+place which their respective<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span> consciences allowed them to assume. Some,
+in the true spirit of the poor Publican, were kneeling at a considerable
+distance, just within view of the cross, to which they hardly lifted
+their eyes; others, whose penance was originally lighter, or its term
+abridged by frequent visits to this place, had approached the cross more
+nearly, and with greater signs of satisfaction.</p>
+
+<p>I must confess, that we observed these poor penitents with an interest
+and attention which the other parts of the ceremony had failed to
+excite. The manifestation of a deep and genuine religious feeling is
+respectable in Catholic, Turk, or Bramin, and seldom or never to be
+mistaken; and though attended by no circumstances of external pomp, must
+impress upon serious beholders of every creed a reverence which
+trappings and mummery fail to excite. It should seem indeed that
+Providence, wishing gently to humble the pride of men, delights in
+producing by the simplest means those physical and moral effects, which
+they waste toil and expense in bringing about. The splendid procession,
+for instance, which takes place on the day of Corpus Christi at Rome,
+with all its assemblage of monks, horse and foot guards, cardinals,
+choristers, and banners, would dwindle before the eye of reason into
+"shreds and patches, were it not for the figure of the truly venerable
+man who now fills the papal chair, kneeling with the same humility and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
+abstraction from the busy scene around him, which marked the deportment
+of the penitents just mentioned.</p>
+
+<p>Time, which decides all questions when they have ceased to be any longer
+interesting, will probably show whether the celebrated Mission, which
+has excited such a sensation in many parts of France, be a mere
+political manoeuvre to strengthen the hands of government by calling in
+the aid of superstition, or (which is at least as probable) a sincere
+and well-meant attempt to awaken the forgotten spirit of religion. In
+the mean while, it is a desirable thing to have turned the attention of
+the French to a subject which, by all accounts, is become nearly
+obsolete among the higher orders of the nation. Even with a view to the
+ascendancy which a more simple and purified religion may ultimately
+obtain under an improved and free constitution, it is better that a
+religious feeling of some sort should exist. The worst and most twisted
+crabstock, if alive, possesses an active principle, which allows of
+successful grafting; not so with a dead branch.</p>
+
+<p>I shall annex a statement of the proceedings of the Mission at Avignon,
+during the Lent of 1819, copied and abridged from a short pamphlet,
+written by a M. Fransoy, a lawyer of that city; which being published by
+a layman on the spot where the events in question recently took place,
+possesses the most probable claim to accuracy and impartiality. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
+writer begins by describing the demoralization and ignorance occasioned
+by the Revolution, "which had completely realised," he observes, "in the
+kingdom of the lilies all the misfortunes foretold by the prophet
+Jeremiah. The people of Avignon, who had remained without instruction
+during this period of horror and barbarism, were soon infected with that
+gross ignorance which assimilates men to brutes: and in a short time
+this field of the Lord, once so fertile, only produced brambles and
+thorns; the evil plants choked the good, and the tares every where
+devoured the corn. Scarcely, however, was the Catholic worship restored
+in France by the concordat, before religion shed among us some rays of
+its former light. Dazzled by the majesty of religious ceremonies, the
+people were jealous to emerge from their revolutionary blindness. The
+dearth of ministers was the cause that instruction only distilled drop
+by drop upon this people famishing with want."</p>
+
+<p>The scanty manner in which this dearth had been occasionally supplied
+for some time, excited a longing to participate in the instructions of
+the new Mission, which had already visited Arles, Valence, and Tarascon,
+under the sanction of the state; and whose claims to religious authority
+the writer defends by precedents unnecessary to enumerate here. On the
+first Sunday in Lent, 1819, its proceedings were commenced at Avignon,
+by a solemn procession,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span> which made the circuit of the principal streets
+of the town, singing penitential psalms, and halted on the hill of Notre
+Dame; where an inaugural sermon was delivered on a spot called Calvary,
+and supposed to represent that sacred place. The multitude, assembled by
+curiosity or a better feeling, was so great, that two of the
+missionaries found it expedient to address them at the same time from
+different stations. One of these was M. Guyon, the director of the
+Mission; of whose eloquence and animation, as a preacher, the author
+speaks highly.</p>
+
+<p>On the succeeding day, the nine ecclesiastics composing the Mission
+attached themselves respectively to the different churches of the town,
+and called in the assistance of the neighbouring clergy, as confessors
+to those persons whom their discourses might affect most strongly. This
+step was rendered the more necessary, inasmuch as the common people of
+the vicinity understand French merely as the Welsh do English, and
+converse only in their native Proven&ccedil;al with any facility. If we may
+believe their zealous eulogist, the effects which the missionaries had
+anticipated immediately followed, and their utmost exertions, as well as
+those of their new associates, were taxed to satisfy the spiritual wants
+of the populace. "The Avignonese," says the narrative, "hungered so
+after the word of God, that the gates of the churches were besieged from
+three hours before daybreak, by those who flocked to be present at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span> the
+morning exhortation. The inhabitants of the country and the neighbouring
+communes walked during a part of the night, in order to secure seats;
+each anxiously sought to place his chair many hours beforehand, and
+caused it to be kept, in fear that another might deprive him of it; the
+churches were so full, that it was hardly possible to move in them. The
+eagerness to obtain room was so great, that indecorous and even
+scandalous scenes took place among the wives of the populace; they
+quarrelled for chairs and seats with a ferocity, <i>qui les mettoit
+souvent hors du cercle de la politesse civile et Chretienne</i>." (Perhaps,
+as a townsman, he is unwilling to be more particular). "More than twenty
+thousand individuals were assembled in the churches at every service;
+and a circumstance which proves how admirably each missionary and
+associate fulfilled his particular task is, that each parish gave the
+preference to the persons attached to it, and none allowed the
+superiority to its neighbouring quarter. Like mothers, who can see
+nothing more perfect than the children to whom themselves have given
+birth, each parishioner acknowledged no better men than the missionaries
+appointed to his own church. MM. Guyon, Menoult, and Bourgin, shone as
+much at St. Agricol, as MM. Ferrail and Levasseur at St. Pierre; and MM.
+Gerard and Rodet in the church of St. Didier, as much as MM. Fauvet and
+Poncelet in that of St. Symphorien." To the character of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span> M.
+Levasseur<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> the writer bears honourable testimony, as a young man who
+had devoted time, talents, and a liberal private fortune, to the cause;
+and whose exertions on this occasion impaired a naturally delicate
+constitution. "From four in the morning to eight or nine at night, their
+time," he says, "was for many days occupied in public or private
+instruction, and in visiting the hospitals and prisons; and forty
+missionaries would have been necessary to have completely accomplished
+what these nine took cheerfully upon them."</p>
+
+<p>The effects of their preaching were manifested by the number of
+penitents who flocked to confession, which, during the second week of
+the mission, increased to such an extent as to render access difficult.
+The missionaries, unable to meet the wishes of all at once, gave an
+obvious preference, not to the more habitually devout, but to those
+classes of persons whose attendance was most unexpected. "Dissipated
+young coxcombs, disabled soldiers, dragoon officers with fierce
+mustaches, and worldly-wise men<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span> with formal wigs," says our author,
+"met with attention and encouragement, to the exclusion of those whose
+habits of piety deserved it better." The apparent injustice of this
+procedure he excuses by the plea, "that it was necessary to quit the
+regular fold in order to recover these lost sheep"&mdash;that "the stouter
+and better worth catching the fish were, the more anxious should they be
+to secure them in the net of the Prince of Apostles." When separated
+from the figurative bombast by which a Frenchman frequently obscures a
+sensible reason, this plea seems fair enough: provided that the motives
+of the missionaries were unmixed with spiritual vanity, and the pride of
+creating a strong sensation. It was no doubt most consonant to the
+purposes of a special mission like this, to accomplish that which was
+most difficult, and to make an impression, while the opportunity lasted,
+on a class of persons least accessible to the usual means of religious
+instruction. The example of such, if permanently reclaimed, would
+naturally be more striking than that of others, and influence public
+opinion more strongly, and this may furnish some excuse for a conduct
+which, in the ordinary course of things, would have been unjust and out
+of place.</p>
+
+<p>A large part of the tract is occupied by accounts of several solemn
+ceremonies which ensued, "for the purpose," says the author, "of
+striking the senses of the lower orders, who are not sufficiently
+affected by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span> argument." These, as in the instance of the general
+communion, were rendered more imposing by the attendance of the civil
+and military authorities, and most persons of rank and wealth in the
+vicinity. Nor did they degenerate into mere processions and pompous
+forms, if the narrative is to be trusted. The missionaries appear on
+every occasion to have availed themselves of the excitation of the
+moment, in calling forth such feelings as must be approved by Christians
+of every country and persuasion, and which, among Frenchmen, may not be
+the less sincere for being expressed somewhat extravagantly. In the
+account of the Amende Honorable, a solemn act of profession of
+repentance, the following passage occurs:&mdash;"He (the missionary) drew an
+affecting picture of our unhappy country, oppressed by the burden of
+impiety and anarchy. He rapidly enumerated the series of crimes produced
+by license and want of faith. He implored the pardon of the most holy
+God in the name of all; and he proclaimed in a loud tone of voice,
+mutual forgiveness between enemies. All his questions were interrupted
+by the tears and sobs of his audience. 'Do you feel contrition and
+repentance,' said he, 'for your offences against God?'&mdash;'Yes.' 'Do you
+ask pardon sincerely?' The congregation again answered 'Yes.' 'Does
+every one of you individually pardon his neighbour all the injuries and
+offences which he may have received from him?'&mdash;'Yes.' 'Do you renounce
+all hatred, all enmity, all revenge?'&mdash;'Yes.'<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> 'Do you promise God to
+live in future as becomes good Christians, in a perfect union and
+concord among yourselves?'&mdash;'Yes.' 'Do you promise fidelity, respect,
+and love, to the monarch who governs France, to the princes of his
+blood, and his representatives, and submission to the laws?'&mdash;'Yes.' The
+pen can but imperfectly describe the effect produced by these questions
+of the missionaries, and the answers of the congregation. No countenance
+but wore the expression of grief and repentance, no cheek but was wet
+with tears. The officiating priest who held the host in his hand, then
+pronounced in the name of the God of mercy, his holy pardon; the
+Magnificat, the Benedictus, and the Te Deum, were thundered forth; and
+the festival concluded with the benediction of the host. The innumerable
+crowd of individuals present, each holding a lighted taper, presented a
+magnificent spectacle." In describing the renewal of the baptismal vow,
+the next ceremony which took place, the author says,&mdash;"This act was held
+in so solemn a manner, that it will remain eternally engraved in the
+memory of the Avignonese. A magnificent altar was displayed to the sight
+of the faithful: a great number of priests in their sacerdotal habits
+encircled this altar, which a thousand tapers and a thousand sacred
+objects rendered more dazzling, and the holy sacrament was majestically
+exposed on it. After the performance of the anthems appropriate to this
+august ceremony, the missionary delivered a discourse, as forcible as
+it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span> was sublime, on the object of the festival, which produced the
+greatest impression on his congregation. The eternal book of the gospel
+was then held up to the people. They were summoned to swear to the
+observance of the precepts of the Lord, contained in that book.&mdash;'We
+swear it,' answered the congregation. All their baptismal vows were in
+turn repeated, ratified, and confirmed by the congregation, with an
+effusion of tears which might have affected the hardest hearts. Their
+cries, their tears, and their sobs, were more eloquent than the
+addresses of the missionaries. The minister in his chair seemed to
+receive the promises and the vows of his parishioners, as Ezra formerly
+received those of the people of Israel."</p>
+
+<p>After the consecration of the Avignonese and their children to the
+service of the Virgin Mary and the general communion, which followed the
+ceremonies last described, the great cross, which now stands near the
+cathedral, was carried in procession to the place of its erection, on
+the 18th of April. So great a sensation had been excited by the
+expectation of this ceremony, and so anxious were all ranks to
+participate in it, that "the town," says the narrator, "swarmed like an
+ant-hill (fourmilloit) with strangers, the inns and private houses
+afforded no more room, and they who could find no quarters, covered the
+roads during the whole of the preceding night."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The number of persons employed to assist in the procession amounted to
+twenty thousand, including the civil and military authorities, the
+monastic establishments, the neighbouring clergy, and a limited number
+of inhabitants from each parish. The cross, amounting in weight to three
+tons and a half, was supported on a frame constructed so as to admit one
+hundred and twenty bearers at once. These were relieved from station to
+station by detachments from all ranks and professions, selected from
+innumerable claimants, and amounting altogether to two thousand men.
+Having thus traversed thirty principal streets, the inhabitants of which
+vied with each other in decorating their windows with garlands and
+tapestry, the cross was borne to the terrace on the Roche Don, and
+erected in sight of more than eighty thousand individuals, who crowded
+the hill above, the extensive space of ground adjoining, and the windows
+and roofs of the houses. "The whole discourse pronounced on the
+occasion," says the narrator, "was as affecting as it was energetic. The
+orator at length closed it, by exhorting his audience not to forget the
+cross and their religion. 'Remember,' said he, 'that you are Christians
+and Frenchmen; fly to the foot of the cross as Christians in all your
+misfortunes, and it will be your consolation; as Frenchmen, you will
+there learn to be faithful to your country, and submissive to your
+king.&mdash;Et d'un ton plein de franchise il s'ecria, Vive la Croix, vive la
+Religion, vive la Roi&mdash;L'auditoire repeta les<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span> m&ecirc;mes mots avec la m&ecirc;me
+enthousiasme, et y ajouta, 'Vive les Missionaries.'"</p>
+
+<p>On the 19th, the following day, a solemn service was performed for the
+dead in the cemetry of St. Roch; and the Mission was closed by sermons,
+exhorting the people to perseverance in the religious vows which they
+had voluntarily made. Having thus performed their proposed duties, the
+missionaries prepared for a private departure. The affectionate zeal of
+the people, however, would not allow the execution of this plan; and
+numbers, consisting chiefly of the national guards, kept watch at the
+doors of their lodgings all night; and in the morning they were besieged
+by a crowd of persons desirous to take leave of them. At the special
+request of these visitors, among whom were some of the most
+distinguished inhabitants of Avignon, they performed an additional
+service at the foot of the newly-erected cross, and were escorted out of
+the town amidst the acclamations of the multitude, who persisted in
+drawing their carnages a certain distance. Many persons accompanied them
+on horseback and in coaches as far as Orange.</p>
+
+<p>To the practical effects of the Mission, the writer bears the following
+testimony.&mdash;"Prudence restricts us from naming individuals; and yet we
+can vouch, that many husbands, separated from their wives and living in
+concubinage, have put away their mistresses<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span> and re-established their
+legitimate wives in their houses. After the revolutionary horrors which
+have afflicted our city, there existed inveterate hatreds and
+animosities, founded on real offences. Well! union and concord have
+removed many of these intestine divisions, many deadly enmities have
+been laid at rest, many resentments have been stifled; great numbers of
+enemies have made the sacrifice of all their revengeful feelings. A
+citizen, round whose neck one of the revolutionary hangmen had actually
+fixed the noose for the fatal suspension, perceived his executioner in a
+state of penitence during the Mission, and approaching the communion
+table&mdash;'I congratulate you,' said he, 'on your reformation, and I pardon
+your offences against me, as I would God may grant me his pardon and
+peace.' The porters of the Rhone, who had been long at variance, have
+been many of them cordially reconciled: the invalids of the national
+guard have also mutually vowed a perpetual friendship."</p>
+
+<p>Whatever the interests and prejudices of M. Fransoy may be, it is
+improbable that he would have risked his professional and private
+reputation, by misrepresenting recent occurrences on the spot where they
+took place; and certainly his narrative places the Mission in a new
+point of view, both as to its conduct, its reception, and its effects.
+It is, indeed, natural enough that such wits as do not affect either
+much knowledge or much interest on religious<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span> subjects, should indulge
+in desultory sarcasms (and the Hermite en Provence prudently does no
+more) on such instances of spiritual Quixotism as may possibly have
+occurred. The absurd<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> choice of hymn tunes, the petulant zeal of one
+or two ecclesiastics, and the rueful countenances of some of the
+penitents, though they prove nothing as to the main question, present a
+ludicrous picture to the imagination, and have been made the most of by
+the fictitious correspondent of the Hermite. It is also natural enough
+that the violent Liberaux, who view with distrust every measure
+countenanced by government, should treat the Mission as a mere engine of
+policy; that the avaricious should consider the donatives received on
+its behalf as squandered away; and that a large class of persons, who
+are inveterately sceptical as to their neighbour's good motives, and
+childishly credulous as to his bad ones, should pronounce it a mere
+manoeuvre of bigotry. The little tract in question, however, addressed
+to the experience of eye-witnesses of all that it describes, tells a
+different story, though its effect may be weakened by the ludicrous
+<i>na&iuml;vet&eacute;</i> of its style. It describes the missionaries as addressing
+themselves particularly to those who stood most in need of their
+instructions, and who were most likely to treat them with derision; as
+availing themselves of the favourable reception which they experienced
+from the Avignonese, to preach the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span> duties of forgiveness and
+reconciliation, both private and political, and to dwell on the
+practical and fundamental parts of Christianity.</p>
+
+<p>Had they, indeed, in a public manner, denounced the vengeance of Heaven
+against the murderers of the unfortunate Brune, or pointedly rebuked the
+religious and political animosities subsisting in the south of France,
+they would have given a proof of their sincerity, but at the risk of
+much of that good which it was desirable to use their temporal influence
+in effecting. Instead, therefore, of giving unnecessary offence, they
+laboured to eradicate from the minds of their hearers the seeds of
+hatred and uncharitableness, and to divert their attention from their
+private bickerings and dissensions, to the common guilt of all in the
+sight of Heaven. The very object which, from all we learn respecting the
+state of feeling in Languedoc and Provence, appears particularly
+desirable, appears also to have been sought, not only by repeated and
+fervent exhortations, but by the exaction also of public vows and
+promises, so as to enlist the sense of shame as much as possible, in
+favour of the general forgiveness which the missionaries preached. Their
+exertions also, always supposing the tract in question to be entitled to
+credit, were rewarded by the conduct of their penitents, some of whom
+put away their vices, and others their mutual animosities. If this be
+fanaticism, then it were to be wished that such fanaticism should<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
+prevail widely in the south of France. "Out of the same mouth cannot
+proceed blessing and cursing;" and if the secret object of the Mission
+be to denounce the disaffected, or preach crusades against Protestants,
+it must be owned that their public labours at Avignon savour but little
+of such a purpose, as far as all appearances go.</p>
+
+<p>There is, it is true, something extravagant and bordering on stage
+effect, in many of the ceremonies performed, and expressions used, as
+recorded by the pen of M. Fransoy. An Englishman, however, is not always
+a fair judge of the best means of influencing the mind of a Frenchman,
+more particularly a south-eastern one. The Proven&ccedil;aux possess, both in
+appearance and in character, the strong characteristics of a people born
+under a burning sun; at once lively and ferocious, strongly led away by
+the excitement of the moment, and ardent in their partialities and
+antipathies: in short, the same romance of character is perceptible
+among them, which, in the dark ages, peopled the country with
+troubadours. The mass of such a people, particularly when profoundly
+ignorant, may not be accessible to cool argument; and the manner and
+style of oratory which would disgust a reasoning Scotch peasant, or
+English mechanic, may be exactly adapted to act on the temperament of an
+Avignonese. The surest test, therefore, of the character and design of
+the Mission, will be the practical effects which it produces<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span> on the
+conduct of its congregation, as well as the future application of those
+liberal donatives, which have excited so much unfavourable feeling
+against it. Time and fair play alone can justify the motives of those
+who planned and conducted it. The question in the mean time is, not
+whether they may or may not have occasionally gone to the lengths of a
+"zeal without knowledge," but whether or not their purpose has been to
+instruct and benefit their fellow-countrymen according to the best of
+their power and belief, and without reference to political party.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_VIII" id="CHAP_VIII"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. VIII</a></h2>
+
+<h3>PONT DU GARD&mdash;NISMES&mdash;MONTPELIER&mdash;CETTE.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May</span> 13.&mdash;This day was fixed on for a journey to Vaucluse, the road to
+which is better adapted for the accommodation of two wheels than of
+four. M. Durand, our voiturier, attended accordingly with one of his
+portly mares harnessed to a sort of cabriolet, very much resembling an
+Irish noddy. Its high boarded front reaching to our chins, and the
+little fat person of Durand rather incommoded than accommodated on a
+cushion tied to the shaft, and much too near the mare on every account,
+formed a grotesque combination but little in character with what ought
+to have been a voyage of sentiment. The deficiency in pathos, however,
+was made up by the poor mare, who bewailed her absent companion with
+such incessant roarings, as to draw many cuts of the whip, and "sacra
+carognas," from the unrelenting Durand. We were struck, by-the-by, more
+than once during this day's route, by the Spanish<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span> and Italian
+terminations of the Proven&ccedil;al patois. A village which we passed, on an
+insulated height commanding the road, and crowned by ruined
+fortifications, is laid down as Ch&acirc;teau Neuf in the map, and called by
+the peasants Castel Novo. A man of whom we inquired the distance to
+Avignon, answered "Tres horas," using not only the words, but the method
+of computation which a Spaniard would employ.</p>
+
+<p>Whether we really reached our place of destination, or were stopped
+short by intense heat and execrable roads, were interested, or
+overturned, this deponent saith not, nor indeed is it necessary. One may
+be pardoned for omitting the mention of a subject already so fully
+described as Vaucluse, its rocks and fountain, its associations, and
+even its eatables; for some travellers have dwelt on the subject of its
+excellent bisque, or crayfish soup, and its eels, a solace, no doubt,
+to<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a> that gentle degree of melancholy, which Fielding affirms to be a
+whet to the appetite.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"And, says the anatomic art,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The stomach's very near the heart;"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>as Peter Pindar also maintains. Some also, with an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span> accuracy worthy
+Moubrays treatise on domestic fowls, have informed us that the hens near
+the fountain of Vaucluse are peculiarly prolific in fine eggs, and so
+on. For my own part, I may as well honestly confess that I am more
+partial to the memory of Petrarch as a philosopher, a patriot, and
+reviver of ancient learning, than as the Werter of Troubadours, though
+in the latter capacity he has stood unrivalled for five hundred years. I
+must own, also, that the hermitage whither he retired to stifle his
+rebellious passion for the wife of another, however melancholy and
+impressive the ideas may be which it would of itself excite, is
+poisoned, in my mind, by the pestilent frivolities with which the
+mawkish of all ages have defaced its sombre features, in violation of
+truth and sound feeling. What syllables of dolour the forgotten
+Della-Cruscan school may have yelled out on the subject, is not worth
+ascertaining, and probably recollected by few or none. The French, who
+with all their ingenuity, are not very apt at comprehending the madness
+of contemplative minds, have caricatured the shade of poor Petrarch most
+woefully, and<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> the Abb&eacute; Delille (peace to his ashes!) has teazed the
+innocent trees of Vaucluse with embarrassing questions, fitter for the
+mouths of Susanna's elders. Under such blighting influence, the stern
+rocks of Vaucluse are transformed into a sentimental<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span> tea-garden, the
+high-minded and melancholy Petrarch into a more ingenious Piercie
+Shafton, and the virtuous Laura, who probably never saw the place, into
+a starched Gloriana of the old school, paraded and gallanted round it
+with all due form. It is, perhaps, a judgment on Petrarch's adulterous
+Platonism, that it has laid him open to impertinences like these, which
+would torture his sensitive ghost almost as keenly as oblivion itself,
+and which very strongly remind one of Punch's intrusion at a tragedy.
+Such ideas cannot be engrafted on the <a name="FNanchor_36a_36a" id="FNanchor_36a_36a"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a>Nonwenwerder, or the<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a>Pena
+de los Enamorados, spots on which a simple and obscure legend has thrown
+an interest which Vaucluse cannot really possess, though embellished by
+every thing which poetry can do for it.</p>
+
+<p>It were to be wished, that the shade of Petrarch could return to his
+former haunts, to frighten away frivolous visitors, and read a lesson to
+the thinking. Instead of rejoicing at the posthumous fame which his
+poetical talents have earned, he would probably dwell on the
+insufficiency of the highest mental endowments without conduct and
+self-command. He would also probably describe his passion as fostered by
+the pedantic and high-flown gallantry of the age, and the applauses
+bestowed on his verses;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span> as increasing and strengthening, after the
+marriage of Laura had rendered it criminal, without any purpose which
+his better conscience dared avow, till his eyes at length opened
+themselves too late to its culpable nature. His mind, of that
+high-wrought and desponding tone which often characterizes extraordinary
+genius, and too sincere to trifle with impunity, struggled then
+fruitlessly against a fatality formerly imagined, but become real; and
+the flower of his life was passed amid illusions and conflicts, in
+alternate self-deception and self-reproach, in wild and beautiful
+visions from which he awoke to sickness of heart and weariness of
+himself and all things, like the victim of a powerful opiate.
+Compromising weakly between his passion and his conscience, he would
+say, he secluded himself at Vaucluse from a society which had become
+dangerous to him, and by the verses which he composed as a vent to his
+feelings, fixed the illusion too deep to be eradicated by lapse of time,
+or the indifference of Laura. Such voluntary mental martyrdom resembles
+the punishment inflicted by some tyrant of history on his prisoners,
+whom he commanded to embrace his Apega, a beautiful automaton so
+constructed as to plunge a concealed dagger into their hearts.</p>
+
+<p>The better feelings of Petrarch's readers will dwell with the least
+alloy on the period after the death of Laura, when he contemplated her
+as beyond the reach of human ties, affections, or jealousies, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
+sought only to rescue from oblivion the virtues and purity which had
+strengthened and refined his passion, while they rendered it hopeless.
+There is a beautiful passage in Campbell which appears exactly written
+to express his state of mind at this time, and the retrospective glance
+which he must have often cast on his past life.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"And yet, methinks, when wisdom shall assuage<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The griefs and passions of our greener age,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Though dull the close of life, and far away,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Each flower that hailed the dawning of our day,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Yet o'er her lovely hopes that once were dear,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The time-taught spirit, pensive, not severe,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With milder griefs her aged eye shall fill,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And weep their falsehood, though she love them still!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The private memorandum,<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> written in the manuscript Virgil, of this
+extraordinary man, which is shown in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, may
+be considered as expressing his most undisguised feelings, as excited by
+an event which dissolves trifling attachments, while it gives permanence
+to those of a genuine nature. It was probably intended for no eye but
+his own. I annex as literal a translation as possible, and from the
+beauty and ease of their latinity, have been tempted to precede it with
+the original words.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span></p>
+<p>"Laura, propriis virtutibus illustris, et meis longum celebrata
+carminibus, primum oculis meis apparuit sub primum adolescenti&aelig; me&aelig;
+tempus, anno Domini 1327, die 6 mensis Aprilis, in ecclesi&acirc; sanct&aelig; Clar&aelig;
+Avinioni, hor&acirc; matutin&acirc;. Et in e&acirc;dem civitate, eodem mense Aprilis,
+eodem die 6, e&acirc;dem hor&acirc; prim&acirc;, anno autem Domini 1348, ab hac luce lux
+illa subtracta est, cum ego forte Veron&aelig; essem, heu fati mei nescius!
+Rumor autem infelix, per literas Ludovici mei, me Parm&aelig; reperit, anno
+eodem, mense Maii, die mane.</p>
+
+<p>"Corpus illud castissimum ac pulcherrimum in loco Fratrum Minorum
+repositum est ips&acirc; die mortis ad vesperam. Animam quidem ejus, ut de
+Africano ait Seneca, in coelum, unde erat, rediisse, mihi persuadeo.</p>
+
+<p>"H&aelig;c autem, ad acerbam rei memoriam, amar&acirc; qu&acirc;dam dulcedine scribere
+visum est; hoc potissimum loco, qui s&aelig;pe sub oculis meis redit, ut
+cogitem nihil esse debere quod amplius mihi placeat in hac vit&acirc;, et
+effracto majori laqueo, tempus esse de Babylone fugiendi, crebr&acirc; horum
+inspectione, ac fugacissim&aelig; &aelig;tatis &aelig;stimatione, commonear. Quod, pr&aelig;vi&acirc;
+Dei grati&acirc;, facile erit, pr&aelig;teriti temporis curas supervacuas, spes
+inanes, et inexpectatos exitus acriter ac viriliter cogitanti."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>"Laura, illustrious for her own virtues, and long celebrated by my
+verses, first appeared to my eyes, in the time of my early youth, on the
+morning of the sixth day of April, in the year of our Lord 1327, in the
+church of St. Clare at Avignon; and in the same month of April, on the
+same first hour of the morning, in the year of our Lord 1348, that light
+was removed from this light of day, while I by chance was at Verona,
+unconscious, alas! of my fate. The unhappy news, however, reached me at
+Parma, in a letter from my friend Ludovico, on the morning of the 19th
+of May.</p>
+
+<p>"Her most chaste and fair body was buried in the evening of the day of
+her death, in the convent of the Fratres Minores; but her soul, as
+Seneca saith of the soul of Africanus, hath returned, I am persuaded, to
+the heaven from whence it came.</p>
+
+<p>"I have felt a kind of bitter pleasure in writing the memorial of this
+mournful event, the rather in this place, which so often meets my eyes,
+to the end that I may consider there is nothing left which ought to
+delight me in this world; and that I may be reminded by the frequent
+sight of these words, and the due appreciation of this fleeting life,
+that my principal tie to the world being broken, it is time for me to
+fly from this Babylon; which, through the preventing grace of God, will
+be an easy task, when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span> I reflect deeply and manfully on the superfluous
+cares, the vain hopes, and the unlooked for events of the time past."</p>
+
+<p>This simple and affecting tribute, written, as it evidently seems, under
+such solemn impressions, clears the memory of Laura from the imputation
+of any thing trifling or criminal, while it sufficiently establishes the
+identity of "a nymph," according to Gibbon, "so shadowy, that her
+existence has been questioned."</p>
+
+<p>May 14.&mdash;We left Avignon this morning, with a more favourable impression
+of its cleanliness and comfort than any other town had as yet left on
+our minds. The road to Nismes, winding up a hill on the opposite side of
+the river, above Fort Villeneuve, is remarkably adapted also to display
+its numerous spires, and the grand Gothic mass of the legate's palace,
+to the utmost advantage: and we watched with something like regret the
+disappearance of these objects over the brow of the hill which we had
+ascended, more especially as on this spot the eye takes leave, for some
+time, of every thing agreeable. The view here consists of a high dull
+flat, with hardly a tree, and the road of rolling stones and dust; and a
+high wind prevailed, which seemed a combination of the Bise and Mistral,
+aided by all the bottled stores of a Lapland witch, and very nearly blew
+poor Durand off his box. After passing Fouzay and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span> Demazan, two Little
+villages, adorned each &agrave; la Proven&ccedil;ale, with a ruined castle, we turned
+out of the road to Nismes at Remoulin, where the features of the country
+somewhat improve. Another mile and a half brought us to an indifferent
+inn within a ten minutes' walk of the Pont du Gard. It is adapted for
+nothing more than a baiting-place for a few hours, and not at all of
+that description which so well-known a ruin would be in most cases
+capable of maintaining. The landlord, however, "a sallow, sublime sort
+of Werter-faced man," was civil, and inclined to do his best, and
+gathered us some double yellow roses, of a sort we had never seen
+before, to season his bad fare.</p>
+
+<p>The Pont du Gard, which we were not long in visiting, is seen to the
+greatest advantage on the side on which we approached it from the inn.
+The deep mountain glen, inhabited only by goats, whose entrance it
+crosses from cliff to cliff, forms a striking back-ground, and serves as
+a measure to the height of the colossal arches which appear to grow
+naturally, as it were, out of the gray rocks on which they rest.<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a>
+There is certainly something more poetical in the stern and simple style
+of architecture of which this noble aqueduct is a specimen, than in the
+more florid and graceful school of art. The latter speaks more to the
+eye, but the former to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span> mind, possessing a superiority analogous to
+that which the great style of painting (as it is termed) boasts over the
+florid and ornamental Venetian school. Our own Stonehenge is too much,
+perhaps, in the rude extreme of this branch of architecture to be quoted
+as a favourable instance of it; but few persons can come suddenly in
+sight of Stonehenge on a misty day without being struck by its peculiar
+effect; and the Pont du Gard, placed in as lonely a situation, exhibits
+materials almost as gigantic in detail, and knit into a towering mass
+which seems to require no less force than an earthquake, or a battery of
+cannon, to change the position of a single stone. A large and solid
+bridge which has been built against it by the states of Languedoc,
+appears by comparison to shrink into insignificance, and shelter itself
+behind the old Roman arches, the lower tier of which, eleven in number,
+overtop it in height by about three-fifths. The span of the largest arch
+is about 78 feet; of the other ten, 66 each: and they are surmounted by
+a row of thirty-five smaller arches. With the exception of two or three
+of these last, the whole fabric is complete, and, if unmolested, appears
+likely to witness more changes of language and dynasty than it has
+already done. I do not know that the mind is ever more impressed with
+the idea of Roman power and greatness, than by contemplating such
+structures as these, erected for subordinate purposes at a distance from
+the main seat of empire. It is like discovering a broken hand or foot of
+the Colossus of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span> Rhodes, and estimating in imagination the height and
+bulk of the whole statue from the size of its enormous extremities.</p>
+
+<p>From the Pont du Gard the road to Nismes has little to recommend it
+excepting the high state of cultivation of the country, and this is not
+of a nature to gratify an eye accustomed to English verdure.
+Olive-groves, it is true, have been naturalized in poetry as conveying
+an image of beauty and freshness; but in reality nothing can be more
+opposed to the oaks and elms of an English hedge-row, than the pale
+shining gray of this stunted tree, which has more of a metallic than a
+vegetable appearance. Nor does a perpetual succession of corn-fields,
+however rich in reality, present the same appearance of luxuriant
+vegetation as an English pasture. There is, besides, nothing in the
+nearer approach to Nismes, which reminds one of the environs of an
+opulent commercial town, and its precincts would cut a poor figure when
+compared with those of Leeds or Bristol. The transition is immediate,
+from a dull range of corn-fields, without a gentleman's house, to a long
+dirty suburb. On emerging, however, from the latter into the better and
+more central part of the town, one is surprised to find wide and elegant
+streets well watered and planted, and public buildings, whose beauty and
+good taste show that the citizens of Nismes have made a good use of the
+fine architectural models afforded by the ancient Nemausis. The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span> Palais
+de Justice deserves to be particularly remarked for its classical
+elegance, and contrasts well with the black solid arches of the Arenes,
+near which it is placed.</p>
+
+<p>"<i>Monsieour!</i> les antiquit&eacute;s!&mdash;<i>Heou! Monsieour!</i> les
+Arenes!&mdash;Commissionaire pour voir la Maison Carr&eacute;e!&mdash;<i>Heou&mdash;ou!
+Monsieour!</i> decrotteur, s'il vous plait!&mdash;Le Temple de Diane,
+<i>Monsieour!</i>" are the cries with which every third or fourth ragamuffin
+at Nismes salutes you, enforcing his application by a peculiar yell, of
+which no combination of letters can give an idea uncouth enough. As it
+is hardly possible to walk in the central part of Nismes without seeing
+its antiquities before you, it is best to avoid a troublesome live
+appendage of this sort, by appearing totally deaf. The Arenes are nearly
+in front of the H&ocirc;tel du Louvre, and the Maison Carr&eacute;e is within two or
+three minutes' walk of it: the Temple of Diana and the Baths are
+situated in the most conspicuous spot in the public gardens, whither a
+perpetual concourse of people may be seen thronging; and the Pharos
+overlooks them from the summit of a small precipitous hill, which may be
+ascended in five minutes by a good walker. Every thing therefore lies
+within the compass of an evening's stroll.</p>
+
+<p>The Maison Carr&eacute;e is a beautiful bijou, better known than any other of
+the curiosities of Nismes.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span> I believe the opinion of Mons. Seguier
+(formed from a laborious examination of the nail-holes belonging to its
+last bronze inscription) is generally adopted; viz. that it was a temple
+dedicated to Caius and Lucius C&aelig;sar, grandsons of Augustus. A perfect
+copy of it, built from actual measurement, may be found in the Temple of
+Victory and Concord, in the Duke of Buckingham's gardens at Stowe. So
+admirable is the preservation of the original in every part, owing to
+the dry and pure air of Languedoc, as almost to operate as a
+disadvantage. Its freshness and compactness suggest rather too much the
+idea of a modern pavilion of twenty or thirty years standing, instead of
+that of a temple; and if I may venture to say so, the same want of the
+&aelig;rugo of age, which renders it more valuable as an architectural relic,
+produces an incongruous and unpoetical effect on the imagination. Age,
+in fact, has its own characteristic branch of beauty. An old man with
+curly hair and a fresh smooth complexion, like Godwin's Struldbrugg, St.
+Leon, would be an unpleasant and unnatural object. There is a masculine
+and imposing medium between youthful vigour and decay, in which the
+leading features of the former man may be distinctly traced; as in
+Wordsworth's beautiful description of the old knight of Rylstone, and
+Sir Walter Scott's fine portraiture of Archibald Bell-the-Cat: and I
+think the analogy holds good in classical remains. Somewhat should be
+decayed for effect's sake; and those parts only left which are
+strikingly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span> beautiful, or of a leading and important nature. The Arena,
+which we next visited, is perhaps more consonant to this standard than
+the Maison Carr&eacute;e. Its structure is similar to that of the Colosseum at
+Rome, of which, however, it falls infinitely short in size and grandeur,
+while at the same time it so far exceeds it in perfectness, as to give a
+complete idea to an inexperienced eye of its original figure and
+arrangement, and of the admirable system of accommodation which such
+places possessed. It has just enough of the graceful decay of age to
+render it picturesque, and enough of freshness to answer the questions
+of the antiquarian: and neither too much nor too little is left to the
+imagination. Mr. Albanis Beaumont, in his work on the Maritime Alps,
+calculates the number of persons which this building must have held at
+16,599, and the spectators in the Colosseum at 34,000. He also states
+the widest interior circumference of the Arena, as 1110&frac12; feet. The
+plate engraved in his work, dated 1795, represents two square towers
+over the principal entrance, erected perhaps by Charles Martel, when he
+converted the building into a citadel; they have however been since
+destroyed, and the work of clearing away the houses which defaced both
+its inside and outside, commenced originally by Louis XVI., has been
+completed. It now stands in a broad open space, adapted to set off its
+full height and proportions.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>The public garden also presents a well-arranged group of interesting
+objects; but to behold them to any advantage, it is necessary to turn
+your back upon a pert little caf&eacute;, roofed with party-coloured tiles like
+the scales of a fancy fish, which glares from under the shade of the
+trees. From hence you look over a handsome balustrade into a large
+excavated space adorned with stone steps, which collects the waters of a
+fine fountain, and in which the foundations of the ancient Baths are
+still visible. On the summit of the opposite cliff, from whence these
+waters issue, the ruined Pharos, which forms the principal landmark of
+Nismes, rises with great majesty, and at its foot, immediately to the
+left of the fountain, the ruined temple of Diana, though not
+individually striking, combines admirably with the general group. From
+the fountain arises a beautifully clear stream, which is distributed in
+wide and deep stone channels through some of the principal streets at
+Nismes, and greatly contributes to the ornament and cleanliness of the
+town. The Pharos, or Tour Magne, to which I scrambled from the Baths,
+fully answers to its distant appearance. There is a peculiar dignity and
+solidity in a figure approaching to the pyramidical, when placed on the
+top of a rock; and independent of its height, which is between eighty
+and ninety feet, the Pharos has this recommendation also. Its interior
+appears a curious work of masonry. A high wide conical vault, without<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>
+pillar or buttress, constitutes almost the whole internal space,
+admitting just light sufficient to render "the darkness visible," and
+give additional solemnity to a mere shell of brickwork.</p>
+
+<p>We found the H&ocirc;tel du Louvre (to which we had been recommended in
+preference to the Hermite's inn, the H&ocirc;tel du Luxembourg) excellent in
+every respect. The two hotels adjoin one another so closely, be it
+observed, and are so similar in appearance, that one may walk into the
+wrong salle-&agrave;-manger, and only discover the mistake through the
+difference of the waiter's faces.</p>
+
+<p>May 15.&mdash;Seventeen miles to New Lunel, where we breakfasted
+indifferently enough, not liking French customs sufficiently to qualify
+the bad coffee with a glass of the brandy of this place, which is as
+celebrated as its wine. New Lunel, which has grown on the back of the
+old town, in consequence of a branch of the Languedoc canal which runs
+close to it, is a neat and thriving place, but possesses no feature
+worthy of remark. The country is of the same character as the town, a
+dull rich flat, over which one may sleep with the soothing consciousness
+that every thing is going on well with its trade and agriculture. To
+Montpelier eighteen miles. Within the last league or two, the country
+begins rather to improve, and rise into somewhat of an undulating<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span> form;
+but no romantic or interesting feature marks the approach to this
+celebrated town.</p>
+
+<p>"How I envy you the sight of that delightful Montpelier, of which one
+reads and hears so much!" exclaims many an untravelled lady, no doubt,
+to her travelled brother or cousin. No place certainly sounds more
+familiarly in the ear as a novel-scene; and its very name is associated
+with ideas of beauty, verdure, retirement, orange groves, hanging woods,
+and all the et ceteras of a spot.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Where simply to feel that we breathe, that we live,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Is worth the best joy that life elsewhere can give."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The truth is, that the Montpelier of the imagination may be found at
+Vico, Sorrento, Massa di Carrara; or, with a little alteration, in some
+spots of our own Devonshire coast. The real Montpelier is a large,
+opulent, well-frequented provincial capital, full of noise and dress,
+and possessing an air of neatness and fashion, but totally devoid of any
+thing allied to the poetry of nature. It stands on a round sweeping
+hill, commanding a considerable extent of land and sea; but the
+sea-coast is chiefly an expanse of low ground and etangs, or salt-water
+lakes; and the neighbouring hill country, resembling in form a
+succession of cultivated downs, has neither height nor variety to
+recommend it. The most interesting spot<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span> in Montpelier is the Place
+Peyrou, a public garden raised on high terraces, in a situation
+commanding the rest of the town. At the extremity of the principal walk
+stands an elegant open building of the Grecian order, overarching a
+basin into which the waters of the celebrated aqueduct of Montpelier are
+received, and from thence distributed through the town. The aqueduct
+itself, which springs from the foot of this pavilion, and conveys the
+water from the crest of an opposite hill, is a truly noble work, and,
+though modern, worthy in every respect of a Roman &aelig;dile. It was erected
+by the states of Languedoc in honour of Louis XIV. whose statue is
+placed in the garden. Like the Pont du Gard, it consists of two tiers of
+arches, fifty of which we counted in the lower range, and one hundred
+and fifty in the upper, until the lessening perspective baffled all
+farther attempts at reckoning. The architecture is inferior in dignity
+and massiveness to that of the Roman work, but exceeds it in extent, and
+probably in the quantity of masonry employed. Nothing can be more
+elegant than its general form, and the manner in which it is united to
+the terrace of the Place Peyrou.</p>
+
+<p>Whatever natural objects are interesting in the environs, may be seen
+also from this elevated spot, though I am inclined to think that the
+views of distant Pyrenees which we were taught to expect, are a fiction
+existing in the minds of some travellers. At all events, the glimpses
+must be partial, and only to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span> be obtained on a fine day. The Cevennes
+mountains rise, however, to a tolerable height in the distance to the
+west; and to the south-east, the remains of the old town and cathedral
+of Maguelone, form a striking distant group, projecting like a low reef
+of rocks into the sea at the distance of three or four miles. To judge
+from the site of this ancient town, which tradition describes as the
+original nucleus of Montpelier, the sea must have made great inroads on
+the neighbouring coast. The air, it is said, is growing less wholesome
+than formerly, owing probably to the accumulation of the etangs. From
+the edge of the coast to Maguelone, the distance cannot be much less
+than a mile and a half at low water.</p>
+
+<p>The Montpelliards are considered a scientific people; and, at all
+events, they seem to have found out the secret of perpetual motion, if
+we may judge from the experience of the first night we spent in the
+town. At half past nine, the principal street, which our hotel
+overlooked, began to swarm with heads. The whole population were on the
+alert, promenading during the greater part of the night; and such a busy
+hum arose from beneath the windows, which the heat obliged us to keep
+open, that it was impossible even to think of sleeping till daybreak.
+Our accommodations indeed were not of the most tempting sort; for
+finding the H&ocirc;tel du Midi full of travellers, and consequently saucy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>
+and unaccommodating, we had tried the Cheval Blanc, described to us as
+the next best hotel; and detestable enough we found it. On stepping
+however next morning into a caf&eacute; and restaurant in the Place de Comedie,
+whose superior appearance had attracted us, we found that M. Pical, the
+master of it, was in the habit of letting rooms, and we immediately
+removed to his house. Nothing indeed could be more clean and elegant
+than its accommodations, or more refreshing after the dusty journey of
+the former day, and the nightly bustle of the streets, than its quiet
+and coolness, situated as it is in a large area in the suburbs or
+boulevards. The salle-&agrave;-manger partakes of the same character with the
+rest of the house, and the carte contains a list of many more good
+things than we were inclined to do justice to. In short, no traveller
+can do better than order himself to be driven directly to this house,
+which comprises all the advantages of a private residence at a
+reasonable charge, with the recommendations of great attention and
+civility.</p>
+
+<p>This day, May 16, we attended service at the French Protestant Church,
+and were gratified both with spending a morning on the shores of the
+Mediterranean in a manner which reminded us of an English Sunday, and
+witnessing also the full and respectable attendance of fellow
+Protestants. The service was performed in the following order:&mdash;1, a
+psalm; 2, a general confession of sins; 3, another<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span> psalm; 4, a sermon;
+5, the commandments and the creed; 6, a long prayer for the sick and
+distressed, the king and the royal family; 7, another psalm, and the
+blessing. The singing was impressive, not so much from any intrinsic
+merit in the performance, as the earnestness in which the whole
+congregation joined in it, "singing praises lustily with a good
+courage," instead of deputing this branch of religious duty to half a
+dozen yawning and jangling charity children, assisted by the clerk and
+parish tailor. I believe it is an observation of Dr. Burney, in his
+History of Handel's Commemoration, that no sound proceeding from a great
+multitude can be discordant. In the present instance, certainly, the
+separate voices qualified and softened down each other, so as to produce
+a good compound. Of the sermon I cannot speak so favourably, for in
+truth it savoured somewhat of the conventicle style. Its theme was
+chiefly the raptures which persons experience under the influence of the
+Holy Spirit, and it was calculated to discourage all whose imaginations
+were not strong enough to assist in working them into this state. The
+manner of the preacher was however good, and his delivery fluent; and so
+great was the attention of the congregation, that during three quarters
+of an hour not a sound interrupted his voice, until, on his pausing to
+use his handkerchief, a general chorus of twanging noses took place,
+giving a ludicrous effect to what was, in fact, a mark of restraint and
+attention.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>In the evening we departed for Cette. The road, according to the set
+phrase of the French Itineraire, is through a "campagne de plus
+agr&eacute;ables;" but our observation showed us only a bleak high common to
+the right, and to the left a succession of etangs and sandy flats,
+affording a prospect at once desolate and uninteresting. The space
+between the etangs and the road is generally marshy; and instead of a
+fine blue expanse of sea in motion, the horizon is commonly bounded by a
+long white sandy line, over which the sails of the little vessels appear
+very oddly. One or two houses erected on these ridges, which border the
+etangs, give to the view, if possible, a still more desolate appearance,
+being totally unaccompanied by even a tree or a patch of verdure, and
+only serve to remind you of the nakedness of the land. Near Frontignan
+the prospect improves, as far merely as concerns its fertility; for it
+is in the vicinity of this town that the famous Frontignac wine, or to
+denominate it more correctly, the Muscat de Frontignan, is made. The
+only thing during this evening's route which could be considered as a
+feature, was the lofty cape at whose foot Cette stands; a perfect idea
+of which, from the side on which we approached it, is given by Vernet's
+picture of that port, in the Louvre. A bridge of fifty-one arches,
+traversing a series of swampy ground and etangs, connects this
+promontory with terra-firma, and crosses the great Languedoc canal,
+which communicates at this spot with the sea. A beautiful sunset,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span> which
+made the whole expanse of back-water appear of a rose-colour, and which,
+I confess, I have seldom seen equalled in England, gave as much richness
+to the view as it was capable of receiving. There is naturally but
+little in it; and the effect of Vernet's view is derived from accidental
+circumstances purposely introduced; so that, on the whole, we wished
+that our evening's excursion had been confined to the Place Peyrou. I
+should, however, conceive the air of Cette to be much better adapted to
+tender lungs than that of Montpelier, as well from the difference of
+temperature, perceptible even to a person in sound health, as from the
+superior shelter which its situation affords; while the high and exposed
+site of Montpelier leaves a doubt whether, in most cases it would not be
+more hurtful than salutary. The productions of the neighbourhood of
+Cette are also in a more forward condition than those of Montpelier. We
+saw hedges of arbor vit&aelig; in full flower; and peaches two-thirds grown,
+in almost a wild state.</p>
+
+<p>May 17.&mdash;We rose at five in the morning, desirous to secure a cool walk
+to the Tour des Pilotes, a signal post on the high cape above Cette. The
+sun was however prepared for us, and continued to grill us alive from
+the first moment; and, after all, the prospect from this station, to
+which you climb as if ascending the steep roof of a house, is not of a
+nature to repay the exertion. We went to satisfy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span> our consciences that
+there was nothing to see, and we saw nothing. The Pyrenees, so far from
+being visible near Montpelier, cannot be distinguished even from this
+nearer point, excepting, perhaps, on a peculiarly clear day; and no
+other feature worth mentioning occurs. The coast presents a bare and
+uninhabited appearance, arising partly from the almost total want of
+trees. Our perquisitions in the town of Cette itself were more
+fortunate, though, by-the-by, it exceeds Lyons itself in dirt and ill
+smells. It is a place of considerable trade in proportion to its size,
+and is employed chiefly as an entrep&ocirc;t for goods, which may be landed
+and reshipped without paying duty: and a walk on the quay affords, in
+consequence, considerable varieties of the human face divine, neat as
+imported. I recognised a group of Catalan sailors by their brown jackets
+embroidered with shreds of gaudy cloth, their red night-caps, and the
+redicillas in which their hair was bagged. No race of men with whom I am
+at all acquainted bear so marked a character of animation and decision
+in every movement of ordinary life as these sturdy provincials, or would
+be more remarked by a stranger among a mixed concourse of different
+nations. The same exuberance of animal motion which degenerates into
+restlessness and buffoonery in the Neapolitan, or the native of
+Languedoc, assumes a more dignified character in the Catalan, who is
+certainly a gentleman of Nature's own making. One of the crew, a tall
+athletic fellow, was holding forth to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span> rest on some trivial matter
+with a varied and graceful action, which might have served as a model to
+a painter. The rest were at breakfast; but even their mode of pouring
+the wine on their tongues at arm's length, from the long spout of a sort
+of glass kettle, had somewhat classical in it, and reminded me of the
+recumbent figure in the Herculanean painting, who is drinking in the
+same manner. Simple as it may appear, this knack is not to be acquired
+without a long apprenticeship, and I was ludicrously reminded of my
+abortive efforts to master it by the sight of the party on the quay. It
+certainly is adapted for making the most of any liquid, and might have
+been adopted during such a scarcity of water as the Hanoverian consul
+informed us existed in Cette during the former year. Not a drop of rain
+fell for ten months, and water at last became dearer than wine.</p>
+
+<p>On crossing the bridge, we observed a man on one of the piers, spearing
+aiguilles de mer, a beautiful silvery fish, of which he had taken
+several. They were about two feet long, and of the shape of an eel,
+excepting in the form of their long picked heads and jaws, which
+correspond exactly with their name. The tunny is also caught in
+abundance near this part of the coast; and Vernet has introduced the
+fishery, from a lack of picturesque circumstances, into one of his
+sea-ports, painted by royal order. No other fish can better deserve this
+particular<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span> compliment, uniting, as it does, size, flavour, and the
+merits of both fish and flesh in a great degree. The "thon marin&eacute;" is
+its plainest and best preparation, and is preferable, with a dish of
+salad, to all the high-seasoned dishes which form a Proven&ccedil;al bill of
+fare; in short, if our national sirloin obtained knighthood, such a good
+lenten substitute as the tunny deserves canonization.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> I cannot say
+so much for the dish, common enough among Frenchmen, which a
+well-dressed man, the harlequin to a troop of comedians, was eating in
+the salle-&agrave;-manger when we entered; viz. a raw artichoke with oil and
+vinegar. Sterne, it appears, little knew the extent of the ass's good
+taste, when he deprived him of this article in the Tabella Cibaria, "to
+see how he would eat a macaroon."</p>
+
+<p>We set off at two o'clock in the day on our return to Montpelier, not a
+little envying the horses and mules their cool quarters in the immense
+remise. Within a mile of Cette lies the breakwater of rough stones,
+which forms a prominent object in the foreground of Vernet's picture,
+and serves to ascertain the spot from whence he took his design. At
+Villeneuve, where we stopped to bait the horses, we were diverted by a
+scene characteristic of the country. A bag had just been found on the
+road by the conductor of the Cette diligence, which drove up to the inn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
+while we were there; and on Durand disowning it, a shabby-looking foot
+passenger claimed it, but could not establish his plea by identifying a
+single article. In a few seconds every soul in the inn, excepting
+ourselves, was assembled to take part in the discussion, and argued the
+pro and con with a vehemence of voice and action, which would have made
+a stranger believe it was a matter of life and death to each. A female
+inside-passenger, with an infant in her arms, which she nearly let drop
+in her energies, was the coryph&eacute;e of this chorus of tongues, which could
+be compared to nothing but bees in the act of swarming, or the cackle
+which the entrance of a fox causes in a hen-roost. We were no longer
+surprised at hearing the peasants whom we met conversing in a tone which
+we had mistaken for quarrelling. The French generally, indeed, are fond
+of noise and action and emphasis about what does not concern their own
+interests a jot, while a London mob indulges an equal degree of
+curiosity by silent gaping; but these good folks certainly outdid
+anything I ever witnessed in France before. An action for defamation
+brought in Languedoc<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> might, with propriety, be worded, "that the
+defendant did, with four-and-twenty mouths, four-and-twenty tongues, and
+four-and-twenty pair of lungs, vilify and damnify his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span> neighbour's
+reputation;" for it is probable that a scolding match could not take
+place in the open air of that country, without enlisting volunteer
+seconds to that amount on both sides, all equally bawling and violent.
+At Nismes, a fellow bellows across the street to offer himself as
+cicerone, in a tone which seems intended to warn you of a mad dog at
+your heels; and, in general, the lungs of Languedoc appear constructed
+on a larger and more discordant scale than is usual, and their
+volubility is rather a contradiction to the yea and nay appellation of
+the country. A respectable Frenchman informed us, that the peasants of
+Languedoc were considered to possess much wit and ingenuity by those who
+could understand their patois, which he frankly owned was unintelligible
+to himself. Their liveliness and animal exuberance are as strong a
+contrast to the immoveable form into which they are swathed when
+infants, as the flutter of a butterfly is to its torpidity as a
+chrysalis; indeed a fanciful person might be apt to suppose, that on
+emerging from their bandages, they indemnify themselves for the previous
+constraint by a life of perpetual fidget, and that the same re-action
+takes place as in the case of Munchausen's horn, which played for half
+an hour of its own accord when unfrozen. To speak seriously, nothing can
+be more piteously ridiculous than the state of a poor Languedoc child,
+swathed and bandaged into all the rigidity of a mummy, and totally<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
+motionless. Our friend H. declares, that his attention was once drawn
+behind a door by a faint cry, and that he there discovered and took down
+one of these little teraphims from the hook by which it hung suspended
+by a loop, like a young American savage. "C'est la mode du pays," is the
+only account of the practice which you get either here or at Nice; and
+it is fortunate that they have not still improved on it by a hint from
+the black nurses of Barbadoes, who embalm weakly young Creoles in
+wrappers lined with assa-foetida, and think it prejudicial to "burst
+their cerements" more than once in a fortnight.</p>
+
+<p>After our horses had eaten a pound of honey with their corn, which
+honest Durand considered a powerful cordial, we resumed our route, and
+reached Montpelier to a late dinner, enjoying in no small degree the
+coolness and quiet of Pical's house. It was indeed the love of quiet,
+and the dislike to a constant ferment, which drove our landlord from
+Nismes to settle in this place. The bigotry and party zeal of the former
+town, in truth, appear to have been hardly exaggerated in the accounts
+which have reached England, and to exist in such a degree as to render
+Nismes an unsafe place for a moderate man, who is owned by neither
+party. The spirit of discord and enmity is instilled by the more violent
+of both parties into their children as a duty, so that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span> it will probably
+descend from generation to generation. Both parties, indeed, might adopt
+as a crest and motto a boot-maker's sign in Montpelier, which is
+somewhat diverting from its bombast, when merely applied as honest
+Crispin meant it. A lion is represented tearing a boot, with the
+inscription, "Tu peux me dechirer, mais jamais me decoudre." Construe
+it, "You may cut my throat, but not alter me," and it will show the
+pleasant state of party spirit at Nismes, if what we heard so near the
+scene of action be true. We returned to Nismes on the 18th with
+associations not so pleasant as had been created by its beautiful walks
+and buildings, and the civility with which our questions were answered
+by the inhabitants. We might have seen the country between Montpelier
+and Nismes to greater advantage, the dust being somewhat less stifling
+than before; but unluckily there was nothing worth seeing. The district
+is certainly a garden, but then it is a flat uninteresting kitchen
+garden, for the supply of the Lunel brandy merchants, and the rich
+Nismes manufacturers, who appear too polite in their tastes to venture
+into it. Hardly a single thing that can be called a gentleman's house
+occurs, and that not for want of culture or opulence. The case seems to
+be this; the people of Nismes, like the Bordelais, are proud of their
+elegant and airy city, embellished with classical relics, and uniting
+most of the advantages of town and country, and are well satisfied
+without<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span> the campagne which a rich Lyonnais, carrying on his business in
+a close town, considers as his paradise. Although this system of "rus in
+urbe" gives but a mean and poor appearance to the environs of a town, it
+produces much pleasure and convenience to such resident strangers as can
+enjoy the society of Nismes, which, by all accounts, must somewhat
+resemble sleeping in Exeter 'Change, the keepers, in the shape of a
+strong preventive force of military, on the alert, it is true, and the
+bars are well secured, but the beasts only watch their opportunity to
+tear each other to pieces. How an Englishman would fare in a public
+disturbance is difficult to say. It is probable that the Catholics would
+abominate him as a heretic, and the Protestants denounce him as an
+anti-Buonapartist, and that he would consequently be thrust from the one
+to the other, like a new comer between two roguish school-boys. This,
+however, was no concern of ours, as we left Nismes the next morning on
+the road to Beaucaire. The old Pharos was the last landmark we took
+leave of, as it was the first of which we caught sight. It contrasts
+with the Maison Carr&eacute;e as a wild legend of the dark ages would with a
+letter of Pliny; and though rough in its fabric, and uncertain in its
+history, dwells as strongly on the recollection as that highly-finished
+gem.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The tower by war or tempest bent,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">While yet may frown one battlement,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Demands and daunts the stranger's eye,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Each ivied arch and pillar lone<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Pleads haughtily for glories gone!"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_IX" id="CHAP_IX"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. IX</a></h2>
+
+<h3>TARASCON&mdash;BEAUCAIRE&mdash;ST. REMY&mdash;ORGON&mdash;LAMBESC.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">To</span> Tarascon 19 miles of road for the most part bad and sandy. I am not
+geologist enough to decide with accuracy on the formation of that part
+of the banks of the Rhone which we were approaching, but the detached
+specimens of rock are of a curious nature. After passing a little
+village called St. Vincent, we came to an open plain, bounded in front
+by several singular round hills on the summit of one of which, called
+the Roche Duclay, was a rock so exactly resembling an old castle in size
+and shape, that a nearer inspection alone satisfied us as to its real
+nature. There is also a great singularity of outline in the hills which
+became soon visible in the distance on the other side of the Rhone, one
+or two of which appeared as if they had shells upon their backs.
+Beaucaire, with its old castle overhanging the Rhone, soon came in
+sight.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span></p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Jeunet encore, &eacute;tois sortant de page,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Lorsque &agrave; Beaucaire ouvrit un grand tournoi.<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Maint chevaliers y firent maint exploits,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Dames d'amour animoient leur courage;"<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>says the French Roman: and in the old fabliaux also, the scene of
+Aucassin and Nicolette is laid in this place. These are, I believe, but
+a small portion of the claims which Beaucaire possesses to chivalrous
+celebrity, and its very name is in a manner connected with knights and
+ladies, tourneys and pageants. There is something in its appearance also
+which does not belie these associations, although it was crowded with
+farmers and market people at the time of our arrival: and those too of
+the vulgar bettermost sort, which is the most hopelessly
+unchivalrous.<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> The castle stands detached from the town, on as bold
+and perpendicular a cliff as any romance writer could wish, and
+overlooking one of the broadest and most rapid reaches of the Rhone; an
+extensive green<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> meadow planted with trees, and large enough for a
+tournament on the most extensive scale, or another Champ du Drap d'Or,
+divides the steep side of this rock from the river; and on the land side
+it is backed by another cliff garnished with as many windmills as Don
+Quixote<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span> himself could have desired. We crossed the Rhone on a bridge of
+boats to a long narrow island, from whence the view on both sides is
+striking. Beaucaire, with the accompaniments I have just described, and
+Tarascon, flanked by the large ancient castle of the counts of Provence,
+front each other on the opposite banks of the Rhone, which rushes and
+thunders on both sides of the isle, making the cables by which the
+floating bridge is lashed, creak most fearfully every moment.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> From
+this point I made a drawing of Tarascon in defiance of a violent wind,
+which forced me to place my paper on the lee side of a stranded boat,
+and to sketch in the attitude of a plasterer white-washing a ceiling.
+Another bridge of boats conducted us to Tarascon;<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> where we walked
+out while the horses were baiting, the whole inn being in the same
+confusion from market people as Beaucaire itself, and not seeming of the
+most comfortable description. Being driven by a heavy scud of rain into
+a shoemaker's shop, we found a civil and intelligent guide in his son,
+from whom, however, we could not ascertain that there was any thing
+worthy of notice in this populous place, except the castle. We passed
+the Maison de Charit&eacute;, in front of which is a new cross lately erected
+by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span> Mission, on the scale of that at Avignon, and profusely gilt and
+ornamented. The same agency also has lately re-established an Ursuline
+convent of fifty-two nuns in this place. The cathedral is old and mean,
+and apparently under no very strict regulations, for an old woman was
+selling cakes in the aisle close to one of the chapels. We went into a
+vault beneath to see a marble statue of St. Martha, which has merit in
+itself, and by the light of a single wax candle, had a striking effect:
+the great admiration, however, in which it is held here may chiefly
+arise from an opinion of its miraculous powers. "Elle devenoit invisible
+pendant la Revolution," whispered our young Crispin.&mdash;"Oui, elle &eacute;toit
+cach&eacute;e, voil&agrave; ce que tu veux dire, mon petit&mdash;." "Eh! non, pardon,
+Messieurs, elle se cacha; mais il y a trois ans qu'elle se montre
+encore," replied the little fellow, with the most confident gravity. I
+trust that this monstrous fiction did not originate in the Ursuline
+convent which he mentioned; and that the fifty-two good ladies employ
+their time in more charitable and useful actions than in filling the
+heads of poor children with stories so hurtful to the real interests of
+religion. However credulous our young guide was, he was not mercenary,
+being with difficulty persuaded to accept a franc or two for what he
+styled the pleasure of having conducted us. We next visited the castle
+of Tarascon, now used as the public prison, and in which 1500 English
+were confined during the war. The enormous height and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span> massiveness of
+its walls, which overtop the weather-cock of the cathedral, and the
+smallness of its few windows, qualify it well for this purpose; and a
+greater appearance of strength and solidity is given by the solid rock
+in which its foundations are embedded, and which in some places is
+shaped into wall and moat. We crossed a drawbridge into a court flanked
+by four round towers, and having a square keep in its centre. On the top
+of one of these towers is an esplanade, from whence the view of the
+course of the Rhone, and the great plain of Arles, is fine: the latter
+town, which is about nine miles distant, was seen distinctly. We were
+rather disappointed by the inside of the castle, which seemed chiefly to
+consist of small mean rooms: perhaps the baronial hall might be the
+dormitory of the prisoners, and not in a presentable state; but we saw
+nothing which recalled any idea of feudal magnificence. The same
+description which serves for the tower of Westburn-flat, in the Black
+Dwarf, allowing for the difference of size and finish, would exactly
+suit the cubical shape and high blind walls of this castle, which
+probably was intended to serve similar purposes in the days of club law.
+Its durability is not so remarkable as the fresh colour and sharpness of
+every part of the carving, and it might pass for a modern gothic edifice
+of twenty years standing, but for the solidity and frowning grandeur
+which characterise it. The air of Provence appears more clear and dry
+than even that of Italy, and to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span> be more favourable to the preservation
+of old buildings. Its clearness certainly is remarkable, particularly in
+diminishing the effect of distance; and on Monday night, at Montpelier,
+I recollect that we could plainly discover with the naked eye the stars
+of the milky way, which are commonly imperceptible without a glass. I
+cannot say that our route from Tarascon to St. Remy was well calculated
+to show the climate of Provence in this light. The whole eleven miles
+were performed in almost a perpetual storm of rain and wind, which
+prevented our seeing much of the rich plain we were traversing. What we
+could see, however, was pleasing: every inch teemed with olives, vines,
+mulberries, corn, onions, and lucerne. We remarked many sheep sheared in
+a comical manner, with two or three tufts, like pincushions, running
+down the centre of their backs, and painted red. Circumstances like
+these, though trivial, are or ought to be pleasing, as they indicate
+that something like comfort or leisure exists, and that the farmer's
+business is partly become an amusement. A needy peasant, pinched by high
+rents or bad seasons, would have but little inclination to ornament his
+favourite wether in this absurd manner; and though Forsyth's remark is
+very true, that a peasant never attempts to become fine but he is
+hideous, such hideous attempts<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> are grateful to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span> the mind's eye from
+the cheerfulness and play of mind which they indicate. Within a little
+distance of St. Remy the storm cleared sufficiently to enable us to
+discern the line of hills to the right, the foot of which we were
+skirting, and which border the great plain of Avignon to the south.
+There is something very singular in the outline of these rocks, which
+are a miniature resemblance of the wild mountains near Valence, but more
+savage and fantastic, presenting the appearance of the sea turned to
+stone in its wildest state of commotion, or in the powerful words of
+Manfred,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"The aspect of a tumbling tempest's foam<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Frozen in a moment; a dead whirlpool's image."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>At the foot of one of these barren gray rocks, which, from its shape and
+perforation, exactly resembles the barbacan and gate of a castle, St.
+Remy is situated. The H&ocirc;tel de la Graille, where we took up our abode
+for the night, was as comfortable as most French inns, excepting those
+in the large towns: and though the <i>gros chien de menage</i>, for whose
+company we always stipulated, was perfectly agreeable, and of a gigantic
+size, yet he was by no means, as is frequently the case, the only
+civilized person in the house. This <i>gros chien du menage</i>, be it known,
+is a person of great responsibility in a Proven&ccedil;al inn, as well as of
+formidable strength and size, and is entrusted for the night with the
+care of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span> the remise, and all the live and dead stock, horses, carriages,
+and waggons, which it contains; and a more effectual guard cannot well
+be: his manners during the day are very mild and gentleman-like, as if
+he acted as master of the ceremonies; and he generally steals in at
+supper-time, as if to inform you that all is safe, and to claim a pat of
+your hand, and a pairing of your fricandeau in acknowledgment of his
+professional care. The greasy landlord will stand staring at his kitchen
+door, the landlady will not be very attentive to your accommodation when
+you are once safely housed, and the dirty, bare-legged fille will poison
+you with steams of garlic; but the <i>gros chien</i> will always make amends
+to a genuine lover of dogs.</p>
+
+<p>May 21.&mdash;We were tempted by a beautiful morning to rise somewhat before
+four o'clock, in order to visit the Roman ruins near this place, before
+our departure for Orgon. A walk of ten minutes conducted us up a gentle
+terrace on which they were situated, and which rises between the town
+and the fantastic hills we had remarked the day before. Having heard but
+little of these classical remains, we were most agreeably surprised to
+find them in such perfect preservation, and so beautiful in themselves.
+They consist of a mausoleum and an arch, which stand within a few yards
+of each other, and appear to have formed the principal objects in a
+public square or place; the area of which is evidently<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span> marked out by a
+row of solid stone seats, well adapted for the accommodation of
+gazers<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> at these beautiful gems. The arch has suffered the most decay
+of the two: or rather, it most exhibits the effects of violence; for the
+unmutilated parts are as sharp and bold as if fresh from the hand of the
+sculptor. The human figures on each side have suffered the most, either
+perhaps from some party commotion of past ages, or the same wanton
+propensity which leads man to disfigure his fellow-creature's image in
+preference to any other work of art; and to which we owe the demolition
+of Andr&eacute; and Washington's heads in Westminster Abbey. The fretted
+compartments in the inside, and the border which surrounds the bend of
+the arch, are in the highest preservation. The latter represents
+clusters of grapes, olives, figs, and pomegranates with the accuracy of
+a miniature, and in a free and natural style. One of the pomegranates
+was represented as ripe and cracking, and every seed distinctly
+expressed. The mausoleum is, I should venture to say, a building
+perfectly unique in its way, as a remnant of antiquity; and therefore
+more difficult to describe by a recurrence to any known work of art. I
+cannot better, however, describe its effect on the mind than by saying,
+that it ought to be removed to Pompeii in company with the arch. It is
+certainly superior, as a work of art, to any thing yet discovered<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span> in
+that singular place; while it possesses the same indescribable domestic
+character which seems to bring you back to the business and bosoms of
+the ancients, in a manner which nothing at Rome can do. As far as I
+could judge by the eye, it is from forty to fifty feet in height. An
+open circular lanthorn of ten Corinthian pillars, surmounted by a
+conical roof of stone, and containing two standing figures, rests on a
+square base, presenting an open arch on each side, which is in its turn
+supported by a solid pedestal, exhibiting on each of its four sides a
+bas relief corresponding to the respective arch. There is great spirit
+and fine grouping in the bas reliefs, which represent battles of cavalry
+and infantry. The standing figures before-mentioned, to whose honour the
+mausoleum may be supposed to have been erected, are in the civil garb:
+and there is an ease and repose in their attitudes, corresponding with
+the grave, calm expression of the heads, of which necessary appendage
+the merciless French Itineraire has guillotined them without warrant.
+The colour of the freestone of which it is built is as fresh as that of
+the castle of Tarascon. The building is constructed with a thorough
+knowledge of what the human eye requires, tapering and becoming more
+light towards its conical top. It is also of size sufficient for all
+purposes of effect, though not too large for a private monument. The
+situation in which these relics stand is sufficient to add beauty to
+objects of less merit. They are placed, as I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span> mentioned, on a cultivated
+rising ground, at the foot of the wild gray rocks which ran parallel to
+the former day's route, and which assume from this spot a more
+castellated appearance than when viewed from the road. On the other side
+a fine and boundless view opens into the great plain of Avignon and the
+Rhone, almost perplexing to the eye by its variety and number of
+objects: in which we distinguished Avignon itself, and Mont Ventou many
+leagues behind it, rising in height apparently undiminished, with light
+hazy clouds sailing along its middle, and backed by the wild Dauphin&eacute;
+mountains, near Ch&acirc;teau Grignan. We could also distinguish Beaucaire,
+Tarascon, and a large part of the former day's route, to the extreme
+left; and the right opened into various vistas of the hilly country
+which we had to cross in our road to Marseilles. The whole scene was
+lighted up and perfumed by the effects of the shower of rain which had
+fallen in the night, and without which a summer landscape in this
+country is a dusty mass oppressive to the eyes. The thyme and lavender
+on which we sat, and the mulberries and standard peaches which shaded
+us, seemed, as well as the vineyards, to be actually growing; and the
+catching lights were thrown in such a manner as to make every distant
+object successively distinct. After a couple of hours survey, we took
+leave of the ancient Glanum Livii, convinced that we had as yet seen
+nothing more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span> perfect in its way than their tout ensemble, when combined
+with the surrounding scenery.</p>
+
+<p>To Orgon twelve miles: winding still round the base of the cluster of
+rocks which form the southern barrier of the vale of Avignon, and which
+assumed every variety of whimsical shape during our morning's route. At
+about a mile and a half from the conclusion of our stage, we joined the
+high road from Avignon to Marseilles, which renders the H&ocirc;tel de la
+Poste at Orgon, a good and well-accustomed inn. While we were at
+breakfast, a S&oelig;ur de la Charit&eacute; called on us to beg for an hospital
+newly established, and in truth her request was but reasonable, for the
+town seems poor enough, and unequal to the maintenance of such an
+establishment. Several of the houses are well built, but wear a decayed
+appearance, as if they had seen much better days. Orgon still deserves
+notice from its beautiful situation, and from its having been the place
+where Buonaparte met with so narrow an escape from the fury of the
+inhabitants during his journey to Elba. "Vous allez sans doute voir la
+Pierre Perc&eacute;e," said every body at the inn, whom we interrogated as to
+what was best worth seeing in the compass of an hour's walk. To the
+Pierre Perc&eacute;e we went accordingly, and found it nothing but a common
+tunnel cut in a neighbouring rock, to draw off the waters of the Durance
+when swoln with avalanches, from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span> vale of Avignon, and supply a
+canal communicating with the Etang de Berre.<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> The summit of the rock
+affords by far the best view of Orgon, and one which seems expressly
+constructed for the purposes of landscape: nothing can group better
+together than an old ruined castle just above it, and a dilapidated
+convent on the summit of the hill, standing out in bold relief from the
+narrow vale of the Durance, up which we traced the course of our next
+stage; and the variety of exotic dwarf shrubs, which grew on the cliff
+where we were standing, gave great richness to the foreground. These,
+and the hedges of cypress and cane, which we occasionally saw, began to
+give an Italian character to this part of France.</p>
+
+<p>The adjoining part of the vale of the Durance is called the district of
+the Cheval Blanc, and, like its namesake, the vale of White Horse in
+Berks, is celebrated for its fertility. To Lambesc twelve miles. For six
+or seven miles the road follows the course of the Durance, which, to
+judge from the extent of its stony shoals, must be a tremendous stream
+at high water, and deserving the termagant appellations which Mad. de
+Sevign&eacute; bestowed upon it. The back of the rocks of Orgon, which we
+traversed during the first mile, and on which the convent stands, is
+very singular, and resembling more a mass of strange petrifactions than
+any regular<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span> stratum. At Senas, we saw the ruins of a handsome house
+belonging to a M. de B. to whom his property has been restored since the
+Revolution; but the gentleman was disgusted at the woods having been cut
+down and sent to Toulon for ship-building, and resides entirely at Aix.
+An English squire in M. de B.'s case would have rebuilt his ruined
+mansion, and raised a belt of young forest trees in a very few years.
+For some miles during this stage the face of the country was interesting
+and rich in cultivation, with a ruined castle or two, which form
+striking features; but on turning to the right up a long hill which led
+to Lambesc, and leaving the vale of the Durance behind us, backed by its
+high barrier of table-shaped mountains, the country became very
+monotonous. It is on a higher level, and though tolerably fertile, is
+deficient in verdure, the olive being almost the only tree met with.
+Lambesc, like Orgon, which it much exceeds in size, has an air of faded
+gentility and desertion, and its fine public fountains tell a tale of
+better days. In this town the states of Provence were convened annually
+in the reign of Louis XIV.; and it possessed also many of the privileges
+of a capital in the days of the counts of Provence, but at present it is
+celebrated for nothing but the growth of the best Provence oil. This is
+no small distinction in the <i>almanac des gourmands</i>, as there is no
+article in which it is so difficult to hit the critical taste of a
+Proven&ccedil;al. I have seen them often make hideous faces at the twang of oil
+which a Spaniard would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span> abuse, and an Englishman admire, for its
+tastelessness. A Proven&ccedil;al lady, with the knowing air of a <i>bonne
+menag&eacute;re</i>, told us, that no traveller could meet with really good oil,
+for that the ordinary sort which we ignorantly thought excellent, was
+made from heaps of olives laid to ferment in order to increase the
+quantity of produce. The best (which answers, I suppose, to the Cayenne
+pepper sent in presents) is made by the proprietors in small quantities
+for their own use, from the natural runnings of choice fresh-picked
+olives, like cold drawn castor oil, and has a greenish tinge; and this
+the good lady assured us was the only true thing.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">No more, when ignorance is bliss,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">'Tis folly to be wise;<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>more particularly in matters relating to the palate. We walked to see
+the house where the Count de Grignan resided in state, during his
+official visits to Lambese: like many other dilapidated mansions in the
+place, it bears the marks of fallen greatness. There is a handsome stone
+gateway belonging to it, decorated with a carved coat of arms supported
+by lions; but the house, like the poor Palazzo Foscari at Venice, is
+tenanted only by a nest of squalid families. The H&ocirc;tel du Bras d'Or is a
+plain, comfortable country inn, civil and reasonable.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_X" id="CHAP_X"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. X</a></h2>
+
+<h3>AIX&mdash;MARSEILLES.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May 22</span>.&mdash;To Aix sixteen miles. Though the country during the first part
+of the stage is hilly without any romantic character, and rather
+unpromising, the difference of climate was already apparent from the
+strong and brilliant colours of the very hedge flowers, of which we
+observed an endless variety. After passing St. Canat, the first post,
+the country improves a little, and the<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a>mountain under which Aix is
+situated begins to thrust its lofty head above the intervening line of
+hills. In proceeding a little further, we caught a distant glimpse of
+the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span> Etang de Berre to the west, and presently distinguished Aix in a
+deep vale under our feet, into which the descent is long and steep. A
+cart escorted by five gens d'armes, in which we saw a priest and another
+person quietly ensconced, and exposed to a burning sun, was toiling up
+the hill on a very different errand from ours. We were surprised to see
+a grave character in so equivocal a situation, but found on inquiry that
+he had benevolently offered his assistance in escorting a woman on her
+journey to Arles, where she was to be executed for a murder. The
+circumstances under which it had been committed, struck us as more
+atrocious than common. About seven years before, this person, in concert
+with her husband, who was since dead, invited an old lady, their friend
+and patroness, and godmother to one of their children, to walk and eat
+grapes in their vineyard. Watching their opportunity, they cut her
+throat, buried her on the spot, and possessed themselves of her
+property, with which they removed from the neighbourhood of Arles, where
+the murder was committed.</p>
+
+<p>Arles and its environs, it seems, are a sort of French Lancashire in
+point of brutal ferocity, and are celebrated for murders as much as for
+pork sausages; not that I mean to connect the two things together, as in
+the well-known nursery tale.</p>
+
+<p>The H&ocirc;tel des Princes at Aix is justly to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span> praised for cleanliness
+and excellent accommodations; but Madame Alary is too well aware of its
+merits to lose by them. It is somewhat ridiculous to pay, in this fine
+fruit country, three francs for a small coffee-saucer of marmalade, with
+which we were charged as a separate item in the breakfast; and those
+therefore who intend staying a couple of days at this inn, should make
+their bargain first.</p>
+
+<p>Mons. Gibelin, a physician residing in the Rue Italienne at Aix,
+possesses, and obligingly allows to be shown, some good pictures,
+including original portraits of Mad. de Sevign&eacute; and her daughter.
+Finding him from home, and the house shut up, we extended our walk
+further into the town, which, in point of airy streets and cleanliness,
+deserves to hold a very high rank indeed among French cities. The houses
+are generally stately, regular, and well built, and give you the idea
+both of former and of present gentility and opulence. It is in some
+degree cooled by several fine fountains, a circumstance of no small
+importance at this season of the year, for the effects of the "beau
+soleil de Provence" began to exceed even my recollections of Naples.
+Speaking merely at hazard on the subject, I should doubt whether any
+place in the south of France is better adapted for the cure of pulmonary
+complaints than Aix. It stands on the side of a rising ground, facing a
+delightfully well-watered and fertile valley to the south-west, and
+sheltered from the piercing winds, so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span> prevalent in Provence at some
+seasons, by a mountainous barrier which rises to the north and
+north-east. Its situation is thus at once sheltered, airy, and cheerful,
+and does the greatest honour to the taste of King R&eacute;n&eacute;<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a> in selecting
+it for his capital.</p>
+
+<p>To Marseilles sixteen miles. At the end of a mile and a half, the road
+ascends a hill to the south, marked by a clump of stone pines, which
+commands the best view of Aix and its environs. The vale running up to
+the right under Mont St. Victoire deserves particular mention, as
+uniting the highest degree of beauty and verdure with a certain wildness
+of feature; and would give a fair idea of the best parts of Italian
+scenery to a person not desirous of crossing the Alps. After taking
+leave of this valley, which better deserves to be called the garden of
+Provence than any other district I have yet seen, the face of the
+country is less pleasing, but in some places more singular and original.
+The first few miles were dull enough, it is true; and to add to our
+pleasure intensely hot, and destitute of any sort of shade. It was
+therefore with no small satisfaction that we stopped for a few minutes
+under a grove of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span> tall old trees which overshadowed the road, with a
+fountain spouting up in the midst, which completely altered the
+atmosphere. No palm island in the deserts of Arabia was ever more
+welcome than this cool spot, which belonged, we understood, to the
+adjoining Ch&acirc;teau Albertas. Whoever was the planner of it, he has
+discovered more true taste and gentlemanly feeling than if he had built
+the finest possible entrance or lodge as a mere tribute to self-love:
+and were pride alone consulted as a motive, nothing leaves so striking a
+recollection on the minds of strangers, or so strongly disposes them to
+inquire the name of the proprietor of a spot, as an elegant proof of
+attention to their convenience, like the one in question.</p>
+
+<p>Having traversed a second interval of dry parched country, we crossed
+another pleasant valley, in which is situated the Ch&acirc;teau Simiane. This
+seat, visible about a mile to the left, was the residence of Pauline de
+Grignan, wife of the Marquis de Simiane; who is said to have inherited
+much of the talent and liveliness of her grandmother and mother. Her
+verses beginning with</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Lorsque j'&eacute;tois encore cette jeune Pauline," &amp;c.
+</p>
+<p>
+jesting on the annoyance of a lawsuit in which she had to defend her
+title to the Grignan estates, are still on record. After passing the
+Ch&acirc;teau Simiane,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span> the country became wild and singular in parts. We
+particularly remarked a small village built round the base of one of
+those castellated rocks which abound in the neighbourhood of Beaucaire,
+as also a singular defile near the post-house of La Pin. The high gray
+rocks which inclose this spot appear as if seared to the quick with
+drought, and for some distance leave room only for the road and a narrow
+riband-shaped line of rich cultivated ground of a few yards in breadth;
+which is again succeeded by a small village, whose houses completely
+block up the defile. From this point you creep and wind gradually to the
+hill called La Viste, from which we were instructed to expect the most
+celebrated view of Marseilles. It fully equals all that can be said of
+it; and, though inferior to the bays of Naples and Genoa, possesses
+features which strongly remind one of both. On reaching a wood of stone
+pines on the summit of the hill, the bay of Marseilles bursts on you all
+at once, in an immense sheet of bright blue, studded with sunny islands,
+among which the Ch&acirc;teau d'If, a little spot fortified to the teeth, and
+commanding the entrance of the inner port, is most conspicuous. On
+advancing a little further, the shores of the bay are seen lengthening
+themselves into a half moon, one horn of which is formed by a line of
+mountains of no remarkable outline, and the other by a more lofty chain,
+communicating with Mont St. Baume and Mont Victoire, and the out-post of
+which is formed by a lofty and barren cape jutting into the sea at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
+back of Marseilles. The town itself possesses no remarkable feature from
+this point, except the fort of Notre Dame de la Garde, which crowns and
+commands it at the top of a lofty hill; but its environs, which rise in
+an amphitheatre from the sea to the adjoining mountains, are one
+perpetual succession of white villas, vineyards, orange, lemon and
+fruit-tree groves, and every thing in short which can enrich and enliven
+a prospect. Too much certainly is not said by the French of this
+celebrated Viste, which deserves at least a quarter of an hour's
+attention; and there are one or two decent cabarets on the top of it,
+the resort of the Marseillois for cool air and refreshment, where the
+horses can be baited while a survey or a sketch is taken.</p>
+
+<p>After the descent of this hill, nothing worth notice occurs, till you
+have passed a long and uninteresting suburb, and enter Marseilles by the
+Cours, the first effect of which is striking, as it runs in a straight
+line dividing the town into two parts. We turned off to the right,
+towards the stately quarter which Vernet has represented in his
+celebrated view from the inner harbour; and took up our abode at the
+H&ocirc;tel de Beauveau, which we found in every way deserving the rank which
+it holds among the number of excellent hotels in this place. We rose
+soon after day-light the next morning, to walk to the fort and signal
+post of Notre Dame de la Garde, the most conspicuous object in a distant
+view of Marseilles,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span> and which we had observed rearing its flag-staff at
+the end of almost every vista of street, like the castle of St. Elmo at
+Naples. In our walk we picked up a species of locust, the sauterelle of
+this country, of a pale, dirty brown, and somewhat more than three
+inches in length. Thanks to the great cleanliness of the H&ocirc;tel de
+Beauveau, this was the first insect which we had as yet met with at
+Marseilles. In a climate, indeed, of a certain degree of heat, perpetual
+scouring and sweeping becomes absolutely necessary in all comfortable
+establishments, and these little evils are more completely eradicated
+than in those places where they are less natural. The simple precaution
+of shutting the windows before candles are brought, is commonly
+sufficient to keep off the mosquitos; and as for the scorpions, this
+formidable bug-bear exists only in the imaginations of travelling
+ladies, in glass jars at apothecaries' shops, and occasionally in the
+poorer houses of the old town, where the dirt and rubbish afford it a
+shelter.</p>
+
+<p>On ascending the hill of Notre Dame de la Garde, we found reason to
+approve our choice of it as a point of general survey. It commands not
+only the whole bay, but also the flat space of land encircled by
+mountains, in which Marseilles is enclosed as between hot walls, and the
+town itself lies like a map under it. As a point, however, for a general
+sketch, I should prefer the island of Ratoneau, which possesses
+sufficient elevation for all purposes of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span> picturesque, and brings in
+the sea and the Ch&acirc;teau d'If as a front ground, grouping at the same
+time the masses of building of Marseilles better than a mere bird's eye
+view would do.</p>
+
+<p>The chapel of this fort, like that of Notre Dame de Fourvi&egrave;res at Lyons,
+possesses a great reputation for sanctity, and much resembles it also in
+its steep ascent, which one would suppose that some austere monk had in
+both cases contrived as a penance to short breathed devotees. The same
+hosts of beggars also besiege both places, of all ranks and pretensions,
+from those who stand silent in a white sheet for drapery, to those who
+obstreperously exhibit their want of any drapery at all. The chapel is
+hung with little pictures, dedicated to the Virgin by the honest sailors
+and peasants, and representing different providential escapes: the
+wretched daubing of which is somewhat atoned for by the good feeling
+which placed them there. One of them represents the Virgin appearing to
+a ship in a storm, with a visage and demeanor which might as well
+accompany a flying mermaid; another describes a man run over by a cart,
+and preserved unhurt by a similar interference; a third, the recovery
+from a sick bed, and the joy of the friends on the occasion, whose
+countenances not a little reminded us of our grim friends Damon and
+Holofernes. Some offerings of a better and richer description were
+pillaged at the time of the Revolution.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>We descended from this airy situation down a range of streets as
+precipitous as the roof of a house, the slope of which probably
+counteracts the effect of heat, and prevents the stagnation of air in
+the crowded situations of the old town: Marseilles is said to be healthy
+in consequence; and the generally active and fine appearance of its
+population confirms it. The heat, however, to judge from a comparison
+with Naples at the hottest season of the year, must be tremendous. It
+struck on us at nine in the morning, on re-entering the town, like the
+air from the mouth of an oven; and the herds of poor goats who compose
+the walking dairies of Marseilles and the environs, dead asleep on the
+trottoirs, formed, with a few strolling Turks, almost all the
+out-of-doors population in the principal streets. We had no objection
+whatever to imitate the general practice, and to sit still in a cool
+room for the rest of the morning, reserving ourselves for an evening's
+walk on the quay. I have as yet seen no place where a promenade of this
+sort is so fraught with little circumstances of amusement, or where such
+a variety of different ideas can be taken in by the eyes alone.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Greeks, Romans, Yankeedoodles, and Hindoos,"
+</p>
+<p>
+
+and more nations than could be described in a whole stanza of names, may
+be found clustering in knots, or lounging under the awnings of their
+different<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span> coffee-houses; while new detachments of fresh-men are seen
+continually landing, with lank staring quarantine faces, and elbowed in
+every direction by the busy Marseillois, whose curiosity is too much
+deadened by continual importations, to be excited by the newest or
+strangest costume. In short, the memorable political masquerade which
+was got up so awkwardly by Anacharsis Clootz and his friends from the
+Fauxbourg St. Antoine, might here be represented almost every day in the
+week by real and genuine actors, in every possible variety.</p>
+
+<p>May 24.&mdash;I cannot say much for the old cathedral; and as far as I can
+collect from the conversation of a scientific Englishman, who has dropt
+his watch into one of the boiling vats, while minuting some process, the
+great soap manufactory of this place offers nothing very different from
+other places of the same sort. Our morning's walk was therefore confined
+principally to the Cours, the shade of whose spreading trees, and the
+profusion of fine bouquets and cheerful faces in the flower-market at
+one end of it, render it a most agreeable promenade. The pleasure of
+lounging, which in the spirit-stirring climate, and among the busy faces
+of England is the offspring of conceit, becomes in such places as this,
+and to an unoccupied person, a real and physical satisfaction, and we
+much preferred it to the lions of Marseilles, which are not many. In the
+evening we explored the western side of the bay, and the low<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span> reef of
+rocks opposite to the Lazaretto, which may someday or other be known by
+the name of Alfieri's<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a> seat, as he has described it in his life with
+sufficient accuracy to mark the spot. It commands one of the best and
+most cheerful views of Marseilles, including several features of the
+prospect afforded from the Viste, but of course on a lower elevation.</p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span></p>
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_XI" id="CHAP_XI"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. XI</a></h2>
+
+<h3>OLLIOULES&mdash;TOULON.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May</span> 23.&mdash;From Marseilles to Cujes twenty-four miles. From the views
+which we had from the Viste and Notre Dame de la Garde, we were prepared
+to expect much from the nearer acquaintance with the environs of
+Marseilles, which the first seven or eight miles would afford us. In
+this case, however, as in Campbell's mountain,</p>
+
+<p class="c">"'Twas distance lent enchantment to the View;"
+</p>
+<p>
+for that which as a distant whole presented a scene of the highest
+beauty, and the richest cultivation, was nothing better in detail than a
+drive between stone walls. I have always thought that the ostentation of
+riches, or of those things which they will procure, was not a subject of
+vanity so common in France as in England; but there is a medium in all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span>
+things, and it would be as well if the Marseillois and their countrymen
+of Lyons, had a little of that social and respectable pride, which
+induces every cit of Hampstead or Clapham to set off his little box to
+the best advantage. They seem to prefer the philosophical sulkiness
+which Shakspeare's Iden describes himself as enjoying between four
+garden walls.<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> On passing Aubagne, however, the valley of Gemenos
+makes ample amends to the eye, uniting the verdure and wild character of
+a Swiss vale, to the rich productions of Provence. After about three
+miles, the road narrows to a mere cleft in the hills, which we threaded
+for several miles, emerging at last upon the green bason of ground on
+which Cujes stands. Here, for the first time, we saw capers, with a
+profusion of every sort of esculent vegetable, which the inhabitants
+cultivate with great assiduity, losing not an inch of ground. To such a
+pitch, indeed, does their laudable economy proceed, that every
+inhabitant of Cujes keeps a pet dunghill before his house, fearing no
+doubt to lose sight of it; and in this wilderness of sweets the good
+women sat basking and gossiping with great satisfaction.</p>
+
+<p>At Cujes we breakfasted in the same salle-&agrave;-manger with an agreeable old
+Marseillois and his wife, who confirmed Peyrol's account of the bloody
+revolutionary committee at Orange, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span> added circumstances which, at
+this distance of time, seemed still fresh in their minds. The latter had
+been confined four months in the prison at L'Isle, near Avignon, from
+which detachments of persons were daily sent to be tried at Orange, none
+of whom returned. Among the sufferers were a Mad. Vidou, a superannuated
+widow of ninety, who was guillotined in company with her son, an amiable
+and respectable man, and was unconscious of her fate till the last.
+Forty nuns of the convent of Bollene were also among the prisoners,
+accused of a plot to bring about a counter-revolution, and four had been
+already guillotined on this charge when the fall of Robespierre took
+place. Three of this lady's friends had been reported as emigrants, and
+lost their property, merely from not having been at home when the
+commissaires made their visit. The wife of one of these offered to
+recall him in ten minutes, if necessary: "Non, Citoyenne, c'est egal;"
+and he was accordingly enrolled and treated as an emigrant, though he
+never had been absent a single day from his home. In a nation where
+almost every person of a certain age has such incidents as these burnt
+into his recollection, it is not wonderful that the general character
+should somewhat alter, and that the lively thoughtless Frenchmen of
+Sterne should become nearly an obsolete race. It may be perhaps a
+fanciful idea to trace to the same source the nature of a Frenchman's
+vanity, which has generally more reference to mental qualities, than to
+those goods of which fortune<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span> or the will of a despot may deprive him in
+an instant. "Bene vixit qui bene latuit" should seem the motto of the
+bulk of the nation.</p>
+
+<p>The first part of the road from Cujes to Toulon traverses great
+inequalities of ground, affording very odd bird's eye glimpses of the
+sea through little chasms in the line of cliffs to the right. Beausset,
+through which we passed, is as filthy a town as Cujes, and the country
+as beautifully cultivated, and as rich in flowers, fruit, and corn; it
+is difficult, indeed, to find animal and vegetable nature more strongly
+contrasted. If I may be allowed to parody the words of a noble poet&mdash;</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"They are brown as the dunghills whereon they decline,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">"And all, save the dwelling of man, is divine."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>About three miles from Beausset, the road inclines towards a barrier of
+high and nearly perpendicular rock to the right, which it appeared
+impossible either to penetrate or ascend. A large string of mules,
+however, which met us from Toulon, loaded with barilla for the great
+glass works at Beausset, showed us that the one or the other was
+practicable, and on advancing a little farther, we distinguished the
+chasm through which the road to Toulon is conducted, surmounted by the
+black ruins of an old castle to the left. On the right of the road in
+this place, a singular cluster of conical rocks occurs, which,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span> both
+from their form and position, seem exactly like a heap of gigantic
+shells, piled up to batter the old ruin on the opposite cliff. Their
+appearance was that of a mass of large pebbles, held together by
+indurated clay; but as each probably weighed some scores of tons, it was
+impracticable to bring away one as a geological specimen; nor would such
+specimen give a more accurate idea of the singular and wild effect of
+the whole mass, than a single corner stone of the Colosseum would of the
+grandeur of the whole amphitheatre. The country name of the castle is
+Ch&acirc;teau Negro, as we understood from some gens d'armes whom we met in
+the pass; and the houses adjoining it, which seem actually overhanging
+the perpendicular edge of the rock, belong to the ancient bourg of
+Emenos. Nothing, one would suppose, but the overruling motive of
+security, ever could have induced human beings to take up their abode in
+such an eagle's nest as this, and its date is therefore probably as
+ancient as it professes to be. In days of old, the castle must have been
+completely the key of the pass, many hundred yards of which would have
+been exposed to stones and arrow-shot from it. A turn to the right
+conducted us into the heart of the Val d'Ollioules, as this mountain
+chasm is called, which is somewhat on the scale of the celebrated pass
+of Pont Aberglasllyn in Wales, but far exceeds it in striking effect. A
+dreary whiteness, unrelieved by hardly a single blade of vegetation,
+covers the whole, as if it had been recently cleft by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span> a volcanic
+eruption, and had as yet had no time to smooth down the sharpness of its
+original fissure; and nothing occurs to break the silence, except the
+trickling of a narrow brook, which just finds room to creep along the
+side of the road, the distant bleating of numberless adventurous goats,
+climbing over head from the mere love of peril, and the occasional echo
+of large stones disengaged by their leaps. One of these, of a size which
+would have shattered the carriage to pieces, came whirling and crashing
+down just in the direction which it had quitted. The whole spot, in
+short, is such as Tasso might have imagined to be the scene of Ismeno's
+incantation, and the congress of devils whom he convoked; and at a
+sudden turn of the road, the Ch&acirc;teau Negro peeps from between the
+opposite heights in such a new and striking position, as to seem,
+without much stretch of imagination, the abode of the wizard himself.
+After threading all the sharp angles of this savage pass, some of which
+are chiseled out to admit the road, the eye is at length relieved by a
+vista of sky, and the sight of the little town of Ollioules close at
+hand, sheltered in a grove of orange trees and olives, and just filling
+up the entrance of the pass. The view is completed by some singular
+gothic ruins to the right, and by the town of Six Fours in the distance,
+which is situated on such a commanding conical hill, that we mistook it
+for the citadel of Toulon. On emerging from the pass, we turned abruptly
+to the left, pursuing our route along the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span> foot of the mountain barrier
+through whose bowels we had just penetrated, and which acts on the
+climate and productions of Toulon like a high south wall. Some corn was
+already reaped at Ollioules; and it may be said almost without
+exaggeration, that the two last miles of the road make a difference of
+at least a degree in latitude, if one could be allowed to judge by one's
+feelings. There is nothing remarkable in the situation of Toulon itself,
+which is flat and uninteresting; but the shores of the bay possess great
+beauty and variety, and the mountains which overhang the town are very
+bold in their outline. The bastides of the wealthy inhabitants are
+sprinkled along the foot and sides of this abrupt range, overlooking
+extensive views of the bay and its vicinity, and disposed with better
+taste and less encumbered with walls than those in the neighbourhood of
+Marseilles. Instead of a multitude of white spots, vying in numbers with
+the trees which surround them, the mansions of the Toulonais are placed
+just thickly enough to agreeably enliven the woods, pleasure grounds,
+and vineyards from which they peep at scattered and irregular distances.
+We found ourselves well accommodated at the Croix de Malte, situated in
+one of the best parts of the town, which although airy, neat, and well
+watered by little streams conducted through the streets, possesses no
+building or feature worth recollection, save its strong and regular
+fortifications.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>May 26.&mdash;A morning of very pleasant lounging, without any particular
+object. We rose at five, and not obtaining admission to the platform of
+the Fort du Malgue, walked about on the heights near it, which are
+situated on the south-east of the town, and form one of the best
+panoramic points in its vicinity. The mountain cape to the south, under
+which the entrance to the harbour winds, the distant islands of Hieres,
+and in a different direction, the town of Six Fours, are striking
+objects from this place. There is certainly more local propriety in this
+latter name, than in its more classical and ancient appellation, Sextii
+Forum, from which it has probably been corrupted in the derivation by
+some wag, for no one would suppose that such a situation afforded room
+to heat more than six ovens, or indeed bread to fill even one.</p>
+
+<p>The town of Hieres, seen at a distance in a contrary direction, appears
+to much more advantage. The nature of its soil is said to be peculiarly
+favourable to the growth of the orange and lemon trees, for which it is
+celebrated, but the climate can hardly exceed that of Toulon in
+mildness. We were particularly struck with the softness of the sea
+breeze during this morning's walk, and the vivid verdure of every thing
+around us, contrasting strongly with the dry and naturally sterile
+character of the immediate neighbourhood of Marseilles. The vegetable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span>
+productions of the latter place seem wrung by the hand of industry from
+a rocky and hide-bound soil, whereas a walk near Toulon almost realizes
+the ideas of some favoured green spot in a tropical climate, where the
+sun has both soil and moisture to act upon. The pleasure of sitting down
+upon cushions of lavender and other aromatic plants, under myrtle hedges
+in flower, of gathering capers in their natural state, and tracing the
+most curious and rich varieties of our own wild and garden flowers, amid
+the infinite profusion of others which we could not name, may seem
+trifling to a scientific botanist, but is no small addition to the
+morning's walk of a plain traveller. A visit to the Jardin des Plantes
+will complete the illusion to the most critical eye: and the lovers of
+romance may fancy themselves at once in Juan Fernandez, or in the Isle
+of France, as they walk in the open air, under the shade of palm-trees,
+and seeing tea, coffee, guava fruit, and a hundred other exotic
+luxuries, growing in their natural state. This establishment, which we
+visited in the course of the day, appears a favourite walk of the
+inhabitants of Toulon, and is conducted in a manner which reflects the
+highest credit on their taste and liberality. The system of irrigation
+is well contrived, and the whole, from its variety and extent,
+interesting to the commonest observer.</p>
+
+<p>We were unsuccessful in our attempts to see the arsenal, the object best
+worth attention in Toulon;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span> as it is open to none but naval officers,
+the very class of men, one would suppose, whose prying eyes it would be
+least desirable to admit. The young officer at the gate, however, was
+very pleasant and communicative, and conversed with us in excellent
+English; a language which he had partly acquired as a prisoner during
+the war, and partly by his education at the Marine School of this place,
+where our language is one of the first things taught. An inveterate John
+Bull might remark, "Ay, these fellows know they are sure to be made
+prisoners, if they fight with us; and that is the reason they take this
+precaution." Our English pride was certainly gratified this evening, but
+it was by the voluntary civility which we experienced during our walk
+from this young man and several others who had been prisoners in our
+country. It is peculiarly pleasing to find those who visited England
+under circumstances commonly the most unfavourable, expressing grateful
+recollections of their treatment, and ready to acknowledge them by
+little attentions. We found, indeed, nothing but friendly faces among
+that very class of people of whom we should have been most shy of making
+inquiries, and at the very place where we should have expected them to
+excite the least pleasant recollections. Two marines accosted us on the
+quay, to point out a sand-bank which the English had attempted to cut
+through during the siege of Toulon, in order to facilitate the entrance
+into the harbour; and on our inquiry whether they had penetrated as<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span> far
+as a station where we saw a 140 gun ship and some others laid up, they
+answered with a laugh, "Ah oui, Messieurs, ils &eacute;toient l&agrave;, et encore
+plus loin, je vous en reponds."</p>
+
+<p>It were to be wished on many accounts, that the French government would
+keep their galley-slaves as much out of sight as they do their arsenal.
+Under the ancient regime, these unfortunate creatures were only employed
+in the works of the latter place, which they never left; but under the
+present system, those only who are condemned for life are so treated,
+and the rest are employed in different parts of the port, where they
+perform the work of horses, in the most public manner, chained by the
+leg in pairs. Some were drawing timber, and stone carts; and others,
+rather more favoured, were laying the pavement of the pier, with a
+single heavy iron link on one leg. How far economy may justify this
+arrangement, or whether the exposure of incorrigible offenders may
+answer as a public example, it is not for a mere visitor to determine;
+but certainly a plan more adapted to deaden and sear the sense of shame
+which may still remain in them, and brutalize their minds by constant
+irritation, can hardly be devised. The mildness and temper with which
+the guard and superintendants appear to behave is not likely to
+counteract sufficiently the effect of the constant gaze of passengers, a
+circumstance which to judge by one's own sensations must tend to stifle
+those feelings of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span> repentance which solitary confinement naturally
+induces, and harden every manly particle of the mind into rebellion. It
+is hard to reproach them with the natural effects of this rough mode of
+regeneration; but I think I never saw a worse or more obdurate set of
+countenances. One fellow in particular, when civilly directed by the
+overseer to change the position of a stone, gave him a look of deadly
+malignity when his back was turned, which reminded me strongly of the
+look of Kemble in Zanga, while pronouncing the emphatic "Indeed!"
+Strange as it may appear, we were informed that there were several
+colonels, generals, priests, and men who could afford to spend 300
+francs a day, among this body. These contrive, it seems, by bribery, to
+procure more variety of food than the bread, soup, and vegetables, which
+are the regular allowance; and are permitted to purchase better linen
+than the ordinary convicts; but the dress and regulations are to outward
+appearance the same in all. Those condemned for military insubordination
+are marked by a bullet round their necks, and the convicts cast for life
+by a green cap. The individuals whose term of confinement is nearly
+expired wear only an iron ring round the ankle, as it is presumed they
+will not incur the penalty of fifty blows and three years additional
+confinement by an attempt to escape: there are others, however,
+sentenced for five, ten, fifteen, or twenty years, and these are heavily
+ironed and more strictly watched.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>A detachment of the celebrated Thibet goats, who are to make the fortune
+of the French shawl-manufacturers, is now in harbour, and others are
+performing quarantine at Marseilles. The specimen of their fleece which
+was shown us, resembles the coat of the musk ox. The wool of which the
+shawls are made grows at the roots of the longer hair, and is of a warm
+and delicately fine texture; a circumstance which should seem to prove
+these animals natives of the cold and mountainous districts of Thibet,
+and capable by dint of British skill and enterprise, of being
+naturalized in our own country.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_XII" id="CHAP_XII"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. XII</a></h2>
+
+<h3>FREJUS&mdash;CANNES&mdash;ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE&mdash;ANTIBES.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">May</span> 27.&mdash;From Toulon to Puget les Crottes, 23 miles. On passing the
+small town of La Valette, from which the road to Hieres diverges, the
+mountain barrier under which Toulon is situated ends abruptly in a
+precipice, fortified by a strong redoubt. From this spot a detachment of
+the combined forces were driven by the republicans, who scaled the rock
+during the night at the most imminent risk; and the evacuation of Toulon
+was the ultimate consequence of this daring coup de main, in which
+Buonaparte is said to have first distinguished himself. After passing
+this point, and leaving on the right the distant hills of Hieres, no
+remarkable feature presents itself. The country is chiefly an extensive
+olive forest, varied by a few vineyards, and enlivened by hedges of
+pomegranate, and Spanish broom. We<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span> found Puget les Crottes but a bad
+exchange for the fountains, and clean airy streets of Toulon: and it
+better deserves the name of Puget le Crott&eacute;, by which it is laid down by
+some mistake in some maps. The inn was perfectly worthy of the place; a
+frowzy kennel of bustling Yahoos, totally deficient in that readiness
+and attention which can put a reasonable traveller in good humour with
+the worst accommodations. Our servant fought his way to the kitchen fire
+to execute our orders; finding them neither attended to by the old dame
+who presided in the kitchen, of whom Gil Blas's Leonarda was a faint
+type, nor by the maid who screamed rejoinders at the top of the stairs,
+to the ravings of her mistress at the bottom, in a tone that deafened
+us. The arrival of the Draguignan diligence, which we had passed on the
+road, heavily laden with money and passengers, and travelling at a foot
+pace, escorted like a condemned cart by two gens d'armes, accounted for
+this mighty sensation. We were glad enough to escape from the din of
+tongues and the steams of garlic, and resume our road, which did not
+offer any variety, till we had nearly reached La Luc, 17 miles from
+Puget, whose situation and red sandy soil reminded us of a Herefordshire
+glen. The junction of two main roads has created a tolerable inn at this
+small place, which may with safety be recommended to persons on an
+abstemious regimen, and to none else.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>May 28.&mdash;To La Muy 19 miles, without any remarkable feature, though the
+character of the country is rather pleasing. La Muy is a wretched
+village, whose <i>tout ensemble</i> is completed by a ruinous house of the
+Count de Muy: this, as well as his castle at Grignan, was destroyed in
+the Revolution, and the annexed property alienated from him. To Frejus
+12 miles: the few last of which improve as to scenery. We saw cork trees
+for the first time, and a profusion of myrtle in hedges and bushes.
+There is something peculiarly stagnant and wo-begone in the appearance
+of Frejus, which, however, is in more strict poetical character with its
+Roman ruins, than the populous and wealthy streets of Nismes would be.
+The inn where we dined and slept preserved the same character most
+rigidly; indeed, Madame, whose ideas seemed perfectly in unison with
+those of mine hostess of La Luc, wished apparently that our feast at
+Forum Julii should be entirely intellectual, and that we should rise
+from dinner with unclouded heads, to enjoy a walk among its antiquities.
+We were really diverted by the formal parsimony with which the good
+woman had contrived to invent a dinner for four, out of what would have
+hardly have sufficed as a whet to an English farmer. Were I blest with
+the culinary accuracy of the facetious Christopher North, or his friend
+Dr. Morris, I could better record a bill of fare which would form a
+complete contrast to the vaunted luxuries of their inspiring deity, Mr.
+Oman<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span> of Edinburgh. Suffice it, as a specimen, that three pettitoes of
+an unfortunate roasting-pig, or rather pigling, which I fear must have
+died a natural death, formed the most substantial part of our repast.</p>
+
+<p>The amphitheatre of Frejus, to pass to a more dignified subject, is
+situated without the walls of the town, on the side by which we had
+entered from Toulon; and is sufficiently perfect to be interesting,
+though it must suffer by a comparison with the better known, and finer
+specimens of the same sort which exist. There is also a temple, and an
+arch, the latter known by the name of the Porte Dor&eacute;e, neither of which
+possesses any thing remarkable when compared with the ruins of Nismes
+and Orange. The aqueduct built by Vespasian, and situated to the
+north-east of the town, is on a more extensive scale, and taken with its
+concomitants, better merits the attention of a painter: even when viewed
+from under the walls of Frejus, which it adjoins at one end, it
+possesses as sombre a character of repose as Poussin could have wished,
+and which is unbroken by the intervention of mean houses, and busy
+figures. Its scattered groupes recede from the eye up a solitary valley,
+interspersed with clumps of olive trees, and backed by pine forests, and
+the foreground derives a degree of wildness from the profusion of
+Spanish broom of an unusual size and beauty, with which its scattered
+blocks are fringed. We walked also to the small village of St. Raphael,
+a mile or two from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span> town, which is the modern port of Frejus, and
+stands in what was formerly the main sea; while the Pharos which marked
+the entrance of the ancient harbour is now surrounded by an alluvial
+meadow, and in place of the numerous vessels which must have crowded the
+ancient quay, a brig, and two or three feluccas, were quietly at anchor.
+A change like this, of the very soil, and local features, speaks more
+strongly to the imagination than the most mighty and extensive ruins.</p>
+
+<p>29th.&mdash;We rose at a very early hour to pursue our route,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">&mdash;&mdash;for our sleep<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Was airy light, from pure digestion bred,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And temperate vapours bland,<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>thanks to the precautions of mine hostess of the Chapeau Rouge: the
+first part of our road lay almost parallel with the line of ruins,
+marking the course of the aqueduct, and afforded a more just idea of its
+extent and size than the view which we had taken before. To judge from
+the scattered groupes of arches, it must have extended as far as the
+hills bounding the bay of Napoule, up whose sides we began to wind, at
+the distance of about two miles from Frejus, and continued to ascend for
+six more. This morning's drive was agreeable enough from its novelty, so
+little reminding us of the usual<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span> features of France. The bold and
+sombre character of its fine woods, undiversified save by an occasional
+patch of cultivation, or a solitary hut, and swept by bodies of clouds
+in their progress from the Mediterranean, reminded us more of the
+descriptions of Norwegian forests, and of the mountains haunted by the
+Wild Huntsman, than of Proven&ccedil;al scenery. The enormous extent of these
+forests has not, as may well be supposed, improved the state of society.
+About fifteen years ago a banditti, composed of deserters, and of the
+peasantry of the country, and regularly organized, held them for a
+length of time, and defied the efforts of a numerous body of
+gend'armerie sent to subdue them. We observed also the traces of a wider
+spread conflagration, which we understood to have caused damage to the
+amount of a million of francs, and the perpetrators of which had equally
+escaped detection: it had made but a small comparative gap in these
+immense tracts of wood.</p>
+
+<p>Soon after passing the post-house of Estrelles, situated on the summit
+of the mountain, the view which opens on the other side becomes
+strikingly fine, and extensive. The shores of the bay of Napoule,
+beautifully wooded and interspersed with white villas, lie under foot in
+a complete bird's-eye view, backed by the sweeping mountains of the
+neighbourhood of Grasse, and terminated by the cape where Antibes
+stands. Farther still the back-ground<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span> is surmounted by the colossal
+groups of the Maritime Alps. The descent from this hill to level ground
+is about seven miles of road as excellent as the former part of the
+stage; the whole having been very much improved by Buonaparte; and
+although the distance from Frejus to Cannes cannot be less than
+twenty-eight miles, it appears to occupy a shorter space of time than
+many much shorter stages.</p>
+
+<p>A nearer approach to Cannes in no way disappointed us: the bay of
+Napoule, in the centre of which it is situated, presents, in different
+points of view, every variety of Italian scenery; and there may be
+conjectures less probable than that it was called originally by mariners
+the bay of Napoli, from some fancied likeness. To the latter celebrated
+spot it bears somewhat of a resemblance, but a stronger still to the
+Porto Venere, or bay of Spezia, both in the wilder and the softer part
+of its features; and the illusion is kept up by the grouping and form of
+the houses, and the Italian patois of the inhabitants, who are mostly a
+colony of Genoese fishermen. Nor ought the H&ocirc;tel des Trois Pigeons to be
+forgotten, though its cleanliness and comfort, and the cheerful alacrity
+of its inmates, remind the traveller more of some quiet country inn on
+the Devon or Somerset coast, than of any thing Italian or French. It
+stands on a little rock just out of the town, looking on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span> sea, and
+facing the island of St. Marguerite; and there is perhaps no scene in
+which more historical recollections are combined under one point of
+view, than that which its windows command. The island, whose garrison
+and buildings are distinguishable by the naked eye, was for many years
+the prison of the mysterious Masque de Fer, whose identity, like that of
+Junius, has hitherto baffled conjecture. In the room where we were
+sitting Murat passed some of the time intervening between his expulsion
+from Naples, and the crisis of his fate; and on the sands about half a
+mile to the left, is the spot where Buonaparte first landed from Elba,
+and bivouacked during the night, surrounded by numbers whom curiosity
+had drawn out of the town to behold him. There is perhaps something
+characteristic of the different fortunes of this singular man, in the
+place from which he had embarked for Elba a year before, and in that
+where he first set foot on his return, full of hope and confidence. The
+former was Frejus, a place dreary and comfortless, surrounded by
+memorials of departed greatness, shrunk within a small part of its
+former limits, and deserted by the very sea, and it might have been
+mercifully chosen on purpose as the scene of his exit, in order to blunt
+his regret at leaving France. The latter was Cannes, a place,<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> as I
+have fully described it, full<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span> of cheerfulness, beauty, and rich distant
+prospects, corresponding almost in brilliancy to those which his mind
+was forming at the time.</p>
+
+<p>Far different must have been the feelings of Murat during the anxious
+interval of forced leisure which he spent at this place; and I will
+confess, that while listening to the landlord's simple account of the
+manner in which he passed his time, we forgot the massacre of Madrid in
+the well-known anecdote of the drowning officer's rescue. During the
+first eight days he remained shut up in the bed-room or sitting-room
+which we occupied, in expectation of despatches from Buonaparte, to whom
+he wrote on his arrival at Cannes. At the end of this time, having
+received no answer, he used to beguile his impatience by rambling on the
+sea shore, or watching the sports of the peasants, till at length,
+evidently heart-sick and desperate, he set out for Toulon on the rash
+expedition which closed his career. "Toujours, toujours, il avoit la
+mine triste.&mdash;Ah! si vous l'aviez connu, vous auriez pleur&eacute; son sort&mdash;il
+&eacute;toit un si bel homme!&mdash;d'une taille superbe!" said our honest host,
+whose knowledge of Murat was probably confined to his soldier-like
+figure, and his desolate state: he could have been no judge of the small
+extent of Buonaparte's obligations to his brother-in-law, whose former
+defection was but repaid in kind. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span> pointed out a green spot under the
+walls of an old castle which overlooked the inn, where he had frequently
+observed Murat lying with his face concealed in his hands, or in his
+more cheerful moments, watching the dances of the country people who
+resorted thither, and whose sports seemed to interest him considerably.
+It would be a task for the hand of a master poet or painter, to describe
+an ambitious and desperate man, softened for a time by disappointment,
+overleaping in thought the immeasurable distance between his present and
+his former self, and contemplating the sports of his youth with a sort
+of melancholy pleasure, yet under the influence of the strong fatality
+which hurried him to his end. It is by mixing somewhat of this feeling
+in the character of Macbeth, that Shakspeare has excited a momentary
+interest even for a murderer and usurper, who perceives "his life fallen
+into the sere and yellow leaf," and pauses for a moment in melancholy
+reflection as he rushes to "die with harness on his back."</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Out, out, brief, candle," &amp;c.<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Having spent an hour among the sunny basking places which abound in the
+rocks of this place, we hired a fishing-boat to convey us to the island
+of St. Marguerite. It was impossible to help being diverted by the
+uncouth appearance of our new<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span> conductors, which was two or three
+degrees wilder than that of poor Murat's amphibious subjects: one fellow
+in particular, was</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i2">"A man,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Cast in the roughest mould Dame Nature boasts,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">With back much broader than a dripping pan,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And legs as thick about the calves as posts,"<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a><br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>or indeed thicker, and tanned a bright copper colour by sun and salt
+water; his broad face grinning with good humour, from beneath a mane as
+shaggy as a lion's. It may be supposed that two or three such rowers,
+proud of the new honour of officiating in a pleasure-boat, got us on
+more quickly than the less athletic boatmen of show lakes, and we soon
+landed at the small fort which was the object of our pursuit, and which
+the commandant politely allowed us to explore. At its eastern extremity
+is situated a guard-house, a chamber of which on the ground floor served
+as the prison of the mysterious captive; it is airy and commodious
+enough, in comparison with places of the sort in general; but the height
+of its only window, strengthened by treble bars from the sea, and the
+perpendicular cliff which it overhangs, with the dangerous breach under
+it, are sufficient protections against<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span> any escape. For the last five
+years no persons have been confined in this fort, which was formerly
+used exclusively as a state prison, but in the Revolution its benefits
+were extended to persons of all ranks. Restraint, indeed, is not at
+present the order of the day within its precincts, to judge from
+appearances. The soldiers seemed to have little or nothing to do, but to
+flirt with two or three gaudily-dressed negresses, who showed their
+white teeth and their black muzzles from the doors of the casernes, and
+to laugh at the chaplain of the garrison, for such I conclude was the
+grade of the old priest, who met us, toddling about in a state of
+drunken fatuity, very much resembling the condition of Obadiah in the
+Committee, with a nose exhibiting the visible effects of a fight or a
+fall. Having escaped at last from the good man's persecuting attentions,
+we got back to Cannes in time to make a sketch from the precise spot
+where Buonaparte landed.<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p>
+
+<p>May 30.&mdash;From Cannes to Antibes eleven miles; a pleasant drive, chiefly
+running close to the sea. Though considerably flattered in Vernet's
+beautiful picture at the Louvre, Antibes, nevertheless, leaves a
+pleasing impression on the mind, from its airy, well-frequented,
+prosperous appearance, and the bustle arising from the presence of a
+garrison. Its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span> inner harbour, and the neck of land which defends it,
+terminated by a little picturesque fort, seem beautifully constructed by
+nature for their respective purposes; but I do not know of any thing
+else meriting notice.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h2><a name="CHAP_XIII" id="CHAP_XIII"></a><a href="#toc">CHAP. XIII</a></h2>
+
+<h3>NICE&mdash;COL DE TENDE&mdash;CONCLUSION.</h3>
+
+
+<p><span class="smcap">From</span> Antibes to Nice, sixteen miles, along a beautiful sweep of coast,
+the whole extent of which, crowned by the gigantic chain of Maritime
+Alps, lies in full view for the whole way. No sketch, much less any
+description, can give an idea of the combined effect of this extensive
+bay, or the air of cheerfulness spread over the whole; among all the
+celebrated first views of Italy, there are probably few which speak to
+the imagination in a more imposing as well as pleasing manner. We
+crossed the frontier by a long wooden bridge over the Var, a broad, wild
+stream, roaring down with violence after the storm of the preceding
+night. We were immediately struck with the different culture of the
+vines, festooning as near Naples, over the other trees, in a manner more
+picturesque than useful. The straw hats of the Nissardes, also
+resembling an inverted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span> wicker corn basket, gave quite a new and
+laughable character to the human apex. Such little novelties as this,
+which would excite no more attention in a professed book of costumes,
+than a view into an old fancy clothes shop, are nevertheless recollected
+with interest when seen in travelling, as connected with particular
+trains of thought or association, which they preserve fresh in the mind;
+and to forget these extraordinary potlids of straw, and the fanciful
+little red toques occasionally substituted for them, would be to forget
+an important feature of the Italian frontier.</p>
+
+<p>Much as I had heard of Nice, I was not disappointed either in the first
+view, or in the nearer survey of it. The situation of its ruined citadel
+on a commanding and insulated rock, and its narrow valley of almost
+tropical richness, surrounded by tier above tier of mountains, and
+studded with villas and orange-groves, present every variety of beauty;
+and there is a stateliness of proportion, and a careless elegance in its
+white houses, and an airiness in their situation, which very much remind
+the eye of the best parts of Naples near the Chiaja and Villa Real. The
+first glance of Nice, in short, bespeaks a higher and more fashionable
+tone of society than that of any French town, excepting Paris, through
+which we had passed. It is impossible, nevertheless, for a person
+looking beyond the mere amusement of the moment, to banish a certain
+train of morbid ideas which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span> connect themselves with the sight of this
+beautiful town. There are few persons perhaps moving in good English
+society, whose ears do not familiarly recognise the hopeless phrase of
+"being sent to die at Nice," and many have watched the departure of the
+wrecks of what was once health, strength, and beauty, consigned to this
+painted sepulchre with the certainty of never returning from it. Thus
+the very efficacy of the air of Nice, which has brought it into vogue
+when all other resources have failed, has inseparably connected it in
+the mind with despondency and decay. If such ideas occurred to us, they
+were certainly not removed by the sight of a funeral which past the
+windows of the inn, within an hour or two after our arrival; the corpse
+laid on an open bier, the hands crossed, and ornamented with flowers,
+and the monks and attendants all joining in a solemn chant. A bell was
+also tolling in another quarter, the signal that a man just condemned to
+the galleys was passing in procession through the town, as is customary.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"But let the stricken deer go weep,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">The hart ungalled play."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>The English dance and dress during an assize week, and the lively
+Nissards, more naturally still, enjoy their fine climate, and elegant
+town, without entering into the gloomy reflections which haunt the mind
+of an Englishman on his arrival. The caf&eacute;s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span> and public walks were
+swarming with company, and the whole place appeared to take its tone of
+gaiety from the gaudy young officers, whose troops were quartered in the
+extensive barracks; the peasants were dancing their grand round on the
+quay, or fighting between jest and earnest with open hands; the native
+dandies managed their green fans with the same adroitness as their fair
+companions; the shops displayed every luxury and accommodation; and
+every thing, in short, savoured of the habits of a continental
+Cheltenham.</p>
+
+<p>The H&ocirc;tel des &Eacute;trangers, where we established ourselves, is somewhat
+high in its charges, but proportionably good, and possesses a delightful
+garden of orange-trees adjoining. After being kept awake by mosquitos,
+which seem more prevalent than at Marseilles, and whose little angry
+note of preparation had apprized us of an attack, we walked in the
+morning to the citadel hill, whose solid masses of ruin had attracted
+our notice on the first view of the town. This point affords the best
+general idea of Nice and its vicinity, though in the month of May, it is
+not attained without a roasting walk. The heat indeed was tremendous, as
+may be expected in a triangular tongue of land only a few miles in
+extent, and encircled by lofty mountains; and the mildness of the
+climate in winter, as we were informed, bears a full proportion to its
+oppressiveness in summer. Green peas are to be had all the year:
+mulberries<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span> and gourds were already ripe, and every garden was a wood of
+the finest orange and lemon-trees loaded with ripe fruit. The
+thermometer too is seldom or never lower than 55 in the depth of winter.
+At the foot of the citadel hill is a road blasted out of the solid rock,
+running along the edge of the sea, and connecting Nice with its port;
+along which we walked towards the afternoon. I should be inclined to
+remark this spot, near which is an esplanade of good houses, as the most
+sheltered and desirable quarter of Nice. The breeze, which had begun to
+freshen, was just perceptible where we stood, though its effects in the
+open sea were visible by the plunging of the waves under our feet; and
+it appears hardly possible for any but a south or south-west wind to get
+at this point. Whether or not the part of Nice north of the citadel be
+equally calculated for an invalid, I should doubt. The mountain gully
+running up towards Escarene may possibly bring down searching winds from
+the north-east; and on the whole the marine esplanade seems to afford a
+situation cooler in summer, and warmer in winter, than the interior of
+the town.</p>
+
+<p>Such as are tolerably active pedestrians will find themselves well
+repaid for an evening's toilsome walk to the height which divides Nice
+from Ville Franche, and whose situation is marked by a small fort.<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a></p>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span></p>
+<p>From hence the view to the west is very wide, including nearly the route
+of the two preceding days. Towards the east it is less extensive, but
+more striking. The town of Ville Franche, and the beautiful little basin
+which forms its port, appear as completely under the feet, as if you
+could leap over them to the opposite side of the water; and the headland
+between that town and Monaco, up and down which the road to Savona is
+seen meandering, is more boldly defined and on a larger scale than that
+of Lulworth Cove, and though strongly resembling it possesses greater
+beauty and variety.</p>
+
+<p>One of Buonaparte's projects was to render the Corniche, as this giddy
+track is expressively called, practicable for carriages; but the
+Sardinian government, instead of completing, have defaced (as we heard,
+out of jealousy) the part which he had begun: this is, I think, rather
+too absurd for belief. It is at the same time probable enough, that the
+undertaking has been abandoned for want of adequate funds. We were
+lighted homewards by myriads of fire-flies, a circumstance which
+produces on a person unaccustomed to the sight, a more novel and
+brilliant effect than any other accompaniment of an Italian climate.</p>
+
+<p>June 2.&mdash;Our original idea had been to have proceeded to Genoa either by
+a felucca or the Corniche, but learning that the latter route<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span> was
+impracticable, excepting on mules, and that the variable nature of the
+wind on this coast rendered feluccas a dangerous and uncertain mode of
+performing the journey, we preferred the road into Italy by the Col di
+Tende.</p>
+
+<p>To Escarene twelve miles: the first four skirt along the beautiful
+valley at whose mouth Nice stands, following, and sometimes crossing,
+the course of the river Poglion; the rest gradually winds up into the
+heart of the mountains, through deep ravines and woods of gigantic
+olives, which in this district become picturesque forest-trees. We
+breakfasted at Escarene, a quiet pretty village, possessing tolerable
+accommodation. To Sospello fifteen miles of good road, the first seven
+or eight of which ascend the lofty wall of mountain which closes up the
+entrance of the valley, and appears at a distance like a score of
+corkscrews laid in a Vandyke figure. Up the whole of this we walked,
+mounting, by an easy but tedious circuit of good road, a long series of
+crags, and courses of torrents, and sometimes looking almost
+perpendicularly down upon the point which we had passed half an hour
+ago. Nothing can be more bare or desolate than the rocky mountain ridge
+in which this ascent terminates, and on which vegetation seems at its
+last gasp. A dance of Satyrs might be appropriately introduced to
+complete the wildness of a sketch from this spot, but that it does not
+afford a single berry or blade of grass<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span> to regale them, even if they
+could live like their cousins the goats. A large family of peasants, as
+wild and merry as these "hairy sylvans," accompanied us up the mountain
+with their cattle, on their way to the summer chalets, exhibiting the
+laughing side of human nature in a manner which it is delightful to
+witness in the poor.</p>
+
+<p class="c">"Pleased with a feather, tickled with a straw,"
+</p>
+<p>
+and grateful for the slightest civility, they seemed to consider the
+mere change of place as a festival. The wife had twitched off her
+husband's cocked hat, which she wore in frolic; the bare-legged children
+appeared ready to dance to their own voices as they walked; and the very
+infant, committed in his cradle to the entire discretion of the family
+donkey, was equally pleased and satisfied with his own situation, as he
+headed the patriarchal cavalcade.</p>
+
+<p>The view of the Mediterranean and the coast of France, which this point
+commands, is prodigious; and the intermediate ranges of mountains which
+shut out Nice, and which appeared elevated peaks when seen from its
+citadel, seem from this spot only masses of wavy ground. From hence a
+descent much steeper than the ascent and almost equally long, conducted
+us into the rich and well-inhabited valley in which Sospello stands. The
+inn at this place is rather below mediocrity; the mistress sturdy and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
+rapacious in her demands, and shameless in retracting them when forced
+to do so.</p>
+
+<p>From the valley of Sospello, which appears as completely insulated by
+nature from the society of the world as Rasselas's happy valley, we
+wound next morning up another eight miles of ascent as steep and tedious
+as the last. On a wild heath between the tops of two mountains called
+the Col de Brouais, in which this ascent terminated, we unexpectedly
+discovered a hut tenanted by an old gend'arme, a pet lamb, a kid, and
+two tame hares, to all which quadrupeds we were introduced by the master
+with great glee, while waiting for the carriage under his roof. We were
+so much pleased and diverted by the whimsical manner in which this merry
+contented mortal lived among his menagerie, that we sent the horses on
+to Breglio, and complied with his eager desire of entertaining us at his
+cabaret, if a hut the size of a tea-caddy, without another human
+habitation visible for four miles, could be so called. He produced, to
+our surprise, bread, milk, cheese, fresh curd, eggs, fruit, and
+preserves, all clean and neatly served, and was equally surprised at our
+giving him two francs a head, which tender he at first remonstrated
+against with great naiv&eacute;t&eacute; as too extravagant. The trouble which he had
+taken in fetching most of these articles from a distance of five miles
+appeared not to enter into this honest fellow's calculation. The French
+were encamped in some force on the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span> Col de Brouais at the time of the
+session of the Comtat of Nice and of Savoy by the king of Sardinia in
+1796. It was, also, about four years previous to our visit, infested by
+a band of robbers, to whom its lofty situation afforded great
+facilities: these were, however, swept off and conveyed to the galleys
+by the exertions of the mountain patrole, of whom our host was one, and
+the whole of the country is now perfectly safe and undisturbed. After
+contemplating for a short time the principal summit of the Col de Tende,
+which from this point appears at its full height, we dived into the
+intervening valley of Breglio by a rapid descent, like the road into a
+mine. The trout stream, which runs past this place in its way to
+Vintimiglia, is such as would cause a traveller fond of fishing, to
+regret the want of his rod and tackle. After leaving Breglio we ascended
+the course of this river till it narrowed into a defile between two
+rocks; on entering which the town of Saorgio appears, after a mile or
+two, piled on the top and shelving side of the precipice to the right in
+a singular manner. The architect who planned it must have taken his idea
+from a colony of swallows' nests in a sand-rock, for it seems hardly
+possible to get to or from it without wings: to judge of it from the
+road, there is no room or footing for streets; a man might jump down the
+chimney of his neighbour's house, or be dashed to pieces on its roof, by
+leaping from his own ground floor; and the fall of a house in the upper
+tier would probably open a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span> clear downward passage to the valley. A
+traveller desirous of making a sketch of what is an unique thing in its
+way, would do well to get three hours start of his carriage from
+Breglio,<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a> and scramble among the heights to the right of the river,
+for a point which gives a more accurate idea of Saorgio than we could
+obtain from the valley. The view is attempted in aquatinta in Beaumont's
+Maritime Alps, and badly as it is executed, the original drawing must
+have been good, and, as far as I can judge, have given an accurate idea
+of it. The peasants call the place by some name sounding in their patois
+like Chavousse; it cannot, however, be mistaken. This is the only spot
+between Breglio and Tende which would be adapted for a drawing; but the
+scenery, nevertheless, is of the most stupendous and extraordinary
+nature I ever witnessed, exceeding, on the whole, the defile of Gondo
+and Iselle in the route of the Simplon, and more decided, though less
+varied in its features, than that justly admired spot. The pass is not
+on a larger scale than the Val d'Ollioules, as far as Saorgio; but after
+leaving the latter village, the rocks rise to a much greater height, and
+assume a more savage character. It is impossible to form an adequate
+idea of the depth of the defile and its effect on the eye, without
+actual inspection; the nearest approach to it will be made by conceiving
+a chasm rent from top to bottom by an earthquake through<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span> Snowdon, or
+any other mountain of similar height. For about twelve miles you travel
+in the condition of those fabled criminals,</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Quos super atra silex jamjam lapsura, cadentique<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Imminet assimilis."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>Jutting rocks, whose gradual change of posture is marked by the
+inclination of the pines on them, hang toppling over your head at a
+height to which the strongest voice could not be heard from the valley;
+and above and between them just peep glimpses of still more elevated
+heights, where a tree appears hardly of the size of a pin's head. A
+peculiar gray, sombre atmosphere overspreads the whole at noon day,
+similar to that which prevails during a solar eclipse; and the deep echo
+of the river is the only sound heard for miles. On the whole, I never
+saw any place so calculated to convey gloomy and wild ideas, and the
+Sicilian name of "Val Demone," or John Bunyan's "Valley of the Shadow of
+Death," would be appropriately applied to this savage spot. Nor would
+the danger be imaginary at the breaking up of a frost, or after violent
+rains, which might bring one of the highest rocks perpendicularly down
+without the intervention of a single crag to give warning and break its
+fall. The visible rents made in the road from time to time, and the
+obstructions in the deep bed of the stream, show sufficient marks of
+these formidable incursions. In one place the valley<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span> originally
+afforded only a passage for the river, and the road has been cut and
+blasted along the cheek of the rock: Close to this spot an inscription
+on the stone informs you that this road was the work of the late king of
+Sardinia; and he had in truth a right to be proud of such an
+undertaking. The whole road from Nice to Turin is admirable, presenting
+hardly a single mauvais pas. The natural difficulties which the
+construction of the road presents have been surmounted in a manner which
+might be a study to a civil engineer, and the whole is, perhaps, as fine
+a specimen of labour and skill as Buonaparte's route over Mont Cenis or
+the Simplon. The natural features of its wilder parts resemble those in
+the pictures of Salvator Rosa, but on a larger scale than he ever
+attempted to give an idea of.</p>
+
+<p>Within a mile or two of Tende,<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> the chasm in the rocks (for it was no
+more) widens into a small narrow valley of a peculiarly quiet character,
+in which the monastery of St. Gervase occupies one of those retired
+green spots which prove so well the good taste of the monks of old. A
+turn which this valley takes to the left affords the view, first, of the
+old castle of Tende, looking quite ghastly in the dusk of evening, and
+next of the town of Tende itself, which stands piled like Saorgio,
+against the shelving side of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span> the valley. Tende is a large and
+apparently flourishing town, affording two inns of very respectable
+appearance. The Albergo Imperiale is high in its charges, but makes
+amends for it by the liberality and comfort of its appointments. It
+fronts one of the principal peaks which form the chain of the Col di
+Tende, which we contemplated as it caught the last rays of the evening
+sun, forming different guesses how we were to get up it.</p>
+
+<p>June 4.&mdash;From Tende to Limone 15 miles. We left Tende at a quarter
+before four: after twisting and re-twisting for about an hour and a half
+among narrow defiles, through which the first part of the rise is
+gradually conducted, we reached a mountain valley at a high level above
+the sea, closed at the opposite end by the main ridge of the Col di
+Tende. Here the chief ascent commences, in a regular zigzag up a jutting
+shoulder of the mountain. The road is wide and good, and free from
+ravine or precipice; but from its continual turns, (of which I counted
+not less than sixty-five) is difficult and embarrassing to any but a
+crane-necked carriage; though in no place could an overturn produce
+worse consequence than a roll of a few yards. The distance may be
+abridged on foot, either by crossing the zig-zags, or by taking the
+summer path to the right through a fine range of Alpine pasture, which
+exhibits a profusion of hardy flowers growing up to the edge of the
+snow-drifts: amongst many others,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span> whose names were unknown to us, we
+observed blue and yellow crocusses, hearts-ease, oxlips, cowslips,
+primroses, and two sorts of gentianella. In this direction the road
+cannot be missed to the turf cabaret which stands on the sharp edge of
+the mountain. It is curious to look back a moment from this elevated
+spot down the narrow valley behind you, and observe the road curling
+from below your feet into blue distance, like the coils of an
+immeasurable white snake.</p>
+
+<p>At this fine season of the year, it exhibits a busy scene of passengers
+and loaded strings of mules, toiling up in your rear, or lessening in
+the perspective till hardly visible at the bottom of the ascent. The
+site of the cabaret borders on the line of perpetual snow, and though
+inferior in height to the crest of the Simplon road, stands in a
+situation, I should conceive, much more exposed to the effects of sudden
+hurricanes and snow storms. The road appears to be commanded by no spot
+where avalanches could accumulate, as on the precipice where you first
+overlook Brieg, and must, therefore, during the winter, be rather
+difficult than dangerous. On the other hand, no mountains intervene on
+the Turin side, to blunt the edge of the north winds from the Savoy
+Alps; and in the direction of Nice, the south-west winds must be
+concentrated and driven up the mountain avenue of Tende with the roar of
+artillery. I can, therefore, easily credit Beaumont's account,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span> that
+many mules are annually lost in consequence of the tempestuous weather
+on the Col. We did not, however, taste any of the mule-hams at the
+cabaret, which, according to that writer, are afforded to the frugal
+natives by these casualties, but contented ourselves with a spoonful of
+brandy, and a taste of their good brown bread. Had our stomachs been
+desperate, other refreshments, I believe, were to be had.</p>
+
+<p>The view to the north from this "raw and gusty" ridge affords a more
+striking idea of height and space combined, than any other prospect with
+which I am acquainted; though not on the whole so imposing as the first
+glimpse of the Swiss side of the Simplon. The eye is carried directly
+over two or three lower peaks of the Col, grinning with snow drifts, to
+the great range of Alps south-west of Mont Cenis, which appear hanging
+in mid air like the domains of a cloud-king; their jagged and glittering
+tops distinctly defined, but their bases melting into the hazy abyss
+which the plain of Piedmont presents.</p>
+
+<p>As far as I can estimate, we were about five hours in performing the
+ascent from Tende. Two more hours took us to Limone, at a jog trot, down
+a zigzag road, less abrupt in its turns than that on the other side. At
+Limone the post-road to Turin begins. The post-house is a tolerably good
+inn:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span> the douaniers, the most troublesome we had yet met with, refusing
+to compound for the customary donation, and asking for money when their
+search was ended. We had, therefore, the sweet revenge of first watching
+them as pick-pockets, and next refusing them as beggars.</p>
+
+<p>To Coni fifteen miles; the first seven or eight through a beautiful
+valley fringed with chestnut woods; every thing, however, appeared
+diminutive, as our eyes had not yet recovered the strain which the
+enormous scenery of the Col had occasioned. In this fine open valley,
+goitres abound as much as near Sion; this malady, therefore, cannot be
+attributed, as some think, to the stagnation of air.</p>
+
+<p>Coni, a neat arcaded town, deserves mention for the beauty of its
+situation, and the fine Alpine panorama which it commands. The
+glittering pinnacle of Monte Viso, is the most striking feature through
+this and the following day's journey.</p>
+
+<p>June 5.&mdash;Breakfasted at Savigliano, a large flourishing town; slept at
+Carignan, and reached Turin to breakfast next day.</p>
+
+<p>June 6.&mdash;The best of Turin is seen in the general survey of the town and
+its princely environs, particularly on the Moncaliere side. Our
+principal amusement was derived from Zuchelli's masterly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span> performance at
+the Opera Buffa. The plot of the piece turned partly on the
+discomfitures and discontents of a supercilious English dandy, which
+part this singer performed with an immoveable countenance, which kept us
+in a roar of laughter, his grave rich toned bass voice giving a double
+effect to the solemn absurdity of the character. For the sake of
+avoiding open offence to our countrymen, the hero was styled a Danish
+count; but the portrait was perfect to the very tail of the coat, and
+could not be mistaken, and the countenances of some of his prototypes in
+the next box showed, that the satire, fair and gentlemanly as it was,
+cut deeper than the awkward puppet-show of "Les Anglaises pour rire."
+The Neapolitan character was handled more unmercifully in the part of a
+guttling, fulsome old coxcomb, as cowardly as the Dane was quarrelsome.</p>
+
+<p>Milan, its inimitable cathedral, and its other curiosities, have, I am
+aware, been well-trodden ground for some years. No one, however, appears
+to notice the courier's little spaniel in the Archduke Rainier's hall,
+who has watched for his master's return from Russia more than a year
+without stirring from his mat, and whom the good-natured Viceroy feeds
+and protects without allowing him to be disturbed. I hope he will find a
+place in some future animal biography, for the credit of his species. As
+to the splendid F&ecirc;te Dieu, which we just arrived in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span> time to witness,
+with its military, civil, and ecclesiastical pageantry,&mdash;the beggar-boys
+plucking the guttering wax from the long tapers of the priests, and the
+priests occasionally singeing their noses in return, I could no more
+undertake to describe, than to sort a bag of gaudy feathers of different
+birds.</p>
+
+<p>The best companion over the Simplon with which I am acquainted, is a
+little French tract, written, I think, by a M. Mallet, and touching
+slightly, but sufficiently, on all subjects of interest connected with
+that stupendous route. The short account which it gives of the life of
+Cardinal Borromeo may be read through while walking up the hill of Arona
+to visit his colossal statue, which deserves a higher rank than perhaps
+it holds, either as a work of art or an achievement of labour. The
+attitude of the figure is easy and graceful, and the artist has managed
+the flowing cardinal's robe with great taste. There is also an
+expression of benevolence and majesty in the countenance and extended
+hand, suitable to one's conceptions of this apostolic character, who
+seems looking and waving a blessing on his native Arona. The height of
+the figure and pedestal is stated at 104 feet; but the effect of its
+grace and proportion renders this difficult of belief, until you look
+back at the distance of two miles on the road to Baveno, and see it like
+a walking giant overtopping the neighbouring woods by more than the head
+and shoulders.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>With this noble statue ends my admiration of Borromean taste: for it is
+not to be borne that the Isola Bella, which nature intended as a central
+finish to such a fairy land as the Lago Maggiore, should have been
+tortured into a piece of confectionary less elegant than the good taste
+of Gunter or Grange would have devised as the centre of a bowl of lemon
+cream. The Isola Madre, it is true, is beautiful; for no Italian
+landscape gardener has yet assailed it with his line and rule.</p>
+
+<p>Our welcome into Switzerland was novel, but pleasing to lovers of
+animals. Several herds of cattle met us on our road to Brieg,
+accompanying their masters to the mountain chalets, and fairly beset us
+with their attentions. The cows crowded and shouldered each other to be
+scratched; one large goat; slipping under their legs, put her head under
+my arm, and took my hand in her mouth; and a whole flock of sheep turned
+round and ran after us in order to obtain more notice. I had no idea
+before that any animal but the dog might be tamed to such a degree of
+instinctive tact, as to perceive whether or not its caresses will be
+acceptable to a stranger; and I am convinced, that the celebrated Ritson
+might have made more converts to his Braminical system by importing and
+exhibiting a Swiss flock, than by writing a book against animal food,
+and classing eggs as a vegetable succedaneum.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span></p>
+
+<p>It would be as superfluous to describe the well-known ground of
+Switzerland, as that of Cumberland; and indeed when once within sight of
+Geneva, one is almost at home. One and one only stage seems to remain,
+more desirable still.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Cum peregrino,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Labore fossi venimus larem ad nostram,<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Desideratoque acquiescimus lecto."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+
+<p>&nbsp;</p>
+<h3>THE END.</h3>
+<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span></p>
+
+
+
+<hr style="width: 65%;" />
+<h3>BOOKS PUBLISHED<br />
+BY<br />
+JAMES CAWTHORN, COCKSPUR STREET.</h3>
+
+
+<p>ITINERARY OF PROVENCE AND THE RHONE, made during the Year 1819, By JOHN
+HUGHES, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford: Illustrated by the following
+Views, engraved in the line manner from Drawings by Dewint, by W.B.
+Cooke, G. Cook, and J.C. Allen. Royal Quarto or Imperial Octavo. Isle of
+St. Marguerite, the Prison of the Masque de Fer&mdash;Ch&acirc;teau
+Rochepot&mdash;Lyons&mdash;Lyons Cathedral&mdash;Mont Blanc from a height above
+Lyons&mdash;Tower of Mauconseil, Vienne&mdash;Ch&acirc;teau La Serve&mdash;Valence and
+Dauphine Mountains&mdash;Montelimart&mdash;Ch&acirc;teau Grignan, Two Views&mdash;Castle of
+Montdragon&mdash;Triumphal Arch at Orange&mdash;Avignon, Two Views&mdash;Aqueduct of
+Pont du Gard&mdash;Castle of Beaucaire and Bridge of Boats&mdash;Tarascon&mdash;Arch
+and Mausoleum at St. Remy&mdash;Orgon&mdash;Bay of Marseilles&mdash;Cannes, where
+Buonaparte remained the night of his landing from Elba, and where Murat
+sheltered when he fled from Naples, Two View&mdash;Maritime Alps, from the
+Castle of Nice&mdash;Castle of Tende.</p>
+
+<p class="c">*** This Work is sold with or without the Illustrations.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+journal of a tour in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar,&mdash;in which he gives
+such an animated and interesting description of the Ch&acirc;teau
+Grignan, the dwelling of Madame de Sevign&eacute;'s beloved daughter, and
+frequently the place of her own residence, that no one who ever
+read the book would be within forty miles of the same, without
+going a pilgrimage to the spot. The Marquis smiled, seemed very
+much pleased, and asked the title at length of the work in
+question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An Itinerary of
+Provence and the Rhone made during the Year 1819, By John Hughes,
+A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'&mdash;observed, he could now purchase no
+books for the ch&acirc;teau, but would recommend that the Itineraire
+should be commissioned for the library to which he was abonn&eacute; in
+the neighbouring town."&mdash;<i>Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward</i>.</p>
+
+<p>"The tower of Mauconseil must have been very difficult to express;
+for the water on the right is between a light coloured stone-quay
+and the tower itself, also very bright; yet the artist, W.B. Cooke,
+has contrived to give it a fine and natural transparency entirely
+in keeping with the scenery around. The second is a simple and
+lovely landscape, with a sky exquisitely managed: but Avignon is
+still a greater favourite with us. The rich architectural
+structures on one hand, the silvery river, the picturesque bridge,
+the distant Alps of Dauphin&eacute;, and the little bit of rustic scenery
+on the foreground of the left, all combine to render this a very
+charming view; and Mr. Allen has great merit in executing it as he
+has done. The Ch&acirc;teau Grignan is of a different and darker
+character, and an extremely interesting performance. Upon the
+whole, the lovers of elegant art will find this publication well
+entitled to their attention."&mdash;<i>Literary Gazette</i>, No. 309.</p></div>
+
+<p>A JOURNEY THROUGH ALBANIA and other Provinces of TURKEY in Europe and
+Asia, in Company with the late Lord Byron; including a Life of Ali
+Pasha, and illustrated by Views of Athens, Constantinople, and various
+other Plates, Maps, &amp;c. By JOHN CAM HOBHOUSE, Esq. M.P. Second Edition,
+with Corrections. 2 vols. 4to. 5l. 5s. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"Both the general reader and the scholar may look for no small
+portion of information and amusement from the present volume. The
+work itself will have a standard place in all Collections of
+Voyages and Travels; a place which it will fully merit, by the
+industry and ardour of research conspicuous throughout, as well as
+by the spirit vivacity and good sense of the general
+narrative."&mdash;<i>Quarterly Review</i>, XIX.</p>
+
+<p>"The narrative which he has produced bears unquestionable marks of
+a curious, capacious and observant mind; and the same may be said
+of the poetical production of his friend Lord Byron, who
+accompanied him on his Travels. As Reviewers are sometimes charged
+with a propensity to cavilling, we will not close these
+introductory remarks without declaring in round terms in justice to
+Mr. Hobhouse, and in vindication of ourselves, that we have
+received as much pleasure and instruction from the perusal of these
+Travels as from that of any others which have ever come before us,"
+&amp;c. &amp;c.&mdash;<i>British Review</i>, No. IX.</p></div>
+
+<p>HOR&AElig; IONIC&AElig;, descriptive of the Ionian Isles and Part of the adjacent
+Coast of Greece, together with other Poems. By WALLER RODWELL WRIGHT,
+Esq. Third Edition. 7s 6d. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="poem"><div class="stanza">
+<span class="i0">"Wright?<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> 'twas thy happy lot at once to view<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">Those shores of glory, and to sing them too;<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">And sure no common muse inspired thy pen<br /></span>
+<span class="i0">To hail the land of gods and godlike men."<br /></span>
+</div></div>
+
+<p>AN HISTORICAL SKETCH of the LAST YEARS of the REIGN of GUSTAVUS the
+FOURTH, late <span class="smcap">King of Sweden</span>, including a Narrative of the Causes,
+Progress, and Termination of the late Revolution; and an Appendix
+containing Official Documents, Letters, and Minutes of Conversations
+between the late King and Sir John Moore, General Brune, &amp;c. &amp;c. 10s.
+6d. boards.</p>
+
+<p>BEAUTIES of DON JUAN; including those Passages only which are calculated
+to extend the real fame of Lord Byron. 10s. 6d.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"This is a very captivating volume with all the impurities of Don
+Juan expurgated, and yet displaying a galaxy of connected lustre,
+which is well calculated to throw a halo of splendour round the
+memory of Lord Byron. It may with perfect propriety be put into
+female hands, from which the levities and pruriences of the entire
+poem too justly excluded it in spite of all its charms of
+genius."&mdash;<i>Literary Gazette</i>, 599.</p>
+
+<p>"We cannot conclude our observations without again congratulating
+the Compiler upon the success which has attended his labour, and
+strongly recommending the work to those who desire that the female
+branches of their family should participate in the beauties of this
+modern Prince of Poesy."&mdash;<i>Public Ledger</i>.</p></div>
+
+<p>AN ACCOUNT of the EMPIRE of MOROCCO and the DISTRICT of SUSE, compiled
+from Miscellaneous Observations during a long Residence in and various
+Journies through those Countries. To which is added, an interesting
+Account of TIMBUCTOO, the great Emporium of Central Africa. By J.G.
+JACKSON, Esq. Quarto. Second Edition. 2L. 12s. 6d. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"The observations which he has himself made upon these parts, and
+the notices which he has collected respecting the interior from
+native travellers, form a work of considerable value both in a
+commercial and literary view, and leads us to rejoice that
+merchants who have resided in foreign countries are beginning more
+and more to communicate information on their return home," &amp;c.
+&amp;c.&mdash;<i>Edinburgh Review</i>.</p></div>
+
+<p>MELANGES et LITTERATURE D'HISTOIRE de MORALE et de PHILOSOPHIE, par
+COMTE D'ESCHERNEY. 3 vols. 1L. 1s.</p>
+
+<p>THE WONDERS of a WEEK AT BATH, in a Doggrel Address to the Hon. T.
+S&mdash;&mdash;, from F. T&mdash;&mdash;, Esq. of that City. Price 7s. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>It contains a satirical description of the present style of life
+and amusements at Bath, with delineations of some individual
+characters. His lines are easy and flowing, and his <i>general</i>
+satire not wanting in vivacity," &amp;c. &amp;c.&mdash;<i>British Critic</i>.</p></div>
+
+<p>MEMOIRS of the LIFE of MRS. ELIZABETH CARTER, with a New Edition of her
+Poems. By the Rev. MONTAGU PENNINGTON, M.A. 2 vols. 8vo. Second Edition.
+10s. 6d. boards.</p>
+
+<p>TRAITS and TRIALS; a Novel. 2 vols. 14s. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"A pretty little tale, in which we find more discernment of
+character and acquaintance with human nature than are usually
+discoverable in the first attempts of novel writers,"&mdash;<i>Monthly
+Review</i>.</p></div>
+
+<p>OURIKA; a Tale by the Duchess de DURAS. 2s. 6d.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"About a month ago a very pretty story under this title was
+published in Paris. It soon not only attracted attention but became
+quite the rage; and every thing in fashion and drama and picture
+has since been Ourika. There are Ourika dresses, Ourika
+Vaudevilles, Ourika prints. Madlle. Mars blacked her face to
+perform Ourika, but did not like her appearance in the glass, and
+refused the character. Such an event, like Mad. George's insult,
+was enough to set all that sensitive metropolis in a flame; and
+every mouth and every journal has rung and is ringing with
+Ourika."&mdash;<i>Literary Gazette</i>, 383.</p></div>
+
+
+<p>THE LAY of the SCOTTISH FIDDLE; a Poem in Five Cantos. 7s. 6d. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"I believe that the nature of this American Poem was known to the
+proprietor of the Quarterly Review. So far as it was a burlesque on
+the Lay of the Last Minstrel, I know it was; yet was he as a
+publisher so anxious to get it, that he engaged Lord Byron to use
+his utmost influence with me to obtain it for him, and his Lordship
+wrote a most pressing letter upon the occasion. He asked me to let
+Mr. Murray, who was in despair about it, have the publication of
+this Poem as the greatest possible favour."&mdash;<i>Dallas's
+Recollections of Byron</i>, p. 270.</p></div>
+
+<p>ADRASTUS; a Tragedy: AMABEL, or the Cornish Lovers; and other Poems. By
+R.C. DALLAS, Esq. 7s. 6d. boards.</p>
+
+<p>ANECDOTES, hitherto <i>unpublished</i>, of the PRIVATE LIFE of PETER THE
+GREAT, on the Authority of Mons. Stehling, Member of the Council of
+State to the <span class="smcap">Empress Catharine</span>, and Translated from the French of The
+Count D'Escherney, Chamberlain to the King of Wirtemberg. 5s. boards.</p>
+
+<div class="blockquot"><p>"These are some very entertaining anecdotes of Peter the Great, and
+place the private character of that Sovereign in a most amiable
+point of view," &amp;c. &amp;c.&mdash;<i>Gentleman's Mag.</i></p></div>
+
+<p>A CATALOGUE of a MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTION of BOOKS, New and Second-hand,
+on Sale for Ready Money.</p>
+
+<p>* * * The Public are most respectfully informed, they can be supplied
+with Clean and Perfect Copies of most of the New and Costly Works <i>as
+soon us the first demand has subsided</i>, at half the Publication Price.</p>
+
+
+<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> In 1419, John Duke of Burgundy, and the Dauphin, against
+whom he had taken part during the troubles of France, agreed to a
+reconciliation. "An interview was fixed to take place on the bridge of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, where a total amnesty was to be concluded, to be
+followed by an union of arms and interests. Every precaution was taken
+by the duke for his safety; a barrier was erected on the bridge; he
+placed his own guard at one end, and advancing with only ten attendants,
+threw himself on his knees before the Dauphin. At this instant Tannegui
+de Chastel, making the signal, leaped the barrier with some others, and
+giving him the first blow, he was almost immediately despatched. Though
+the Dauphin was in appearance only a passive spectator of this
+assassination, there can be no doubt that he was privy to its
+commission."&mdash;<i>Wraxall's Valois</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> The Welsh proverb, that a man who sleeps on the top of
+Snowdon, must awake either a fool or a poet, refers as probably to the
+effect produced on the mind by the prodigious mountain panorama
+discernible from thence, as to any fancied influence of the genius
+loci.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Vide Cooke's View.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> The characteristic beauties of Italy are no proof of the
+picturesque taste of the Italians themselves, as planners and
+architects. The commanding situation of their villages, and the small
+proportion of window to wall, are circumstances favourable to landscape,
+but intended merely as the means of catching and retaining cool air.
+Their classical ruins are preserved as a source of pride and profit, and
+the natural features of the country cannot be altered.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Vide Cooke's View.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> Collot d'Herbois.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> See Godwin's St. Leon.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> There is, I believe, positive historical authority, which
+fixes Vienne as the place of Pilate's banishment and death.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> "See Mad. de S.'s Letters."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> "Je me r&eacute;jouis, avec M. de Grignan, de la beaut&eacute; de sa
+terrasse; s'il en est content, les ducs de Genes, ses grands p&egrave;res,
+l'auraient &eacute;t&eacute;; son gout est meilleur que celui de ce temps-l&agrave;;
+* * * * * ces vieux lits sont dignes des Adhemars."&mdash;<i>Mad. de Sevign&eacute;</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> "L'air de Grignan me fait peur pour vous; me fait
+trembler; je crains qu'il n'emporte, ma chere enfant, qu'il ne l'&eacute;puise,
+qu'il ne la dess&egrave;che&mdash;."
+</p><p>
+"Voil&agrave; le vent, le tourbillon, l'ouragan, les diables decha&icirc;n&eacute;s qui
+veulent emporter votre ch&acirc;teau; quel &eacute;branlement universel! quelle
+furie! quelle frayeur r&eacute;pandue partout!"&mdash;<i>Mad. de Sevign&eacute;</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> See Southey's translation of the Cid.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> Eighty feet by twenty-four, according to a measurement
+made previous to the burning of the castle.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Pour entrer au vestibule (says the same letter which I
+quoted before, written before the Revolution) on monte par un escalier,
+car les appartemens sont tous au premier. Il y a quatre beaux salons,
+qui s'appellent la salle du roi, la salle de la reine, la salle des
+ev&ecirc;ques, et la galerie: le reste de la maison, qui est vaste, est
+distribu&ecirc;e en divers appartemens, dont chacun est compos&eacute; d'une chambre
+a coucher, un grand cabinet, et un cabinet &agrave; toilette.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> See the Spectator.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> Marius's victory is said to have been gained near Aix
+(Aqu&aelig; Se&aelig;ti&aelig;).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> "Cette memorable bataille, sur laquelle nous n'avons aucun
+d&eacute;tail, nous sauva du joug des Arabes, et fut le terme de leur grandeur.
+Depuis ce revers, ils tenterent encore de p&eacute;n&eacute;trer dans la France; ils
+s'emparerent m&ecirc;me d'Avignon; mais Charles Martel les d&eacute;fit de nouveau,
+r&eacute;prit cette ville, leur enleva Narbonne, et leur ota pour jamais
+l'esp&eacute;rance dont ils s'&eacute;taient flatt&eacute;s si longtemps."&mdash;<i>Florian's Pr&eacute;cis
+Historique sur les Maures.</i></p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> As late as 1688, Louis XIV. seized on the territory of
+Avignon in consequence of disagreements with Innocent XI., and the Count
+de Grignan held the city as his viceroy for two subsequent years. Mad.
+de Sevign&eacute;, in her letters written at this period of time, congratulates
+her daughter (whose boat was nearly overset against the piers of this
+identical bridge), on the dignity of the situation conferred on the
+count, and the more solid advantages which might accrue from it.
+</p><p>
+"Vous prenez, ma chere fille, (says she) une fort honnete resolution
+d'aller &agrave; votre terre d'Avignon, voir des gens qui vous donnent de si
+bon c&oelig;ur ce qu'ils donnoient au vicelegat."&mdash;June, 1689.
+</p><p>
+"Quelle difference de la vie que vous faites &agrave; Avignon, toute &agrave; la
+grande, toute brillante, toute dissip&eacute;e, avec celle que nous faisons
+ici!"&mdash;<i>Les Rochers</i>. June, 1689.
+</p><p>
+"Toutes vos descriptions nous ont divertis au dernier point; nous sommes
+charm&eacute;s, comme vous, de la douceur de l'air, de la noble antiquit&eacute; des
+eglises honor&eacute;es comme vous dites, de la presence et de la residence de
+tant de Papes, &amp;c. &amp;c."&mdash;June 26, 1689.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> It is to be hoped that Adam Smith has taken a correct view
+of the subject of madness in his Moral Sentiments. "Of all the
+calamities," says he, "to which the condition of mortality exposes
+mankind, the loss of reason <i>appears</i> by far the most dreadful; and we
+behold that last stage of human wretchedness with deeper commisseration
+than any other. But the poor wretch who is in it, laughs and sings,
+perhaps, and is altogether insensible of his own misery. The anguish
+therefore which humanity feels at the sight of such an object, cannot be
+the reflection of any sentiment of the sufferer. The compassion of the
+spectator must arise altogether from the consideration of what he would
+himself feel if he were reduced to the same situation, and, what perhaps
+is impossible, were at the same time able to regard it with his present
+reason and judgment.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> "Ce vertueux jeune homme paroit dej&agrave; consomm&eacute; dans l'art
+Evangelique; ses instructions sont aussi sublimes qu'elles sont precises
+et pathetiques; il joint a ses grandes qualit&eacute;s un amour ardent pour les
+pauvres; il consomme annuellement les revenus d'un patrimoine majeur a
+de bonnes &oelig;uvres dans les cours des Missions. Une foule de faits
+attestant ses liberalit&ecirc;s journalieres."&mdash;<i>Fransoy's Memoir</i>.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> See the letter introduced in Jo&uuml;y's Hermite en Provence.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> "And do not forget the toasted cheese." Vide <i>Matilda
+Pottingen</i> in "The Rovers."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> See the Quarterly Review, to which I am obliged for the
+Abb&eacute;'s remark.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> See Campbell's ballad of "The Brave Roland," in one of the
+numbers of the New Monthly Magazine; and Southey's tale of Manuel and
+Leila, in his early productions.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> I had procured this document from Milan, and translated it
+for the press, previous to reading the version of it which is given in
+the Quarterly.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> A similar dignity was conferred by some heathen poet, I
+believe, on the &#960;&#959;&#964;&#957;&#953;&#945; &#963;&#965;&#967;&#951; (the august, or god-like fig).</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> The word Oc, according to tradition, meant in the old
+patois of the country "yes:" hence the original derivation of "Langue
+d'Oc."</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> The celebrated fair of Beaucaire, which may be almost
+called the carnival of the Mediterranean, is held in this meadow
+yearly.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> For an account of the Tarasque, or fabulous dragon, which
+infested the country, and the ceremonies commemorative of it, see Miss
+Plumptre's tour. The name of Tarascon, she says, is derived from this
+animal.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> I do not except even John Bull's favourite yew peacocks
+and dragons, at least when they decorate the garden of a poor man.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> According to Sanson's excellent Atlas, the French part of
+which was laid down from measurement, in the reign of Louis XIV., this
+mountain is the Mont St. Victoire, near which Marius gained his
+celebrated victory over the Cimbri. The field of battle is fixed by
+history as near Aqu&aelig; Sexti&aelig;.&mdash;(<i>Aix</i>.)</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> For an account of the curious ceremonies and processions
+instituted by this monarch, see Miss Plumptre, under the heads of "Leis
+Razcassetos," "Lou Juec des Diables," &amp;c. I cannot say but that the
+enumeration reminds me of the merry court of Old King Cole, with his
+fiddlers three, his tailors three, and the long list of et ceteras
+detailed in the well-known song.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> See Second Part of Henry VI. Act 4.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> See Colman.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> There is, I believe, no inn at Saorgio.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Vide Cooke's Views.</p></div>
+
+<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> 'Mr. Wright, late Consul General for the Seven Islands, is
+author of a very beautiful Poem just published: it is entitled Hor&aelig;
+Ionic&aelig;, and is descriptive of the Isles and the adjacent Coast of
+Greece.'&mdash;<i>Lord Byron's English Bards</i>.</p></div>
+
+</div>
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone, by John Hughes
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+Project Gutenberg's Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone, by John Hughes
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone
+       Made During the Year 1819
+
+Author: John Hughes
+
+Release Date: March 24, 2007 [EBook #20891]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ITINERARY OF PROVENCE ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Carlo Traverso, Chuck Greif and the Online
+Distributed Proofreading Team at http://dp.rastko.net
+(Produced from images of the Bibliotheque nationale de
+France (BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr)
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+Hughes
+
+South of France
+
+ONLY TWO HUNDRED AND FIFTY COPIES PRINTED.
+
+"----I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+journal of a tour made in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar--in which he gives such an
+animated and interesting description of the Chateau Grignan, the
+dwelling of Madame de Sevigne's beloved daughter, and frequently the
+place of her own residence, that no one who ever read the book would be
+within forty miles of the same without going a pilgrimage to the spot.
+The Marquis smiled, seemed very much pleased, and asked the title at
+length of the work in question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An
+Itinerary of Provence and the Rhone made during the year 1819, by John
+Hughes, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'--observed, that he could now
+purchase no books for the Chateau, but would recommend that the
+Itineraire should be commissioned for the Library to which he was abonne
+in the neighbouring town,"--_Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward_.
+
+Thomas White, Printer, Johnson's Court.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+ITINERARY
+
+OF
+
+PROVENCE & THE RHONE,
+
+MADE DURING THE YEAR 1819.
+
+BY JOHN HUGHES, M.A.
+
+OF ORIEL COLLEGE OXFORD.
+
+[Illustration: J. Hughes Esq. del. W. Woolnoth, SG.
+ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE NEAR CANNES AND PRISON OF MASQUE DE FER.]
+
+SECOND EDITION.
+
+LONDON:
+
+JAMES CAWTHORN.
+
+MD.CCCXXIX.
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE.
+
+
+IT has been the Author's object to render the following volume a
+companion to persons visiting the country described. He has therefore
+not so much studied to compile from known books of historical reference,
+as to answer those plain and practical questions which suggest
+themselves during an actual journey, and to enable those whose time is
+limited, and who wish to employ it actively, to form the necessary
+calculations as to what is to be seen and done. The best points of view,
+and the parts which may be passed over rapidly, are therefore specified,
+as well as the places where good accommodation are to be expected, or
+imposition to be guarded against.
+
+The subjects of the Illustrations will be mentioned in the course of the
+Itinerary, for the information of collectors, of whose notice it is
+trusted they will be rendered worthy by the well-known talents of Mr.
+Dewint and the Messrs. Cookes.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+CHAP. I.--Paris to Rochepot
+
+CHAP. II.--Rochepot to Lyons
+
+CHAP. III.--Lyons
+
+CHAP. IV.--Lyons to Montelimart
+
+CHAP. V.--Chateau Grignan
+
+CHAP. VI.--Orange--Avignon
+
+CHAP. VII.--Avignon--Murder of Brune--Hopital des Fous--Mission of 1819
+
+CHAP. VIII.--Pont du Gard--Nismes--Montpelier--Cette
+
+CHAP. IX.--Tarascon--Beaucaire--St. Remy--Orgon--Lambesc
+
+CHAP. X.--Aix--Marseilles
+
+CHAP. XI.--Ollioules--Toulon
+
+CHAP. XII.--Frejus--Cannes--Isle of St. Marguerite--Antibes
+
+CHAP. XIII.--Nice--Col di Tende--Conclusion
+
+
+
+
+* * *
+
+AN
+
+ITINERARY,
+
+&c.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. I.
+
+PARIS TO ROCHEPOT.
+
+
+NO one, I imagine, ever yet left an hotel in a central and bustling part
+of Paris, without feeling the faculty of observation strained to the
+utmost, and experiencing a whirl and jumble of recollections as little
+in unison with each other as the well known signs of that whimsical
+city, the _Boeuf a-la-mode_, (with his cachemire shawl and his ostrich
+feathers) and the _Mort d'Henri Quartre_. The contrasts and varieties of
+the grave and gay, the affecting and the burlesque, the magnificent and
+the paltry, which exist and may be sought out in abundance in every
+great capital, are perhaps more vividly concentrated at Paris than any
+where else, and brought with less trouble under the eye of those whose
+spirits or leisure may not allow them to mix in society. In London
+every thing wears a busy uniform exterior, varied only by the apparition
+of a Turk, a Lascar, or a Highlander; and home appears to be the place
+reserved for the development of character: but in Paris, from the
+fashion of living almost in public, and the freedom which every one
+enjoys of following his own taste in dress or amusement without notice,
+the history of most individuals appears to a certain degree written on
+their exterior; and a morning's walk brings you in contact with all the
+diversities of character which rapidly succeeding events have created.
+The old beau, with the identical toupet of 1770; the musty, moth-eaten
+nondescripts sometimes seen at the mass of Notre Dame, which remind you
+of a still earlier period; the faded royalist, with a countenance
+saddened by the recollection of former days; the ex-militaires, whose
+looks own no friendship with "the world or the world's law;" the old
+bourgeois riding in the same roundabout with his grandchildren, and
+enjoying the _jeu de bague_ as cordially,--revolve in succession like
+the different figures in a magic lantern, while the place of Punch and
+Pierrot is supplied by a host of laborious drolls and _gens a
+l'incroyable_. The various members of this motley assemblage appear also
+more distinct from each other, as connected in the recollection with
+places so strongly marked by historical events, or bearing in themselves
+so peculiar a character:--the place Louis Quinze, the grim old
+Conciergerie, the deserted Fauxbourg St. Germain, with the grass
+growing in its streets; the Place de Carousel, the Boulevards, and the
+Catacombs, the Palais Royal and the Morgue.
+
+To attempt, however, to say any thing new of a place so well known and
+so fully described as Paris, would be as superfluous as to write the
+natural history of the dog or cat. The peculiarities of such animals are
+continually striking one in new and amusing points of view; but verbal
+delineation has already done its utmost in acquainting us with them. In
+like manner, every thing relating to Paris, and illustrative of it at a
+period of interest which probably will not arise again for centuries,
+has been already made known in Paul's admirable letters, in poor Scott's
+powerful but unmerciful satire, and finally in a host of books,
+booklings, and bookatees, teaching us how to spend any period of time at
+Paris from three to three hundred and sixty-five days; how to enjoy it,
+how to eat, drink, see, hear, feel, think, and economise in it. Kotzebue
+has devoted sixty pages to its bon bons and savories; others more
+modestly give you only a diary of their own fricasseed chicken and
+champagne, and information of a still lower sort is supplied by the
+delectable Mr. Hone, for the instruction of our Jerries and Corinthian
+Toms. I shall commence dates, therefore, from the 26th of April, on
+which day we quitted the Hotel de l'Europe, Rue Valois, not sorry to
+obtain a respite from sounds and sights.
+
+Though in such a country as Tuscany, where every furlong of ground
+affords a new and rich subject for the pencil, the voiture mode of
+travelling is preferable to posting; yet no one, I think, would
+recommend it in traversing the tedious interval which separates Paris
+from the southern provinces. We had adopted this species of conveyance
+from the idea that it would afford more leisure for observation to those
+of the party to whom France was new; but we found in reality that by
+subjecting us to a dependence on hours, it diverted our attention from
+those places where we might have spent half a day to advantage, and
+familiarized us only with one branch of knowledge,--the merit and
+demerit of most of the inns on the roads, whose characters I shall not
+fail to give as we found them. Homely as this species of information may
+be, I have often regretted the want of it beforehand; and concluding
+that others may be of the same opinion, I shall therefore afford it as
+far as I am able: premising, that it is as well not to vary, on this or
+any other road, from the practice of ascertaining beforehand the rate of
+the aubergiste's charges. The traveller's first impulse certainly is to
+save himself trouble, by paying whatever is demanded, and not to expend
+time and attention on a series of petty disputes, which make no great
+difference in his travelling expenses. There is, however, in all or most
+of those who are fitted to conduct the business of life, a feeling of
+shame at being outwitted even in trifles, which naturally rebels
+against this easy mode of proceeding, and inclines one rather to take
+the trouble of asking a few questions, than to be laughed at as a _grand
+seigneur_ by a cunning landlord. This trouble after all may be taken by
+a servant, and need not subject the master to the necessity of entering
+every inn like an angry terrier, with his bristles up and ready for
+battle; and the settlement of preliminaries does not lead to any want of
+attention on the part of the people of the inn.
+
+We neglected this precaution at Essonne, where we breakfasted on leaving
+Paris, and where accordingly we paid about double the charge which
+Tortoni or the Cafe Hardy would have made. It appears, in truth, that at
+the Croissant d'Or, as at the Emperor Joseph's memorable German inn,
+"though eggs are not scarce, yet gentry are."
+
+The distance from Paris to this place is about 24 miles: the road of
+course excellent, as is uniformly the case in the route to Chalons; but
+the only thing during the stage which remains on my recollection, is an
+obelisk inscribed, "Dieu, le Roi, et les dames;" a melange perhaps
+compounded in compliment to Louis XV. who greatly improved a part of
+this road, which was once nearly impassable. Corbeil, a neat flourishing
+town within half a mile of Essonne, and possessing large cotton
+manufactories, derives some interest from the celebrated siege it
+sustained during the war of the league. Two miles beyond Essonne we
+remarked, at a short distance to the right, Chateau Moncey, once the
+seat of the gay and brilliant Duke de Villeroi and his descendants; and
+on a hill to the left, Chateau Coudray, the former residence of the
+Prince de Chalot. Both the possessors of these estates were guillotined
+during the reign of terror, and their places are filled by Marechal
+Jourdan, and some _nouveau riche_, whose very name the peasants seemed
+never to have heard, or to have forgotten from want of interest.
+
+We found the Hotel de la Ville de Lyon at Fontainebleau a good inn, and
+fair in its charges. The old palace, though not intrinsically worth a
+visit in point of architecture, yet conveys one of those "sermons in
+stones," in which the Fauxbourg de St. Germain so much abounds; and
+presents also more pleasing recollections of Louis Quatorze (a prince
+possessing many of the good points of the _bon Henri_) than the
+bombastic personification of him as Jupiter Tonans, in the palace of
+Versailles, which is on a par as a painting with Tom Thumb as a tragedy.
+
+April 27.--To Fossard, eighteen miles: the first six through the forest,
+just sufficiently sylvan to suffer by a comparison with that of Windsor.
+At the end of two more miles we crossed the valley, in which is situated
+the town of Moret, to which is attached a history equally curious, as
+Anquetil observes, with that of the Iron Mask. The following is the
+extract from the Duke de St. Simon's Memoirs, which he introduces as
+relative to it.
+
+"Il y avoit a Moret, petite ville aupres de Fontainebleau, un petit
+couvent, ou etoit professe une Mauresse inconnue, et qu'on ne montroit a
+personne. Bontemps, Gouverneur de Versailles, par qui passoient les
+choses du secret domestique du roi, l'y avoit mise toute jeune, avoit
+paye une dot assez considerable, et continuoit a lui payer une grosse
+pension tous les ans. Il avoit attention qu'elle eut son necessaire, que
+tout ce qu'elle pouvoit desirer en agremens et douceurs, et qui peut
+passer pour abondance pour une religieuse, lui fut fourni. La reine y
+alloit souvent de Fontainebleau, et prenoit grand soin du bien-etre du
+couvent; et Mad. de Maintenon apres elle. Ni l'une ni l'autre ne prenoit
+de cette Mauresse un soin direct, et qui peut se remarquer. Elles ne la
+voyoient meme toutes les fois qu'elles alloient au couvent, mais elles
+s'informoient curieusement de sa sante, de sa conduite, et de celle de
+la superieure a son egard. Quoiqu'il n'y eut dans cette maison personne
+d'un nom connu, Monseigneur (le Dauphin) y a ete quelquefois; les
+princes, ses enfans, aussi; et tous demandoient et voyoient la Mauresse.
+Elle etoit dans un couvent avec plus de consideration que les autres, et
+se prevaloit fort des soins qu'on prenoit d'elle, et du mystere qu'on en
+faisoit. Quoiqu'elle vecut tres-religieusement, on s'appercevoit bien
+que sa vocation avoit ete aidee. Il lui echappoit une fois, entendant
+Monseigneur chasser dans le foret, de dire negligemment, 'c'est mon
+frere qui chasse.' On dit qu'elle avoit quelquefois des hauteurs, que
+sur les plaintes de la superieure, Mad. de Maintenon alla un jour expres
+pour tacher de lui inculquer des sentimens plus conformes a l'humilite
+religieuse; que lui ayant voulu insinuer qu'elle n'etoit pas ce qu'elle
+croyoit, elle lui repondit, 'Si cela n'etoit pas, Madame, vous ne
+prendriez pas la peine de venir me le dire!' Ces indices ont fait
+conjectures qu'elle etoit fille du roi et de la reine, et que sa couleur
+l'avoit fait sequestrer, en publiant que la reine avoit fait une fausse
+couche."
+
+In addition to this extract, Anquetil adds, "En effet, la fantaisie de
+garder devant ses yeux une naine monstreuse (her favourite negress
+mentioned previously), peut faire conjecturer que Marie Therese n'aura
+pas ete assez exacte a detourner ses regards d'objets qu'une femme
+prudente doit s'interdire; qu'elle les aura fixes sur les negres que le
+progres du commerce maritime commencoit de rendre communs en France; et
+que de la sera venue la couleur de cette infortunee, qu'il aura fallu
+cacher dans un cloitre. Cette Mauresse et l'homme au masque de fer sont
+les deux mysteres du regne de Louis XIV. Le redacteur des Memoires de
+St. Simon dit qu'elle est morte a Moret en 1732, et que son portrait
+etoit encore en 1779 dans le cabinet de l'abbesse, d'ou, quand cette
+maison a ete reunie ou Prieure de Champ Benoit a Provins, il a passe
+dans le cabinet des antiques et curiosites de l'abbaye de St. Genevieve
+du Mont a Paris, ou il est encore. On lit au bas de ce portrait, ces
+mots, Religieuse de Moret." Such are the words of the extract relative
+to this singular person.
+
+The Hotel de Poste, (as it chooses to style itself) at Fossard, is a
+dismal pot-house; and the people possess none of that good humour and
+alacrity which cover a multitude of faults. Having swallowed some of
+their gritty coffee, which might have been very delectable to the palate
+of a Turk, we walked about a mile and a half to the bridge[1] of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, on which John Duke of Burgundy was murdered by
+Tannegui de Chastel, in the presence, and probably with the connivance
+of the Dauphin, afterwards Charles VII. Near this spot we remarked a
+small mass of ruins, the only remains of the once magnificent Chateau
+Varennes. Its former owner, the Duke de Chatelet, as we were informed by
+some market-people, resided for six months in the year at this seat,
+maintaining or employing most of the poor within his reach, and
+entertaining his peasantry with a weekly dance at the Chateau. Like many
+others, he fell a victim to the guillotine during the reign of terror;
+his lands, with the exception of a portion recovered by his heirs, were
+alienated, and the fragment which we observed was the only part of his
+residence left standing. From the tone and manner in which the French
+peasantry appear to speak of these very common occurrences, I should
+judge that the effects of the revolution have not yet eradicated that
+"subordination of the heart," which is natural among a simple and
+industrious people, and which nothing but very gross neglect or
+misconduct on the part of their superiors, or the unchecked licence of
+political quacks, can destroy. Most of the ravages in question might no
+doubt be traced to bands of plunderers, organized from the most
+desperate and notorious characters in many different parishes, and
+sufficiently countenanced by the revolutionary tribunals to overawe the
+peaceable and unarmed mass of the population, whom it would be hardly
+fair to confound with them. Let us fancy for a moment, how quickly,
+under similar political circumstances, a moveable Spencean brigade
+might be collected in any district of England from poachers,
+sheep-stealers, gypsies, incendiaries, and those whose latent love of
+mischief might be drawn out by proper encouragement, and we may find
+reason not to condemn the French peasantry in general, as sharers in the
+outrages which they probably abominated, but could not prevent.
+
+[Footnote 1: In 1419, John Duke of Burgundy, and the Dauphin, against
+whom he had taken part during the troubles of France, agreed to a
+reconciliation. "An interview was fixed to take place on the bridge of
+Montereau-sur-Yonne, where a total amnesty was to be concluded, to be
+followed by an union of arms and interests. Every precaution was taken
+by the duke for his safety; a barrier was erected on the bridge; he
+placed his own guard at one end, and advancing with only ten attendants,
+threw himself on his knees before the Dauphin. At this instant Tannegui
+de Chastel, making the signal, leaped the barrier with some others, and
+giving him the first blow, he was almost immediately despatched. Though
+the Dauphin was in appearance only a passive spectator of this
+assassination, there can be no doubt that he was privy to its
+commission."--_Wraxall's Valois_.]
+
+From Fossard to Sens, 21 miles: the country uninteresting as far as
+Pont-sur-Yonne. Chapelle de Champigny affords a tolerably exact idea of
+a Spanish village; each farm-house and its premises forming a square,
+inclosed in blank walls, and opening into the street by folding gates,
+with hardly a window to be seen. From Pont-sur-Yonne to Sens, the road
+becomes more cheerful; and its fine old cathedral forms a good central
+object in the valley, along which the Yonne is seen winding. The
+principal inn at Sens being full for the night, we found neat and
+comfortable accommodations, with great civility, at the Bouteille.
+Whether there be any object worthy of notice in this cheerful little
+city, besides its cathedral, I do not know; but the latter possesses
+works of art which deserve an early and attentive visit. Nothing can be
+more minutely beautiful than the small figures and ornaments on the tomb
+of the Cardinal du Prat, which is sufficient in itself to give a
+character to any one church. But the grand object of interest is a large
+sepulchral group in the centre of the choir, to the memory of the
+Dauphin and his consort, the parents of Louis XVI. The grace and
+classical contour of this monument, which is executed by the well-known
+Nicholas Coustou, would excite admiration even in the studio of Canova,
+while the deep tone of genuine feeling displayed, particularly in the
+figure of Hymen quenching his torch, is worthy of the chisel of our own
+Chantry. Somewhat might perhaps be owing to an evening light, which cast
+strong mellow shades on the figures, and gave an effect of reality to
+the fine white marble of which they are composed; but their merits are
+very striking, and are quite unalloyed by the graphic bombast of which
+the most able French artists have been with too much truth accused. The
+character of the Dauphin, whose exemplary life in the midst of a corrupt
+court, was a tacit reproof which his haughty father could ill brook, is
+well known.
+
+    Ostendunt terris hunc tantum fata, neque ultra
+    Esse sinunt.
+
+He was snatched in the flower of his age, in the year 1765, from an evil
+which was even then brooding, and which might have brought his grey
+hairs to a bloody end at a more advanced period: and his consort
+survived him about a year and a half. "They were lovely and pleasant in
+their lives, and in their deaths they were not divided." The latter
+monument, as well as others of inferior merit, owed its preservation
+from revolutionary fury to the conduct and firmness of Mons. Menestrier,
+an avocat, and mayor of Auxerre during the reign of terror. _Ce brave
+homme_ (I like the old sacristan's term of _brave homme_, as it is one
+of the few untranslateable French words) flew to the cathedral at the
+moment that a horde of brigands had entered it to commence the work of
+mutilation; and, seconded by nothing but his known character for
+resolution, and an athletic person, fairly intimidated and turned them
+out for the time. Losing not a moment, he removed to a place of safety
+the Dauphin's monument, the avowed object of their vengeance, before a
+second visit took place; and desirous also to preserve a fine bas relief
+which stands in another part of the church, representing St. Nicholas
+portioning three orphan girls, he engraved on the wall under it an
+inscription to Benevolence in the republican style, which produced the
+desired effect. Not very long afterwards he fell a victim to a fever
+caught by over-exertion in advocating the cause of a poor family; and
+his wife survived him only a few days, exhibiting an humble copy of the
+conjugal affection of those whose memorials her husband had so loyally
+preserved. Whether to give full credit or not to the old sacristan's
+narration, I do not know; but it appears more probable that even so
+large a monument was removed piecemeal at short notice, than that the
+malice of the brigands would have allowed it to stand unhurt; and there
+is besides an ingenuity and presence of mind shown in the preservation
+of St. Nicholas, quite consistent with the character of M. Menestrier,
+as described by the old man. Had the latter felt that inclination to
+romance, which is not uncommon among his brethren, he would probably
+have adopted the hacknied legend, that both monuments were miraculously
+secreted from the eyes of the marauders.
+
+April 28.--To Joigny, where we breakfasted, twenty-one miles. Passed
+through Villeneuve, a decayed old town, with two singular gateways. Even
+this place emulates Paris in the possession of a Tivoli, which, in the
+present instance, consisted of a walled square of court-yard (for garden
+it could not be called), measuring about thirty yards by twenty, and
+overshadowed by poplars from three to four feet high: a most pleasant
+representative, in truth, of the wild olive woods, the sequestered
+waterfalls, and the classical ruins of the original Tivoli.
+
+      Domus Albunese resonantis,
+    Et praeceps Anio, et Tiburni lucus.
+
+On leaving Joigny, a neat pleasant town, extending in one wide street
+along the Yonne, and crowned by a handsome chateau, left unfinished by
+the Due de Villeroi, we reached the heart of the wine district of
+Burgundy. The country here assumes the appearance of a garden, both from
+the steep and regular form of the hills, which exactly resemble the
+Dutch slopes in old-fashioned gardens, and from the high state of
+culture to which their thin gravelly soil is brought. The hoe and the
+pruning-knife seem never at rest, and not a weed is to be seen; while
+the slightest portion of manure dropt on the high road becomes a prize,
+if not an object of contention, to the nearest vignerons. The air of
+cheerfulness and beauty, however, which we annex to our notions of high
+cultivation, is wholly wanting. The appearance of the vines was that of
+sapless black stumps, about thirty inches high, and pruned so as to
+leave only four or five eyes; and though the subject of poverty is too
+serious to joke on, the withered and stunted appearance of the country
+people exactly corresponded to that of these dry pollards. I trust that
+we were in some degree deceived by their natural ugliness, and that hard
+labour and scanty profits are not the only reasons which render their
+_tout ensemble_ such a contrast to the healthy robust looks of the
+Normans and Picards, whose very horses show the effects of their
+abundant corn harvests.
+
+From Joigny to Auxerre, twenty-one miles. We arrived too late to visit
+the interior of the cathedral, which was not mentioned to us as
+containing any thing remarkable. Its exterior, however, is fine and
+venerable, and affords a beautiful evening study, viewed from the
+opposite bank of the Yonne, about half a mile on the Vermanton road. The
+rest of the town, seen from this point, is broken into fine masses of
+conventual and other old buildings; and the river and bridge complete a
+landscape very well worthy of an accurate sketch.
+
+The excellence of the Hotel de Beaune, at Auxerre, "tenu par Boillet,
+gendre Mineau," as his cards inform us, deserves notice. This is one of
+those palm-islands among a desert of dirty pothouses, most treacherously
+adapted to lure onward a certain class of fair weather pilgrims, whom
+one wonders to meet with beyond Paris, and whose dolorous complaints of
+thin milk and large coffee-spoons, have afforded me no small amusement
+in casual rencounters. The most fastidious, however, of this class of
+smelfungi, would find but little to carp at under the roof the civil Mr.
+Boillet; and would do well to lay in a stock of comfortable
+recollections in this place, on which to feast as far as Chalons; for
+the interval between Auxerre and the latter city will prove but a dreary
+one to a traveller of the gastronomic school.
+
+The general air of Auxerre is ancient and respectable; but conveys no
+ideas of populousness or commerce. In the opinion, however, of an old
+sub-matron of the Enfans Trouvees (who looked over my shoulder while
+sketching, and whom, by way of something to say, I ignorantly
+complimented on her fine family of grandchildren), there is nothing, or,
+according to Malthus, much to complain of in the former respect. "Ah,
+Monsieur, que voulez vous? ce sont les militaires, ils vont par ci, ils
+vont par la, et puis--voila des enfans, et ou chercher les peres?"
+
+April 29.--To Vermanton, our first stage, eighteen miles: a succession
+of fine vineyards and square steep hills, such as Uncle Toby might have
+constructed for his amusement, with Gargantua for an assistant instead
+of the corporal. About six miles short of Vermanton, at the bottom of a
+long descent, we remarked Cravant, a little town to the right, fortified
+in an ancient and picturesque manner, and which, the peasants said, had
+been the seat of much fighting in days of old. Our informant was
+ploughing in a fierce cocked hat, with a team composed of a cow and an
+ass. Query, might not cocked hats, which appear to our ideas an
+exclusively military costume, have originated in such countries as
+these, among the vine-dressers? who flap down the sides alternately, in
+a manner that shows they understood the true use of them as a parasol.
+Vermanton is a small obscure place, affording an inn slovenly enough,
+though not glaringly bad.
+
+From hence to Lucy le Bois, where the horses were baited, fifteen miles.
+A pretty sequestered valley occurs about three miles beyond Vermanton;
+but the whole of the road, like that of the day before, may be travelled
+in the dark without any loss: the best part of it consists of a distant
+view of the vale and town of Avalon, backed by the Nivernois hills. In
+the old French Fablieux, the valley of Avalon is selected as the spot
+where a fairy confined Sir Lanval, her mortal lover; but whether the
+French Avalon, or the beautiful vale of Glastonbury was meant, appears
+doubtful, as the latter formerly bore the same name. There is a
+resemblance between the two districts, which amounts to an odd
+coincidence, particularly with regard to one of the Nivernois hills in
+the back ground, which presents a strong likeness of Glastonbury Tor. We
+should have passed through Avalon, but for a trick of the voiturier, who
+took a cross road to avoid paying the post duty there, and save his
+money at the expense of our bones. For this manoeuvre he might have been
+severely punished, had we chosen to interfere.
+
+From Lucy le Bois to Rouvray, where we slept, the level of the country
+becomes gradually more elevated, and its general features much more
+English, consisting of corn, woody copses, and pastures full of
+cowslips. I cannot say, however, that we found any thing to remind us of
+England at the detestable inn where we were quartered for the night, and
+have no doubt but that Lucy le Bois or Avalon would have afforded
+somewhat much better. The only civilized person was a large black
+baker's dog, who, like Gil Blas's first travelling acquaintance, seemed
+free of the house, and did the honours of the supper to us with an
+assiduity as disinterested, "Ah, messieurs," said his civil master, when
+we stept across the street in the morning, to return the dog's visit in
+form, "je suis charme que vous trouvez l'Abri si beau; je suis au
+desespoir qu'il ne soit pas chez lui a present, mais je vais le chercher
+partout afin qu'il vous fasse ses hommages." The good man could not have
+spoken of a favourite son with more unsuspecting complacency.
+
+April 30.--To Saulieu, where we breakfasted at a tolerably good inn,
+fifteen miles: the morning intensely cold, and one of those white frosts
+on the ground, which so much endanger the vintage at this season. We
+observed, however, no vineyards on the elevated ridge of country along
+which we were travelling, and which was perfectly English. A respectable
+old chateau, with a rookery, quick hedges, and extensive woods, thick
+enough for a fox covert, kept up the illusion agreeably. This style of
+ground continues beyond Saulieu; and between the latter place and Arnay
+le Duc, eighteen miles farther, its features are not unromantic. One or
+two castles of a very baronial air occur; the first of which, reduced to
+ruins, is visible at about a mile beyond Saulieu, occupying an insulated
+hill at some distance from the road, and much resembling the remains of
+an Italian freebooter's stronghold. Another, situated at the head of a
+glen, about six miles farther on, and overlooking a small village, is
+more perfect and striking in its appearance. It is the property, as we
+were informed, of the widow of M. Fenou, a royalist, who, during the
+revolution, stood a siege within its walls equal to that of
+Tillietudlem, repulsing a strong body of republicans with considerable
+loss. Buonaparte subsequently recalled M. Fenou, with the grant of a
+free pardon; and the estate was, in the course of things, restored to
+his widow. Such, as far as we could collect from the account of our
+informant, was the history belonging to Chateau Torcy la Vachere, which
+bears some resemblance, in situation and general outline, to Eastnor
+Castle, the seat of the Earl of Somers, at the foot of the Malvern
+hills.
+
+Arnay le Duc, a town situated on commanding ground, where we slept,
+boasts of an earlier celebrity, having been the scene of one of Admiral
+de Coligni's victories. It possesses several convents, now private
+property, and one or two fragments of building of a peculiarly
+antiquated style. Among these I particularly remarked an old iron-shop,
+supposed, as a bourgeois informed me, to be more than seven hundred
+years old, and which seems to have communicated with the ancient walls
+as a guard-house. While busied in sketching this singular relic, we were
+saluted gracefully by an old chevalier de St. Louis, who was passing,
+and whose distinguished air would have become the person of Coligni
+himself. On casually inquiring the name of this gentleman, we learnt
+that he had been one among the many imprisoned during the reign of
+terror, and would have fallen by the guillotine, had the fall of
+Robespierre happened four-and-twenty hours later. This, it must be
+owned, is a trite and common story; but it is, perhaps, by the very
+triteness and frequency of such hair-breadth escapes, more than by any
+other circumstance, that the extent and ferocity of the revolutionary
+massacres are brought home to the imagination. The appointed victims,
+whom the delay of a day or an hour preserved from destruction at this
+crisis, still survive in all parts of France, like widely-scattered
+land-marks, to remind one of the numbers swept away in the previous
+deluge of murder.
+
+May 1.--To Rochepot twenty-one miles. We were not sorry to leave the
+Hotel de Poste, at Arnay le Duc, which, with higher pretensions than the
+inn at Rouvray, only differs from it in the ratio of "dear and nasty" to
+"cheap and nasty;" and to commence a stage which promised more to the
+eye than any part of our former route. The country still continues to
+rise in this direction, and soon assumes the air of an extensive forest
+or chase, enlivened by half-wild herds of cattle, and opening into green
+glades and vistas of distant ranges of hills. At Ivry, we wound up a
+steep hill; the summit of which, a wide naked common, might match most
+parts of Dartmoor in height and bleakness. I had observed heaps of
+granite and micaceous stone at a much lower elevation in the course of
+the day before; and conclude that we were now on one of the highest
+inhabited points which occur in the interior of France. We had not
+leisure to walk to a telegraph on the right, which, to judge from the
+occasional glimpses which we had, must command a splendid map of the
+country near Autun. It had been recommended to us to take the route to
+Chalons through the latter town, as affording the most objects of
+interest; but, on the whole, I doubt whether that which we had adopted
+as the least circuitous, be not also preferable, as possessing the
+striking panoramic point to which we had climbed. After two or three
+more miles over an expanse of parched turf, we reached what geologists
+would call the bluff escarpment of the stratum. The descent before us
+was so precipitous, as to leave us at first at a loss to make out how
+the road could be conducted down it: and the prospect which burst upon
+us in front, had apparently no limit but the power of human vision.
+Beyond the foreground, which was formed by a series of rocky glens
+diverging from below the point on which we stood, the immense vale of
+the Saone extended like a bird's-eye view of the ocean, its relative
+distances marked by towns and villages glittering like white sails.
+Above the flat line of haze, which, at the first glance, appears to
+terminate the prospect at the distance of sixty miles, or more, we
+distinguished a faint blue outline of lofty mountains, which must have
+been the barrier separating France from Switzerland; and, as occasional
+gleams of sunshine broke out, the glittering and jagged lines of a
+barrier still more distant, and apparently hanging in mid air, became
+distinctly visible. Among these I recognised, at last, the features of
+Mont Blanc, in whose peculiar outline I could not be mistaken, and
+which, according to the map, cannot be less than 110 or 120 miles
+distant, in a direct line from the Montagne de Rochepot. It is, perhaps,
+not necessary to be a mountaineer, like Jean Jacques, by birth and
+education, in order to feel the peculiar expansion of mind, which he
+describes as caused by breathing mountain-air, and contemplating
+prospects like this of which I speak.[2] A boundless plain, and enormous
+mountains, such as the Alps, whether viewed individually, or contrasted
+with each other, are objects not physically grand alone, but affording
+also food for deep and enlarged reflection. The mind, while expatiating
+over the mass of feelings and projects, of hopes and fears, which are
+passing within the limits of the wide map below, feels the nothingness
+of the atom which it animates, and the comparative insignificance of its
+own joys and griefs in the scale of creation, and retires at last into
+itself, sobered into that calm state which is so favourable to the
+formation of any momentous decision, or the prosecution of a train of
+deep thought. A moment's glance changes the scene from culture and
+population to the silence and solitude of a dead icy desert; from the
+redundancy of animal and vegetable life to its "solemn syncope and
+pause." The ideas of obscurity, danger, and infinity, all powerful and
+acknowledged sources of the sublime, are excited at the view of a range
+of frozen summits, cold, fixed, and everlasting as the imaginary nature
+of those destinies, with whom a noble bard has peopled them; alternately
+glittering in sunshine, and enveloped in clouds, and from the well-known
+effects of haze and distance, appearing suspended in the air in their
+full dimensions and relative proportions. The imagination dwells upon
+the appalling hazards peculiar to their few accessible parts, and on the
+almost total extinction of life and animal powers, which is the penalty
+of a few hours sojourn there. And here again, too, the mind is forcibly
+impressed with the utter helplessness of the speck of dust which it
+inhabits, and that momentary dependence on Providence, which must be so
+convincingly felt in traversing such regions. Ascending in the scale of
+comparison, it may reflect, that these gigantic forms, which fill the
+eye at a distance at which cities and pyramids would fade into
+imperceptible specks, are but excrescences on the face of that earth,
+which itself is but an atom in the map of the universe. But I am
+wandering from my subject, and from the route, which, in this quarter,
+is somewhat precipitous. I shall, therefore, only remark what has
+frequently struck me as not an improbable conjecture, that Milton might
+have formed his splendid conception of the icy region of Pandaemonium
+from some of these colossal ranges of Alps with which his eye must have
+been familiar, seen through the vistas of a stormy sky. In the
+well-known passage which I shall take the liberty of quoting, one seems
+to recognise the deep drifts of snow, and the blue crevasses which
+abound in such a spot as the Mer de Glace, as well as the castellated
+peaks and glaciers which border on it, and the biting atmosphere which
+prevails among their summits.
+
+[Footnote 2: The Welsh proverb, that a man who sleeps on the top of
+Snowdon, must awake either a fool or a poet, refers as probably to the
+effect produced on the mind by the prodigious mountain panorama
+discernible from thence, as to any fancied influence of the genius
+loci.]
+
+    "Beyond this flood a frozen continent
+    Lies dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms
+    Of whirlwind and dire hail, which on firm land
+    Thaws not, but gathers heap, and ruin seems
+    Of ancient pile; or else deep snow and ice,
+    A gulf profound as that Serbonian bog
+    'Twixt Damiata and Mount Casius old,
+    Where armies whole have sunk: the parching air
+    Burns frore, and cold performs th' effect of fire."
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. II.
+
+ROCHEPOT TO LYONS.
+
+
+"MON Dieu, ma fille," says Madame de Sevigne in one of her letters to
+Mad. de Grignan, "que vous avez raison d'etre fatiguee de cette Montagne
+de Rochepot! je la hais comme la mort; que de cahots, et quelle cruaute
+qu'au mois de Janvier les chemins de Bourgogne soient impracticables!"
+Allowing this to have been the case in her days, I can hardly wonder
+that even Mad. de Sevigne was insensible to the magnificence of the
+prospect from this elevated point; and thought only of the safety of her
+neck. No danger however exists at present, as the road descending to
+Rochepot is good, and judiciously conducted down the brow of the hill;
+though the nature of the ground gives no very pleasing idea of what it
+must have been as a cross-country track. The inn also at Rochepot,
+situated at the junction of four roads, is clean and comfortable. A
+household loaf, weighing not less than thirty pounds, stood on the table
+to welcome us on our arrival, and we saw for the first time straw hats
+bearing a full proportion to it, the rim of which equalled in size a
+moderate umbrella.
+
+After breakfast we visited the ruined castle of Rochepot,[3] on which we
+had at first looked down, but which, seen from the village, bears a
+strong resemblance to Harlech Castle in North Wales, both in its form,
+and its position upon a commanding rock. We found upon inquiry that it
+had been tenanted at a much later period than its appearance would have
+led us to suppose. M. Blancheton, the proprietor, had made it his chief
+residence some thirty years ago, and kept it up in a style imitating as
+nearly as possible its ancient feudal grandeur. At the Revolution
+however it was forfeited, and has since been sold twice; but though each
+purchaser has pulled down a part, and sold the materials, enough still
+remains to give a perfect idea of its former strength and massiveness.
+M. Blancheton now resides, as we were informed, near Beaune, regretted
+as a _bon seigneur_ by his poorer neighbours, whom he has not visited
+since the demolition of his paternal seat. "It would break his heart,"
+said a poor old woman, "to see it as it now is." I could not help
+thinking of Campbell's "Lines on visiting a spot in Argyleshire," which
+bear the impress of a real occasion of this sort.
+
+[Footnote 3: Vide Cooke's View.]
+
+From Rochepot to Chalons-sur-Saone, eighteen miles; commencing with a
+steep hill, to the left of which winds a rocky valley of a singular
+description, cultivated to the very top of the abrupt heights which
+surround it, and so bare of soil, that the eye is surprised by the
+flourishing state of its corn and fruit-trees. The heat reflected from
+the rocks upon the thin gravel which supports its vineyards, must boil
+their juices to a liqueur; at least such was its effect on ourselves,
+while winding along a series of these natural forcing-houses, through
+which the road is conducted into the great plain of Chalons. From the
+ridges which border these valleys, the wide extent of the latter, and
+its border of Alps, are visible, though not so finely as from the
+elevation which we had descended. "Mont Blanc, the monarch of
+mountains," was however more plainly discernible than before, like a
+thin distinct fabric of vapour, with his "diadem of snow faintly lighted
+up by the sun;" and I never recollect to have seen this white-headed
+patriarch of the Alps before in any position which gave so fully the
+effect of his enormous height, I will not even except the spot near
+Merges, where from a gap in the intervening mountains, he appears almost
+to rest his base upon the lake of Geneva.
+
+On emerging from the hilly country near Rochepot, the road to Chalons
+passes along a dead flat, cheerful from its richness, but rather
+monotonous. To the right, we looked back upon a semicircular range of
+well wooded hills, in front of which, on an eminence, stands a stately
+old chateau belonging to the Count de Rouilly. It answers very much to
+the beau ideal of what a French chateau ought to be, but seldom is. I
+say "ought to be," premising that most of us have formed our first ideas
+of French chateaux, from those works of imagination which endow such
+places so liberally with gothic architecture and haunted woods. The
+mansion of the Count de Rouilly would not greatly disappoint a reader of
+Mrs. Ratcliffe's romances; and bears a strong resemblance to Westwood,
+near Ombersley, in Worcestershire, the seat of Sir John Packington,
+which is said to have been once a conventual building.
+
+With no small pleasure did we arrive at the handsome town of Chalons,
+our patience being nearly exhausted by the tiresome running base with
+which our Noah's ark accompanied the driver's abuse of his clumsy grey
+mares. _Grand chameau, sacre vache_, and _canaille_, where the most
+genteel and decent terms with which he favoured them, and his
+perverseness was in proportion. For this precious commodity, selected I
+should conceive from the most consummate ragamuffins on the road, we
+were indebted to Mons. Picon, a master voiturier at Paris, who imposed
+on us both as to the number of horses, and the length of time in which
+we were to be conveyed to Chalons.
+
+"Hic niger est; hunc tu, Romane, caveto."
+
+Having met with a respectable voiturier, named Veroux, who conveyed us
+admirably from Calais to Paris, my habitual distrust of this class of
+gentry had relaxed just at the wrong time, for the benefit of M. Picon.
+
+If cities are to be estimated by their appearance of neatness and
+opulence, Chalons deserves to be marked on the map in more capital
+letters than the imposing names of Sens or Auxerre. To no town indeed
+does it bear a greater resemblance than to Tours, both from the modern
+air of its houses, and from its noble river, adapted for every purpose
+of internal commerce. The Hotel des Trois Faisans is also an excellent
+inn, and, like that at Auxerre, sufficiently well frequented to find no
+account in these little beggarly impositions which are practised at
+inferior places.
+
+May 2.--We walked before breakfast to St. Marcel, a village about a mile
+from Chalons, to visit the church and monastery where Abelard, after his
+removal from Cluni, died and was buried. Our excursion however only
+answered in affording us an hour's healthy exercise; for the monastery
+has been destroyed, and the church stript of what ornaments it
+possessed, during the time of the Revolution; and the monument of
+Abelard is removed to Paris. Nor does the town of Chalons itself,
+handsome and cheerful as it is, present any food for the pencil, the
+more particularly as its flat situation offers no favourable point of
+perspective. The spot from which its stately quay, and its stone bridge
+ornamented with obelisks, are seen to the most advantage, is about a
+mile down the river;--in fact from the deck of the coche d'eau, in which
+we embarked at noon for Lyons. This excellent conveyance is a large
+covered boat, towed at the rate of six miles an hour by four
+post-horses, or, when necessary, by six; and performs the journey from
+Chalons to Lyons, a distance of about ninety miles, in twenty-eight or
+thirty hours, affording ample time for rest and refreshment at a line of
+inns of a superior description. The reasonable amount of the fare paid
+by each person at the bureau des diligences, (nine francs fourteen sous)
+might induce a fastidious or inexperienced traveller to form an
+indifferent idea both of the company and accommodations of the coche
+d'eau. Both however appear unexceptionable in their way, as this is the
+mode of conveyance adopted for the royal mail, and as generally
+preferred for the sake of comfort and expedition, as the Margate or
+Glasgow steam-boats. It affords the range of a tolerably spacious deck,
+and a couple of cabins, to which the passengers may retire in inclement
+weather. Had it indeed been less convenient or agreeable, we should have
+found it a blessed respite after the rumbling tub of penance in which we
+had been cooped. Indeed, the abuse which our voiturier had vented on the
+_desagremens et disgraces_ of the coche d'eau, in order to secure
+himself our company to Lyons, had determined us on trying this
+conveyance; for the habit of lying is so constant and inveterate in this
+class of fellows, as to possess all the advantages of truth; inasmuch as
+you have only to believe the direct contrary of what they say. The only
+inconvenient and perplexing liars are those who sometimes speak truth by
+accident; and their fictions moreover are seldom extravagant enough to
+afford the amusement created by romancers of the former class; among
+whom I may reckon a beggar, who beset us on the quay of Chalons,
+maintaining in a strong French accent, that he was the son of a carman
+of Thames-street, in the parish of St. George Hanovre, and had only been
+a few months in France.
+
+The _elite_ of our company consisted of a tall well-looking officer,
+wearing the croix d'honneur; a shrewd old Provencal merchant, to whom we
+were indebted for much valuable travelling information; two young
+friends, one of whom sang very agreeably and unaffectedly, and the
+other, a lively French Falstaff ate and talked enough for both; and
+last, not least, an old gentleman of the name of C. travelling to his
+campagne in Languedoc, whose arch quiet manners answered very much to my
+idea of the imaginary Hermite en Province. At Tournus, we took in a host
+of additional passengers, not so polished, but unobtrusive and
+well-behaved. I question however, whether, in the event of a rainy day,
+we should have found this mode of travelling very desirable; as the
+common cabin is but small in proportion to the number of persons capable
+of being accommodated on deck. There is indeed a smaller cabin
+adjoining, which, though the exclusive right of the diligence passengers
+from Paris, is usually shared by them with the rest. It is distinguished
+by the words over the door, "Chambre de Pairs," which some wag had
+altered into "Chambre des Paris," or the Upper House, inscribing the
+other cabin with his pencil as the Chambre des Deputes.
+
+Many a person fond of indulging in classical reveries, and not aware of
+the real breadth of the Clitumnus, may have formed a very spacious idea
+of that celebrated stream, and longed to contemplate its wide reaches
+from the foot of its well-known temple. As however the Clitumnus is in
+this identical spot, not broader than what a Yorkshire farmer would call
+"a bonny beck," and a Yorkshire fox-hunter would ride at without
+hesitation, the imaginary picture of it may with real propriety be
+transferred to the Saone near Tournus, winding as it does through the
+extensive meadows of a rich champaign country, and reflecting in its
+broad blue mirror the herds of fine white cattle which we saw paddling
+in every creek. It bears a strong resemblance to many parts of the Po,
+excepting in the stillness of its current, which was so great, that it
+would have been easy while leaning over the bow of the vessel, to fancy
+the Saone into the blue sky, and the coche d'eau, into Southey's vessel
+of the Suras, or Wordsworth's aerial skiff.
+
+At seven in the evening we came within view of the stately towers of
+Macon, a town, to all appearance, fully equal to Chalons in size and
+opulence, and much exceeding it as a subject for the pencil. Its fine
+navigation, the general richness of the country, and the productive
+vineyards on the neighbouring hills, all unite to render it a central
+point of business and bustle. There are several inns on the quay, of a
+good appearance; but we found the Hotel de l'Europe, to which we had
+been directed, in every respect deserving of its high reputation, and
+inferior, perhaps, to no country inn on the continent. After
+reconnoitring Mont Blanc again from the windows of the clean and airy
+bed-rooms to which we had been shown, we dined at the table d'hote,
+which was served within a quarter of an hour after the arrival of the
+coche. Among the more polished company present, I was not a little
+diverted by some scattered specimens of the French gentleman-farmer,
+present for the express purpose of wallowing for once in a dinner drest
+by the Duc d'Angouleme's ci-devant cook; fat and well-clad; their
+countenances wearing a sort of awkward purse-proud defiance to the cool
+sarcastic look with which the Parisian travellers eyed them; and their
+conscious shame struggling with the desire to appropriate all the good
+things before them. Numps, in the well-known old tale, was but a type
+of these honest personages, who seemed to be considered as "de trop" by
+the majority. In spite of the mixtures (I do not mean those made in the
+stomach) which must necessarily take place on these occasions, and
+allowing for the English prejudice in favour of privacy, there are
+advantages in dining at all French table d'hotes, frequented by
+tolerable company. To the epicure it ensures better fare and attendance
+than he can command by any other means, as the landlord and his
+attendants feel both their credit and interest concerned in displaying
+the most alacrity, and producing the greatest variety of dishes before a
+large party; while chance customers, after waiting for a long hungry
+interval, may have to encounter tired waiters, and partake of the
+tossed-up leavings of this very table d'hote;
+
+    Which, certainly, these gentlemen must own,
+    Is much more dignified than entertaining,
+
+as Colman pleasantly saith. There is a better and more satisfactory
+reason for this practice, which is, that it affords the best opportunity
+of ascertaining those points of local knowledge, which at once give an
+interest to the district through which you are travelling, and instruct
+you in the best methods of doing and seeing every thing. A Frenchman's
+manners and acquirements ought never to be judged of by his travelling
+suit, which is always avowedly the refuse of his wardrobe; and the
+importance which he is apt to attach to everything connected with his
+own town or district, if it leads to ridiculous minuteness, at least
+insures the accuracy of his details. The marked civility and attention
+of the French to strangers is too well known to be commented on,
+particularly to those who pay them the compliment of acquiescing in
+their national customs. I think I never saw the temper of French
+travellers thoroughly ruffled but on one occasion, when a shabby-looking
+Englishman and his gawky son, who had arrived in a cabriolet, made a
+fruitless attempt to exclude a large diligence party from any share in
+the table and fire of a country inn. Had they been contented to make
+their bread-and-butter arrangements in concert with the party, which
+included a member of the chamber of deputies, and a young officer, their
+company would have been considered as a pleasure.
+
+May 3.--We embarked at five o'clock in the morning, in the face of a
+very strong gale, which rendered six horses necessary, and tempted us to
+wish for warmer clothing. The morning, however, was beautifully clear
+and bright; and Mont Blanc, which is perceptible even from the low level
+of the river, was without a cloud. To the right, the Beaujolois hills,
+at the foot of which Macon stands, accompanied us as far as Trevoux,
+presenting an outline not unlike that of our own Malverns; but more
+varied and rich, as well as occasionally more lofty, and sprinkled with
+thousands of white farm-houses and villas: many of the parts are
+similar, and almost equal, to the hills which front Florence on the
+Fiesole side.
+
+At noon we stopped to breakfast, or rather dine, at Trevoux. Here the
+Beaujolois hills (or, at least, a range which runs in an uniform line
+with them) recede, and conduct the eye to a distant vista of higher
+mountains, toward the south; while, to the left, the river takes a
+sudden turn among the steep but cultivated sides of the Limonais. This
+curve brought us all at once upon such a green sunny nook, as might have
+served for the hermitage of Alexander Selkirk, in the island of Juan
+Fernandez; in the centre of which stands Trevoux, crowned by the ruins
+of an old castle, and overlooking the beautifully fertile valley which
+skirts the foot of the Limonais hills. From its situation, and the form
+and disposition of its houses, piled tier above tier to the top of a
+woody bank, Trevoux affords a perfect idea of a little Tuscan town. The
+Hotel du Sauvage, and the Hotel de l'Europe, are equally well
+frequented; and, like Oxford pastry-cooks, take care to employ the fair
+sex as sign-posts to their good cheer. Each inn has its couple of
+waiting-maids stationed at the waterside, in the costume of
+shepherdesses at Sadler's Wells, full of petits soins and agremens, and
+loud in the praises of their respective hotels. By these pertinacious
+damsels every passenger is sure to be dragged to and fro in a state of
+laughing perplexity, like Garrick, contended for by the tragic and comic
+muse, in Sir Joshua's well-known picture; nor do their persecutions
+cease, till all are safely housed. We went to the Hotel de l'Europe,
+whose table may be supposed not deficient in goodness and variety, from
+the specimen of one man's dinner eaten there. I shall enumerate its
+particulars, without attempting to decide on the question so often
+canvassed, whether our neighbours do not exceed us in versatility and
+capacity of stomach. Our young Falstaff then (for it was he of whom I
+speak), ate of soup, bouilli, fricandeau, pigeon, boeuf piquee, salad,
+mutton cutlets, spinach stewed richly, cold asparagus, with oil and
+vinegar, a roti, cold pike and cresses, sweetmeat tart, larded
+sweetbreads, haricots blancs au jus, a pasty of eggs and rich gravy,
+cheese, baked pears, two custards, two apples, biscuits and sweet cakes.
+Such was the order and quality of his repast, which I registered during
+the first leisure moment, and which is faithfully reported; and, be it
+recollected, that he did not confine himself to a mere taste of any one
+dish. Perhaps I may be borne out by the experience of those who have had
+the patience to sit out an old Parisian gourmand, by the help of coffee
+and newspapers, and observed him employed corporeally and mentally for
+nearly two hours, digesting and discriminating, with the carte in one
+hand, and his fork in the other. The solemn concentration of mind
+displayed by many of these personages is worthy of the pencil of
+Bunbury; and though French caricaturists have done no more than justice
+to our guttling Bob Fudges, I question whether they would not find
+subjects of greater science and physical powers among their own
+countrymen. On our return to the coche d'eau, our fat companion lighted
+his cigar, and hastened to lie down in the cabin, observing, "Il faut
+que je me repose un peu, pour faire ma digestion;" and Monsieur C.,
+instead of leaving him quietly in his state of torpidity, like a boa
+refreshed with raw buffalo, began to argue with us on the superior
+nicety of the French in eating. "Nous aimons les mets plus delicats que
+vous autres," quoth he; at which we laughed, and pointed to the cabin.
+We found, upon explanation, however, that Mr. C., though well-informed
+in general upon the subject of English customs, entertained an idea not
+uncommon in France, viz. that we always despatch the whole of those
+hospitable haunches and sirloins, which appear at an English table, at
+one and the same sitting: with this notion, his observation was
+certainly natural enough.
+
+From Trevoux, the Saone winds between narrow, steep, and picturesque
+banks as far as Lyons, near which place they close in upon its channel,
+exhibiting more varieties of rock and wood than before. For the good
+taste displayed by the rich Lyonnais in their villas and gardens, which
+began to peep upon us at every step, I cannot in truth say much; but
+our French companions, who had overlooked the merely natural beauties of
+the country, found much to commend in these little vagaries of art. A
+lively bourgeoise, on whom we stumbled the next day behind the counter
+of a glove-shop, ran up, openmouthed, to explain to us the beauties of
+one of their show spots, in view of which a sudden turn of the river was
+just bringing us. A conspicuous inscription on a large vulgar-looking
+house painted red and yellow, informed us that it was styled the
+"Hermitage du Mont d'Or." In the space of not quite an acre of ground,
+on the side of a wooded hill of the highest natural loveliness, the
+proprietor had contrived to commit a host of the most outrageous and
+fantastical absurdities, which were hailed with a smile from Mons. C.,
+and a burst of approbation from the rest of the party. At the top of the
+hill were four scattered pillars of different diminutive forms, with
+gilt balustrades; all painted with gaudy colours, and none large enough
+for a moderate tea-garden, or sufficiently solid to have resisted the
+point-blank stagger of a drunken man. Lower down were two holes in the
+rock, which, from their size and appearance, I should have taken for a
+rabbit-burrow and a badger's earth, but for the young lady's joyous
+exclamation--"Ah! voila les hermitages. Messieurs, il y a deux hermites
+la-dedans." "A la bonne heure, Mademoiselle; ils sont vivans, sans
+doute"--. "Mais pour cela--pas absolument--c'est que--ils sont de cire,
+voyez vous, mais d'une beaute! ah, c'est une chose a voir!" Then came
+an inclosure so thickly studded with pillars of different sizes, as to
+resemble a Mahometan burying ground. "Vous y trouverez des inscriptions
+de toute espece, et la vous voyez la colonne de Trajan." This was a
+wooden obelisk about ten feet high, painted white, at the base of which
+ROME was written in large black letters, occupying the whole of one
+side. Immediately above the house stood a small wooden building, with a
+red and white dome, and pillars and windows painted on the sides. The
+name COSMORAMA, which took up half the height of the side fronting us,
+still left us in doubt as to its use or intention; and our fair cicerone
+could no more explain the nature of her favourite building, than
+Bardolph could the meaning of the word "accommodate." "Eh, Monsieur,
+c'est ce qu'on appelle Cosmorama; je ne saurois vous dire precisement;
+peut-etre il y a des betes sauvages;--ou--quelque chose de gentil, voyez
+vous--mais enfin c'est un Cosmorama." "Mais voila ce qui est vraiment
+joli," resounded on all sides; and so general and good-humoured was
+their admiration of this rickety bauble, that we did our best to
+acquiesce in it. After all, we could admire, without any breach of
+sincerity, the natural beauties of this spot, which very much resembles
+the more open parts of the glen where Matlock is situated, and which all
+these abominations could not entirely deface. How to account for this
+perversion of eye in a people of sensibility and taste, I am rather at a
+loss; but this last is by no means a singular instance. "Bientot vous
+allez sortir de ces tristes bois," compassionately observed a very
+gentleman-like officer, with whom we had fallen in during a stage of
+beautiful forest scenery; and not a soul in a voiture which breakfasted
+in the salle a manger at Rochepot, could understand why we stopped to
+admire the distant prospect of the Alps. Not to multiply instances of
+the indifference to the beauties of simple nature, which will, I think,
+be allowed to exist in the French, as contrasted with ourselves, I am
+inclined to extend the line of distinction still farther, and to affirm,
+that this deficiency in taste appears generally to distinguish the
+Teutonic from the Southern blood. It is no exaggeration to say, that for
+one French or Italian traveller in Switzerland, twenty English, or ten
+Germans, may be reckoned. The French taste in landscape gardening is
+well known, and that of the Italians[4] is but a shade or two better:
+witness the detestable baby-house with which they have defaced one of
+the finest scenes in the world, and which they distinguish, _par
+excellence_, as the Isola Bella; to say nothing of a host of similar
+instances, as contrasted with our own Longleat and Rydal Park.
+
+[Footnote 4: The characteristic beauties of Italy are no proof of the
+picturesque taste of the Italians themselves, as planners and
+architects. The commanding situation of their villages, and the small
+proportion of window to wall, are circumstances favourable to landscape,
+but intended merely as the means of catching and retaining cool air.
+Their classical ruins are preserved as a source of pride and profit, and
+the natural features of the country cannot be altered.]
+
+The fairest account of the matter, perhaps, is, that this inferiority in
+one branch of taste may result from a difference of temperament in our
+lively southern neighbours, which, in other respects, has its
+advantages. Restless, acute, and loquacious, they delight more naturally
+in those objects which remind them of the "busy hum of men:" and,
+whatever the force of circumstances may have effected in particular
+cases, it may be safely asserted, that the diplomatist and man of the
+world is the indigenous growth of France and Italy, while the powers of
+abstraction and meditation exist more naturally in English and German
+minds, inducing the love of solitary nature.
+
+The styles of Claude, who was a German by birth, and of our own Wilson,
+are strongly contrasted with that of Vernet, as illustrative of the
+present subject. In the admirable paintings of the latter, bustle and
+motion are generally the characteristics of the scene represented, and
+the features of nature seem intended to be subordinate to some human
+action which is going on. In the pictures of Claude, the combinations of
+scenery are every thing, and the figures nothing, or rather, merely
+introduced to illustrate and harmonize with the effect which the
+landscape itself is to produce: and nothing is allowed to disturb the
+repose and serenity of the whole. Of Wilson, who delighted more in
+storms and convulsions of nature, it may be said, that his figures, also
+are merely subordinate to the effect of a dashing sea, a thunder-cloud,
+or a forest waving and crashing with the wind; and that they are not
+strongly enough marked to interrupt the eye in the contemplation of
+these objects. Gaspar Poussin, I must own, is an instance that a French
+painter can understand and represent the deep repose of nature; but the
+style of Poussin is certainly not that of the French school in general,
+nor that of Salvator to be considered as establishing a rule by which to
+judge of Italian taste.
+
+Mais revenons a nos moutons. We were surprised to observe how much our
+fellow-passengers interested themselves about the characters of the
+royal family of England. Several of its members underwent a free review,
+though not an ill-natured one; but all who spoke of our late queen
+Charlotte, did her more justice than has, perhaps, been done in England,
+and particularly praised the purity of her court, and the excellent
+domestic example which her private life afforded to Englishwomen in
+general. On this point we cordially agreed with them; but our sly
+acquaintance, Mons. C., was not disinclined to lead us to ground more
+debateable, and lay a trap for our national vanity. The master of the
+vessel had a wooden leg, which led to the subject of artificial limbs,
+and the perfection to which the art of making them had arrived in
+England. We accidentally mentioned the case of Lord Anglesey. "Et qui
+est ce Lord Anglesey?" said M.C., looking archly. "Un de nos plus grands
+seigneurs, Monsieur." Still he persisted in inquiring how he lost his
+leg. "C'etait in Flandres." "Ah, vous voulez dire a Vaterloo, n'est ce
+pas?" said the old gentleman, with a smile, not displeased to observe
+the motive of our hesitation. He would not allow us to use the word
+_emprunter_, as applied to the conduct of his countrymen, with regard to
+the Louvre collection, "Non, _voler_, voila le mot." The little
+bourgeoise, who had lionized the Hermitage du Mont d'Or so eloquently,
+grew very communicative on the strength of the display which she had
+made, and M.C.'s good humour; and volunteered her sentiments on the
+folly of reflecting too deeply, observing, that all but the old ought to
+banish the idea of death and such dismal bugbears from their minds.
+"Mais, songez, Mademoiselle," quoth he, interrupted in some observation
+rather better worth hearing, "que tout le monde ne possede pas votre
+force de caractere;" a compliment to which the young lady assented with
+a grateful curtsy.
+
+By the time F. had finished his sleep and digestion, as he had proposed
+to do, and learned "Pescator dell' Onda," by repeated trials and
+lessons, we arrived at the Pierre Incise, at the corner of which the
+Saone enters Lyons. Tradition says that this spot, which reminded me of
+St. Vincent's rocks, near Clifton, derives its Latinized name from the
+great work performed by Agrippa in cutting through the solid rock, and
+enlarging the channel of the river. The site of the castle of Pierre
+Incise, formerly a prison, and destroyed at the Revolution, is still
+visible on a strong height overhanging the river to the right; the
+bottom of which appears to have been cut away artificially.
+
+On another height, to the left, stands an old fort; on passing which, an
+abrupt turn of the Saone brought us into the centre of dirt, bustle, and
+business. Its course becomes in a moment confined between masses of
+tall, smoky, old houses, and its azure colour stained by party-coloured
+streams from dyers' shops, and a thousand other abominations, which
+would defy the pen of a Smollett to describe, and all the breezes from
+the Alps to purify. There are several bridges in this quarter, mostly
+appearing from their paltry and irregular character, to have been
+erected on some sudden emergency; from these, however, the noble Pont de
+Tilsit, near the cathedral, claims an exception. Long before we
+approached this last bridge, however, the boat reached the diligence
+office, and our porter dived with us to the left, through a succession
+of courts and streets as high and gloomy as the cavern of Posilipo. We
+emerged into the Place de Terreaux, and took up our quarters opposite to
+the Hotel de Ville, a formal, but fine old building.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. III.
+
+LYONS.
+
+
+EVERY traveller on his first arrival at a large place of any interest,
+and where his time is limited, must have experienced a difficulty in
+classing and forming, as it were, into a mental map, the various objects
+around him, and in familiarizing his eye with the relative position of
+the most striking features. To meet this difficulty, I should advise any
+one visiting Lyons, to direct his first walk to the eastern bank of the
+Rhone, and after crossing a long stone bridge called the Pont la
+Guillotiere, to follow the course of the river for about a mile along
+the meadows, towards its junction with the Saone. From this point of
+view, Lyons really presents a princely appearance.[5] The line of quays
+facing the Rhone, and which constitute the handsomest and most imposing
+part of the city, extend along the opposite bank in a lengthened
+perspective, in which the Hotel Dieu and its dome form a central and
+conspicuous feature. In the back ground, the heights which divide the
+Rhone and Saone from each other rise very beautifully, covered with
+gardens and country seats. More to the left, and on the other side of
+the Saone, the hill of Fourvieres (anciently Forum Veneris) presents a
+bold landmark, and forms a very characteristic back-ground to the city.
+Instead of continuing his walk towards the junction of the Rhone and the
+Saone, which possesses nothing worthy of notice, I should recommend the
+traveller to re-cross the Pont la Guillotiere, and make for this
+eminence. In his way he may pass through the Place Louis le Grand,
+formerly the Place de Bellecour, of the architecture of which the
+Lyonnais are very proud, and which is a marked spot in the revolutionary
+history of Lyons. Though on a costly and extensive plan, its proportions
+want breadth, and are too much frittered away to convey the idea of
+grandeur or solidity; and the inscription Vive le Roi, which occupies a
+place on two of its sides, in enormous letters, assists in giving it the
+air of a temporary range of building for a loyal fete. Not so the
+beautiful[6] Pont de Tilsit, by which you cross the Saone soon
+afterwards. This bridge, built by Buonaparte, to commemorate the treaty
+of Tilsit, unites elegance, solidity, and chasteness of design in a very
+great degree. Some of the stones, which I measured, are eighteen feet in
+length, and proportionably large, and altogether it reminded me of
+Waterloo bridge upon a smaller scale, and divested of its columns. The
+cathedral, which stands on the other side of the Saone, nearly at the
+foot of this bridge, is a venerable black old building of great
+antiquity, and though far inferior to those of Beauvais, Tours,
+Abbeville, or Rouen, in its general outline, possesses many detached
+parts of rich and curious architecture. It bears no marks of the
+devastation which it suffered in the Revolution, or during the late war,
+when, as we were told, the Austrians stabled their horses in it. Much of
+its repair has been owing to Cardinal Fesch, the late archbishop. The
+windows, rich as they are, have a gloomy effect, from being entirely
+composed of painted glass; and prevented us from distinguishing much
+very clearly. A statue of John the Baptist, however, crowned with
+artificial roses, should not be forgotten. A considerable part of the
+old town of Lyons lies on this side of the Saone; but as it will not
+repay the trouble of exploring, the traveller will do well to proceed
+immediately, or rather climb, to the church of Notre Dame de Fourvieres.
+The fame of peculiar sanctity which this church enjoys, attracts many
+daily visitors from Lyons, though from its situation, it reminds one of
+the chapel in Shropshire, which as country legends tell, "the devil
+removed to the top of a steep hill to spite the church-goers." The
+continual resort of all ranks hither has attracted also a host of
+beggars, who have taken their stations in the only footway leading up
+to the church, some singly, some in parties, every four or five yards,
+and all besetting you in full chorus. The same cause has drawn to the
+terrace in front of the church a seller of Catholic legends, who to suit
+all tastes, mingles the spiritual, the secular, and the loyal, in his
+profession. The legend of St. Genevieve, Le Testament de Louis XVI.,
+L'Enfant Prodigue, Damon and Henriette, Judith and Holofernes, and Le
+Portrait du Juif ambulant, might all be bought at his stall, adorned
+with blue and red wood-cuts. Poor Damon cut but a sorry figure in this
+goodly company; for though adorned with a crook secundum artem, he
+looked more rawboned and ugly than Holofernes, and more villainous than
+the wandering Jew: fully justifying the scorn with which the
+stiff-skirted Henriette seemed to treat him. It is almost misplaced
+however to enumerate such follies in a place, which on a fine day
+presents perhaps one of the most varied and magnificent views in the
+world: and which a person who had only an hour to spare in Lyons, ought
+to visit, to the exclusion of every other object of curiosity. By
+changing one's position from the terrace of the church to some rude and
+imperfect remains of Roman masonry on the western side of it, a complete
+panorama of the surrounding country is obtained. The Rhone and Saone are
+both seen inclining towards each other from the north and north-east,
+like the two branches of the letter Y; the former issuing like a narrow
+white thread from the distant gorges of the Alps, and widening into
+broad reaches through the intermediate plain; and the latter issuing
+suddenly from among the hills of the Mont d'Or: till after inclosing the
+peninsula in which the principal part of Lyons is situated, and which
+lies like a map under your feet, they unite towards the south; and the
+broad and rapid body of water formed by their junction, loses itself at
+length among ranges of hills surmounted by Mont Pilate, a lofty mountain
+near Valence. Towards the east, north-east, and south-east, the view is
+of the same description as that from Rochepot; a wild chain of Alps seen
+over a plain of great extent and richness. In a western direction, the
+broad hilly features of the adjoining country are enlivened by a
+continual succession of vineyards, woods, gardens, and villas of all
+sizes, absolutely perplexing to the eye from its undulating richness:
+with which the sober gray of distant ranges of mountains contrasts well.
+One cannot form a better idea of this part of the view, than by fancying
+the most hilly parts of the country near Bath, clothed in a lively
+French dress; the only deformity of which consists in the high stone
+walls that enclose every tenement, and whose long white lines cut the
+eye unpleasantly. Most persons can point out the Chateau Duchere, which
+is visible from this spot at the distance of about a mile on the
+north-west side, and was the scene of a sharp action between the French
+and Austrians in 1814.
+
+[Footnote 5: Vide Cooke's View.]
+
+[Footnote 6: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+If an hour or two of leisure remain after this walk, they may be filled
+up by a visit to the public library and the Palais des Arts. The former
+contains, they say, ninety thousand volumes, rather an embarrass de
+richesses to a hurrying traveller. I confess I was more amused by the
+importance with which the little old woman, who acted as concierge,
+talked of the "esprit mal tournu de Voltaire." The latter building
+adjoins the Hotel de Ville, in the Place des Terreaux, the scene of one
+of the revolutionary fusillades. It contains, besides, several good
+pictures hung in bad lights, a large collection of Roman altars and
+sepulchral monuments, arranged in a cloister below, which serves as the
+exchange; and a cabinet of Roman antiquities found in the environs. The
+Hotel de Ville itself is a massy stone building, a good deal in the
+taste of the Tuileries, and containing two fine statues of the rivers
+Rhone and Saone, which deserve notice. Whether the interior of Lyons can
+boast of any thing else worth notice I know not, but from the specimen
+which we had, too minute a survey of it can hardly be edifying to any
+one but a scavenger; and no single building can be named of any
+particular beauty, though its masses of tall well-built houses are
+imposing at a distance. To complete the short general survey of Lyons,
+which I mentioned, another not very long walk will suffice; traversing
+first the fine line of quays which front the Rhone, from the Pont la
+Guillotiere to the Quai St. Clair. From this point ascend the highest
+part of the city, called the Croix Rousse, and inquire for a place
+called Chateau Montsuy, which stands bordering upon its outskirts, and
+is best described as the most elevated spot on this line of heights.[7]
+From hence the view of Mont Blanc and the vale of the Rhone is
+peculiarly fine on a bright evening; and the whole prospect as rich and
+extensive as that from Fourvieres. Beware of being persuaded by the
+laquais de place to visit La Tour de la belle Allemande, which is one of
+their show spots, and so called from some old legend of the imprisonment
+of a German lady. The view from Chateau Montsuy must, from the nature of
+the ground, be just the same, or, perhaps, even superior: and, what is
+more to the purpose, the Baroness de Vouty, in whose garden this old
+tower stands, seldom admits either Lyonnese or strangers to see it. On
+descending from the Croix Rousse, cross the Rhone by the Pont Morand,
+the wooden bridge next to that of La Guillotiere. Near the foot of this
+bridge is situated a large open space of ground, called Les Brotteaux,
+where the most atrocious of the revolutionary massacres took place. The
+site of the fusillade, by which two hundred and seven royalists perished
+at one time, is marked by a large chapel, dedicated to the memory of the
+victims, in the erection of which they are now proceeding. Three only
+are said to have escaped from this massacre, and to be still living.
+One of them finding his cords cut asunder by the first shot that reached
+him, escaped in the confusion, and plunging amid the thick bushes and
+dwarf willows which bordered upon the Rhone, baffled the pursuit of
+several soldiers. There is nothing remarkable in the appearance of the
+Brotteaux at present; but no true lover of his country ought to neglect
+visiting a spot associated with such warning recollections. One of the
+stanzas inscribed by Delandine on the cenotaph of his countrymen (which
+has been removed to make room for the chapel above mentioned), expresses
+briefly, and much in the spirit of Simonides's well known epitaph on the
+Spartans, the impressions conveyed by the sight of this Aceldama:
+
+    Passant, respecte notre cendre;
+    Couvrez la d'une simple fleur:
+    A tes neveux nous te chargeons d'apprendre
+    "Que notre mort acheta leur bonheur."
+
+This passage is, indeed, prophetic of the salutary effects of a lesson,
+which these and a thousand more voices from the tomb will proclaim to
+future ages; if, indeed, future ages will believe, that a[8] dastardly
+stroller was allowed to glut his full vengeance on the kindred of those
+who had hissed him from their stage, and to vow in a fit of wanton
+frenzy, that an obelisk only should mark the site of the second city in
+France; that he found himself seconded in this plan of destruction by
+thousands of hands and voices; that one citizen was executed for
+supplying the wounded with provisions, another for extinguishing a fire
+in his own house; and that when these pretexts failed, such ridiculous
+names as "quadruple" and "quintuple counter-revolutionist" were invented
+as terms of accusation. Such facts as these, written in the blood of
+thousands, furnish a strong practical comment on the consequences of
+anarchy, and the uncompromising firmness which should be displayed in
+checking its first inroads; the nature of which was never more
+eloquently or instructively described than in Lord Grenville's words.
+
+"What first occurred? the whole nation was inundated with inflammatory
+and poisonous publications. Its very soil was deluged with sedition and
+blasphemy. No effort was omitted of base and disgusting mockery, of
+sordid and unblushing calumny, which could vilify and degrade whatever
+the people had been most accustomed to love and venerate. * * * * * * *
+And when, at last, by the unremitted effect of all this seduction,
+considerable portions of the multitude had been deeply tainted, their
+minds prepared for acts of desperation, and familiarized with the
+thought of crimes, at the bare mention of which they would before have
+revolted, then it was that they were encouraged to collect together in
+large and tumultuous bodies; then it was that they were invited to feel
+their own strength, to estimate and display their numerical force, and
+to manifest in the face of day their inveterate hostility to all the
+institutions of their country, and their open defiance of all its
+authorities."
+
+[Footnote 7: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 8: Collot d'Herbois.]
+
+A vivid description this, and strikingly applicable to the operations of
+that evil spirit which is still at work, with less excuse and
+provocation than France could plead for her atrocities. Such are the
+first and second acts of the drama of modern sedition; the fifth is well
+delineated in a tract by M. Delandine, the public librarian of Lyons in
+1793, as introduced in Miss Plumtre's Tour in France. This interesting
+narrative, intitled "An Account of the State of the Prisons at Lyons
+during the Reign of Terror," bears a character of truth and feeling,
+which bespeaks him an eye-witness of the horrors he describes. Torn from
+his family without any assignable cause, and imprisoned in the hourly
+expectation of death, his own apprehensions seem at no time to have
+absorbed his interest in the fate of his suffering friends; and to their
+merit and misfortunes he does justice in the verses before alluded to.
+The following is a free translation of them.
+
+    Oft, Lyonnese, your tears renew
+    To those who died upon this spot;
+    Their valour's fame descends to you,
+    In life, in death, forget them not.
+
+    Here calm they drew their parting breath,
+    Soul-weary of their country's woes,
+    Here, fearless, in the stroke of death
+    Met honour,--victory,--repose.
+
+    Pilgrim, revere their dust, and strew
+    One flow'ret on this lowly tomb;
+    Then say unto thy sons, "For you,
+    "Children of France! they braved their doom."
+
+    Thou fatal, hallow'd spot of earth,
+    Immortal shrines shall mark thy place!
+    Alas! what genius, valour, worth,
+    Lie mouldering in thy narrow space!
+
+Within less than half an hour's walk of the Brotteaux, and on the same
+side of the river, stands the Chateau la Motte, in which Henry IV.
+received Mary de Medicis as his bride. The way thither is best found by
+following the street leading to the Turin road for about a mile, when a
+turn to the right, not far from the junction of the road to Vienne,
+brings you in the course of a few minutes to the castle. When seen at a
+distance either from the Croix Rousse or Fourvieres, its four turrets
+and a watch-tower give it an air of grandeur consistent with its former
+history, and distinguish it from the adjoining suburb. In a nearer point
+of view, indeed, its patched and dilapidated appearance shows the vain
+attempts which have been made to repair the ravages of the Revolution.
+At that period it belonged, as we were informed, to M. de Verres, a
+brave royalist gentleman, whose activity against the Revolutionists
+drew their marked vengeance upon himself and his possessions. At the
+time of the siege of Lyons, he garrisoned the Chateau la Motte with a
+strong detachment of chasseurs; and, as a peasant informed us, "fought
+like a devil incarnate," obstructing the operations of the sans-culotte
+army materially, and retarding their success against Lyons by his
+obstinate resistance. The position of his extensive premises, detached
+from the rest of the suburb, and surrounded with a wall, added to the
+advantage of a gently rising ground, must have enabled him to prolong
+the contest with effect. His fate was like that of so many other loyal
+and intrepid Lyonnese: being forced at last to surrender, he underwent,
+as may be supposed, a very summary trial, and was shot on the Brotteaux,
+in sight of the distant turrets of his own house. The property was
+confiscated, and great part of the chateau pulled down; but fortunately
+the round tower, containing Henry the Fourth's bed-room, still remains,
+rather owing in all probability to the ignorance of the Jacobins, than
+their good will. A part of the estate has been restored to his daughter,
+Mad. d'A., together with the chateau, which she inhabits; but I have
+reason to fear this part is but an inconsiderable one. Observing us
+wandering round the chateau with an air of curiosity, she politely sent
+to invite us to walk in. The room in which she was sitting opened upon a
+terrace, commanding a fine view down the Rhone towards Mont Pilate; and
+its interior was decorated with a few specimens of magnificent old
+furniture, which contrasted strongly with the air of desolation visible
+throughout. Two fauteuils of rich crimson velvet, with massy gilt
+frames, and two commodes inlaid and ornamented with brass, seem all the
+remains of the splendour of this once royal residence. From hence we
+visited Henry's apartment, which occupies the middle story of a large
+turret. It commands a fine view of Lyons and its noble environs; and the
+ceiling and walls bore some remains of the golden fleurs-de-lys on a
+blue ground, which had once ornamented them. Nearly the whole, however,
+had been white-washed during the Revolution; and on the advance of the
+Austrians, in 1814, the whole building suffered more by the hands of the
+combatants, than during the former sanguinary times. "Cependant il est
+bien connu," as Mad. d'A. answered with a proud smile, when we expressed
+our surprise at having found a well dressed person who could not direct
+us to Chateau la Motte. It may claim, indeed, to be well known to every
+good Frenchman, both from its former and latter history. It is singular,
+that in the course of the same day we should receive attentions from two
+persons, both of whom had lost their dearest friends in the carnage
+which followed the siege of Lyons. While I was sketching Mont Blanc and
+the course of the Rhone from the environs of Chateau Montsuy, a tall
+genteel old man, looking very like a Castilian, accosted us civilly,
+and, having peeped over my shoulder for a moment or two, invited us into
+his garden, which commanded the same view in a much superior manner. His
+sister-in-law, who was walking with him, had, he informed us, lost her
+husband and son in the fusillade. Yet, perhaps, when we consider the
+extent of the havoc, it would seem more singular to find a family who
+had not suffered, nearly or remotely, from its consequences.
+
+In returning over the Pont la Guillotiere, we were led to remark the
+probable antiquity of its construction. The centre still retains the
+drawbridge; and the whole fabric appears to have been widened, when
+wheel carriages came into fashion, with a supplementary parallel slice,
+riveted on to it by iron bolts. This expedient rather reminded me of a
+story which I had heard in my infancy, of a prudent housewife, who first
+roasted half a turkey for the family dinner, and when it had been twenty
+minutes on the spit, sewed on the remaining half to welcome an
+unexpected guest.
+
+Our excursion on the Saone had in every respect answered so well, that
+we were tempted to make inquiry whether the Rhone was also practicable
+as far as Avignon. Learning, however, that this mode of conveyance was
+seldom resorted to, and not liking the appearance of the passage-boats
+which we saw, we concluded, and found afterwards, that there were
+sufficient objections against it, excepting to those who wish to save
+time and expense. The rapidity of the current, and the violence and
+uncertainty of the winds which prevail upon the Rhone, render it
+necessary to employ a very skilful boatman; and, in a picturesque point
+of view, as much is lost by the intervention of the high banks of the
+Rhone, which shut out the distant parts of the landscape, as is gained
+by the perpetual accompaniment of water as a foreground. On the whole,
+we found reason to prefer the land route by Vienne and Valence, for
+which our arrangements were made accordingly.
+
+I think it is an observation of Cowper, that
+
+"God made the country, and man made the town;"
+
+and not even the centre of Lombard-street itself affords a truer
+illustration of the sentiment, than this town of mud and money,
+contrasted with its beautiful environs. The distant view of Lyons is
+imposing from most points; but the interior presents but few objects to
+repay the traveller for its closeness, stench, and bustle (not even good
+silk stockings). Its two noble rivers have had no apparent effect in
+purifying it, nor the easterly winds from the Alps, which stand in full
+sight, in ventilating its narrow smoky streets: and though usually
+considered the second city of the empire in wealth and importance, the
+houses and their inhabitants appear marvellously inferior to Bordeaux
+and the Bordelais in the air of neatness and fashion which might be
+expected to mark this distinction. In every thing relating to Bordeaux
+there is an easy elegant exterior, which conveys the idea of an
+independent and frequented capital of a kingdom, and an eligible
+residence; whereas Lyons bears the obvious marks of its manufacturing
+origin, defiling, like our own Colebrook Dale, a lovely country by its
+smoke and stench, and leaving hardly one of the five senses unmolested.
+Those fine buildings of which it can boast, take their place amid the
+general mass, like a fastidious courtier in low company,
+
+"Wondering how the devil they came there."
+
+Whereas the elegant theatre of Bordeaux appears just in its proper
+situation, and supported by suitable accompaniments of well-dressed
+people and airy streets. After the sight of the Hotel Dieu, a standing
+proof that the Lyonnese can employ their money laudably and well, I will
+not pretend to judge whether there is any truth in the charge of avarice
+brought against them, and which Voltaire slyly admits in a professed
+eulogium on Lyons. There are other reasons accounting in a degree for
+its inferiority to Bordeaux in appearance, and the sordid impression
+which it leaves on the mind. In the first place, to judge from the
+innumerable quantities of villas of all sizes within reach of the town,
+it seems that the rich Lyonnese appreciate their fine environs as they
+deserve, and consider the country as the scene of display and enjoyment,
+while they treat Lyons as a mere counting-house. On the contrary, the
+villas in the neighbourhood of Bordeaux appear comparatively few, and
+business and pleasure to unite in the town itself. The imagination also
+may have some share in giving the preference, particularly after
+reading[9] M. de Ruffigny's tirade against his infantine life in the
+silk mills of Lyons. One fancies the merchant conversant with a higher
+and less sordid class of persons and details than the master spinner,
+and vineyards more agreeable objects than dying-houses and treddles. Be
+this as it may, appearances are certainly in favour of Bordeaux as the
+second city in France.
+
+[Footnote 9: See Godwin's St. Leon.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. IV.
+
+LYONS TO MONTELIMART.
+
+
+MAY 7.--From Lyons to St. Symphorien, our breakfast-stage, twelve miles.
+For the first seven, the outskirts of Lyons, extending along the western
+bank of the Rhone, continue to exhibit one unvarying appearance of
+wealth and population. The Archbishop's palace, which stands about two
+miles out of the city, on a hill overlooking the river, does not add
+much to the beauty of the country, as it strongly resembles a large
+manufactory. St. Symphorien, a neat small town, marked by a ruined
+watch-tower to the left of the road, possesses no inn at which a
+tolerable breakfast can be procured; but we fared well, in this respect,
+at a coffee-house in the middle of the town, situated under the Mairie.
+To Vienne, nine miles more. During this stage, the Alps become again
+visible in full majesty, from a high terrace overlooking a range of
+woody rising ground; and extend as far as the eye can reach from north
+to south. Mont Blanc and Monte Viso, the Gog and Magog of this gigantic
+chain, preserve their pre-eminence; the distant pyramid of the latter,
+which shoots into the clouds like the Peak of Teneriffe, from a cluster
+of lower mountains, contrasting with the massy dome of the former. From
+its figure and position in the map, I judged it could be no other than
+Monte Viso, which is so strikingly conspicuous on the road from Coni to
+Turin. Mont Pilate, towards the foot of which the Rhone wound to the
+right, sinks into utter insignificance when compared with these Alps,
+though of a height and grandeur which would render it a leading feature
+in Wales or Cumberland. It is considered in this neighbourhood as stored
+with rich specimens of botany, and its appearance, much less scorched
+and barren than the mountains of a southern climate usually are, renders
+this probable.
+
+The view of Vienne, as you descend into the narrow green valley in which
+it is situated, crowned by the dark ruins of an old Roman castle, and
+watered by a deep and rapid reach of the Rhone, combines beauties
+calculated to please all tastes. On the opposite side of the river,
+overlooking the ruins of a bridge with which it probably once
+communicated as a guard-house, stands a tall, square, Roman tower,
+called the Tour[10] de Mauconseil. The legends of the country affirm,
+that this was the abode of Pontius Pilate,[11] and that, in a fit of
+despair and frenzy, he threw himself from its windows into the Rhone,
+where he perished. This point the good Catholics must settle as they can
+with the Swiss, who maintain that he drowned himself in a little Alpine
+lake on the mountain which bears his name; and that the storms by which
+it is frequently agitated are occasioned by the writhings of his
+perturbed spirit. Nothing shows more forcibly the power of association
+in minds not capable of discriminating, than that the name of a man so
+obviously a reluctant instrument in the hands of God, and who declared
+by a public act his abhorrence of the part he was forced to act, should
+be selected as synonymous to every thing fiendlike and murderous.
+
+[Footnote 10: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 11: There is, I believe, positive historical authority, which
+fixes Vienne as the place of Pilate's banishment and death.]
+
+The cathedral of Vienne was shut, and its external appearance did not
+tempt us to make further inquiries; but we were directed to a Roman
+temple, which, like that at Nismes, is called the Maison Carree. It can
+only boast of the remains of lofty pilasters, and the marks of what was
+once an inscription; and the inside being converted into a
+paltry-looking palais de justice, will hardly repay the trouble of
+waiting for the concierge. We departed from Vienne with too unfavourable
+an impression of its dirty inn, and of the place in general, to render
+us desirous of spending the night there. The squalid, dispiriting
+appearance of the town itself, indeed, forms a strong contrast both to
+the fine country in which it stands, and the capital letters which
+decorate its name in the map of France. Instead of loitering in its
+smoky, desolate streets, while horses are changing, I should recommend
+the traveller to walk on and await their arrival at the Aiguille, an old
+Roman monument so called, which stands close to the road on the right,
+within about a mile of the town. This singular pyramidical relic
+commands a beautiful view of the Rhone, winding into the sequestered
+vallies at the foot of Mont Pilate; and the variety of coins and other
+small relics, found there, indicate the ancient boundaries of the city
+as extensive, and comprising both this building and the temple
+above-mentioned; The inhabitants, forgetting that a person once set
+afloat "in the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone," would probably find no
+grave but the gulf of Lyons, have denominated this building the tomb of
+Pilate.
+
+Near Vienne the country of silk-worms begins, every tree almost being a
+mulberry; and on the steep hills, which inclose the channel of the Rhone
+during two days journey from this town, the celebrated Cote-Roti wine is
+chiefly produced. The vineyards are in the highest state of cultivation;
+and, as in Burgundy also, the nature and position of the soil seem to
+operate as a forcing-wall upon the vines, which had, at this early
+season, made immense shoots from their knotty close-pruned stumps. Here
+I frequently observed the industrious expedient practised in many parts
+of Valencia and Catalonia. On the steepest parts of the hills, terraces
+above terraces, of loose stones, are built to secure and consolidate the
+scanty portion of earth which would otherwise be washed away from the
+roots of their vines by the first winter storm; and not a spot is
+neglected, however unpromising and difficult of access, where a
+barrow-full of mould can be raked together, and increased by
+hand-carriage. One cannot witness such industry without wishing that it
+could procure more of the comforts of life; but here, as in Burgundy,
+the exertions of the inhabitants seem hardly repaid by a bare
+subsistence, if one may judge by the general appearance of their houses
+and persons. Those travellers who have not yet learned to button
+themselves up in total indifference, will find, that the interest and
+pleasure derived from a tour depend on nothing more than on the apparent
+well-being of those whom they see around them. It is this circumstance
+which, viewed in the mind's eye, throws a perpetual sunshine over the
+fine scenes of Tuscany and Catalonia, and lends a charm even to the flat
+uninteresting corn-fields of Picardy. The absence of it, on the
+contrary, disfigures the finest scenes in the south of Italy, and causes
+Naples, the most delightful spot on earth, perhaps, for situation and
+climate, to dwell on the recollection like a whited sepulchre, a gilded
+lazar-house of helpless and incurable wretchedness. A Roman beggar,
+glaring at you from the arches of a ruined temple, like one of Salvator
+Rosa's Radicals, with a look at once abject and ferocious, may be,
+perhaps, a characteristic accompaniment to the scene; but the active,
+erect walk, the frank countenance, and cheerful salutation of a peasant
+of the Val d'Arno, leave a more pleasing recollection on the mind, as
+connected with the ideas of comfort, manliness, and independence.
+
+About five miles from Vienne, we ascended a steep hill to the left,
+leaving on the opposite side of the Rhone a well-wooded chateau,
+belonging to a Mons. d'Arangues; which forms a good accompaniment to the
+view of Mont Pilate. By the road side was a very primitive mill, near
+which we saw a woman sifting corn as we walked up the hill. The corn is
+laid in the circular trough, and ground by a stone revolving round the
+shaft in the centre; which is probably worked by an ass. Such little
+circumstances as these frequently remind us more strongly of the change
+of place, than the difference of language and costume, which we are
+prepared to witness in the different provinces of a wide empire.
+Nothing, for instance, forms a stronger or more distinct feature in
+one's recollections of the south of France, than the enormous remises
+which are annexed to every paltry inn on the road from Lyons to the
+southward, and which serve both as warehouse and stable to the hosts of
+stout Provencal carriers, who travel with wine, oil, and merchandise to
+the interior. The remise at Vienne was sixty feet square, without
+compartment; its roof-timbers were worthy of Westminster Hall, and for
+its folding doors
+
+    "The gates wide open stood,
+    That with extended wings a banner'd host,
+    Under spread ensigns marching, might pass through,
+    With horse and chariots ranked in loose array;
+    So wide they stood!"
+
+Independent of the uses to which these capacious buildings are properly
+applied, they furnish the most agreeable place for rest and refreshment,
+during the heat of the day, being, as the traveller will frequently
+experience, the coolest and the sweetest place belonging to the inn.
+
+During the rest of our day's journey, nothing occurred worthy of
+attention, until the descent into Peage de Rousillon, where we slept.
+Here the Rhone, of which we had lost sight, again appears winding
+through the broad rich valley which opens at the foot of the hill; and
+Mont Pilate also, after you have lost sight of it for the last seven or
+eight miles, and expect to see it behind you, again makes its appearance
+at a distance seemingly undiminished. So difficult is it to judge of the
+real bearings of objects in this clear air, which in fact is less
+favourable to the display of the grander features of nature, than our
+own misty Ossianic climate.
+
+Our inn at Peage de Rousillon, although the only place in the
+neighbourhood at which we could have slept in any comfort, somewhat
+resembled, in its general style, those recorded in Don Quixote, and
+afforded similar adventures. In the midst of our supper, (which was by
+no means a bad one of the kind), in burst a fat German woman in a
+transport of fury, who thought herself ill-used in the allotment of the
+rooms; squabbling in a very discordant key with the landlady, who
+followed her "blaspheming an octave higher." Both were apparently
+viragos of the first order, and the keen encounter of their wits was so
+loud, that we turned a deaf ear to the German's appeal, and insisted on
+their choosing another field of battle. Battle however was the order of
+the day, or rather night, for both myself and my servant were roused in
+the middle of the night to put a stop to a drunken quarrel on the
+staircase, which we effected by ordering down stairs the Maritornes, who
+proved the bone of contention. The Hotel du Grand Monarque, is evidently
+on a par with that class of inns in our English country towns, which
+bear the royal badge of the George and Dragon, through some fatality
+attendant on high names and dignities.
+
+From Peage de Rousillon to St. Vallier, you traverse eighteen miles of
+flat road, only enlivened by the hills to the right of the Rhone, which,
+becoming gradually more rocky and abrupt, meet at length with a
+corresponding barrier on the left, and enclose the river in a narrow
+valley. Just beyond its entrance, which we had distinguished from above
+Peage de Rousillon, stands the town of St. Vallier, where the conducteur
+intended that we should breakfast. The Hotel de Poste is a most dismal
+hole indeed, in every respect, and no appearance of any other inn: but
+soon after we learnt by experience, that wherever there is a cafe of
+tolerable appearance, it affords a much better chance for breakfast than
+any inn of the same rank. Neatness is the more the trade of the
+cafetier, and his notions of breakfast much more English, than those of
+the inn-keeper, who is usually put completely out of his way by our
+habits.
+
+"Eh! Messieurs," said a well-dressed bourgeoise, who saw us sauntering
+about near the door of her shop, "vous irez sans doute voir notre beau
+chateau: il fut donne par Jean de Poitiers au premier Seigneur de St.
+Vallier, et il a descendu jusqu'a Mons. de St. Vallier l'actuel
+proprietaire." Nothing could be more acceptable to idle wanderers than
+this information, and off we set at a round pace up a most filthy
+street, according to our directions; our heads full of crenelles,
+pont-levis, donjon, fosse, and the proper etceteras. I am not sure that
+we did not half expect to meet M. de St. Vallier himself, (a good
+baronial name) cap-a-pie at the barbacan gate, his lance in rest, and
+his visor down, like Sir Boucicault, or the Lord de Roye, or the
+doughtiest of Froissart's heroes. A long white-washed mud wall, with
+green folding gates, began somewhat to cool our Gothic
+enthusiasm--. "Perhaps the portcullis was destroyed at the Revolution." A
+bell hung at the gate. "Pshaw, it ought at least to have been a
+bugle-horn." When we had rung, instead of sounding a blast, not a dwarf,
+but a slipshod dirty girl, not much bigger, opened the door cautiously.
+"Il ne faut pas entrer: Monsieur ne permet personne de voir le chateau."
+We made involuntarily two steps forward; when lo! the end of a modern
+house, with a pea-green door and sash windows, and a shrubbery of lilacs
+interspersed with Lombardy poplars, blasted our sight. No longer
+ambitious of pursuing the lord of St. Vallier in flank, we hoped at
+least that a front view of his castle from the road to Avignon might
+afford some remains of feudal splendour. Off we set accordingly, and
+emerging from the dirty town as quickly as possible, beheld on turning
+round!--a large modern front, in the full smile of complacent ugliness,
+with a Grecian portico, not of masonry, but of red and yellow paint a la
+Lyonnaise; the whole edifice quite worthy of the Hermitage du Mont d'Or.
+The two short round towers on the sides might have been originally
+Gothic; but if really so, they had been most effectually disguised by
+white-washing, and new tiled tops, which very much resembled Grimaldi's
+red cap and his whited face. In front of the windows, instead of the
+sweeping lawns and dark avenues of which Mrs. Ratcliffe is so liberal,
+stood a large close-pruned vineyard, inclosed by a high white wall; at
+one end of which, and facing the front of his red and yellow chateau, M.
+de St. Vallier had built a red and yellow summer-house, with green
+shutters, to keep it in countenance. Very much diverted at our ludicrous
+disappointment, we sauntered along the road, which followed the course
+of the Rhone. At two miles distance, just where the river winds with a
+broad and rapid sweep into a woody gorge, with one blue mountain peeping
+over it, a black venerable old ruin, with turret and watch-tower, and
+every thing to render it complete, stood cresting an abrupt rock which
+hung over the river. Nothing, said I, shall persuade me that this castle
+is not the genuine gift of John of Poitiers, and the real object of our
+search. Down we sat at all events to sketch it, and meeting by good
+fortune a communicative young officer on the road, we learnt that this
+castle, called[12] Chateau la Serve, had in reality been the residence
+of the lords of St. Vallier; that many years ago it had been reduced by
+an accidental fire to its present state, and was finally wrested from
+the family at the Revolution. Of the present Chateau St. Vallier, and
+the estate annexed, they have remained in uninterrupted possession; and
+all admirers of the Gothic must rejoice that the ruin has been
+purchased by the commune of La Serve: for, standing as it does within
+view of the new chateau, no doubt it would have been brought to the
+state of that delectable domicile by the aid of the trowel and
+paint-brush.
+
+[Footnote 12: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From La Serve to Tain, the same style of country continues, without much
+alteration. The utmost exertions of the inhabitants seem necessary to
+struggle against the stony ungenial nature of the soil; and a black
+storm which was rolling to the right over Mont Pilate, appeared to
+menace the scanty crops of vines which their labour had produced. In
+every hamlet we heard the bells ringing, and saw the poor peasants
+crowding to the church to put up prayers against the coming hail, which
+at this season of the year is peculiarly fatal. If this be a
+superstition, it is surely not a contemptible or uninteresting one to
+witness: nor can one wonder at the influence gained over peasants thus
+instructed to associate Heaven with their daily hopes and fears. To our
+great satisfaction, after two or three vivid flashes of lightning, the
+clouds broke away to the north-west, and a light rain fell partially,
+more beneficial to the parched vineyards than hurtful to the hay, which
+even at this early season was in great forwardness in most places. On
+the whole, I should say that the district lying fifty miles south of
+Lyons, is a month more early than our own in point of climate and
+productions.
+
+At Tain, the Rhone forces for itself a narrow passage into the vale of
+Valence, from among the rugged skirts of Mont Pilate, leaving on the one
+side Tain, and on the other Tournon; both backed by strong heights,
+which seem to guard the entrance of the defile. The situation of Tournon
+is striking, and very much corresponds with the ideas which one forms of
+a strong baronial hold upon the Rhine. A large portion of the
+precipitous hill which commands it, is connected with the town by a
+broken line of grim old walls and towers, which betoken the former
+importance of this position. Its castle, a building of a heavy
+conventual style of architecture, and standing on a fortified terrace,
+formerly belonged to the Prince de Soubisc, but is now converted, as we
+were informed, into a prison. To this purpose it is well adapted, as a
+leap from one of the round towers which breast the river at the angles
+of its terrace, would be fatal; and the character of despotism impressed
+on its walls seems to say, that in former times its uses were not very
+different. The resemblance indeed which it bears to the Chateau
+d'Amboise on the Loire, the scene of the Duke de Guise's murder, may
+possibly assist its effect on the imagination.
+
+On issuing from this gloomy but not uninteresting spot, the eye opens
+upon an extensive prospect, rich in many of those features which we find
+scattered through the works of Claude and Salvator. To the right, the
+hills which hung[13] over the road to Tain, recede into a long
+perspective, terminated in the distance by a ruined castle on a
+pyramidical rock, near Valence; and the Rhone, following the same
+direction, winds away from the road in a slower and wider current than
+before. To the left, the outskirts of the Dauphine Alps form a
+singularly wild and fantastic barrier, sometimes rising in abrupt
+pinnacles, and sometimes rent as if by an earthquake into precipices of
+some thousand feet of sheer perpendicular descent. The vale inclosed
+between these rough walls, and in the centre of which the Isere unites
+itself to the Rhone, appears a perfect garden in point of richness,
+cheerfulness, and high cultivation. We crossed the Isere, a strong and
+rapid stream, by a ferry, for our Itineraire, with its usual accuracy,
+forgot to mention that the bridge of which it speaks was broken down by
+Augereau on the advance of the Austrians. Within two or three miles of
+Valence, a rising ground, fringed with scattered oak underwood, affords
+a more distinct and striking semicircular view of the mountains to the
+left; and glimpses of others yet more distant, bordering an immense
+plain, through which the Rhone takes its course towards Avignon.
+
+[Footnote 13: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+As we approached Valence, the ancient Civitas Valentinorum, we again
+observed the ruined castle which we had at first remarked, called
+Chateau Crussol. It stands on a conical cliff on the opposite side of
+the river, overlooking the town at about two cannon-shots distance. On
+inquiring into the history of this eagle's nest, we found that it had
+been in days of yore the fortress of a petty free-booting chieftain, who
+kept the inhabitants of Valence in a perpetual state of war and
+annoyance; a history which almost appears fabricated to suit its
+appearance and character. It bears a very strong resemblance, in point
+of situation, to the ruin within a mile of Massa di Carrara; which the
+tradition of the peasants assigns as the abode of Castruccio Castracani,
+the scourge of the Pisans. Seeing it relieved by a gleam of sunshine
+from a dark evening cloud behind it, we could fancy, without any great
+effort of imagination, that, like the bed-ridden Giant Pope in honest
+John Bunyan, it was grinning a ghastly smile of envy at the prosperity
+which it could no longer interrupt. Or, if this idea should seem
+extravagant, at least the two opposite neighbours present as lively a
+personification as stone and mortar can afford, of their respective
+inhabitants; the town of Valence flourishing in industrious
+cheerfulness, and the castle domineering, savage, poverty-stricken, and
+formed only for purposes of plunder and mischief.
+
+In the suburbs of Valence we found an excellent inn, called the Croix
+d'Or, worthy to be recommended both for comfort, civility, and fair
+charges. A walk into the town of Valence itself has very little in it to
+repay the traveller, with the exception of the Champ de Mars, a sort of
+public garden bordering on the Rhone. Certainly no place ever united
+such a degree of dirt and closeness to so smiling an exterior. Its old
+Gothic walls still remain, and the streets therefore are probably built
+on the same scale as in those times when they crowded together for
+security against feudal aggressors.
+
+May 9.--To Loriol five miles. The road passes through a country as
+beautiful and diversified as before, seldom deviating above a mile or
+two from the course of the river: corn and hay-fields, the latter fit
+for cutting, mulberry, almond, and fig-trees, cover every inch of
+ground. About a mile before we reached Loriol, and just after passing a
+small town called Livron, we crossed the Drome, over a noble bridge of
+three arches, constructed of a rough sort of whitish marble, and
+reminding us somewhat of a reduced section of the Strand bridge. Its
+massy solidity is not misplaced, as a view up the mountain glen to the
+left of it convinced us. Though the river was at this time low, the
+immense extent of dry beds of gravel showed what its volume and force
+must be when swoln by rain; and the cluster of gloomy mountains which
+close the valley from whence it issues, seem the perpetual abode of
+storms. In one of them I recognised the Montagne de Midi, whose form is
+so remarkably perpendicular when seen from Tain; and altogether, I have
+no idea of forms more wild and extraordinary upon so large a scale. The
+rocks of St. Michel, in Savoy, near St. Jean de Maurienne, are a
+miniature resemblance of them; but a better idea as to size and
+wildness, may be formed by those who recollect the mountains of Nant
+Francon, in Wales, and can imagine them not yet settled into place,
+after the first confusion of the Titanic war.
+
+    "Ter sunt conati imponere Pelio Ossam
+    Scilicet, atque Ossa frondosum involvere Olympum;
+    Ter pater exstructos dejecit fulmine montes."
+
+The view is worth several hours of an artist's time, and its effect is
+considerably increased by a solitary tower, resembling a moss-trooper's
+abode, which stands in the middle distance. It is called, as we
+understood, the Chateau de Crest, and is the relic of a state prison. On
+passing a corner of rising ground this wild valley disappears, and the
+same rich and cheerful country as has been already described
+recommences. The same unbroken rocky barrier bounds the Rhone on the
+right, while in front numberless peaks of very distant mountains become
+visible over the plain through which its windings are traced.
+
+The neat-looking inn at Loriol probably affords better breakfasts than
+the cafe, which, in spite of its neat outside, is dirty and imposing, an
+exception to the usual rule.
+
+To Montelimart fifteen miles: the first three we walked, and rested on a
+rising ground, commanding in each direction a long day's journey through
+this fine district. Our walk perhaps made us relish the more a bottle of
+the vin du pays, which Derbieres, a little village a mile or two farther
+on, afforded; but I have no doubt that worse is sold in Paris at seven
+or eight francs a bottle, under the name of pink champagne: it is at
+least worth the while of any thirsty traveller to try the experiment, if
+it were merely for the sake of the civil old landlady of the little inn.
+We could obtain no information from her respecting the history of a
+singular ruin on the opposite side of the river, excepting that it was
+called Chateau Crucis, and about seven hundred years ago was an abbey.
+Somewhat beyond this black pile stand two or three pyramidical rocks,
+projecting from the general line of hills, the same probably which the
+French Itineraire mentions as commanding a celebrated view, and
+exhibiting in themselves a geological curiosity. I doubt, however,
+whether any person would do well to cross the Rhone to explore them,
+upon the mere credit of that wise octavo.
+
+Montelimart is a large old town, the ancient fortifications of which,
+as of Valence, remain in perfect preservation. The approach to it from
+Loriol gives by no means so favourable an idea of it as it deserves; and
+to estimate its beauties fully, it is necessary to visit the citadel,
+now used as a prison, which stands on a height above the town.[14] The
+view which it commands is uniformly mountainous in the back grounds, and
+flat and rich in its nearer details; but the finest part of it is
+towards the east. The snowy Alps near Grenoble, and the line of
+mountains from whence the Drome issues, and at whose foot Chateau
+Grignan is situated, are its prominent features; and the little
+farm-houses and tufts of trees in the rich pasture grounds which
+intervene, seem disposed by the hand of a painter.
+
+[Footnote 14: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Not to omit the luxuries of the palate as well as those of the eye, it
+is worth while to procure at Montelimart a wedge or two of the nogaux,
+or almond-cakes, which Miss Plumptre so particularly recommends. The
+genuine sort is as glutinous as pitch, and made in moulds, from whence
+it is cut like portable soup; and the makers at Montelimart, like the
+rusk-bakers of Kidderminster, have, I understand, refused a large sum
+for the receipt. Another of the good things of Provence, to which Miss
+Plumptre's Tour introduced us, was the confiture de menage, or fruit
+boiled up with grape juice instead of sugar. This is a preserve which
+you meet with in most of the commonest inns, but which is so easily made
+and little esteemed, that they do not bring it without a particular
+order. It is very much like asking for treacle at an English inn;
+nevertheless I, for my part, felt obliged to the fair tourist for an
+information which has served to mend many a bad breakfast; and a bad
+breakfast, as the world doth know, is the stumbling-block, or the
+grumbling-stock, of most Englishmen, travelled or untravelled.
+
+The inn at Montelimart is excellent; but Madame must not be left to make
+her own charges. We should, however, have parted from her in good
+humour, had not her avarice affected persons less able to help
+themselves. The poor maid, who appeared jaded to the bone, confessed
+that her mistress detained half her etrennes, and I have reason to
+believe that she spoke truth.
+
+To the classical ground of Chateau Grignan, which we visited next day, I
+shall devote a separate chapter.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. V.
+
+CHATEAU GRIGNAN.
+
+
+MAY 10.--This was the day of the greatest interest and fatigue which we
+had as yet passed; and moreover afforded us a tolerably accurate idea,
+at the risk of our bones, of the nature of French crossroads. Having
+understood that the road from Montelimart to Grignan was inaccessible to
+four-wheeled carriages, we set off at four in the morning in a patache,
+the most genteel description of one-horse chair which the town afforded.
+Let no one imagine that a patache bears that relation to a cabriolet
+which a dennet does to a tilbury; for ours, at least, would in England
+have been called a very sorry higgler's cart. The inside accommodations
+were so arranged, that we sat back to back, and nearly neck and heels
+together, after swarming up a sort of dresser or sounding-board in the
+rear, which afforded the most practicable entrance. "Mais montez,
+montez, Messieurs, vous y serez parfaitement bien," quoth our civil
+conducteur, haranguing, handing, and shoving at the same time. The
+alacrity with which he and his merry little dog Carlin did the honours
+of the vehicle, and the stout active appearance of the horse (to say
+nothing of the whim of the moment, and the fine morning), reconciled us
+to a mode of conveyance no better than that which calves enjoy in a
+butcher's cart; and for the first few miles we forgot even the want of
+springs.
+
+After travelling a league or two, the road began to wind into the
+outskirts of the range of mountains which we had first seen from Tain,
+and reminded us, in its general features, of some of the most
+sequestered parts of South Wales. The soil is generally poor, but
+derives an appearance of verdure and cheerfulness from the large walnut
+and mulberry-trees which shade the road, and the stunted oak copses
+through which it occasionally winds. We passed an extensive pile of
+building, of a character which we had not before observed, consisting of
+a number of small awkwardly-contrived rooms, without any uniformity,
+piled like so many inhabited buttresses against the outside and inside
+of a circular wall. This, it seems, is the property and habitation of
+one person, a M. Dilateau; but it certainly has more the appearance of
+the residence of a whole Birkbeck colony, each back-settler established
+in his own nook, amid the contents of his travelling waggon. A little
+farther, on the summit of a bare rocky ridge to the left, stands a
+castle of a more Gothic character, but equally uncouth and comfortless.
+It was demolished, as we understood, at the time of the Revolution; but
+in its best days must have been but a wretched residence, as no trace
+remains within many hundred yards of it, of any soil where tree or
+garden could have stood. To the genuine admirers of Mad. de Sevigne,
+however, even these cheerless mountain holds present an interesting
+object, as having been peopled by the honest country families whose
+ceremonious visits to Grignan afforded her many a good-natured
+laugh.[15] Or to treat the Chateau Race-du-fort (for such we understood
+to be the name of this last castle) with more respect, we may fancy its
+proprietor sallying forth, like old Hardyknute, at the head of his armed
+sons and servants, to join the seven hundred country gentlemen who
+volunteered their services, with the Count de Grignan at their head, in
+besieging the rebellious town of Orange.
+
+[Footnote 15: "See Mad. de S.'s Letters."]
+
+We found it necessary, both from common consideration for the
+patache-horse, and our own necks, to walk up the two miles of steep
+ascent, which occur after passing this last castle. On the top of the
+hill all vegetation appears to cease, excepting a few shrubby dwarf
+firs, and a profusion of aromatic plants, such as juniper, lavender,
+southernwood, and wild thyme, which delight in the stony hot-bed
+afforded by the interstices of disjointed rocks. The view from the high
+table of ground to which we climbed at length fully repaid our
+exertions, and may be almost compared, for extent and beauty, to those
+from the church of Fourvieres, and the Montagne de Rochepot. Towards the
+north we surveyed not only the valleys of Montelimart and the Drome, but
+nearly the whole of the route of the three preceding days, bordered on
+the one side by the abrupt and lofty mountains, from which the latter
+river takes its source, and on the other by the steep banks of the
+Rhone. On proceeding a little farther, over a road which consisted of
+the native rock in all its native inequality, we caught sight of the
+Comtat Grignan, and the great plain of Avignon, into which that district
+opens in a south-western direction, flanked on the east by a colossal
+Alp, called Mont Ventou, on whose long ridge traces of snow were still
+visible. In the centre of the Comtat, [16]Chateau Grignan is easily
+distinguished by the grandeur of its outline and proportions, and the
+tall insulated rock on which it stands, somewhat resembling that on
+which Windsor Castle is situated, though inferior in size. Its effect is
+somewhat heightened by several other smaller crags at different
+distances, which thrust themselves through the scanty stratum of soil,
+each crowned with a solitary tower, or little fortalice. In the feudal
+days of the Adhemars, ancestors of the Grignan family, who possessed the
+whole of the Comtat, these were probably the peel-houses, or outposts,
+of the old Chateau, in the quarter from which it would have been most
+exposed to attack. The Chateau Race-du-fort was, in all likelihood, also
+the key of the mountain glen leading to the hill which we were
+descending, and formed the line of communication with Montelimart, which
+was formerly included in the family territory. The records on this
+subject trace the foundation of the lordship of Grignan up to the days
+of Charlemagne, who is said to have created Adhemar,[17] one of his
+paladins, Duke of Genoa, as a reward for having re-conquered Corsica
+from the Saracens. Adhemar having fallen in a second expedition against
+the same enemy, his children divided his possessions: the elder
+remaining Duke of Genoa, another possessing the towns of St. Paul de
+Trois Chateau et Mondragon; and a third, the sovereignty of Orange. A
+fourth possessed the town of Monteil, called after him Monteil Adhemar,
+or Montelimart; and in 1160, the emperor Frederic I. granted to Gerard
+Adhemar de Monteil, his descendant and heir, the investiture of Grignan,
+with many sovereign rights, such as that of coining money. It was to
+this noble family that the Count de Grignan, whose third wife was the
+daughter of Madame de Sevigne, traced his blood and inheritance in a
+direct line.
+
+[Footnote 16: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 17: "Je me rejouis, avec M. de Grignan, de la beaute de sa
+terrasse; s'il en est content, les ducs de Genes, ses grands peres,
+l'auraient ete; son gout est meilleur que celui de ce temps-la;
+* * * * * ces vieux lits sont dignes des Adhemars."--_Mad. de Sevigne_.]
+
+As we reached the level of the plain, and approached the castle, its
+commanding height and structure seemed completely to justify Mad. de
+S.'s expression to her daughter, "Votre chateau vraiment royal." Few
+subjects certainly ever had such a residence as this; which, though
+reduced to a mere shell by the ravages of the Revolution, still seems to
+bespeak the hospitable and chivalrous character of its former possessor.
+It rises from a terrace of more than a hundred feet in height, partly
+composed of masonry, and partly of the solid rock. The town of Grignan,
+piled tier above tier, occupies a considerable declivity at the foot of
+this terrace, and communicates with the castle by a road which winds
+round the ascent, and terminates in a massy gateway.
+
+On entering the town, we were directed to the Bons Enfans, kept by a man
+of the name of Peyrol; which, contrary to the expectations we had
+naturally formed of an inn not much frequented, provided us with a
+breakfast, which even the editor of honest Blackwood would delight to
+describe in all its minutiae, for it was quite Scotch in variety and
+excellence, and served up with great cleanliness. It may be well to
+remark, that as far as I could judge from the appearance of the rooms, a
+family might spend two or three days here without sacrificing their
+comfort to their curiosity, and would be as well off as at the Quatre
+Nations at Massa, or the Tre Maschere at Caffagiolo, the models of
+little country inns. Our host, we found, was entrusted with the
+privilege of showing the castle by the Count de Muy, in whose family he
+had been a servant; and he accordingly accompanied us in our visit
+thither. On gaining the level of the terrace, we found the wind, which
+had been imperceptible in the town, blowing with such force, as to
+account for[18] Mad. de Sevigne's fears lest her daughter should be
+carried away from her "belle terrasse" by the force of the Bise. Persons
+travelling to the south of France for the sake of health, should be
+particularly on their guard against this violent and piercing wind, as
+well as that called the Mistral; both of which are occasionally
+prevalent in this country at most seasons of the year, and render warm
+clothing adviseable. I shall quote, as illustrative of the power with
+which the Bise blows, an extract from a letter by an intelligent
+traveller, written previous to the destruction of Chateau Grignan: "En
+faisant le tour du Chateau, je remarquais avec surprise que les vitres
+du cote du nord etaient presque toutes brisees, tandis que celles des
+autres faces etaient entieres. On me dit, que c'etait la Bise qui les
+cassait; cela me parut incroyable; je parlai a d'autres personnes, qui
+me firent la meme reponse: et je fus enfin force de le croire. La Bise y
+souffle avec une telle violence, qu'elle enleve le gravier de la
+terrasse, et le lance jusqu'au second etage, avec assez de force pour
+casser les vitres." From the violence of the Bise wind this morning, and
+my subsequent experience of its force at Beaucaire, I have but little
+difficulty in believing this account; and conceive that the danger of
+yielding to the occasional temptation of heat, and wearing light
+clothing, cannot be too strongly insisted on in this country. Persons,
+indeed, who have not visited the south of France, connect its very name
+with the idea of uniform mildness; but in reality, its caprices render
+it, without proper caution, a more dangerous climate than our own.
+
+[Footnote 18: "L'air de Grignan me fait peur pour vous; me fait
+trembler; je crains qu'il n'emporte, ma chere enfant, qu'il ne l'epuise,
+qu'il ne la desseche--."
+
+"Voila le vent, le tourbillon, l'ouragan, les diables dechaines qui
+veulent emporter votre chateau; quel ebranlement universel! quelle
+furie! quelle frayeur repandue partout!"--_Mad. de Sevigne_.]
+
+On advancing to the balustrades of what appeared a projecting part of
+the terrace, we were surprised to find that it formed one of the towers
+of the lofty church of Grignan, on the top of which, as on a massy
+buttress, we were standing. A trap-door, formed by a moveable paving
+stone, admitted us upon the leads of the church, which are secured from
+the effects of weather by the additional casing which the terrace
+affords. Its interior communicates with the lower rooms of the castle by
+a passage, terminating in a stone gallery, where from its height above
+the body of the church, the family could hear mass unperceived, as in a
+private oratory. The establishment of this church, founded entirely at
+the private expense of the Count de Grignan's ancestors, was very rich,
+and consisted of a deanery, twenty-one canonries, and a numerous and
+well-appointed choir. From its lofty proportions, I should suppose that
+the internal decorations had also been costly; but much mischief, we
+were informed, had been done to it during the time of the Revolution by
+the same troop of brigands which burnt the castle, and which consisted
+of the refuse of the neighbouring towns, countenanced by the
+revolutionary committee of Orange. With a natural aversion to every
+thing noble, these ragamuffins directed their outrages particularly
+against the statue of the founder of the church, whose grim black trunk
+stands in the vestibule, deprived of its head. One almost regrets that
+the figure did not possess the miraculous power of revenge which the
+corpse of Campeador[19] exerted when the Jew plucked his beard, and fall
+headlong of its own accord into the thick of its assailants. The remains
+of Mad. de Sevigne, and of the Grignan family, however, were safe from
+their violence, as the adherents of the castle had taken the precaution
+of changing the position of the flat black stone inscribed with the name
+of the former, which marked the entrance of the family vault; and which
+has since been restored to its original place. The inscription on this
+stone, which stands, a little to the right of the communion-table, is
+simply, "Cy git Marie de Rabutin Chautal, Marquise de Sevigne;" the date
+of her death, April 14, 1696, annexed. Such a name, in truth, does not
+need the assistance of owl-winged cherubs, brawny Fames, and blubbering
+Cupids, those frequent appendages of departed vanity and selfishness;
+which would have been probably as repugnant to the wishes of the good
+marchioness, as inconsistent with her simple and unassuming character.
+
+[Footnote 19: See Southey's translation of the Cid.]
+
+To return to the subject of the revolution, as it affected Chateau
+Grignan. Miss Plumptre, a writer of much research and general accuracy,
+and whose book would furnish twenty gentlemen-tourists with good
+materials, has, I believe, been misled as to one circumstance, the
+disinterment of Mad. de Sevigne, which, as far we could ascertain by
+inquiry, never took place from causes to which I have just alluded. The
+silk wrapping-gown, the expression of the features, and the respect with
+which the brigands beheld the corpse, are circumstances which Miss
+Plumptre's French informant appears to have accumulated, "pour faire une
+sensation;" and, had they taken place, our communicative guide, who was
+rather given to the melting mood, would have dwelt on them for the same
+purpose. They appear, however, to know nothing about the matter at
+Grignan, a place which Miss P. acknowledges herself never to have
+visited.
+
+The work of destruction was more complete in the castle than in the
+church. The Count de Muy, whose family had become possessed by purchase
+of this splendid pile of building, inhabited it for half the year, doing
+extensive good, if one may trust the partial account of his old servant,
+and maintaining a mode of living which would have done honour to a
+legitimate descendant of the Adhemars. Eighty-four lits de maitre, and
+servants' beds in proportion, were made up, we understood, during a
+visit paid to the count by the present king, then Count of Provence.
+These hospitable doings, however, were not to last long. The
+revolutionists broke into the castle, and having pillaged it of whatever
+they could turn to any use, burnt the remainder of the furniture,
+pictures, &c., in the market-place, to the amount of 20,000 francs. One
+fellow, now residing at Montelimart, had the good taste to select for
+his share the dressing-glass and writing-table known as those of Mad. de
+Sevigne. The castle, which they set on fire, continued burning for two
+or three days: yet such was the solidity and goodness of the masonry,
+that an imposing mass still remains, sufficient to give an idea of what
+it must have once been.
+
+      "Qualem te dicam bonam
+    Antehac fuisse, tales cum sint reliquiae!"
+
+As the terrace remains uninjured, and many of the walls are still
+perfect, the castle might be rendered again habitable at a comparatively
+reasonable expense. But the Count de Muy is seventy, has no children,
+and has lost 25,000 pounds per annum by the revolution; a combination of
+circumstances not very favourable to the spirit of improvement. "C'est
+la," said Peyrol, pointing out a small house at the foot of the terrace,
+"c'est la que demeure l'homme d'affaires de M. le Comte; il y vient tous
+les ans pour peu de jours; moi je lui fais son petit morceau; et souvent
+je le vois se promener sur cette belle terrasse, les larmes aux yeux;
+c'est que Monsieur aimait passionnement ce beau chateau. Ah, mon Dieu!
+ca me fait pleurer; moi qui ai tout perdu; ma place, mon bon maitre, et
+puis je gagne le pain ici avec beaucoup de peine: cette pauvre ville est
+abimee; nous avons perdu tous nos droits, notre bailliage, notre cour de
+justice, tout, tout--" &c. Our host had apparently imbibed all his
+master's enthusiastic respect for the house of Grignan; for, finding
+that we had purposely deviated from our route to behold the residence of
+Mad. de Sevigne, his delight and loquacity appeared to know no bounds.
+The space of years, and the succession of owners from the time of the
+good Marquise and her son-in-law, to that of his own master, seemed to
+have no place in his mind. He had her letters by heart, I believe, for
+he quoted them with great volubility and correctness, a-propos to almost
+every question which we asked; and seemed fairly to have worked himself,
+by their perusal, into the idea that he had seen and waited on her.
+"C'est ici qu'elle dormait; voila le cabinet ou elle ecrivait ses
+lettres; c'est ici qu'elle prisait ses belles idees." Nothing indeed
+could be more delightful, or more calculated to inspire fine ideas, than
+the situation of the ruined boudoir into which he conducted us at these
+words. It occupies one floor of a turret, about fifteen feet in
+diameter, and opens into the shell of a large bedchamber. Its large
+croisees, which look out in three directions, command an extensive
+bird's eye view of the Comtat Grignan, surmounted by the long Alpine
+ridge of Mont Ventou, and an amphitheatre of other smaller mountains:
+and enough remained of both apartments to give a full idea of the
+lightness and airiness of their situation, and of their former
+magnificence.
+
+The walls, on which some gilding still remained, the stone
+window-frames, and the chimney-pieces, were still entire. From the door,
+we looked out into the long gallery[20] built by the Count de Grignan,
+and communicating with different suites of handsome rooms, or at least
+their remains. We explored them as far as was consistent with safety,
+and descended to the "belle terrasse," now over-run with weeds and
+lizards, in order to take[21] another survey of the castle, and form a
+general idea of the parts which we had separately visited. Though built
+at different periods of time, each part is in itself regular and
+handsome. The two grand fronts are the north and west, the former of
+which is represented in Mr. Cooke's first engraving of Grignan. The
+eastern part, facing Mont Ventou, is in a more ornamental style of
+architecture, somewhat resembling that of the inside square of the
+Louvre.[22] The southern part, affording a view of Mad. de Sevigne's
+window, and of the collegiate church founded by the family, is
+represented in the second engraving, the subject of which was sketched
+on the road to La Palud, whither we were bound for the night. In our way
+thither, we made a short detour, accompanied by our host, to the Roche
+Courbiere, a natural excavation on the rock, within sight of the
+terrace, and to the left of the road. This cool retreat, it may be
+recollected, was discovered and chosen by Mad. de Sevigne, as a sort of
+summer pavilion; and was embellished by the Count de Grignan with a
+marble table, benches of stone, and a stone bason, which collected the
+filterings of a spring that took its source from this cavern. I have
+since seen a drawing made previous to the Revolution, which confirms
+Peyrol's account. Even this modest hermitage, however, was not spared by
+the systematic spite of the brigands who destroyed the castle. Only one
+stone bench remains; the table and bason are demolished, and the spring
+now oozes over the damp floor as it did in a state of nature. On
+returning from this spot to the road, we crossed an open common field on
+the south side of the castle, planted with corn, and apparently of a
+better quality than the land in its vicinity. "Voila le jardin," said
+our guide; "c'etoit la ou il y avoit de ces belles figues, ces beaux
+melons, ce delicieux. Muscat dont Madame parle." The fine trees, which
+marked the limits of the garden, have all been cut down and burnt, with
+the exception of a row of old elms on the western side, forming part of
+the avenue which flanked the mail, or ball-alley, a constant appendage
+in days of old to the seats of French noblemen. The turf of the mail is
+even and soft still, and the wall on both sides tolerably perfect--"And
+now, Messieurs," said mine host, "you may tell your countrymen, that you
+have walked in the actual steps of the Marquise. C'est ici qu'elle
+jouoit au mail avec cette parfaite grace--et M. le Comte aussi--ah!
+c'etoit un plaisir de les voir." We hardly knew whether to laugh at, or
+be interested by the comical Quixotism of this man, who I verily believe
+had, by dint of residence on the spot, and thumbing constantly a dirty
+old edition of Madame's letters, worked himself up to the notion that he
+had witnessed the scenes which he described. We were induced, in the
+course of our walk, to inquire somewhat into his own history, which
+appeared rather a melancholy one, though common enough in the times
+through which he had lived. About a week after the pillage and
+destruction of Chateau Grignan, he was denounced as a royalist, and
+immured in the prison of Orange, in company with several gentlemen of
+the neighbourhood, acquaintances of his master. By means of a friend in
+the town, (for they were not all devils at Orange, as he emphatically
+assured us), he was enabled to procure a few common necessaries, to
+improve the scanty prison allowance of some of the more infirm; but his
+charitable labour soon ceased, for all were successively dispatched by
+the guillotine in a short space of time. In the course of three months,
+378 persons perished by decree of the miscreants composing the
+Revolutionary tribunal at Orange, whose names were Fauvette, Fonrosac,
+Meilleraye, Boisjavelle, Viotte, and Benoit Carat, the greffier. One of
+their first victims was an aged nun of the Simiane family, canoness of
+the convent of Bollene, accused of being a counter-revolutionist; so
+lame and infirm, that her executioners were forced to carry her to the
+scaffold. Madame d'Ozanne, Marquise de Torignan, aged ninety-one, and
+her grand-daughter, a lovely young woman of twenty-two, perished in the
+same massacre. The personal beauty of the latter, which was much
+celebrated in the neighbourhood, had interested one of the brigands of
+Orange in her fate, who promised to exert his influence with the council
+of five, to save the life of the grandmother, on condition of receiving
+the hand of Mademoiselle d'Ozanne. The poor girl overcame her horror and
+reluctance for the sake of her aged relative, and promised to marry this
+man on condition of his success in the promised application. The life,
+however, of so formidable a conspirator as a superannuated and dying
+woman, was too great a favour to be granted even to a friend; and the
+only boon which he could obtain was the promise of Mademoiselle
+d'Ozanne's life, in consideration of her becoming his wife. "Eh bien! il
+faut mourir ensemble;" was her answer without a moment's deliberation,
+and next day, accordingly, both the relatives perished on the same
+scaffold. Poor Peyrol himself, after expecting the fatal _Allons_ for
+many a morning, was at length relieved from his apprehensions by the
+fall of Robespierre, and obtained his release, on condition of serving
+in the army. After fighting for four years, with a cordial detestation
+of the cause in which he was engaged, he was disabled for the time by a
+severe wound, and obtained leave to return to Grignan, where he settled
+in the little inn; but the most severe blow of all was yet in store for
+him; for his wife died not long after, leaving him with five children.
+"Ainsi vous voyez, Monsieur, que j'ai connu le malheur. Au reste, Mons.
+de Muy m'a donne la clef de ce chateau, et cela me vaut quelque chose;
+car il y a du monde qui viennent quelquefois le voir." Then, relapsing
+into his habitual strain of complaint, he ended with, "Oh mon pauvre
+cher maitre! ce beau, ce grand chateau! ah, j'ai tout perdu!" One bright
+moment, however, as he exultingly remarked, occurred during his
+compulsory service in the army; for it so chanced that he was one of the
+guard on duty during the execution of his former oppressor, Fauvette.
+"Moi a mon tour je l'accompagnois a cet echafaud ou il m'auroit envoye;
+il avoit la mine triste, un fleur de jasmin a la bouche; ma foi, ca ne
+sentoit pas bon pour lui."
+
+Such is an exact transcript of our communicative host's conversation,
+which, notwithstanding the suspicion with which I regard the prattle of
+foreign guides, seemed to me not so much a well-conned lesson, as the
+genuine overflowing of such a disposition as honest Thady M'Quirk's. His
+interest in the persons and events of which he spoke, appeared as warm
+and genuine as his _naivete_ was amusing and we took leave of him with a
+strong feeling of good will towards himself and his little clean inn.
+
+[Footnote 20: Eighty feet by twenty-four, according to a measurement
+made previous to the burning of the castle.]
+
+[Footnote 21: Pour entrer au vestibule (says the same letter which I
+quoted before, written before the Revolution) on monte par un escalier,
+car les appartemens sont tous au premier. Il y a quatre beaux salons,
+qui s'appellent la salle du roi, la salle de la reine, la salle des
+eveques, et la galerie: le reste de la maison, qui est vaste, est
+distribuee en divers appartemens, dont chacun est compose d'une chambre
+a coucher, un grand cabinet, et un cabinet a toilette.]
+
+[Footnote 22: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+It is as needless to apologize for devoting a whole chapter to local
+circumstances connected with Madame de Sevigne's life, as it would be to
+detail the well-known social virtues which have erected this amiable and
+unpretending woman into a sort of household deity in the eyes of so
+large a class of persons, while the Lauzuns, the Montespans, and other
+gay and brilliant favourites of that period, are only recollected with
+disgust.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VI.
+
+ORANGE--AVIGNON.
+
+
+OUR road to La Palud lay along the rocky vale first discovered from the
+heights above Chateau Grignan, which in fact is not so much a vale as a
+high plateau of ground enclosed between hills, like many parts of
+Castille. To the latter country, indeed, the Comtat Grignan bears a
+striking resemblance in the characteristic features which prevail
+through the greater part of it. The insulated grey rocks have forced
+themselves through the starved soil, like projecting bones; the parched
+fields are more full of pebbles than corn; and the stunted evergreen
+oaks, with their diminutive tough leaves of a dingy grey, though well
+enough adapted to the inhospitable ground in which they grow, present an
+appearance quite repugnant to our English ideas of verdure and
+vegetation. The immediate neighbourhood of Chateau Grignan, indeed,
+seems tolerably fertile, but it is difficult nevertheless to conceive
+from whence the adequate supplies for the Count's immense table were
+procured, or how the feudal contributions of such a country could have
+supported in earlier days the number of castles and towers, whose ruins
+we saw on the summits of every detached rock. These, from their
+resemblance to the "antiguas obras de Moros," which the muleteers used
+to point out, presented another feature strongly reviving my Spanish
+recollections. In the days of romance, this country must have been the
+Utopia of Troubadours, where each might in the compass of a short walk
+have taken morning draught, breakfast, nooning, dinner, and supper, at
+the strong holds of different barons. The first of these fortalices,
+called Chamaret le Maigre, presents a striking landmark from the town of
+Grignan; but, on a nearer approach, consists of little more than a tall
+slender tower upon an insulated rock; the rest is in ruins. At a short
+distance beyond this spot stands Montsegur, a little old fortified town
+upon a hill, which, from its name and appearance, may have been one of
+those cradles of civil liberty, where the "bon homme Jacques" first
+found refuge from his haughty feudal oppressors. A ruin of a more lordly
+description close to it, is called, as we understood, the Chateau
+Beaume: but the number of less important ruins, which occurred in this
+day's journey, is too great to admit of a particular description. A turn
+to the right between a couple of commanding heights, brought us out of
+this barren country into the wide and fertile plain of the Rhone, and
+under the walls of St. Paul de Trois Chateaux, the ancient Augusta
+Tricastinorum. From the respectable appearance of this town, we
+conceived ourselves in the high road to La Palud, and likely to be soon
+indemnified by dinner and rest, for the joltings of the day; but our
+driver, instead of taking the proper direction, lost himself in a series
+of inextricable cross roads, which terminated in a quagmire. In this
+slough of despond the unfortunate patache, from which we had descended,
+might have stuck for ever, but for the assistance of two shepherds, as
+wild in their attire, and as civil, as Don Quixote's friendly goatherds.
+By dint of their exertions and those of the floundering and groaning
+horse, the vehicle, which was too deeply imbedded in the muddy ruts to
+dread an overturn, was dragged out by main force; the driver sometimes
+wringing his hands in King Cambysses' vein, and sometimes strenuously
+applying his shoulder to the wheel. A franc or two dismissed our
+bare-legged friends grinning to their very earrings, and we pursued our
+road without further interruption, quite satisfied with this specimen of
+the loamy fatness of the soil. From the experience of this day, I
+certainly should recommend no one to make the detour to Grignan in a
+wheeled carriage of any sort. An active person might accomplish on foot,
+before breakfast, the whole distance from Montelimart to Grignan, and
+might reach St. Paul de Trois Chateaux, or perhaps La Palud, by night;
+but even lady travellers would find less fatigue in hiring
+saddle-horses and mules from Montelimart, than in being bumped at the
+rate of two miles and a half per hour, over roads which frequently seem
+a jumble of unhewn paving-stones. We afterwards understood that there
+was a direct road from Grignan to Orange, which would have saved us some
+distance, and could not have been worse than that which we travelled
+this evening.
+
+At La Palud we found the servants and voiture established in the second
+inn, the name of which I forget. The accommodations, however, were
+decent and comfortable, and the charges moderate: and, on the whole, the
+appearance of this inn was nearly, or quite as good as that of the Hotel
+d'Angouleme. The people of the latter house, to which the servants were
+originally directed, concluding that they had positive orders to await
+us there, persisted in demanding a price for every thing which more than
+doubled any charge yet attempted; an instance of pertinacious rascality
+which it is not amiss to mention, and which would have diverted us by
+its very absurdity, had we not been too tired to find amusement in any
+thing but supper and beds. In the course of this day and the next, we
+heard, for the first time, the Provencal patois, which seems a bad
+compound of French, Spanish, and Italian, with an original gibberish of
+their own. As far, indeed, as a slight and partial observation enables
+me to judge, I have been much struck by a similarity which the
+inhabitants of the Mediterranean coast bear to each other in language
+and character, a similarity so great, as to lead one to suppose them
+descended from the same original stock. The same savage originality of
+manner, (accompanied frequently by much good-humour and civility), the
+same extravagance of gesture, which seems the overflow of bodily vigour
+and animal spirits, the same red cap, and lastly, the same villainous
+compound of languages, mixed up in discordant cadences and terminations,
+appear to distinguish the inhabitants of Provence, Languedoc, Naples,
+and Genoa, and last and noblest of all, the Catalans.
+
+May 11.--To Orange eighteen miles, through the same rich and extensive
+plain, from which the barrier of hills that accompanied us before,
+receded to a considerable distance; but which is still interrupted and
+broken occasionally by rocks of the wildest and most abrupt shape
+possible, with the addition in general of a frowning castle in ruins.
+The little towns of Montdragon[23] and Mornas, which we passed this
+morning, are each situated under heights of this description. The castle
+of the former, of which a plate is given in Mr. Cooke's work, I think
+even superior to that of Caerphilly, in South Wales, in the "awsome
+eyriness," as a Scotsman would express it, with which its detached
+masses are grouped. The castle of Mornas is not so remarkable, but the
+rocks on which it stands are very striking; for if they have any
+inclination out of the perpendicular, it is rather towards than from the
+road. It is indeed impossible, when you stand under the shade of this
+lofty barrier, and look up to the clouds drifting over it, to fancy that
+it is not in the act of toppling down upon your head. We had not as yet
+emerged from the land of castles, for, as in yesterday's route, almost
+every little town possessed some vestige of ancient fortification, a
+silent testimony to the peaceful virtues of "the good old days." The
+heat of the weather at this comparatively early season of the year,
+induced us to congratulate ourselves that we had not chosen a month, or
+even a fortnight later, for our excursion, particularly as the
+mulberry-trees, which in this thrifty country form almost the only
+shade, were beginning to lose their covering of leaves. Every where we
+met women and children carrying ladders, shaped exactly like those used
+by cocks and hens in roosting, or perched high in trees, stripping them
+for the food of the silk-worms. The natural gracefulness of the mulberry
+foliage is entirely destroyed by the unmerciful pruning and pollarding
+which it undergoes in this country, in order to concentrate it for
+gathering. Very little fruit, and that small and tasteless, is produced
+from these cabbage-cut trees; a circumstance which I mention to prevent
+disappointment, since, no doubt, many a gentle traveller may indulge, as
+I confess to have done, the luxurious hope of feasting on this fruit in
+perfection under every hedge-row in Provence. Another month would have
+rendered the heat of the country insufferable, and stript it of much of
+its beauty, by reducing to bunches of bare poles those trees which still
+continued to afford verdure and finish to the prospect.
+
+[Footnote 23: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Within a few miles of Orange we crossed the river Aigues by a handsome
+stone bridge, commanding a magnificent view of Mont Ventou. This
+mountain seems the most conspicuous landmark in the part of France which
+we were traversing, continuing visible as it does for two or three days
+journey with very little alteration of outline. To judge from its
+situation on the map, it could not be less than twenty-five or thirty
+miles from the place where we stood, though from the deception caused by
+its enormous length and height, and not uncommon in mountain scenery, it
+appeared accessible in a walk of two or three hours. I well remember, as
+an instance illustrative of this deception, the surprise of a Berkshire
+servant at Capel Curig, when informed that he really could not take an
+evening's walk to the top of Snowdon after littering up his horses, and
+return to supper. The effect in question is increased, and rather to the
+detriment of picturesque beauty, by the less hazy atmosphere of southern
+countries; but I never recollect so strong an instance of it, as in the
+view of Mont Ventou of which I am speaking. I was struck also by its
+great similarity to drawings which I had seen of AEtna from the Catanian
+coast, as well its outline, as the manner in which it rises from a
+cluster of satellite hills into the borders of the snowy region. Several
+scattered snow-ridges were visible near its top, contrasting curiously
+with the effect of the sun's rays reflected from its sides, which,
+instead of Campbell's picturesque "cliffs of shadowy tint" appeared a
+red-hot stony mass, and might be fancied by a slight effort of
+imagination, into AEtna covered with an eruption of burning cinders.
+
+The approach to the celebrated arch of Orange, commemorating Marius's
+victory over the Cimbri, is marked by an avenue of Lombardy poplars
+which line the high road. The classical and sombre stone pine, which
+gives so striking an effect to the tomb of the Scipios (as it is styled)
+near Tarragona, would have been more in character as an accompaniment to
+this proud monument also; but since the days of [24] Alpheus and his red
+silk stockings, the taste for _quelque chose de gentil_ has constantly
+poisoned those classical associations of which the French are so fond.
+The grave Patavinian is still designated by the tom-tit appellation of
+Tite Live; and the majestic arch, whose history would have been so well
+illustrated by his lost annals, is tricked out with a poplar avenue,
+like a summer-house on Clapham-common.
+
+[Footnote 24: See the Spectator.]
+
+The townsmen of Orange, however, deserve credit for the substantial
+style in which they have repaired one end of it, to prevent farther
+dilapidation, and for the manner in which the road is diverted from it
+on both sides in a handsome sweep, leaving a green space in the middle,
+in which the arch stands. We returned to it immediately after breakfast,
+and our second impressions were fully equal to the first. As[25] a work
+of art, it is certainly worthy of one of the proudest places in the
+Campo Vaccino, though of course its effect is more striking in the
+neighbourhood[26] of the victory which it commemorates. The bas relief
+on the side facing Orange, would not be unworthy of a place between the
+well-known statues of Dacian captives, which ornament the arch of
+Constantine. Different as were their respective aeras, the stern
+thoughtful dignity of the barbarian chiefs, and the spirit which
+animates
+
+    "The fiery mass
+    Of living valour, rolling on the foe,"
+
+as represented in the battle of Marius, appear to have been conceived by
+the same powerful mind, and embodied by the same master hand. The same
+chastened energy and unaffected greatness of design which characterizes
+the poetry of Milton, the painting of Michael Angelo, and the music of
+Handel, is conspicuous in both. The bas relief which I have mentioned
+forms the principal ornament of the arch; but the trophies, the rostra,
+&c. which appear in other parts, are in a style of simple and
+soldier-like grandeur corresponding with its character and the
+achievement which it commemorates. I do not pretend to consider this
+monument as comparable on the whole to the arch of Constantine; but
+still it is of a very different school of art from that which produced
+the arch of Severus. On the bas relief representing Marius's victory,
+one might fancy the most high born and athletic of Achilles's Myrmidons
+in the full "tug of war;" whereas the swarms of crawling pigmies which
+burlesque the triumph of Severus might be supposed the original Myrmidon
+rabble, just hatched, as the fable reports, from their native ant-hills,
+and basking in the sun like so many tadpoles.
+
+[Footnote 25: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 26: Marius's victory is said to have been gained near Aix
+(Aquae Seaetiae).]
+
+The Roman colony of Orange, to judge from the relative positions of the
+arch and circus, must have been very considerable, and have occupied a
+far larger space than the present town. The arch stands detached from
+its entrance, as I mentioned, on the Lyons' side, and the circus at the
+extreme end, in the direction of Avignon; yet the former we may suppose
+to have joined on to the ancient town, and the latter to have stood in
+the same central position which the Colosseum occupied in Rome. Of the
+circus nothing now remains but the chord of the semicircle, or, to
+express it more familiarly, the straight line of the D figure, in which
+it was built. As far as I could guess, from pacing the length of this
+enormous wall, encumbered and buttressed as it was by dirty shops, it is
+in length nearly or quite a hundred yards, and of a height
+proportionate. The point of view from which it appears to the most
+advantage, is on the road to Avignon, about two or three furlongs out of
+the town. When viewed in this direction, it stands with a commanding air
+of a grim old Roman ghost among a group of men of the present day;
+forming, by its blackness and colossal scale of proportions, a striking
+contrast to every thing around it, and overtopping houses, church-tower,
+and every thing near, excepting a circular hill at the foot of which it
+stands. The latter is marked as the position of the ancient Roman
+citadel by the remains of tower and wall, half imbedded in turf, which
+surround it: and one veteran bastion still stands firm and unbroken, in
+a position facing the Circus, its companion through the silent and
+ruinous lapse of so many centuries. Without the affectation of decrying
+well-known and celebrated monuments of antiquity, or the wish to put any
+thing really in comparison with the ruins of ancient Rome, I must still
+own, that the unexpected view which I caught of the citadel and Circus
+from this position, realized more strongly to my mind the august
+conceptions so well expressed in Childe Harold, than any view in Rome
+itself, hardly excepting the Colosseum.
+
+      O'er each mouldering tower
+    Dim with the mist of years, grey flits the shade of power.
+
+The stanza concluding with these lines involuntarily occurs to the mind,
+while viewing Orange in the direction of which I now speak; and the
+lofty visions of the noble author, which are, perhaps, too over-wrought
+and ideal to harmonize with the sober contemplations of the closet, seem
+in this spot to assume "a local habitation and a name." Undoubtedly they
+ought to do so more particularly at Rome, and would so in every
+instance, but that much of the effect of the "Eternal City" is lost from
+the deserved eminence in which we know it to stand, and the consequent
+familiarity which we have acquired with it through the works of Piranesi
+and innumerable other artists. Thus its very celebrity lessens its
+effect, as the commendations bestowed on a celebrated beauty frequently
+occasion disappointment. The _on admire ici_ of the well-bound
+Itineraire, the elaborate descriptions of Vasi, and the _Ecco Signore_
+of your obliging cicerone, produce the same effect upon the mind, which
+the mistaken attentions of Koah, the South Sea priest, did on the
+stomach of Captain Cook. The meat was good, but honest Koah spoiled its
+relish by proffering it ready chewed; and in the same manner, the effect
+of what is really most admirable in nature and art is weakened by the
+impertinent obtrusion of ready-made ecstasies. It is no reflection on
+human perverseness to say, that every one has his own way of admiring,
+and loves to feel and observe for himself; as well as to chew with his
+own teeth. For my own part, I never could appreciate the stupendous
+beauties of Rome as I wished, until I managed to abstract myself from
+the notion that I was come to admire as thousands had done before, and
+from the recollection of the unclassical comforts of the excellent inn
+in the Piazza di Spagna. An English letter, or newspaper, is an
+excellent preparative for this purpose; and when once absorbed in the
+train of thought which it creates, the sudden transition to the mighty
+scenes before you, produces by contrast the effect which it ought to do.
+
+I have been led into these observations, to account for the reason why
+Orange struck me so much; a place of which I had heard and read little
+or nothing. No attentive and intelligent cicerone anticipated our
+reflections in this place; nor did the creature-comforts of a good inn
+debase our Roman reveries, though we could well have pardoned their so
+doing. Madame Ran, of the Croix Blanche, was as mean and dirty as the
+hole in which she lived; and looked as malevolent as Canidia, Erichtho,
+or any other classical witch; and as to the inhabitants of Orange,
+though the revolutionary anecdotes which we have heard of them at
+Grignan might create some prejudice to their disadvantage, I think, in
+truth, that I never beheld a more squalid, uncivilized,
+ferocious-looking people. A grin of savage curiosity, or a cannibal
+scowl, seems almost universally to disfigure features which are none of
+the best or cleanest; and their whole appearance is as direct a contrast
+as can well be imagined, to the hale, honest Norman, or le franc Picard,
+as he is proverbially styled. We turned our backs upon them with
+pleasure, after casting back one lingering look at the noble old Circus;
+and soon found ourselves in the centre of the extensive plain in which
+Avignon stands. The forwardness of the climate, and the skilful system
+of irrigation pursued here, afforded us, at this early time of the year,
+the spectacle of hay-making in many places. An English farmer might be
+shocked by the rudeness of the method here pursued, the hay being mostly
+carried in sail-cloth sheets, and turned with large wooden forks. With
+respect to the former practice, I have nothing to say; but, having
+attentively observed their method of using these forks, I am confident
+that they are better adapted to the purpose of turning the hay than our
+heavy prongs of ash and iron. They are at once lighter in hand, and,
+from the length of their teeth, they take up a larger portion of hay at
+once; and must therefore be well calculated for making the most of the
+fine weather, which, in our climate, cannot always be calculated upon,
+and occasions a scarcity of working hands.
+
+At three or four miles from Avignon, and before any other part of the
+town becomes visible,[27] the legate's palace appears conspicuously
+
+    Rising with its tiara of proud towers
+    At airy distance, with majestic motion;
+
+and a more splendid Gothic building, both as to outline and dimensions,
+cannot be imagined. On a nearer approach, a long and wide reach of the
+Rhone, winding round the base of this noble pile, and reflecting its
+figure in a deep mirror, adds greatly to its effect. In Mr. Cooke's
+work, the palace is represented nearly in this direction, from a point
+somewhat diverging to the right of the road, so as to introduce a broken
+Gothic bridge, and a part of the Roche Don, or Roche Notre Dame (for I
+believe it bears both names). The rest of the town of Avignon, placed as
+it is on a low level, affords no striking coup d'oeil, from the
+direction in which we approached it: the ancient walls, however, which
+inclose its whole circumference, unbroken and perfect, and beautifully
+crenated in every part, are a very remarkable feature. I know but of one
+other instance of this continuity of Gothic wall, which occurs at
+Valencia; but the fortifications of the Spanish town, though they far
+exceed those of Avignon in dimensions and strength, fall as short of
+them in beauty. We had a full opportunity of examining the merits of
+the latter, as the police had unaccountably thought fit to shut up all
+the entrances to the town but one or two; which obliged us, on arriving
+at the foot of the walls, to add two miles more to our day's journey
+before we could reach their interior. We found the Hotel de l'Europe,
+kept by the widow Pierron, a superior inn in every respect, both in the
+comfort and liberality of the establishment, and the cleanliness of the
+servants.
+
+[Footnote 27: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VII.
+
+AVIGNON--MURDER OF BRUNE--HOSPITAL DES FOUS--MISSION OF 1819.
+
+
+ON the opposite side of the square in which our inn was situated, stands
+the Hotel du Palais Royal, the scene of Brune's assassination. The
+account which M. Jouey gives in the Hermite en Provence, of this horrible
+transaction, corresponds as nearly as possible with the particulars
+which we heard upon the spot. Being summoned on the restoration of Louis
+to answer the charge of treason, and having stopped with his escort at
+Avignon for the purpose of changing horses and refreshing himself, the
+marshal was recognized by the populace as one of the supposed murderers
+of the Princess de Lamballe. A ferocious mob soon assembled at the door
+of the hotel, broke in by force, and after deliberately shooting him,
+dragged the body to the adjoining bridge, and with every mark of
+contumely threw it into the Rhone. Such is the brief outline of the
+murder of a defenceless man, on a charge which, whether true or not,
+should have rested between God and his conscience. Jouey may indeed be
+pardoned for commenting and enlarging on this story, though the simple
+facts address themselves more strongly to the mind, than when dressed up
+with stage effect, and must be better adapted to produce the impression
+probably desired by that author. In the detestable ruffians who
+disgraced the good cause of loyalty on this occasion, we recognize the
+same black and fiery blood which flowed in the veins of the Marseillois
+assassins of 1793, and of the fanatics of Nismes: and whose ebullitions
+render them equally hateful as friends or enemies. There are many
+strange historical discoveries which would surprise me more than to
+learn that the Moorish blood remained in this part of France
+unextirpated by the victories of Charles Martel;[28] for to a person who
+knows them only by report and casual observation, the _tout ensemble_ of
+its inhabitants seems to differ totally from that of the Gascon and the
+Basque; names which, like the name of Norman, convey to the mind an
+image of frankness and gallantry.
+
+[Footnote 28: "Cette memorable bataille, sur laquelle nous n'avons aucun
+detail, nous sauva du joug des Arabes, et fut le terme de leur grandeur.
+Depuis ce revers, ils tenterent encore de penetrer dans la France; ils
+s'emparerent meme d'Avignon; mais Charles Martel les defit de nouveau,
+reprit cette ville, leur enleva Narbonne, et leur ota pour jamais
+l'esperance dont ils s'etaient flattes si longtemps."--_Florian's Precis
+Historique sur les Maures._]
+
+On the morning after our arrival, we ascended first of all the Roche
+Don, a hill enclosed within the walls of the town, and backing the
+ruined palace of the legate; being desirous, as in Lyons, to begin our
+survey from a point which might serve as a general key to the whole, and
+instruct us in the bearings of different objects. From this elevated
+spot, situated at the north-western extremity of the city, we looked to
+the east, north, and south, over a plain as rich in verdure and
+cultivation as the finest parts of Lombardy; to which the stately towers
+of the palace, and the clustering spires and battlemented walls of
+Avignon form a fine foreground. The distant hills, at the foot of which
+Vaucluse is situated, form the eastern boundary of this plain; and are
+succeeded and overtopped to the northward by a chain of the Dauphine
+Alps, among which the long sweeping mass of Mont Ventou predominates.
+From the latter quarter the Rhone is traced winding up in a wide and
+rapid current, till it reaches the highly cultivated islands at the foot
+of Mont Don, and pursues its course with increased grandeur towards the
+southward. The neighbourhood of its junction with the Durance is marked
+in this quarter by a barrier of mountains of less height than those
+above-mentioned, but more abrupt and wild in their forms, at whose foot
+appear casual glimpses of the two rivers, winding like narrow silver
+threads into the horizon. "Vous avez passe ce diantre de Rhone," says
+Madame de Sevigne, "si fier, si orgueilleux, si turbulent; il faut le
+marier avec la Durance quand elle est en furie; ah le bon menage!" The
+good people of Lyons have, however, settled this point otherwise by
+their inscriptions and statues in the Hotel de Ville, which certify this
+river-god as already married to the Saone: the Durance, therefore, can
+hold no higher rank than that of his termagant mistress, while the
+gentle, even, beneficent character of her rival, and the priority of her
+claims, suit much better with the title of wife. If it be permitted me
+to quote Mad. de Sevigne once more, I should remark, that the broken
+Gothic bridge beneath our feet, which forms so picturesque an object in
+every point of view, is the same against the piers of which Mad. de
+Grignan was nearly lost.[29] It formerly connected the Roche Don with
+the heights on the western side of the Rhone, up which the road to
+Nismes winds near Fort Villeneuve; and is well worthy of a nearer survey
+as an architectural relic. The few arches which remain have the same
+bold span and elegant lightness of design so remarkable in the
+celebrated Pont y Prydd in South Wales; and the piers, which appear
+slight at a distance, are nevertheless solid and well adapted to the
+nature of the Rhone, whose current they cut like the sharp bow of a
+canoe. Its remarkable narrowness, which hardly allows two horses to pass
+abreast, and the ancient guard-house in the centre, secured by gates on
+both sides, carry the mind strongly back to those days of distrust and
+violence, which have by some been called "the good old times:"--
+
+       "Ego me nunc denique natum
+    Gratulor."
+
+[Footnote 29: As late as 1688, Louis XIV. seized on the territory of
+Avignon in consequence of disagreements with Innocent XI., and the Count
+de Grignan held the city as his viceroy for two subsequent years. Mad.
+de Sevigne, in her letters written at this period of time, congratulates
+her daughter (whose boat was nearly overset against the piers of this
+identical bridge), on the dignity of the situation conferred on the
+count, and the more solid advantages which might accrue from it.
+
+"Vous prenez, ma chere fille, (says she) une fort honnete resolution
+d'aller a votre terre d'Avignon, voir des gens qui vous donnent de si
+bon coeur ce qu'ils donnoient au vicelegat."--June, 1689.
+
+"Quelle difference de la vie que vous faites a Avignon, toute a la
+grande, toute brillante, toute dissipee, avec celle que nous faisons
+ici!"--_Les Rochers_. June, 1689.
+
+"Toutes vos descriptions nous ont divertis au dernier point; nous sommes
+charmes, comme vous, de la douceur de l'air, de la noble antiquite des
+eglises honorees comme vous dites, de la presence et de la residence de
+tant de Papes, &c. &c."--June 26, 1689.]
+
+At the period when the territory of Avignon was styled by the kings of
+France the "derriere du Pape," from the convenient posture in which it
+lay for their correction, one may fancy the same scenes to have taken
+place on a larger scale, which are described as occurring at the bridge
+of Kennaquhair, the same struggle between secular and monastic
+authority, the same sullen important bridgeward, and the same forcible
+arguments employed by wandering troops of jackmen to effect a passage.
+In Mr. Cooke's first view of the legate's palace, this bridge appears
+projecting from the part of the Roche Don where we stood, a spot marked
+with two round buildings, like small Martello towers. The window marked
+by two birds flying directly over it, and second from the highest in the
+same tower, has acquired a bloody notoriety. From this giddy height, as
+we were informed by an inhabitant whom we met, the half-murdered victims
+of revolutionary massacre were thrown, to put an end to their
+sufferings: and their remains heaped up for a time in the square
+building which stands below, originally erected for the purpose of an
+ice-house.
+
+Having familiarized ourselves with the leading features of Avignon and
+its vicinity, as viewed from this commanding point, we descended into
+the town to take a more particular survey.
+
+      Rhetor comes Heliodorus,
+    Graecorum longe doctissimus.
+
+To translate Horace freely, our companion was a rhetorician, or talker
+by profession, and the most learned of his class in extraordinary
+legends and fabrications; in other respects an useful civil fellow, with
+an Irish brogue, which his service in the French army had not been able
+to eradicate, or even weaken, and the established cicerone of the place.
+To account satisfactorily for his wooden leg and French uniform, he
+anticipated our inquiries by informing us, that he had been crippled by
+a shipwreck on the French coast, and through the recommendation of his
+friends the _Duchess_ of Westmoreland and _Countess_ of Devonshire,
+patronized by Louis, "who allowed him this uniform coat to wear, and two
+_males_ a-day." In England, one would not have borne the sight of such a
+lying varlet another instant, but I must confess that the mere sound of
+our own language in a foreign town, disarmed our indignation, and we
+bore with the fellow, whom we found not unamusing, and from his local
+knowledge, serviceable. A very small degree of merit indeed suffices to
+open one's heart towards a fellow-countryman in a strange land; a truth
+no doubt known and acted on by knights of industry, matrimonial
+speculators, and
+
+"Broken dandies lately on their travels."
+
+The legate's palace is now divided into barracks and a prison, and the
+nakedness of its appearance upon a nearer view make its lofty
+proportions more striking. We were expressing to each other our wonder
+at its size, when our guide interrupted us with an original observation
+of his own:--"The reason of its size, sir, is quite _clare_. The pope,
+you see, always went about with such a _hape_ of monks--and of nuns--and
+of all them kind of people, that the big number of rooms which you see
+could hardly hold them any how." After all, if the annals of former
+times have been truly written, the Milesian's account of this merry
+menage might be nearer the truth than he knew or suspected.
+
+The Papal Chapel exhibits now but few remains of its former probable
+grandeur, its inside having been defaced with the most persevering
+animosity during the Revolution, and presenting little more than a damp
+bare shell, filled with the broken remains of monumental figures.
+Headless popes and crippled cardinals lie together in heaps, mingled in
+a manner which will render it impossible to restore to each his proper
+allotment of limbs, when the projected repairs of the chapel are put in
+execution. One tomb, broken up and shattered to pieces more than the
+rest, was pointed out by the old woman as the sepulchre of La belle
+Laure, an honour which, for aught I know, may be claimed by a tomb in
+every church of Avignon. An assertion apparently still more apocryphal,
+however, is that one of the small side chapels was built by
+Constantine.
+
+The interior of Avignon affords a much more agreeable promenade than
+that of Lyons, from the superior cleanliness of its inhabitants, and the
+moderate height of the houses. These circumstances tend to disperse the
+combinations of ill smell, and purify the thick, vapid, flagging air
+which is felt so perceptibly at Lyons. It may, perhaps, be beneath the
+dignity of a _printed book_ to enumerate such circumstances as these,
+but they occupy in fact a high place in the scale of human comfort; and,
+joined to the cheapness of the necessaries of life, (which we inferred
+from the price of two or three articles of consumption,) must have their
+weight in rendering Avignon a desirable place of banishment. Banishment,
+I say; for I have no better name by which to express a prolonged
+residence abroad, especially in cases where the mind has lost its power
+of deriving amusement from trifles.
+
+With the exception of its fine walls, its Gothic bridge, and the
+legate's palace, Avignon possesses in itself no remarkable architectural
+feature, or fine combination of buildings. Its churches are numerous;
+but no one remarkable above the rest, as far at least as external
+appearance is concerned; and we had not time for a very minute internal
+survey. The Hopital des Fous, however, is an establishment well
+calculated to gratify the laudable curiosity of the humane; and to judge
+from all we witnessed, may perhaps exhibit points of internal regulation
+worthy the attention of professional men. Nothing indeed can exceed the
+quiet, orderly behaviour of the patients there confined, whom we found
+walking about at perfect liberty in a square court planted with trees.
+Many of them wore a certain air of content and satisfaction which could
+not be mistaken, and all seemed much gratified by the notice of the mild
+sensible ecclesiastic who accompanied us, and who presides over the
+establishment. No coercion, as we understood from him, is used, save
+restriction from walking with their fellow patients, and the restraint
+of handcuffs, when rendered necessary in cases of violent conduct. I
+particularly observed also, that he had never any occasion to exert that
+command of the eye, on which so much stress is laid as a means of
+intimidation, but passed all their little follies off with a smile, in
+which we were frequently inclined to join. One poor patient accosted us
+with high titles of nobility, dwelling on the peculiar pleasure he
+experienced from our visit; another, an old man of a very venerable
+appearance, called our attention to a dirty stone which he held in his
+hand, affirming it to be a piece of Henri Quatre's identical foot: but
+none were troublesome or obtrusive, and most appeared to be deriving as
+much enjoyment from their own little vagaries as their melancholy state
+would admit of.[30] Their apartments, built round the square, are neat
+and airy, each furnished with a bed, dressing table, and a few plain
+utensils. In one large room are a row of hot and cold baths, which are
+frequently and regularly used; and nothing, the good priest said, has
+been found to produce so desirable an effect on the mind and body as
+this custom. The rank of the patients is various; the poorer sort are
+supported by voluntary contributions; and many persons in the higher
+ranks are also placed here at their own expense, or that of their
+friends. Among others, there is a general who became deranged, as we
+were assured, on hearing of the abdication of his patron Napoleon; the
+most unequivocal instance of misplaced fidelity, which I have ever
+heard. How this poor man contrives to agree with the partizan of Henry
+IV., I am at a loss to make out: and he was not then visible to answer
+for himself. At the time of the Revolution, the estates belonging to the
+hospital were confiscated; and the establishment itself would have been
+abolished, had not one of the members of the council at Avignon
+observed, half in jest, that they might possibly be one day glad
+themselves of such a retreat. It is now, as I mentioned, maintained by
+private donations, and by the salaries paid for the accommodation of the
+richer patients. The only objects of taste belonging to the institution
+are a fine altar-piece attributed to Murillo, and an ivory crucifix
+carved by Jean Guillermin, in 1659. The latter is not above two feet in
+length; but the manner in which every muscle and vein indicate
+suffering, and the mingled expression of pain and resignation in the
+countenance, place it on the footing of a statue; and I could hardly
+have supposed that a small piece of ivory-carving could do such justice
+to a sacred subject. The worthy priest dwelt, with great exultation, on
+the precautions he had taken to secure this favourite relic from
+revolutionary pillage, slightly alluding to the circumstance of having
+been forced to fly for his life to Italy, as a matter of minor
+importance to himself.
+
+[Footnote 30: It is to be hoped that Adam Smith has taken a correct view
+of the subject of madness in his Moral Sentiments. "Of all the
+calamities," says he, "to which the condition of mortality exposes
+mankind, the loss of reason _appears_ by far the most dreadful; and we
+behold that last stage of human wretchedness with deeper commisseration
+than any other. But the poor wretch who is in it, laughs and sings,
+perhaps, and is altogether insensible of his own misery. The anguish
+therefore which humanity feels at the sight of such an object, cannot be
+the reflection of any sentiment of the sufferer. The compassion of the
+spectator must arise altogether from the consideration of what he would
+himself feel if he were reduced to the same situation, and, what perhaps
+is impossible, were at the same time able to regard it with his present
+reason and judgment.]
+
+The admirers of show houses, may find some gratification in visiting the
+hotel of M. De Leutre, the banker; which was purchased of M. Villeneuve,
+an emigre, and contains, besides the usual etceteras of carving and
+gilding, orange-trees, and gold fish, a curious collection of prints
+representing Chinese battles, and supposed to be the only perfect
+duplicate of that in the royal collection. A sight more interesting is
+presented in the hospital of invalid soldiers, established in the place;
+1500 of whom are maintained as in-pensioners, apparently in great
+comfort. "On est bien ici," said a blind veteran, who, hearing the
+voices of strangers, invited us to walk in; and indeed most of those
+whom we saw strolling in the garden, or sitting under the shade of the
+trees, seemed very cheerful, though some of them, and those very young
+men, were dreadfully mutilated, and the loss of both legs very common.
+The two buildings which accommodate them were formerly the Convent des
+Celestins, and that of the Dames de St. Louis. Two other handsome
+convents have been converted to uses less beneficent, one being now a
+gunpowder manufactory, and the other a cannon foundery.
+
+In the evening we walked across the long wooden bridge adjoining our
+hotel,[31] towards the western bank of the Rhone; and the expectations
+which we had formed of the view from this quarter, were not
+disappointed. The Roche Don terminates more abruptly on the side of the
+river than in any other part, and in a manner which sets off strikingly
+the commanding height of the legate's palace. With this princely pile of
+building, the broken Gothic bridge and its guard-house, the ancient
+palace of the archbishop, and a portion of the battlemented walls of
+Avignon, combine to form a striking architectural group, whose unity of
+character is hardly at all broken by meaner objects; and the whole is
+well backed by Mont Ventou and the Dauphine Alps. From this spot we
+again returned to Roche Don, a station to which every visitor of Avignon
+may return twice or thrice in the day with undiminished pleasure. In our
+way we fell in with a procession of children, the eldest of whom could
+not be more than seven years of age, in pairs, and with lighted candles
+in their hands, escorting a cross of lath and a very indifferent daub,
+which represented some female saint, and screaming in chorus with all
+their might. Those who had no candles, ran about with little dishes,
+vociferously begging money to buy some; and in spite of the respect with
+which one would wish to consider whatever fellow Christians choose to
+denominate, in pure earnest, a religious ceremony, it was impossible not
+to be reminded, by the petitions of these sucking Catholics, of Guy
+Fawkes's little votaries on the fifth of November. We thought
+involuntarily of a boy who had followed us that very morning into the
+church of St. Didier, tossing a ball in his hand, and after crossing
+himself with great gravity, immediately began his game again. Whether
+the interests of religion gain or suffer most by the familiarity with
+the ordinary business of life which it assumes in Catholic countries, is
+a point which I cannot presume to determine. It is true, that it may
+frequently occasion such ridiculous scenes as those which I have
+mentioned; and our habits of mind, as Protestants, may lead us to
+conceive that such familiarity may tend to generate levity and
+indifference. On the other hand, however, amidst all the mummery which
+may mix itself up with the occasional ceremonies of the Catholic
+service, there is much worthy of commendation in the more common
+ordinances, to which alone a sensible Catholic must look for religious
+improvement. I particularly allude to the shortness and frequent
+recurrence of the mass (such as it is), and the constant access afforded
+to Catholic churches, in which some service or other appears to be
+carried on during great part of the day. These regulations are well
+adapted to take advantage of those serious trains of thought which often
+arise most forcibly at accidental times, and from unpremeditated causes.
+The attention is thus excited without being fatigued, and the privacy of
+the closet is combined with that solemnity which attaches itself to the
+house of God. It may be said, indeed, that to consult the caprices and
+associations of the human mind, is to lower the dignity of religion; but
+surely a good end must justify any means which are not in themselves
+culpable or ridiculous. The mechanic, for instance, in returning from
+his daily labour, enters an open church from accident or curiosity,
+crosses himself from habit, and is led on by the momentary feeling of
+reverence which that act must generally awaken, to employ five minutes
+in his devotions, a well spent portion of time, which probably would not
+otherwise have been rescued from the business of the day, but which may
+influence his conduct during the rest of it.
+
+[Footnote 31: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+On ascending the Mont Don, we found it the scene of a graver ceremony
+than the infantine gambols which we had just witnessed. In the centre of
+the terrace facing the river, a new and highly gilt crucifix of colossal
+size has been erected at the expense of the Mission, round which a
+number of monks and inhabitants were collected on their knees, the still
+evening increasing the effect of a solemn mass which they were singing,
+and in which we heard the name of St. Paulus several times repeated.
+Several nuns, belonging to an establishment lately revived, knelt on the
+steps of the cross, enveloped in their black hoods; and the prisoners at
+the palace window united their deep tones to the chant, pausing every
+now and then to solicit the charity of passers by. Scattered at
+different distances from the cross, eight or ten separate groups of
+persons were kneeling farther off, in attitudes of the deepest
+devotional abstraction, though surrounded on all sides by sauntering
+soldiers, children playing, and groups of loungers laughing or
+whispering. The different distances at which they knelt were regulated,
+as we were told, by the degrees of penance imposed upon them, and the
+place which their respective consciences allowed them to assume. Some,
+in the true spirit of the poor Publican, were kneeling at a considerable
+distance, just within view of the cross, to which they hardly lifted
+their eyes; others, whose penance was originally lighter, or its term
+abridged by frequent visits to this place, had approached the cross more
+nearly, and with greater signs of satisfaction.
+
+I must confess, that we observed these poor penitents with an interest
+and attention which the other parts of the ceremony had failed to
+excite. The manifestation of a deep and genuine religious feeling is
+respectable in Catholic, Turk, or Bramin, and seldom or never to be
+mistaken; and though attended by no circumstances of external pomp, must
+impress upon serious beholders of every creed a reverence which
+trappings and mummery fail to excite. It should seem indeed that
+Providence, wishing gently to humble the pride of men, delights in
+producing by the simplest means those physical and moral effects, which
+they waste toil and expense in bringing about. The splendid procession,
+for instance, which takes place on the day of Corpus Christi at Rome,
+with all its assemblage of monks, horse and foot guards, cardinals,
+choristers, and banners, would dwindle before the eye of reason into
+"shreds and patches, were it not for the figure of the truly venerable
+man who now fills the papal chair, kneeling with the same humility and
+abstraction from the busy scene around him, which marked the deportment
+of the penitents just mentioned.
+
+Time, which decides all questions when they have ceased to be any longer
+interesting, will probably show whether the celebrated Mission, which
+has excited such a sensation in many parts of France, be a mere
+political manoeuvre to strengthen the hands of government by calling in
+the aid of superstition, or (which is at least as probable) a sincere
+and well-meant attempt to awaken the forgotten spirit of religion. In
+the mean while, it is a desirable thing to have turned the attention of
+the French to a subject which, by all accounts, is become nearly
+obsolete among the higher orders of the nation. Even with a view to the
+ascendancy which a more simple and purified religion may ultimately
+obtain under an improved and free constitution, it is better that a
+religious feeling of some sort should exist. The worst and most twisted
+crabstock, if alive, possesses an active principle, which allows of
+successful grafting; not so with a dead branch.
+
+I shall annex a statement of the proceedings of the Mission at Avignon,
+during the Lent of 1819, copied and abridged from a short pamphlet,
+written by a M. Fransoy, a lawyer of that city; which being published by
+a layman on the spot where the events in question recently took place,
+possesses the most probable claim to accuracy and impartiality. The
+writer begins by describing the demoralization and ignorance occasioned
+by the Revolution, "which had completely realised," he observes, "in the
+kingdom of the lilies all the misfortunes foretold by the prophet
+Jeremiah. The people of Avignon, who had remained without instruction
+during this period of horror and barbarism, were soon infected with that
+gross ignorance which assimilates men to brutes: and in a short time
+this field of the Lord, once so fertile, only produced brambles and
+thorns; the evil plants choked the good, and the tares every where
+devoured the corn. Scarcely, however, was the Catholic worship restored
+in France by the concordat, before religion shed among us some rays of
+its former light. Dazzled by the majesty of religious ceremonies, the
+people were jealous to emerge from their revolutionary blindness. The
+dearth of ministers was the cause that instruction only distilled drop
+by drop upon this people famishing with want."
+
+The scanty manner in which this dearth had been occasionally supplied
+for some time, excited a longing to participate in the instructions of
+the new Mission, which had already visited Arles, Valence, and Tarascon,
+under the sanction of the state; and whose claims to religious authority
+the writer defends by precedents unnecessary to enumerate here. On the
+first Sunday in Lent, 1819, its proceedings were commenced at Avignon,
+by a solemn procession, which made the circuit of the principal streets
+of the town, singing penitential psalms, and halted on the hill of Notre
+Dame; where an inaugural sermon was delivered on a spot called Calvary,
+and supposed to represent that sacred place. The multitude, assembled by
+curiosity or a better feeling, was so great, that two of the
+missionaries found it expedient to address them at the same time from
+different stations. One of these was M. Guyon, the director of the
+Mission; of whose eloquence and animation, as a preacher, the author
+speaks highly.
+
+On the succeeding day, the nine ecclesiastics composing the Mission
+attached themselves respectively to the different churches of the town,
+and called in the assistance of the neighbouring clergy, as confessors
+to those persons whom their discourses might affect most strongly. This
+step was rendered the more necessary, inasmuch as the common people of
+the vicinity understand French merely as the Welsh do English, and
+converse only in their native Provencal with any facility. If we may
+believe their zealous eulogist, the effects which the missionaries had
+anticipated immediately followed, and their utmost exertions, as well as
+those of their new associates, were taxed to satisfy the spiritual wants
+of the populace. "The Avignonese," says the narrative, "hungered so
+after the word of God, that the gates of the churches were besieged from
+three hours before daybreak, by those who flocked to be present at the
+morning exhortation. The inhabitants of the country and the neighbouring
+communes walked during a part of the night, in order to secure seats;
+each anxiously sought to place his chair many hours beforehand, and
+caused it to be kept, in fear that another might deprive him of it; the
+churches were so full, that it was hardly possible to move in them. The
+eagerness to obtain room was so great, that indecorous and even
+scandalous scenes took place among the wives of the populace; they
+quarrelled for chairs and seats with a ferocity, _qui les mettoit
+souvent hors du cercle de la politesse civile et Chretienne_." (Perhaps,
+as a townsman, he is unwilling to be more particular). "More than twenty
+thousand individuals were assembled in the churches at every service;
+and a circumstance which proves how admirably each missionary and
+associate fulfilled his particular task is, that each parish gave the
+preference to the persons attached to it, and none allowed the
+superiority to its neighbouring quarter. Like mothers, who can see
+nothing more perfect than the children to whom themselves have given
+birth, each parishioner acknowledged no better men than the missionaries
+appointed to his own church. MM. Guyon, Menoult, and Bourgin, shone as
+much at St. Agricol, as MM. Ferrail and Levasseur at St. Pierre; and MM.
+Gerard and Rodet in the church of St. Didier, as much as MM. Fauvet and
+Poncelet in that of St. Symphorien." To the character of M.
+Levasseur[32] the writer bears honourable testimony, as a young man who
+had devoted time, talents, and a liberal private fortune, to the cause;
+and whose exertions on this occasion impaired a naturally delicate
+constitution. "From four in the morning to eight or nine at night, their
+time," he says, "was for many days occupied in public or private
+instruction, and in visiting the hospitals and prisons; and forty
+missionaries would have been necessary to have completely accomplished
+what these nine took cheerfully upon them."
+
+[Footnote 32: "Ce vertueux jeune homme paroit deja consomme dans l'art
+Evangelique; ses instructions sont aussi sublimes qu'elles sont precises
+et pathetiques; il joint a ses grandes qualites un amour ardent pour les
+pauvres; il consomme annuellement les revenus d'un patrimoine majeur a
+de bonnes oeuvres dans les cours des Missions. Une foule de faits
+attestant ses liberalites journalieres."--_Fransoy's Memoir_.]
+
+The effects of their preaching were manifested by the number of
+penitents who flocked to confession, which, during the second week of
+the mission, increased to such an extent as to render access difficult.
+The missionaries, unable to meet the wishes of all at once, gave an
+obvious preference, not to the more habitually devout, but to those
+classes of persons whose attendance was most unexpected. "Dissipated
+young coxcombs, disabled soldiers, dragoon officers with fierce
+mustaches, and worldly-wise men with formal wigs," says our author,
+"met with attention and encouragement, to the exclusion of those whose
+habits of piety deserved it better." The apparent injustice of this
+procedure he excuses by the plea, "that it was necessary to quit the
+regular fold in order to recover these lost sheep"--that "the stouter
+and better worth catching the fish were, the more anxious should they be
+to secure them in the net of the Prince of Apostles." When separated
+from the figurative bombast by which a Frenchman frequently obscures a
+sensible reason, this plea seems fair enough: provided that the motives
+of the missionaries were unmixed with spiritual vanity, and the pride of
+creating a strong sensation. It was no doubt most consonant to the
+purposes of a special mission like this, to accomplish that which was
+most difficult, and to make an impression, while the opportunity lasted,
+on a class of persons least accessible to the usual means of religious
+instruction. The example of such, if permanently reclaimed, would
+naturally be more striking than that of others, and influence public
+opinion more strongly, and this may furnish some excuse for a conduct
+which, in the ordinary course of things, would have been unjust and out
+of place.
+
+A large part of the tract is occupied by accounts of several solemn
+ceremonies which ensued, "for the purpose," says the author, "of
+striking the senses of the lower orders, who are not sufficiently
+affected by argument." These, as in the instance of the general
+communion, were rendered more imposing by the attendance of the civil
+and military authorities, and most persons of rank and wealth in the
+vicinity. Nor did they degenerate into mere processions and pompous
+forms, if the narrative is to be trusted. The missionaries appear on
+every occasion to have availed themselves of the excitation of the
+moment, in calling forth such feelings as must be approved by Christians
+of every country and persuasion, and which, among Frenchmen, may not be
+the less sincere for being expressed somewhat extravagantly. In the
+account of the Amende Honorable, a solemn act of profession of
+repentance, the following passage occurs:--"He (the missionary) drew an
+affecting picture of our unhappy country, oppressed by the burden of
+impiety and anarchy. He rapidly enumerated the series of crimes produced
+by license and want of faith. He implored the pardon of the most holy
+God in the name of all; and he proclaimed in a loud tone of voice,
+mutual forgiveness between enemies. All his questions were interrupted
+by the tears and sobs of his audience. 'Do you feel contrition and
+repentance,' said he, 'for your offences against God?'--'Yes.' 'Do you
+ask pardon sincerely?' The congregation again answered 'Yes.' 'Does
+every one of you individually pardon his neighbour all the injuries and
+offences which he may have received from him?'--'Yes.' 'Do you renounce
+all hatred, all enmity, all revenge?'--'Yes.' 'Do you promise God to
+live in future as becomes good Christians, in a perfect union and
+concord among yourselves?'--'Yes.' 'Do you promise fidelity, respect,
+and love, to the monarch who governs France, to the princes of his
+blood, and his representatives, and submission to the laws?'--'Yes.' The
+pen can but imperfectly describe the effect produced by these questions
+of the missionaries, and the answers of the congregation. No countenance
+but wore the expression of grief and repentance, no cheek but was wet
+with tears. The officiating priest who held the host in his hand, then
+pronounced in the name of the God of mercy, his holy pardon; the
+Magnificat, the Benedictus, and the Te Deum, were thundered forth; and
+the festival concluded with the benediction of the host. The innumerable
+crowd of individuals present, each holding a lighted taper, presented a
+magnificent spectacle." In describing the renewal of the baptismal vow,
+the next ceremony which took place, the author says,--"This act was held
+in so solemn a manner, that it will remain eternally engraved in the
+memory of the Avignonese. A magnificent altar was displayed to the sight
+of the faithful: a great number of priests in their sacerdotal habits
+encircled this altar, which a thousand tapers and a thousand sacred
+objects rendered more dazzling, and the holy sacrament was majestically
+exposed on it. After the performance of the anthems appropriate to this
+august ceremony, the missionary delivered a discourse, as forcible as
+it was sublime, on the object of the festival, which produced the
+greatest impression on his congregation. The eternal book of the gospel
+was then held up to the people. They were summoned to swear to the
+observance of the precepts of the Lord, contained in that book.--'We
+swear it,' answered the congregation. All their baptismal vows were in
+turn repeated, ratified, and confirmed by the congregation, with an
+effusion of tears which might have affected the hardest hearts. Their
+cries, their tears, and their sobs, were more eloquent than the
+addresses of the missionaries. The minister in his chair seemed to
+receive the promises and the vows of his parishioners, as Ezra formerly
+received those of the people of Israel."
+
+After the consecration of the Avignonese and their children to the
+service of the Virgin Mary and the general communion, which followed the
+ceremonies last described, the great cross, which now stands near the
+cathedral, was carried in procession to the place of its erection, on
+the 18th of April. So great a sensation had been excited by the
+expectation of this ceremony, and so anxious were all ranks to
+participate in it, that "the town," says the narrator, "swarmed like an
+ant-hill (fourmilloit) with strangers, the inns and private houses
+afforded no more room, and they who could find no quarters, covered the
+roads during the whole of the preceding night."
+
+The number of persons employed to assist in the procession amounted to
+twenty thousand, including the civil and military authorities, the
+monastic establishments, the neighbouring clergy, and a limited number
+of inhabitants from each parish. The cross, amounting in weight to three
+tons and a half, was supported on a frame constructed so as to admit one
+hundred and twenty bearers at once. These were relieved from station to
+station by detachments from all ranks and professions, selected from
+innumerable claimants, and amounting altogether to two thousand men.
+Having thus traversed thirty principal streets, the inhabitants of which
+vied with each other in decorating their windows with garlands and
+tapestry, the cross was borne to the terrace on the Roche Don, and
+erected in sight of more than eighty thousand individuals, who crowded
+the hill above, the extensive space of ground adjoining, and the windows
+and roofs of the houses. "The whole discourse pronounced on the
+occasion," says the narrator, "was as affecting as it was energetic. The
+orator at length closed it, by exhorting his audience not to forget the
+cross and their religion. 'Remember,' said he, 'that you are Christians
+and Frenchmen; fly to the foot of the cross as Christians in all your
+misfortunes, and it will be your consolation; as Frenchmen, you will
+there learn to be faithful to your country, and submissive to your
+king.--Et d'un ton plein de franchise il s'ecria, Vive la Croix, vive la
+Religion, vive la Roi--L'auditoire repeta les memes mots avec la meme
+enthousiasme, et y ajouta, 'Vive les Missionaries.'"
+
+On the 19th, the following day, a solemn service was performed for the
+dead in the cemetry of St. Roch; and the Mission was closed by sermons,
+exhorting the people to perseverance in the religious vows which they
+had voluntarily made. Having thus performed their proposed duties, the
+missionaries prepared for a private departure. The affectionate zeal of
+the people, however, would not allow the execution of this plan; and
+numbers, consisting chiefly of the national guards, kept watch at the
+doors of their lodgings all night; and in the morning they were besieged
+by a crowd of persons desirous to take leave of them. At the special
+request of these visitors, among whom were some of the most
+distinguished inhabitants of Avignon, they performed an additional
+service at the foot of the newly-erected cross, and were escorted out of
+the town amidst the acclamations of the multitude, who persisted in
+drawing their carnages a certain distance. Many persons accompanied them
+on horseback and in coaches as far as Orange.
+
+To the practical effects of the Mission, the writer bears the following
+testimony.--"Prudence restricts us from naming individuals; and yet we
+can vouch, that many husbands, separated from their wives and living in
+concubinage, have put away their mistresses and re-established their
+legitimate wives in their houses. After the revolutionary horrors which
+have afflicted our city, there existed inveterate hatreds and
+animosities, founded on real offences. Well! union and concord have
+removed many of these intestine divisions, many deadly enmities have
+been laid at rest, many resentments have been stifled; great numbers of
+enemies have made the sacrifice of all their revengeful feelings. A
+citizen, round whose neck one of the revolutionary hangmen had actually
+fixed the noose for the fatal suspension, perceived his executioner in a
+state of penitence during the Mission, and approaching the communion
+table--'I congratulate you,' said he, 'on your reformation, and I pardon
+your offences against me, as I would God may grant me his pardon and
+peace.' The porters of the Rhone, who had been long at variance, have
+been many of them cordially reconciled: the invalids of the national
+guard have also mutually vowed a perpetual friendship."
+
+Whatever the interests and prejudices of M. Fransoy may be, it is
+improbable that he would have risked his professional and private
+reputation, by misrepresenting recent occurrences on the spot where they
+took place; and certainly his narrative places the Mission in a new
+point of view, both as to its conduct, its reception, and its effects.
+It is, indeed, natural enough that such wits as do not affect either
+much knowledge or much interest on religious subjects, should indulge
+in desultory sarcasms (and the Hermite en Provence prudently does no
+more) on such instances of spiritual Quixotism as may possibly have
+occurred. The absurd[33] choice of hymn tunes, the petulant zeal of one
+or two ecclesiastics, and the rueful countenances of some of the
+penitents, though they prove nothing as to the main question, present a
+ludicrous picture to the imagination, and have been made the most of by
+the fictitious correspondent of the Hermite. It is also natural enough
+that the violent Liberaux, who view with distrust every measure
+countenanced by government, should treat the Mission as a mere engine of
+policy; that the avaricious should consider the donatives received on
+its behalf as squandered away; and that a large class of persons, who
+are inveterately sceptical as to their neighbour's good motives, and
+childishly credulous as to his bad ones, should pronounce it a mere
+manoeuvre of bigotry. The little tract in question, however, addressed
+to the experience of eye-witnesses of all that it describes, tells a
+different story, though its effect may be weakened by the ludicrous
+_naivete_ of its style. It describes the missionaries as addressing
+themselves particularly to those who stood most in need of their
+instructions, and who were most likely to treat them with derision; as
+availing themselves of the favourable reception which they experienced
+from the Avignonese, to preach the duties of forgiveness and
+reconciliation, both private and political, and to dwell on the
+practical and fundamental parts of Christianity.
+
+[Footnote 33: See the letter introduced in Jouey's Hermite en Provence.]
+
+Had they, indeed, in a public manner, denounced the vengeance of Heaven
+against the murderers of the unfortunate Brune, or pointedly rebuked the
+religious and political animosities subsisting in the south of France,
+they would have given a proof of their sincerity, but at the risk of
+much of that good which it was desirable to use their temporal influence
+in effecting. Instead, therefore, of giving unnecessary offence, they
+laboured to eradicate from the minds of their hearers the seeds of
+hatred and uncharitableness, and to divert their attention from their
+private bickerings and dissensions, to the common guilt of all in the
+sight of Heaven. The very object which, from all we learn respecting the
+state of feeling in Languedoc and Provence, appears particularly
+desirable, appears also to have been sought, not only by repeated and
+fervent exhortations, but by the exaction also of public vows and
+promises, so as to enlist the sense of shame as much as possible, in
+favour of the general forgiveness which the missionaries preached. Their
+exertions also, always supposing the tract in question to be entitled to
+credit, were rewarded by the conduct of their penitents, some of whom
+put away their vices, and others their mutual animosities. If this be
+fanaticism, then it were to be wished that such fanaticism should
+prevail widely in the south of France. "Out of the same mouth cannot
+proceed blessing and cursing;" and if the secret object of the Mission
+be to denounce the disaffected, or preach crusades against Protestants,
+it must be owned that their public labours at Avignon savour but little
+of such a purpose, as far as all appearances go.
+
+There is, it is true, something extravagant and bordering on stage
+effect, in many of the ceremonies performed, and expressions used, as
+recorded by the pen of M. Fransoy. An Englishman, however, is not always
+a fair judge of the best means of influencing the mind of a Frenchman,
+more particularly a south-eastern one. The Provencaux possess, both in
+appearance and in character, the strong characteristics of a people born
+under a burning sun; at once lively and ferocious, strongly led away by
+the excitement of the moment, and ardent in their partialities and
+antipathies: in short, the same romance of character is perceptible
+among them, which, in the dark ages, peopled the country with
+troubadours. The mass of such a people, particularly when profoundly
+ignorant, may not be accessible to cool argument; and the manner and
+style of oratory which would disgust a reasoning Scotch peasant, or
+English mechanic, may be exactly adapted to act on the temperament of an
+Avignonese. The surest test, therefore, of the character and design of
+the Mission, will be the practical effects which it produces on the
+conduct of its congregation, as well as the future application of those
+liberal donatives, which have excited so much unfavourable feeling
+against it. Time and fair play alone can justify the motives of those
+who planned and conducted it. The question in the mean time is, not
+whether they may or may not have occasionally gone to the lengths of a
+"zeal without knowledge," but whether or not their purpose has been to
+instruct and benefit their fellow-countrymen according to the best of
+their power and belief, and without reference to political party.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. VIII.
+
+PONT DU GARD--NISMES--MONTPELIER--CETTE.
+
+
+MAY 13.--This day was fixed on for a journey to Vaucluse, the road to
+which is better adapted for the accommodation of two wheels than of
+four. M. Durand, our voiturier, attended accordingly with one of his
+portly mares harnessed to a sort of cabriolet, very much resembling an
+Irish noddy. Its high boarded front reaching to our chins, and the
+little fat person of Durand rather incommoded than accommodated on a
+cushion tied to the shaft, and much too near the mare on every account,
+formed a grotesque combination but little in character with what ought
+to have been a voyage of sentiment. The deficiency in pathos, however,
+was made up by the poor mare, who bewailed her absent companion with
+such incessant roarings, as to draw many cuts of the whip, and "sacra
+carognas," from the unrelenting Durand. We were struck, by-the-by, more
+than once during this day's route, by the Spanish and Italian
+terminations of the Provencal patois. A village which we passed, on an
+insulated height commanding the road, and crowned by ruined
+fortifications, is laid down as Chateau Neuf in the map, and called by
+the peasants Castel Novo. A man of whom we inquired the distance to
+Avignon, answered "Tres horas," using not only the words, but the method
+of computation which a Spaniard would employ.
+
+Whether we really reached our place of destination, or were stopped
+short by intense heat and execrable roads, were interested, or
+overturned, this deponent saith not, nor indeed is it necessary. One may
+be pardoned for omitting the mention of a subject already so fully
+described as Vaucluse, its rocks and fountain, its associations, and
+even its eatables; for some travellers have dwelt on the subject of its
+excellent bisque, or crayfish soup, and its eels, a solace, no doubt,
+to[34] that gentle degree of melancholy, which Fielding affirms to be a
+whet to the appetite.
+
+[Footnote 34: "And do not forget the toasted cheese." Vide _Matilda
+Pottingen_ in "The Rovers."]
+
+    "And, says the anatomic art,
+    The stomach's very near the heart;"
+
+as Peter Pindar also maintains. Some also, with an accuracy worthy
+Moubrays treatise on domestic fowls, have informed us that the hens near
+the fountain of Vaucluse are peculiarly prolific in fine eggs, and so
+on. For my own part, I may as well honestly confess that I am more
+partial to the memory of Petrarch as a philosopher, a patriot, and
+reviver of ancient learning, than as the Werter of Troubadours, though
+in the latter capacity he has stood unrivalled for five hundred years. I
+must own, also, that the hermitage whither he retired to stifle his
+rebellious passion for the wife of another, however melancholy and
+impressive the ideas may be which it would of itself excite, is
+poisoned, in my mind, by the pestilent frivolities with which the
+mawkish of all ages have defaced its sombre features, in violation of
+truth and sound feeling. What syllables of dolour the forgotten
+Della-Cruscan school may have yelled out on the subject, is not worth
+ascertaining, and probably recollected by few or none. The French, who
+with all their ingenuity, are not very apt at comprehending the madness
+of contemplative minds, have caricatured the shade of poor Petrarch most
+woefully, and[35] the Abbe Delille (peace to his ashes!) has teazed the
+innocent trees of Vaucluse with embarrassing questions, fitter for the
+mouths of Susanna's elders. Under such blighting influence, the stern
+rocks of Vaucluse are transformed into a sentimental tea-garden, the
+high-minded and melancholy Petrarch into a more ingenious Piercie
+Shafton, and the virtuous Laura, who probably never saw the place, into
+a starched Gloriana of the old school, paraded and gallanted round it
+with all due form. It is, perhaps, a judgment on Petrarch's adulterous
+Platonism, that it has laid him open to impertinences like these, which
+would torture his sensitive ghost almost as keenly as oblivion itself,
+and which very strongly remind one of Punch's intrusion at a tragedy.
+Such ideas cannot be engrafted on the [36]Nonwenwerder, or the [36]Pena
+de los Enamorados, spots on which a simple and obscure legend has thrown
+an interest which Vaucluse cannot really possess, though embellished by
+every thing which poetry can do for it.
+
+[Footnote 35: See the Quarterly Review, to which I am obliged for the
+Abbe's remark.]
+
+[Footnote 36: See Campbell's ballad of "The Brave Roland," in one of the
+numbers of the New Monthly Magazine; and Southey's tale of Manuel and
+Leila, in his early productions.]
+
+It were to be wished, that the shade of Petrarch could return to his
+former haunts, to frighten away frivolous visitors, and read a lesson to
+the thinking. Instead of rejoicing at the posthumous fame which his
+poetical talents have earned, he would probably dwell on the
+insufficiency of the highest mental endowments without conduct and
+self-command. He would also probably describe his passion as fostered by
+the pedantic and high-flown gallantry of the age, and the applauses
+bestowed on his verses; as increasing and strengthening, after the
+marriage of Laura had rendered it criminal, without any purpose which
+his better conscience dared avow, till his eyes at length opened
+themselves too late to its culpable nature. His mind, of that
+high-wrought and desponding tone which often characterizes extraordinary
+genius, and too sincere to trifle with impunity, struggled then
+fruitlessly against a fatality formerly imagined, but become real; and
+the flower of his life was passed amid illusions and conflicts, in
+alternate self-deception and self-reproach, in wild and beautiful
+visions from which he awoke to sickness of heart and weariness of
+himself and all things, like the victim of a powerful opiate.
+Compromising weakly between his passion and his conscience, he would
+say, he secluded himself at Vaucluse from a society which had become
+dangerous to him, and by the verses which he composed as a vent to his
+feelings, fixed the illusion too deep to be eradicated by lapse of time,
+or the indifference of Laura. Such voluntary mental martyrdom resembles
+the punishment inflicted by some tyrant of history on his prisoners,
+whom he commanded to embrace his Apega, a beautiful automaton so
+constructed as to plunge a concealed dagger into their hearts.
+
+The better feelings of Petrarch's readers will dwell with the least
+alloy on the period after the death of Laura, when he contemplated her
+as beyond the reach of human ties, affections, or jealousies, and
+sought only to rescue from oblivion the virtues and purity which had
+strengthened and refined his passion, while they rendered it hopeless.
+There is a beautiful passage in Campbell which appears exactly written
+to express his state of mind at this time, and the retrospective glance
+which he must have often cast on his past life.
+
+    "And yet, methinks, when wisdom shall assuage
+    The griefs and passions of our greener age,
+    Though dull the close of life, and far away,
+    Each flower that hailed the dawning of our day,
+    Yet o'er her lovely hopes that once were dear,
+    The time-taught spirit, pensive, not severe,
+    With milder griefs her aged eye shall fill,
+    And weep their falsehood, though she love them still!"
+
+The private memorandum,[37] written in the manuscript Virgil, of this
+extraordinary man, which is shown in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, may
+be considered as expressing his most undisguised feelings, as excited by
+an event which dissolves trifling attachments, while it gives permanence
+to those of a genuine nature. It was probably intended for no eye but
+his own. I annex as literal a translation as possible, and from the
+beauty and ease of their latinity, have been tempted to precede it with
+the original words.
+
+[Footnote 37: I had procured this document from Milan, and translated it
+for the press, previous to reading the version of it which is given in
+the Quarterly.]
+
+"Laura, propriis virtutibus illustris, et meis longum celebrata
+carminibus, primum oculis meis apparuit sub primum adolescentiae meae
+tempus, anno Domini 1327, die 6 mensis Aprilis, in ecclesia sanctae Clarae
+Avinioni, hora matutina. Et in eadem civitate, eodem mense Aprilis,
+eodem die 6, eadem hora prima, anno autem Domini 1348, ab hac luce lux
+illa subtracta est, cum ego forte Veronae essem, heu fati mei nescius!
+Rumor autem infelix, per literas Ludovici mei, me Parmae reperit, anno
+eodem, mense Maii, die mane.
+
+"Corpus illud castissimum ac pulcherrimum in loco Fratrum Minorum
+repositum est ipsa die mortis ad vesperam. Animam quidem ejus, ut de
+Africano ait Seneca, in coelum, unde erat, rediisse, mihi persuadeo.
+
+"Haec autem, ad acerbam rei memoriam, amara quadam dulcedine scribere
+visum est; hoc potissimum loco, qui saepe sub oculis meis redit, ut
+cogitem nihil esse debere quod amplius mihi placeat in hac vita, et
+effracto majori laqueo, tempus esse de Babylone fugiendi, crebra horum
+inspectione, ac fugacissimae aetatis aestimatione, commonear. Quod, praevia
+Dei gratia, facile erit, praeteriti temporis curas supervacuas, spes
+inanes, et inexpectatos exitus acriter ac viriliter cogitanti."
+
+"Laura, illustrious for her own virtues, and long celebrated by my
+verses, first appeared to my eyes, in the time of my early youth, on the
+morning of the sixth day of April, in the year of our Lord 1327, in the
+church of St. Clare at Avignon; and in the same month of April, on the
+same first hour of the morning, in the year of our Lord 1348, that light
+was removed from this light of day, while I by chance was at Verona,
+unconscious, alas! of my fate. The unhappy news, however, reached me at
+Parma, in a letter from my friend Ludovico, on the morning of the 19th
+of May.
+
+"Her most chaste and fair body was buried in the evening of the day of
+her death, in the convent of the Fratres Minores; but her soul, as
+Seneca saith of the soul of Africanus, hath returned, I am persuaded, to
+the heaven from whence it came.
+
+"I have felt a kind of bitter pleasure in writing the memorial of this
+mournful event, the rather in this place, which so often meets my eyes,
+to the end that I may consider there is nothing left which ought to
+delight me in this world; and that I may be reminded by the frequent
+sight of these words, and the due appreciation of this fleeting life,
+that my principal tie to the world being broken, it is time for me to
+fly from this Babylon; which, through the preventing grace of God, will
+be an easy task, when I reflect deeply and manfully on the superfluous
+cares, the vain hopes, and the unlooked for events of the time past."
+
+This simple and affecting tribute, written, as it evidently seems, under
+such solemn impressions, clears the memory of Laura from the imputation
+of any thing trifling or criminal, while it sufficiently establishes the
+identity of "a nymph," according to Gibbon, "so shadowy, that her
+existence has been questioned."
+
+May 14.--We left Avignon this morning, with a more favourable impression
+of its cleanliness and comfort than any other town had as yet left on
+our minds. The road to Nismes, winding up a hill on the opposite side of
+the river, above Fort Villeneuve, is remarkably adapted also to display
+its numerous spires, and the grand Gothic mass of the legate's palace,
+to the utmost advantage: and we watched with something like regret the
+disappearance of these objects over the brow of the hill which we had
+ascended, more especially as on this spot the eye takes leave, for some
+time, of every thing agreeable. The view here consists of a high dull
+flat, with hardly a tree, and the road of rolling stones and dust; and a
+high wind prevailed, which seemed a combination of the Bise and Mistral,
+aided by all the bottled stores of a Lapland witch, and very nearly blew
+poor Durand off his box. After passing Fouzay and Demazan, two Little
+villages, adorned each a la Provencale, with a ruined castle, we turned
+out of the road to Nismes at Remoulin, where the features of the country
+somewhat improve. Another mile and a half brought us to an indifferent
+inn within a ten minutes' walk of the Pont du Gard. It is adapted for
+nothing more than a baiting-place for a few hours, and not at all of
+that description which so well-known a ruin would be in most cases
+capable of maintaining. The landlord, however, "a sallow, sublime sort
+of Werter-faced man," was civil, and inclined to do his best, and
+gathered us some double yellow roses, of a sort we had never seen
+before, to season his bad fare.
+
+The Pont du Gard, which we were not long in visiting, is seen to the
+greatest advantage on the side on which we approached it from the inn.
+The deep mountain glen, inhabited only by goats, whose entrance it
+crosses from cliff to cliff, forms a striking back-ground, and serves as
+a measure to the height of the colossal arches which appear to grow
+naturally, as it were, out of the gray rocks on which they rest.[38]
+There is certainly something more poetical in the stern and simple style
+of architecture of which this noble aqueduct is a specimen, than in the
+more florid and graceful school of art. The latter speaks more to the
+eye, but the former to the mind, possessing a superiority analogous to
+that which the great style of painting (as it is termed) boasts over the
+florid and ornamental Venetian school. Our own Stonehenge is too much,
+perhaps, in the rude extreme of this branch of architecture to be quoted
+as a favourable instance of it; but few persons can come suddenly in
+sight of Stonehenge on a misty day without being struck by its peculiar
+effect; and the Pont du Gard, placed in as lonely a situation, exhibits
+materials almost as gigantic in detail, and knit into a towering mass
+which seems to require no less force than an earthquake, or a battery of
+cannon, to change the position of a single stone. A large and solid
+bridge which has been built against it by the states of Languedoc,
+appears by comparison to shrink into insignificance, and shelter itself
+behind the old Roman arches, the lower tier of which, eleven in number,
+overtop it in height by about three-fifths. The span of the largest arch
+is about 78 feet; of the other ten, 66 each: and they are surmounted by
+a row of thirty-five smaller arches. With the exception of two or three
+of these last, the whole fabric is complete, and, if unmolested, appears
+likely to witness more changes of language and dynasty than it has
+already done. I do not know that the mind is ever more impressed with
+the idea of Roman power and greatness, than by contemplating such
+structures as these, erected for subordinate purposes at a distance from
+the main seat of empire. It is like discovering a broken hand or foot of
+the Colossus of Rhodes, and estimating in imagination the height and
+bulk of the whole statue from the size of its enormous extremities.
+
+[Footnote 38: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From the Pont du Gard the road to Nismes has little to recommend it
+excepting the high state of cultivation of the country, and this is not
+of a nature to gratify an eye accustomed to English verdure.
+Olive-groves, it is true, have been naturalized in poetry as conveying
+an image of beauty and freshness; but in reality nothing can be more
+opposed to the oaks and elms of an English hedge-row, than the pale
+shining gray of this stunted tree, which has more of a metallic than a
+vegetable appearance. Nor does a perpetual succession of corn-fields,
+however rich in reality, present the same appearance of luxuriant
+vegetation as an English pasture. There is, besides, nothing in the
+nearer approach to Nismes, which reminds one of the environs of an
+opulent commercial town, and its precincts would cut a poor figure when
+compared with those of Leeds or Bristol. The transition is immediate,
+from a dull range of corn-fields, without a gentleman's house, to a long
+dirty suburb. On emerging, however, from the latter into the better and
+more central part of the town, one is surprised to find wide and elegant
+streets well watered and planted, and public buildings, whose beauty and
+good taste show that the citizens of Nismes have made a good use of the
+fine architectural models afforded by the ancient Nemausis. The Palais
+de Justice deserves to be particularly remarked for its classical
+elegance, and contrasts well with the black solid arches of the Arenes,
+near which it is placed.
+
+"_Monsieour!_ les antiquites!--_Heou! Monsieour!_ les
+Arenes!--Commissionaire pour voir la Maison Carree!--_Heou--ou!
+Monsieour!_ decrotteur, s'il vous plait!--Le Temple de Diane,
+_Monsieour!_" are the cries with which every third or fourth ragamuffin
+at Nismes salutes you, enforcing his application by a peculiar yell, of
+which no combination of letters can give an idea uncouth enough. As it
+is hardly possible to walk in the central part of Nismes without seeing
+its antiquities before you, it is best to avoid a troublesome live
+appendage of this sort, by appearing totally deaf. The Arenes are nearly
+in front of the Hotel du Louvre, and the Maison Carree is within two or
+three minutes' walk of it: the Temple of Diana and the Baths are
+situated in the most conspicuous spot in the public gardens, whither a
+perpetual concourse of people may be seen thronging; and the Pharos
+overlooks them from the summit of a small precipitous hill, which may be
+ascended in five minutes by a good walker. Every thing therefore lies
+within the compass of an evening's stroll.
+
+The Maison Carree is a beautiful bijou, better known than any other of
+the curiosities of Nismes. I believe the opinion of Mons. Seguier
+(formed from a laborious examination of the nail-holes belonging to its
+last bronze inscription) is generally adopted; viz. that it was a temple
+dedicated to Caius and Lucius Caesar, grandsons of Augustus. A perfect
+copy of it, built from actual measurement, may be found in the Temple of
+Victory and Concord, in the Duke of Buckingham's gardens at Stowe. So
+admirable is the preservation of the original in every part, owing to
+the dry and pure air of Languedoc, as almost to operate as a
+disadvantage. Its freshness and compactness suggest rather too much the
+idea of a modern pavilion of twenty or thirty years standing, instead of
+that of a temple; and if I may venture to say so, the same want of the
+aerugo of age, which renders it more valuable as an architectural relic,
+produces an incongruous and unpoetical effect on the imagination. Age,
+in fact, has its own characteristic branch of beauty. An old man with
+curly hair and a fresh smooth complexion, like Godwin's Struldbrugg, St.
+Leon, would be an unpleasant and unnatural object. There is a masculine
+and imposing medium between youthful vigour and decay, in which the
+leading features of the former man may be distinctly traced; as in
+Wordsworth's beautiful description of the old knight of Rylstone, and
+Sir Walter Scott's fine portraiture of Archibald Bell-the-Cat: and I
+think the analogy holds good in classical remains. Somewhat should be
+decayed for effect's sake; and those parts only left which are
+strikingly beautiful, or of a leading and important nature. The Arena,
+which we next visited, is perhaps more consonant to this standard than
+the Maison Carree. Its structure is similar to that of the Colosseum at
+Rome, of which, however, it falls infinitely short in size and grandeur,
+while at the same time it so far exceeds it in perfectness, as to give a
+complete idea to an inexperienced eye of its original figure and
+arrangement, and of the admirable system of accommodation which such
+places possessed. It has just enough of the graceful decay of age to
+render it picturesque, and enough of freshness to answer the questions
+of the antiquarian: and neither too much nor too little is left to the
+imagination. Mr. Albanis Beaumont, in his work on the Maritime Alps,
+calculates the number of persons which this building must have held at
+16,599, and the spectators in the Colosseum at 34,000. He also states
+the widest interior circumference of the Arena, as 1110-1/2 feet. The
+plate engraved in his work, dated 1795, represents two square towers
+over the principal entrance, erected perhaps by Charles Martel, when he
+converted the building into a citadel; they have however been since
+destroyed, and the work of clearing away the houses which defaced both
+its inside and outside, commenced originally by Louis XVI., has been
+completed. It now stands in a broad open space, adapted to set off its
+full height and proportions.
+
+The public garden also presents a well-arranged group of interesting
+objects; but to behold them to any advantage, it is necessary to turn
+your back upon a pert little cafe, roofed with party-coloured tiles like
+the scales of a fancy fish, which glares from under the shade of the
+trees. From hence you look over a handsome balustrade into a large
+excavated space adorned with stone steps, which collects the waters of a
+fine fountain, and in which the foundations of the ancient Baths are
+still visible. On the summit of the opposite cliff, from whence these
+waters issue, the ruined Pharos, which forms the principal landmark of
+Nismes, rises with great majesty, and at its foot, immediately to the
+left of the fountain, the ruined temple of Diana, though not
+individually striking, combines admirably with the general group. From
+the fountain arises a beautifully clear stream, which is distributed in
+wide and deep stone channels through some of the principal streets at
+Nismes, and greatly contributes to the ornament and cleanliness of the
+town. The Pharos, or Tour Magne, to which I scrambled from the Baths,
+fully answers to its distant appearance. There is a peculiar dignity and
+solidity in a figure approaching to the pyramidical, when placed on the
+top of a rock; and independent of its height, which is between eighty
+and ninety feet, the Pharos has this recommendation also. Its interior
+appears a curious work of masonry. A high wide conical vault, without
+pillar or buttress, constitutes almost the whole internal space,
+admitting just light sufficient to render "the darkness visible," and
+give additional solemnity to a mere shell of brickwork.
+
+We found the Hotel du Louvre (to which we had been recommended in
+preference to the Hermite's inn, the Hotel du Luxembourg) excellent in
+every respect. The two hotels adjoin one another so closely, be it
+observed, and are so similar in appearance, that one may walk into the
+wrong salle-a-manger, and only discover the mistake through the
+difference of the waiter's faces.
+
+May 15.--Seventeen miles to New Lunel, where we breakfasted
+indifferently enough, not liking French customs sufficiently to qualify
+the bad coffee with a glass of the brandy of this place, which is as
+celebrated as its wine. New Lunel, which has grown on the back of the
+old town, in consequence of a branch of the Languedoc canal which runs
+close to it, is a neat and thriving place, but possesses no feature
+worthy of remark. The country is of the same character as the town, a
+dull rich flat, over which one may sleep with the soothing consciousness
+that every thing is going on well with its trade and agriculture. To
+Montpelier eighteen miles. Within the last league or two, the country
+begins rather to improve, and rise into somewhat of an undulating form;
+but no romantic or interesting feature marks the approach to this
+celebrated town.
+
+"How I envy you the sight of that delightful Montpelier, of which one
+reads and hears so much!" exclaims many an untravelled lady, no doubt,
+to her travelled brother or cousin. No place certainly sounds more
+familiarly in the ear as a novel-scene; and its very name is associated
+with ideas of beauty, verdure, retirement, orange groves, hanging woods,
+and all the et ceteras of a spot.
+
+    "Where simply to feel that we breathe, that we live,
+    Is worth the best joy that life elsewhere can give."
+
+The truth is, that the Montpelier of the imagination may be found at
+Vico, Sorrento, Massa di Carrara; or, with a little alteration, in some
+spots of our own Devonshire coast. The real Montpelier is a large,
+opulent, well-frequented provincial capital, full of noise and dress,
+and possessing an air of neatness and fashion, but totally devoid of any
+thing allied to the poetry of nature. It stands on a round sweeping
+hill, commanding a considerable extent of land and sea; but the
+sea-coast is chiefly an expanse of low ground and etangs, or salt-water
+lakes; and the neighbouring hill country, resembling in form a
+succession of cultivated downs, has neither height nor variety to
+recommend it. The most interesting spot in Montpelier is the Place
+Peyrou, a public garden raised on high terraces, in a situation
+commanding the rest of the town. At the extremity of the principal walk
+stands an elegant open building of the Grecian order, overarching a
+basin into which the waters of the celebrated aqueduct of Montpelier are
+received, and from thence distributed through the town. The aqueduct
+itself, which springs from the foot of this pavilion, and conveys the
+water from the crest of an opposite hill, is a truly noble work, and,
+though modern, worthy in every respect of a Roman aedile. It was erected
+by the states of Languedoc in honour of Louis XIV. whose statue is
+placed in the garden. Like the Pont du Gard, it consists of two tiers of
+arches, fifty of which we counted in the lower range, and one hundred
+and fifty in the upper, until the lessening perspective baffled all
+farther attempts at reckoning. The architecture is inferior in dignity
+and massiveness to that of the Roman work, but exceeds it in extent, and
+probably in the quantity of masonry employed. Nothing can be more
+elegant than its general form, and the manner in which it is united to
+the terrace of the Place Peyrou.
+
+Whatever natural objects are interesting in the environs, may be seen
+also from this elevated spot, though I am inclined to think that the
+views of distant Pyrenees which we were taught to expect, are a fiction
+existing in the minds of some travellers. At all events, the glimpses
+must be partial, and only to be obtained on a fine day. The Cevennes
+mountains rise, however, to a tolerable height in the distance to the
+west; and to the south-east, the remains of the old town and cathedral
+of Maguelone, form a striking distant group, projecting like a low reef
+of rocks into the sea at the distance of three or four miles. To judge
+from the site of this ancient town, which tradition describes as the
+original nucleus of Montpelier, the sea must have made great inroads on
+the neighbouring coast. The air, it is said, is growing less wholesome
+than formerly, owing probably to the accumulation of the etangs. From
+the edge of the coast to Maguelone, the distance cannot be much less
+than a mile and a half at low water.
+
+The Montpelliards are considered a scientific people; and, at all
+events, they seem to have found out the secret of perpetual motion, if
+we may judge from the experience of the first night we spent in the
+town. At half past nine, the principal street, which our hotel
+overlooked, began to swarm with heads. The whole population were on the
+alert, promenading during the greater part of the night; and such a busy
+hum arose from beneath the windows, which the heat obliged us to keep
+open, that it was impossible even to think of sleeping till daybreak.
+Our accommodations indeed were not of the most tempting sort; for
+finding the Hotel du Midi full of travellers, and consequently saucy
+and unaccommodating, we had tried the Cheval Blanc, described to us as
+the next best hotel; and detestable enough we found it. On stepping
+however next morning into a cafe and restaurant in the Place de Comedie,
+whose superior appearance had attracted us, we found that M. Pical, the
+master of it, was in the habit of letting rooms, and we immediately
+removed to his house. Nothing indeed could be more clean and elegant
+than its accommodations, or more refreshing after the dusty journey of
+the former day, and the nightly bustle of the streets, than its quiet
+and coolness, situated as it is in a large area in the suburbs or
+boulevards. The salle-a-manger partakes of the same character with the
+rest of the house, and the carte contains a list of many more good
+things than we were inclined to do justice to. In short, no traveller
+can do better than order himself to be driven directly to this house,
+which comprises all the advantages of a private residence at a
+reasonable charge, with the recommendations of great attention and
+civility.
+
+This day, May 16, we attended service at the French Protestant Church,
+and were gratified both with spending a morning on the shores of the
+Mediterranean in a manner which reminded us of an English Sunday, and
+witnessing also the full and respectable attendance of fellow
+Protestants. The service was performed in the following order:--1, a
+psalm; 2, a general confession of sins; 3, another psalm; 4, a sermon;
+5, the commandments and the creed; 6, a long prayer for the sick and
+distressed, the king and the royal family; 7, another psalm, and the
+blessing. The singing was impressive, not so much from any intrinsic
+merit in the performance, as the earnestness in which the whole
+congregation joined in it, "singing praises lustily with a good
+courage," instead of deputing this branch of religious duty to half a
+dozen yawning and jangling charity children, assisted by the clerk and
+parish tailor. I believe it is an observation of Dr. Burney, in his
+History of Handel's Commemoration, that no sound proceeding from a great
+multitude can be discordant. In the present instance, certainly, the
+separate voices qualified and softened down each other, so as to produce
+a good compound. Of the sermon I cannot speak so favourably, for in
+truth it savoured somewhat of the conventicle style. Its theme was
+chiefly the raptures which persons experience under the influence of the
+Holy Spirit, and it was calculated to discourage all whose imaginations
+were not strong enough to assist in working them into this state. The
+manner of the preacher was however good, and his delivery fluent; and so
+great was the attention of the congregation, that during three quarters
+of an hour not a sound interrupted his voice, until, on his pausing to
+use his handkerchief, a general chorus of twanging noses took place,
+giving a ludicrous effect to what was, in fact, a mark of restraint and
+attention.
+
+In the evening we departed for Cette. The road, according to the set
+phrase of the French Itineraire, is through a "campagne de plus
+agreables;" but our observation showed us only a bleak high common to
+the right, and to the left a succession of etangs and sandy flats,
+affording a prospect at once desolate and uninteresting. The space
+between the etangs and the road is generally marshy; and instead of a
+fine blue expanse of sea in motion, the horizon is commonly bounded by a
+long white sandy line, over which the sails of the little vessels appear
+very oddly. One or two houses erected on these ridges, which border the
+etangs, give to the view, if possible, a still more desolate appearance,
+being totally unaccompanied by even a tree or a patch of verdure, and
+only serve to remind you of the nakedness of the land. Near Frontignan
+the prospect improves, as far merely as concerns its fertility; for it
+is in the vicinity of this town that the famous Frontignac wine, or to
+denominate it more correctly, the Muscat de Frontignan, is made. The
+only thing during this evening's route which could be considered as a
+feature, was the lofty cape at whose foot Cette stands; a perfect idea
+of which, from the side on which we approached it, is given by Vernet's
+picture of that port, in the Louvre. A bridge of fifty-one arches,
+traversing a series of swampy ground and etangs, connects this
+promontory with terra-firma, and crosses the great Languedoc canal,
+which communicates at this spot with the sea. A beautiful sunset, which
+made the whole expanse of back-water appear of a rose-colour, and which,
+I confess, I have seldom seen equalled in England, gave as much richness
+to the view as it was capable of receiving. There is naturally but
+little in it; and the effect of Vernet's view is derived from accidental
+circumstances purposely introduced; so that, on the whole, we wished
+that our evening's excursion had been confined to the Place Peyrou. I
+should, however, conceive the air of Cette to be much better adapted to
+tender lungs than that of Montpelier, as well from the difference of
+temperature, perceptible even to a person in sound health, as from the
+superior shelter which its situation affords; while the high and exposed
+site of Montpelier leaves a doubt whether, in most cases it would not be
+more hurtful than salutary. The productions of the neighbourhood of
+Cette are also in a more forward condition than those of Montpelier. We
+saw hedges of arbor vitae in full flower; and peaches two-thirds grown,
+in almost a wild state.
+
+May 17.--We rose at five in the morning, desirous to secure a cool walk
+to the Tour des Pilotes, a signal post on the high cape above Cette. The
+sun was however prepared for us, and continued to grill us alive from
+the first moment; and, after all, the prospect from this station, to
+which you climb as if ascending the steep roof of a house, is not of a
+nature to repay the exertion. We went to satisfy our consciences that
+there was nothing to see, and we saw nothing. The Pyrenees, so far from
+being visible near Montpelier, cannot be distinguished even from this
+nearer point, excepting, perhaps, on a peculiarly clear day; and no
+other feature worth mentioning occurs. The coast presents a bare and
+uninhabited appearance, arising partly from the almost total want of
+trees. Our perquisitions in the town of Cette itself were more
+fortunate, though, by-the-by, it exceeds Lyons itself in dirt and ill
+smells. It is a place of considerable trade in proportion to its size,
+and is employed chiefly as an entrepot for goods, which may be landed
+and reshipped without paying duty: and a walk on the quay affords, in
+consequence, considerable varieties of the human face divine, neat as
+imported. I recognised a group of Catalan sailors by their brown jackets
+embroidered with shreds of gaudy cloth, their red night-caps, and the
+redicillas in which their hair was bagged. No race of men with whom I am
+at all acquainted bear so marked a character of animation and decision
+in every movement of ordinary life as these sturdy provincials, or would
+be more remarked by a stranger among a mixed concourse of different
+nations. The same exuberance of animal motion which degenerates into
+restlessness and buffoonery in the Neapolitan, or the native of
+Languedoc, assumes a more dignified character in the Catalan, who is
+certainly a gentleman of Nature's own making. One of the crew, a tall
+athletic fellow, was holding forth to the rest on some trivial matter
+with a varied and graceful action, which might have served as a model to
+a painter. The rest were at breakfast; but even their mode of pouring
+the wine on their tongues at arm's length, from the long spout of a sort
+of glass kettle, had somewhat classical in it, and reminded me of the
+recumbent figure in the Herculanean painting, who is drinking in the
+same manner. Simple as it may appear, this knack is not to be acquired
+without a long apprenticeship, and I was ludicrously reminded of my
+abortive efforts to master it by the sight of the party on the quay. It
+certainly is adapted for making the most of any liquid, and might have
+been adopted during such a scarcity of water as the Hanoverian consul
+informed us existed in Cette during the former year. Not a drop of rain
+fell for ten months, and water at last became dearer than wine.
+
+On crossing the bridge, we observed a man on one of the piers, spearing
+aiguilles de mer, a beautiful silvery fish, of which he had taken
+several. They were about two feet long, and of the shape of an eel,
+excepting in the form of their long picked heads and jaws, which
+correspond exactly with their name. The tunny is also caught in
+abundance near this part of the coast; and Vernet has introduced the
+fishery, from a lack of picturesque circumstances, into one of his
+sea-ports, painted by royal order. No other fish can better deserve this
+particular compliment, uniting, as it does, size, flavour, and the
+merits of both fish and flesh in a great degree. The "thon marine" is
+its plainest and best preparation, and is preferable, with a dish of
+salad, to all the high-seasoned dishes which form a Provencal bill of
+fare; in short, if our national sirloin obtained knighthood, such a good
+lenten substitute as the tunny deserves canonization.[39] I cannot say
+so much for the dish, common enough among Frenchmen, which a
+well-dressed man, the harlequin to a troop of comedians, was eating in
+the salle-a-manger when we entered; viz. a raw artichoke with oil and
+vinegar. Sterne, it appears, little knew the extent of the ass's good
+taste, when he deprived him of this article in the Tabella Cibaria, "to
+see how he would eat a macaroon."
+
+[Footnote 39: A similar dignity was conferred by some heathen poet, I
+believe, on the _potnia syke_ (the august, or god-like fig).]
+
+We set off at two o'clock in the day on our return to Montpelier, not a
+little envying the horses and mules their cool quarters in the immense
+remise. Within a mile of Cette lies the breakwater of rough stones,
+which forms a prominent object in the foreground of Vernet's picture,
+and serves to ascertain the spot from whence he took his design. At
+Villeneuve, where we stopped to bait the horses, we were diverted by a
+scene characteristic of the country. A bag had just been found on the
+road by the conductor of the Cette diligence, which drove up to the inn
+while we were there; and on Durand disowning it, a shabby-looking foot
+passenger claimed it, but could not establish his plea by identifying a
+single article. In a few seconds every soul in the inn, excepting
+ourselves, was assembled to take part in the discussion, and argued the
+pro and con with a vehemence of voice and action, which would have made
+a stranger believe it was a matter of life and death to each. A female
+inside-passenger, with an infant in her arms, which she nearly let drop
+in her energies, was the coryphee of this chorus of tongues, which could
+be compared to nothing but bees in the act of swarming, or the cackle
+which the entrance of a fox causes in a hen-roost. We were no longer
+surprised at hearing the peasants whom we met conversing in a tone which
+we had mistaken for quarrelling. The French generally, indeed, are fond
+of noise and action and emphasis about what does not concern their own
+interests a jot, while a London mob indulges an equal degree of
+curiosity by silent gaping; but these good folks certainly outdid
+anything I ever witnessed in France before. An action for defamation
+brought in Languedoc[40] might, with propriety, be worded, "that the
+defendant did, with four-and-twenty mouths, four-and-twenty tongues, and
+four-and-twenty pair of lungs, vilify and damnify his neighbour's
+reputation;" for it is probable that a scolding match could not take
+place in the open air of that country, without enlisting volunteer
+seconds to that amount on both sides, all equally bawling and violent.
+At Nismes, a fellow bellows across the street to offer himself as
+cicerone, in a tone which seems intended to warn you of a mad dog at
+your heels; and, in general, the lungs of Languedoc appear constructed
+on a larger and more discordant scale than is usual, and their
+volubility is rather a contradiction to the yea and nay appellation of
+the country. A respectable Frenchman informed us, that the peasants of
+Languedoc were considered to possess much wit and ingenuity by those who
+could understand their patois, which he frankly owned was unintelligible
+to himself. Their liveliness and animal exuberance are as strong a
+contrast to the immoveable form into which they are swathed when
+infants, as the flutter of a butterfly is to its torpidity as a
+chrysalis; indeed a fanciful person might be apt to suppose, that on
+emerging from their bandages, they indemnify themselves for the previous
+constraint by a life of perpetual fidget, and that the same re-action
+takes place as in the case of Munchausen's horn, which played for half
+an hour of its own accord when unfrozen. To speak seriously, nothing can
+be more piteously ridiculous than the state of a poor Languedoc child,
+swathed and bandaged into all the rigidity of a mummy, and totally
+motionless. Our friend H. declares, that his attention was once drawn
+behind a door by a faint cry, and that he there discovered and took down
+one of these little teraphims from the hook by which it hung suspended
+by a loop, like a young American savage. "C'est la mode du pays," is the
+only account of the practice which you get either here or at Nice; and
+it is fortunate that they have not still improved on it by a hint from
+the black nurses of Barbadoes, who embalm weakly young Creoles in
+wrappers lined with assa-foetida, and think it prejudicial to "burst
+their cerements" more than once in a fortnight.
+
+[Footnote 40: The word Oc, according to tradition, meant in the old
+patois of the country "yes:" hence the original derivation of "Langue
+d'Oc."]
+
+After our horses had eaten a pound of honey with their corn, which
+honest Durand considered a powerful cordial, we resumed our route, and
+reached Montpelier to a late dinner, enjoying in no small degree the
+coolness and quiet of Pical's house. It was indeed the love of quiet,
+and the dislike to a constant ferment, which drove our landlord from
+Nismes to settle in this place. The bigotry and party zeal of the former
+town, in truth, appear to have been hardly exaggerated in the accounts
+which have reached England, and to exist in such a degree as to render
+Nismes an unsafe place for a moderate man, who is owned by neither
+party. The spirit of discord and enmity is instilled by the more violent
+of both parties into their children as a duty, so that it will probably
+descend from generation to generation. Both parties, indeed, might adopt
+as a crest and motto a boot-maker's sign in Montpelier, which is
+somewhat diverting from its bombast, when merely applied as honest
+Crispin meant it. A lion is represented tearing a boot, with the
+inscription, "Tu peux me dechirer, mais jamais me decoudre." Construe
+it, "You may cut my throat, but not alter me," and it will show the
+pleasant state of party spirit at Nismes, if what we heard so near the
+scene of action be true. We returned to Nismes on the 18th with
+associations not so pleasant as had been created by its beautiful walks
+and buildings, and the civility with which our questions were answered
+by the inhabitants. We might have seen the country between Montpelier
+and Nismes to greater advantage, the dust being somewhat less stifling
+than before; but unluckily there was nothing worth seeing. The district
+is certainly a garden, but then it is a flat uninteresting kitchen
+garden, for the supply of the Lunel brandy merchants, and the rich
+Nismes manufacturers, who appear too polite in their tastes to venture
+into it. Hardly a single thing that can be called a gentleman's house
+occurs, and that not for want of culture or opulence. The case seems to
+be this; the people of Nismes, like the Bordelais, are proud of their
+elegant and airy city, embellished with classical relics, and uniting
+most of the advantages of town and country, and are well satisfied
+without the campagne which a rich Lyonnais, carrying on his business in
+a close town, considers as his paradise. Although this system of "rus in
+urbe" gives but a mean and poor appearance to the environs of a town, it
+produces much pleasure and convenience to such resident strangers as can
+enjoy the society of Nismes, which, by all accounts, must somewhat
+resemble sleeping in Exeter 'Change, the keepers, in the shape of a
+strong preventive force of military, on the alert, it is true, and the
+bars are well secured, but the beasts only watch their opportunity to
+tear each other to pieces. How an Englishman would fare in a public
+disturbance is difficult to say. It is probable that the Catholics would
+abominate him as a heretic, and the Protestants denounce him as an
+anti-Buonapartist, and that he would consequently be thrust from the one
+to the other, like a new comer between two roguish school-boys. This,
+however, was no concern of ours, as we left Nismes the next morning on
+the road to Beaucaire. The old Pharos was the last landmark we took
+leave of, as it was the first of which we caught sight. It contrasts
+with the Maison Carree as a wild legend of the dark ages would with a
+letter of Pliny; and though rough in its fabric, and uncertain in its
+history, dwells as strongly on the recollection as that highly-finished
+gem.
+
+    "The tower by war or tempest bent,
+    While yet may frown one battlement,
+    Demands and daunts the stranger's eye,
+    Each ivied arch and pillar lone
+    Pleads haughtily for glories gone!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. IX.
+
+TARASCON--BEAUCAIRE--ST. REMY--ORGON--LAMBESC.
+
+
+TO Tarascon 19 miles of road for the most part bad and sandy. I am not
+geologist enough to decide with accuracy on the formation of that part
+of the banks of the Rhone which we were approaching, but the detached
+specimens of rock are of a curious nature. After passing a little
+village called St. Vincent, we came to an open plain, bounded in front
+by several singular round hills on the summit of one of which, called
+the Roche Duclay, was a rock so exactly resembling an old castle in size
+and shape, that a nearer inspection alone satisfied us as to its real
+nature. There is also a great singularity of outline in the hills which
+became soon visible in the distance on the other side of the Rhone, one
+or two of which appeared as if they had shells upon their backs.
+Beaucaire, with its old castle overhanging the Rhone, soon came in
+sight.
+
+    "Jeunet encore, etois sortant de page,
+    Lorsque a Beaucaire ouvrit un grand tournoi.
+    Maint chevaliers y firent maint exploits,
+    Dames d'amour animoient leur courage;"
+
+says the French Roman: and in the old fabliaux also, the scene of
+Aucassin and Nicolette is laid in this place. These are, I believe, but
+a small portion of the claims which Beaucaire possesses to chivalrous
+celebrity, and its very name is in a manner connected with knights and
+ladies, tourneys and pageants. There is something in its appearance also
+which does not belie these associations, although it was crowded with
+farmers and market people at the time of our arrival: and those too of
+the vulgar bettermost sort, which is the most hopelessly
+unchivalrous.[41] The castle stands detached from the town, on as bold
+and perpendicular a cliff as any romance writer could wish, and
+overlooking one of the broadest and most rapid reaches of the Rhone; an
+extensive green[42] meadow planted with trees, and large enough for a
+tournament on the most extensive scale, or another Champ du Drap d'Or,
+divides the steep side of this rock from the river; and on the land side
+it is backed by another cliff garnished with as many windmills as Don
+Quixote himself could have desired. We crossed the Rhone on a bridge of
+boats to a long narrow island, from whence the view on both sides is
+striking. Beaucaire, with the accompaniments I have just described, and
+Tarascon, flanked by the large ancient castle of the counts of Provence,
+front each other on the opposite banks of the Rhone, which rushes and
+thunders on both sides of the isle, making the cables by which the
+floating bridge is lashed, creak most fearfully every moment.[43] From
+this point I made a drawing of Tarascon in defiance of a violent wind,
+which forced me to place my paper on the lee side of a stranded boat,
+and to sketch in the attitude of a plasterer white-washing a ceiling.
+Another bridge of boats conducted us to Tarascon;[44] where we walked
+out while the horses were baiting, the whole inn being in the same
+confusion from market people as Beaucaire itself, and not seeming of the
+most comfortable description. Being driven by a heavy scud of rain into
+a shoemaker's shop, we found a civil and intelligent guide in his son,
+from whom, however, we could not ascertain that there was any thing
+worthy of notice in this populous place, except the castle. We passed
+the Maison de Charite, in front of which is a new cross lately erected
+by the Mission, on the scale of that at Avignon, and profusely gilt and
+ornamented. The same agency also has lately re-established an Ursuline
+convent of fifty-two nuns in this place. The cathedral is old and mean,
+and apparently under no very strict regulations, for an old woman was
+selling cakes in the aisle close to one of the chapels. We went into a
+vault beneath to see a marble statue of St. Martha, which has merit in
+itself, and by the light of a single wax candle, had a striking effect:
+the great admiration, however, in which it is held here may chiefly
+arise from an opinion of its miraculous powers. "Elle devenoit invisible
+pendant la Revolution," whispered our young Crispin.--"Oui, elle etoit
+cachee, voila ce que tu veux dire, mon petit--." "Eh! non, pardon,
+Messieurs, elle se cacha; mais il y a trois ans qu'elle se montre
+encore," replied the little fellow, with the most confident gravity. I
+trust that this monstrous fiction did not originate in the Ursuline
+convent which he mentioned; and that the fifty-two good ladies employ
+their time in more charitable and useful actions than in filling the
+heads of poor children with stories so hurtful to the real interests of
+religion. However credulous our young guide was, he was not mercenary,
+being with difficulty persuaded to accept a franc or two for what he
+styled the pleasure of having conducted us. We next visited the castle
+of Tarascon, now used as the public prison, and in which 1500 English
+were confined during the war. The enormous height and massiveness of
+its walls, which overtop the weather-cock of the cathedral, and the
+smallness of its few windows, qualify it well for this purpose; and a
+greater appearance of strength and solidity is given by the solid rock
+in which its foundations are embedded, and which in some places is
+shaped into wall and moat. We crossed a drawbridge into a court flanked
+by four round towers, and having a square keep in its centre. On the top
+of one of these towers is an esplanade, from whence the view of the
+course of the Rhone, and the great plain of Arles, is fine: the latter
+town, which is about nine miles distant, was seen distinctly. We were
+rather disappointed by the inside of the castle, which seemed chiefly to
+consist of small mean rooms: perhaps the baronial hall might be the
+dormitory of the prisoners, and not in a presentable state; but we saw
+nothing which recalled any idea of feudal magnificence. The same
+description which serves for the tower of Westburn-flat, in the Black
+Dwarf, allowing for the difference of size and finish, would exactly
+suit the cubical shape and high blind walls of this castle, which
+probably was intended to serve similar purposes in the days of club law.
+Its durability is not so remarkable as the fresh colour and sharpness of
+every part of the carving, and it might pass for a modern gothic edifice
+of twenty years standing, but for the solidity and frowning grandeur
+which characterise it. The air of Provence appears more clear and dry
+than even that of Italy, and to be more favourable to the preservation
+of old buildings. Its clearness certainly is remarkable, particularly in
+diminishing the effect of distance; and on Monday night, at Montpelier,
+I recollect that we could plainly discover with the naked eye the stars
+of the milky way, which are commonly imperceptible without a glass. I
+cannot say that our route from Tarascon to St. Remy was well calculated
+to show the climate of Provence in this light. The whole eleven miles
+were performed in almost a perpetual storm of rain and wind, which
+prevented our seeing much of the rich plain we were traversing. What we
+could see, however, was pleasing: every inch teemed with olives, vines,
+mulberries, corn, onions, and lucerne. We remarked many sheep sheared in
+a comical manner, with two or three tufts, like pincushions, running
+down the centre of their backs, and painted red. Circumstances like
+these, though trivial, are or ought to be pleasing, as they indicate
+that something like comfort or leisure exists, and that the farmer's
+business is partly become an amusement. A needy peasant, pinched by high
+rents or bad seasons, would have but little inclination to ornament his
+favourite wether in this absurd manner; and though Forsyth's remark is
+very true, that a peasant never attempts to become fine but he is
+hideous, such hideous attempts[45] are grateful to the mind's eye from
+the cheerfulness and play of mind which they indicate. Within a little
+distance of St. Remy the storm cleared sufficiently to enable us to
+discern the line of hills to the right, the foot of which we were
+skirting, and which border the great plain of Avignon to the south.
+There is something very singular in the outline of these rocks, which
+are a miniature resemblance of the wild mountains near Valence, but more
+savage and fantastic, presenting the appearance of the sea turned to
+stone in its wildest state of commotion, or in the powerful words of
+Manfred,
+
+    "The aspect of a tumbling tempest's foam
+    Frozen in a moment; a dead whirlpool's image."
+
+[Footnote 41: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 42: The celebrated fair of Beaucaire, which may be almost
+called the carnival of the Mediterranean, is held in this meadow
+yearly.]
+
+[Footnote 43: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+[Footnote 44: For an account of the Tarasque, or fabulous dragon, which
+infested the country, and the ceremonies commemorative of it, see Miss
+Plumptre's tour. The name of Tarascon, she says, is derived from this
+animal.]
+
+[Footnote 45: I do not except even John Bull's favourite yew peacocks
+and dragons, at least when they decorate the garden of a poor man.]
+
+At the foot of one of these barren gray rocks, which, from its shape and
+perforation, exactly resembles the barbacan and gate of a castle, St.
+Remy is situated. The Hotel de la Graille, where we took up our abode
+for the night, was as comfortable as most French inns, excepting those
+in the large towns: and though the _gros chien de menage_, for whose
+company we always stipulated, was perfectly agreeable, and of a gigantic
+size, yet he was by no means, as is frequently the case, the only
+civilized person in the house. This _gros chien du menage_, be it known,
+is a person of great responsibility in a Provencal inn, as well as of
+formidable strength and size, and is entrusted for the night with the
+care of the remise, and all the live and dead stock, horses, carriages,
+and waggons, which it contains; and a more effectual guard cannot well
+be: his manners during the day are very mild and gentleman-like, as if
+he acted as master of the ceremonies; and he generally steals in at
+supper-time, as if to inform you that all is safe, and to claim a pat of
+your hand, and a pairing of your fricandeau in acknowledgment of his
+professional care. The greasy landlord will stand staring at his kitchen
+door, the landlady will not be very attentive to your accommodation when
+you are once safely housed, and the dirty, bare-legged fille will poison
+you with steams of garlic; but the _gros chien_ will always make amends
+to a genuine lover of dogs.
+
+May 21.--We were tempted by a beautiful morning to rise somewhat before
+four o'clock, in order to visit the Roman ruins near this place, before
+our departure for Orgon. A walk of ten minutes conducted us up a gentle
+terrace on which they were situated, and which rises between the town
+and the fantastic hills we had remarked the day before. Having heard but
+little of these classical remains, we were most agreeably surprised to
+find them in such perfect preservation, and so beautiful in themselves.
+They consist of a mausoleum and an arch, which stand within a few yards
+of each other, and appear to have formed the principal objects in a
+public square or place; the area of which is evidently marked out by a
+row of solid stone seats, well adapted for the accommodation of
+gazers[46] at these beautiful gems. The arch has suffered the most decay
+of the two: or rather, it most exhibits the effects of violence; for the
+unmutilated parts are as sharp and bold as if fresh from the hand of the
+sculptor. The human figures on each side have suffered the most, either
+perhaps from some party commotion of past ages, or the same wanton
+propensity which leads man to disfigure his fellow-creature's image in
+preference to any other work of art; and to which we owe the demolition
+of Andre and Washington's heads in Westminster Abbey. The fretted
+compartments in the inside, and the border which surrounds the bend of
+the arch, are in the highest preservation. The latter represents
+clusters of grapes, olives, figs, and pomegranates with the accuracy of
+a miniature, and in a free and natural style. One of the pomegranates
+was represented as ripe and cracking, and every seed distinctly
+expressed. The mausoleum is, I should venture to say, a building
+perfectly unique in its way, as a remnant of antiquity; and therefore
+more difficult to describe by a recurrence to any known work of art. I
+cannot better, however, describe its effect on the mind than by saying,
+that it ought to be removed to Pompeii in company with the arch. It is
+certainly superior, as a work of art, to any thing yet discovered in
+that singular place; while it possesses the same indescribable domestic
+character which seems to bring you back to the business and bosoms of
+the ancients, in a manner which nothing at Rome can do. As far as I
+could judge by the eye, it is from forty to fifty feet in height. An
+open circular lanthorn of ten Corinthian pillars, surmounted by a
+conical roof of stone, and containing two standing figures, rests on a
+square base, presenting an open arch on each side, which is in its turn
+supported by a solid pedestal, exhibiting on each of its four sides a
+bas relief corresponding to the respective arch. There is great spirit
+and fine grouping in the bas reliefs, which represent battles of cavalry
+and infantry. The standing figures before-mentioned, to whose honour the
+mausoleum may be supposed to have been erected, are in the civil garb:
+and there is an ease and repose in their attitudes, corresponding with
+the grave, calm expression of the heads, of which necessary appendage
+the merciless French Itineraire has guillotined them without warrant.
+The colour of the freestone of which it is built is as fresh as that of
+the castle of Tarascon. The building is constructed with a thorough
+knowledge of what the human eye requires, tapering and becoming more
+light towards its conical top. It is also of size sufficient for all
+purposes of effect, though not too large for a private monument. The
+situation in which these relics stand is sufficient to add beauty to
+objects of less merit. They are placed, as I mentioned, on a cultivated
+rising ground, at the foot of the wild gray rocks which ran parallel to
+the former day's route, and which assume from this spot a more
+castellated appearance than when viewed from the road. On the other side
+a fine and boundless view opens into the great plain of Avignon and the
+Rhone, almost perplexing to the eye by its variety and number of
+objects: in which we distinguished Avignon itself, and Mont Ventou many
+leagues behind it, rising in height apparently undiminished, with light
+hazy clouds sailing along its middle, and backed by the wild Dauphine
+mountains, near Chateau Grignan. We could also distinguish Beaucaire,
+Tarascon, and a large part of the former day's route, to the extreme
+left; and the right opened into various vistas of the hilly country
+which we had to cross in our road to Marseilles. The whole scene was
+lighted up and perfumed by the effects of the shower of rain which had
+fallen in the night, and without which a summer landscape in this
+country is a dusty mass oppressive to the eyes. The thyme and lavender
+on which we sat, and the mulberries and standard peaches which shaded
+us, seemed, as well as the vineyards, to be actually growing; and the
+catching lights were thrown in such a manner as to make every distant
+object successively distinct. After a couple of hours survey, we took
+leave of the ancient Glanum Livii, convinced that we had as yet seen
+nothing more perfect in its way than their tout ensemble, when combined
+with the surrounding scenery.
+
+[Footnote 46: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+To Orgon twelve miles: winding still round the base of the cluster of
+rocks which form the southern barrier of the vale of Avignon, and which
+assumed every variety of whimsical shape during our morning's route. At
+about a mile and a half from the conclusion of our stage, we joined the
+high road from Avignon to Marseilles, which renders the Hotel de la
+Poste at Orgon, a good and well-accustomed inn. While we were at
+breakfast, a Soeur de la Charite called on us to beg for an hospital
+newly established, and in truth her request was but reasonable, for the
+town seems poor enough, and unequal to the maintenance of such an
+establishment. Several of the houses are well built, but wear a decayed
+appearance, as if they had seen much better days. Orgon still deserves
+notice from its beautiful situation, and from its having been the place
+where Buonaparte met with so narrow an escape from the fury of the
+inhabitants during his journey to Elba. "Vous allez sans doute voir la
+Pierre Percee," said every body at the inn, whom we interrogated as to
+what was best worth seeing in the compass of an hour's walk. To the
+Pierre Percee we went accordingly, and found it nothing but a common
+tunnel cut in a neighbouring rock, to draw off the waters of the Durance
+when swoln with avalanches, from the vale of Avignon, and supply a
+canal communicating with the Etang de Berre.[47] The summit of the rock
+affords by far the best view of Orgon, and one which seems expressly
+constructed for the purposes of landscape: nothing can group better
+together than an old ruined castle just above it, and a dilapidated
+convent on the summit of the hill, standing out in bold relief from the
+narrow vale of the Durance, up which we traced the course of our next
+stage; and the variety of exotic dwarf shrubs, which grew on the cliff
+where we were standing, gave great richness to the foreground. These,
+and the hedges of cypress and cane, which we occasionally saw, began to
+give an Italian character to this part of France.
+
+[Footnote 47: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+The adjoining part of the vale of the Durance is called the district of
+the Cheval Blanc, and, like its namesake, the vale of White Horse in
+Berks, is celebrated for its fertility. To Lambesc twelve miles. For six
+or seven miles the road follows the course of the Durance, which, to
+judge from the extent of its stony shoals, must be a tremendous stream
+at high water, and deserving the termagant appellations which Mad. de
+Sevigne bestowed upon it. The back of the rocks of Orgon, which we
+traversed during the first mile, and on which the convent stands, is
+very singular, and resembling more a mass of strange petrifactions than
+any regular stratum. At Senas, we saw the ruins of a handsome house
+belonging to a M. de B. to whom his property has been restored since the
+Revolution; but the gentleman was disgusted at the woods having been cut
+down and sent to Toulon for ship-building, and resides entirely at Aix.
+An English squire in M. de B.'s case would have rebuilt his ruined
+mansion, and raised a belt of young forest trees in a very few years.
+For some miles during this stage the face of the country was interesting
+and rich in cultivation, with a ruined castle or two, which form
+striking features; but on turning to the right up a long hill which led
+to Lambesc, and leaving the vale of the Durance behind us, backed by its
+high barrier of table-shaped mountains, the country became very
+monotonous. It is on a higher level, and though tolerably fertile, is
+deficient in verdure, the olive being almost the only tree met with.
+Lambesc, like Orgon, which it much exceeds in size, has an air of faded
+gentility and desertion, and its fine public fountains tell a tale of
+better days. In this town the states of Provence were convened annually
+in the reign of Louis XIV.; and it possessed also many of the privileges
+of a capital in the days of the counts of Provence, but at present it is
+celebrated for nothing but the growth of the best Provence oil. This is
+no small distinction in the _almanac des gourmands_, as there is no
+article in which it is so difficult to hit the critical taste of a
+Provencal. I have seen them often make hideous faces at the twang of oil
+which a Spaniard would abuse, and an Englishman admire, for its
+tastelessness. A Provencal lady, with the knowing air of a _bonne
+menagere_, told us, that no traveller could meet with really good oil,
+for that the ordinary sort which we ignorantly thought excellent, was
+made from heaps of olives laid to ferment in order to increase the
+quantity of produce. The best (which answers, I suppose, to the Cayenne
+pepper sent in presents) is made by the proprietors in small quantities
+for their own use, from the natural runnings of choice fresh-picked
+olives, like cold drawn castor oil, and has a greenish tinge; and this
+the good lady assured us was the only true thing.
+
+    No more, when ignorance is bliss,
+    'Tis folly to be wise;
+
+more particularly in matters relating to the palate. We walked to see
+the house where the Count de Grignan resided in state, during his
+official visits to Lambese: like many other dilapidated mansions in the
+place, it bears the marks of fallen greatness. There is a handsome stone
+gateway belonging to it, decorated with a carved coat of arms supported
+by lions; but the house, like the poor Palazzo Foscari at Venice, is
+tenanted only by a nest of squalid families. The Hotel du Bras d'Or is a
+plain, comfortable country inn, civil and reasonable.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. X.
+
+AIX--MARSEILLES.
+
+
+MAY 22.--To Aix sixteen miles. Though the country during the first part
+of the stage is hilly without any romantic character, and rather
+unpromising, the difference of climate was already apparent from the
+strong and brilliant colours of the very hedge flowers, of which we
+observed an endless variety. After passing St. Canat, the first post,
+the country improves a little, and the [48]mountain under which Aix is
+situated begins to thrust its lofty head above the intervening line of
+hills. In proceeding a little further, we caught a distant glimpse of
+the Etang de Berre to the west, and presently distinguished Aix in a
+deep vale under our feet, into which the descent is long and steep. A
+cart escorted by five gens d'armes, in which we saw a priest and another
+person quietly ensconced, and exposed to a burning sun, was toiling up
+the hill on a very different errand from ours. We were surprised to see
+a grave character in so equivocal a situation, but found on inquiry that
+he had benevolently offered his assistance in escorting a woman on her
+journey to Arles, where she was to be executed for a murder. The
+circumstances under which it had been committed, struck us as more
+atrocious than common. About seven years before, this person, in concert
+with her husband, who was since dead, invited an old lady, their friend
+and patroness, and godmother to one of their children, to walk and eat
+grapes in their vineyard. Watching their opportunity, they cut her
+throat, buried her on the spot, and possessed themselves of her
+property, with which they removed from the neighbourhood of Arles, where
+the murder was committed.
+
+[Footnote 48: According to Sanson's excellent Atlas, the French part of
+which was laid down from measurement, in the reign of Louis XIV., this
+mountain is the Mont St. Victoire, near which Marius gained his
+celebrated victory over the Cimbri. The field of battle is fixed by
+history as near Aquae Sextiae.--(_Aix_.)]
+
+Arles and its environs, it seems, are a sort of French Lancashire in
+point of brutal ferocity, and are celebrated for murders as much as for
+pork sausages; not that I mean to connect the two things together, as in
+the well-known nursery tale.
+
+The Hotel des Princes at Aix is justly to be praised for cleanliness
+and excellent accommodations; but Madame Alary is too well aware of its
+merits to lose by them. It is somewhat ridiculous to pay, in this fine
+fruit country, three francs for a small coffee-saucer of marmalade, with
+which we were charged as a separate item in the breakfast; and those
+therefore who intend staying a couple of days at this inn, should make
+their bargain first.
+
+Mons. Gibelin, a physician residing in the Rue Italienne at Aix,
+possesses, and obligingly allows to be shown, some good pictures,
+including original portraits of Mad. de Sevigne and her daughter.
+Finding him from home, and the house shut up, we extended our walk
+further into the town, which, in point of airy streets and cleanliness,
+deserves to hold a very high rank indeed among French cities. The houses
+are generally stately, regular, and well built, and give you the idea
+both of former and of present gentility and opulence. It is in some
+degree cooled by several fine fountains, a circumstance of no small
+importance at this season of the year, for the effects of the "beau
+soleil de Provence" began to exceed even my recollections of Naples.
+Speaking merely at hazard on the subject, I should doubt whether any
+place in the south of France is better adapted for the cure of pulmonary
+complaints than Aix. It stands on the side of a rising ground, facing a
+delightfully well-watered and fertile valley to the south-west, and
+sheltered from the piercing winds, so prevalent in Provence at some
+seasons, by a mountainous barrier which rises to the north and
+north-east. Its situation is thus at once sheltered, airy, and cheerful,
+and does the greatest honour to the taste of King Rene[49] in selecting
+it for his capital.
+
+[Footnote 49: For an account of the curious ceremonies and processions
+instituted by this monarch, see Miss Plumptre, under the heads of "Leis
+Razcassetos," "Lou Juec des Diables," &c. I cannot say but that the
+enumeration reminds me of the merry court of Old King Cole, with his
+fiddlers three, his tailors three, and the long list of et ceteras
+detailed in the well-known song.]
+
+To Marseilles sixteen miles. At the end of a mile and a half, the road
+ascends a hill to the south, marked by a clump of stone pines, which
+commands the best view of Aix and its environs. The vale running up to
+the right under Mont St. Victoire deserves particular mention, as
+uniting the highest degree of beauty and verdure with a certain wildness
+of feature; and would give a fair idea of the best parts of Italian
+scenery to a person not desirous of crossing the Alps. After taking
+leave of this valley, which better deserves to be called the garden of
+Provence than any other district I have yet seen, the face of the
+country is less pleasing, but in some places more singular and original.
+The first few miles were dull enough, it is true; and to add to our
+pleasure intensely hot, and destitute of any sort of shade. It was
+therefore with no small satisfaction that we stopped for a few minutes
+under a grove of tall old trees which overshadowed the road, with a
+fountain spouting up in the midst, which completely altered the
+atmosphere. No palm island in the deserts of Arabia was ever more
+welcome than this cool spot, which belonged, we understood, to the
+adjoining Chateau Albertas. Whoever was the planner of it, he has
+discovered more true taste and gentlemanly feeling than if he had built
+the finest possible entrance or lodge as a mere tribute to self-love:
+and were pride alone consulted as a motive, nothing leaves so striking a
+recollection on the minds of strangers, or so strongly disposes them to
+inquire the name of the proprietor of a spot, as an elegant proof of
+attention to their convenience, like the one in question.
+
+Having traversed a second interval of dry parched country, we crossed
+another pleasant valley, in which is situated the Chateau Simiane. This
+seat, visible about a mile to the left, was the residence of Pauline de
+Grignan, wife of the Marquis de Simiane; who is said to have inherited
+much of the talent and liveliness of her grandmother and mother. Her
+verses beginning with
+
+"Lorsque j'etois encore cette jeune Pauline," &c.
+
+jesting on the annoyance of a lawsuit in which she had to defend her
+title to the Grignan estates, are still on record. After passing the
+Chateau Simiane, the country became wild and singular in parts. We
+particularly remarked a small village built round the base of one of
+those castellated rocks which abound in the neighbourhood of Beaucaire,
+as also a singular defile near the post-house of La Pin. The high gray
+rocks which inclose this spot appear as if seared to the quick with
+drought, and for some distance leave room only for the road and a narrow
+riband-shaped line of rich cultivated ground of a few yards in breadth;
+which is again succeeded by a small village, whose houses completely
+block up the defile. From this point you creep and wind gradually to the
+hill called La Viste, from which we were instructed to expect the most
+celebrated view of Marseilles. It fully equals all that can be said of
+it; and, though inferior to the bays of Naples and Genoa, possesses
+features which strongly remind one of both. On reaching a wood of stone
+pines on the summit of the hill, the bay of Marseilles bursts on you all
+at once, in an immense sheet of bright blue, studded with sunny islands,
+among which the Chateau d'If, a little spot fortified to the teeth, and
+commanding the entrance of the inner port, is most conspicuous. On
+advancing a little further, the shores of the bay are seen lengthening
+themselves into a half moon, one horn of which is formed by a line of
+mountains of no remarkable outline, and the other by a more lofty chain,
+communicating with Mont St. Baume and Mont Victoire, and the out-post of
+which is formed by a lofty and barren cape jutting into the sea at the
+back of Marseilles. The town itself possesses no remarkable feature from
+this point, except the fort of Notre Dame de la Garde, which crowns and
+commands it at the top of a lofty hill; but its environs, which rise in
+an amphitheatre from the sea to the adjoining mountains, are one
+perpetual succession of white villas, vineyards, orange, lemon and
+fruit-tree groves, and every thing in short which can enrich and enliven
+a prospect. Too much certainly is not said by the French of this
+celebrated Viste, which deserves at least a quarter of an hour's
+attention; and there are one or two decent cabarets on the top of it,
+the resort of the Marseillois for cool air and refreshment, where the
+horses can be baited while a survey or a sketch is taken.
+
+After the descent of this hill, nothing worth notice occurs, till you
+have passed a long and uninteresting suburb, and enter Marseilles by the
+Cours, the first effect of which is striking, as it runs in a straight
+line dividing the town into two parts. We turned off to the right,
+towards the stately quarter which Vernet has represented in his
+celebrated view from the inner harbour; and took up our abode at the
+Hotel de Beauveau, which we found in every way deserving the rank which
+it holds among the number of excellent hotels in this place. We rose
+soon after day-light the next morning, to walk to the fort and signal
+post of Notre Dame de la Garde, the most conspicuous object in a distant
+view of Marseilles, and which we had observed rearing its flag-staff at
+the end of almost every vista of street, like the castle of St. Elmo at
+Naples. In our walk we picked up a species of locust, the sauterelle of
+this country, of a pale, dirty brown, and somewhat more than three
+inches in length. Thanks to the great cleanliness of the Hotel de
+Beauveau, this was the first insect which we had as yet met with at
+Marseilles. In a climate, indeed, of a certain degree of heat, perpetual
+scouring and sweeping becomes absolutely necessary in all comfortable
+establishments, and these little evils are more completely eradicated
+than in those places where they are less natural. The simple precaution
+of shutting the windows before candles are brought, is commonly
+sufficient to keep off the mosquitos; and as for the scorpions, this
+formidable bug-bear exists only in the imaginations of travelling
+ladies, in glass jars at apothecaries' shops, and occasionally in the
+poorer houses of the old town, where the dirt and rubbish afford it a
+shelter.
+
+On ascending the hill of Notre Dame de la Garde, we found reason to
+approve our choice of it as a point of general survey. It commands not
+only the whole bay, but also the flat space of land encircled by
+mountains, in which Marseilles is enclosed as between hot walls, and the
+town itself lies like a map under it. As a point, however, for a general
+sketch, I should prefer the island of Ratoneau, which possesses
+sufficient elevation for all purposes of the picturesque, and brings in
+the sea and the Chateau d'If as a front ground, grouping at the same
+time the masses of building of Marseilles better than a mere bird's eye
+view would do.
+
+The chapel of this fort, like that of Notre Dame de Fourvieres at Lyons,
+possesses a great reputation for sanctity, and much resembles it also in
+its steep ascent, which one would suppose that some austere monk had in
+both cases contrived as a penance to short breathed devotees. The same
+hosts of beggars also besiege both places, of all ranks and pretensions,
+from those who stand silent in a white sheet for drapery, to those who
+obstreperously exhibit their want of any drapery at all. The chapel is
+hung with little pictures, dedicated to the Virgin by the honest sailors
+and peasants, and representing different providential escapes: the
+wretched daubing of which is somewhat atoned for by the good feeling
+which placed them there. One of them represents the Virgin appearing to
+a ship in a storm, with a visage and demeanor which might as well
+accompany a flying mermaid; another describes a man run over by a cart,
+and preserved unhurt by a similar interference; a third, the recovery
+from a sick bed, and the joy of the friends on the occasion, whose
+countenances not a little reminded us of our grim friends Damon and
+Holofernes. Some offerings of a better and richer description were
+pillaged at the time of the Revolution.
+
+We descended from this airy situation down a range of streets as
+precipitous as the roof of a house, the slope of which probably
+counteracts the effect of heat, and prevents the stagnation of air in
+the crowded situations of the old town: Marseilles is said to be healthy
+in consequence; and the generally active and fine appearance of its
+population confirms it. The heat, however, to judge from a comparison
+with Naples at the hottest season of the year, must be tremendous. It
+struck on us at nine in the morning, on re-entering the town, like the
+air from the mouth of an oven; and the herds of poor goats who compose
+the walking dairies of Marseilles and the environs, dead asleep on the
+trottoirs, formed, with a few strolling Turks, almost all the
+out-of-doors population in the principal streets. We had no objection
+whatever to imitate the general practice, and to sit still in a cool
+room for the rest of the morning, reserving ourselves for an evening's
+walk on the quay. I have as yet seen no place where a promenade of this
+sort is so fraught with little circumstances of amusement, or where such
+a variety of different ideas can be taken in by the eyes alone.
+
+"Greeks, Romans, Yankeedoodles, and Hindoos,"
+
+and more nations than could be described in a whole stanza of names, may
+be found clustering in knots, or lounging under the awnings of their
+different coffee-houses; while new detachments of fresh-men are seen
+continually landing, with lank staring quarantine faces, and elbowed in
+every direction by the busy Marseillois, whose curiosity is too much
+deadened by continual importations, to be excited by the newest or
+strangest costume. In short, the memorable political masquerade which
+was got up so awkwardly by Anacharsis Clootz and his friends from the
+Fauxbourg St. Antoine, might here be represented almost every day in the
+week by real and genuine actors, in every possible variety.
+
+May 24.--I cannot say much for the old cathedral; and as far as I can
+collect from the conversation of a scientific Englishman, who has dropt
+his watch into one of the boiling vats, while minuting some process, the
+great soap manufactory of this place offers nothing very different from
+other places of the same sort. Our morning's walk was therefore confined
+principally to the Cours, the shade of whose spreading trees, and the
+profusion of fine bouquets and cheerful faces in the flower-market at
+one end of it, render it a most agreeable promenade. The pleasure of
+lounging, which in the spirit-stirring climate, and among the busy faces
+of England is the offspring of conceit, becomes in such places as this,
+and to an unoccupied person, a real and physical satisfaction, and we
+much preferred it to the lions of Marseilles, which are not many. In the
+evening we explored the western side of the bay, and the low reef of
+rocks opposite to the Lazaretto, which may someday or other be known by
+the name of Alfieri's[50] seat, as he has described it in his life with
+sufficient accuracy to mark the spot. It commands one of the best and
+most cheerful views of Marseilles, including several features of the
+prospect afforded from the Viste, but of course on a lower elevation.
+
+[Footnote 50: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XI.
+
+OLLIOULES--TOULON.
+
+
+MAY 23.--From Marseilles to Cujes twenty-four miles. From the views
+which we had from the Viste and Notre Dame de la Garde, we were prepared
+to expect much from the nearer acquaintance with the environs of
+Marseilles, which the first seven or eight miles would afford us. In
+this case, however, as in Campbell's mountain,
+
+"'Twas distance lent enchantment to the View;"
+
+for that which as a distant whole presented a scene of the highest
+beauty, and the richest cultivation, was nothing better in detail than a
+drive between stone walls. I have always thought that the ostentation of
+riches, or of those things which they will procure, was not a subject of
+vanity so common in France as in England; but there is a medium in all
+things, and it would be as well if the Marseillois and their countrymen
+of Lyons, had a little of that social and respectable pride, which
+induces every cit of Hampstead or Clapham to set off his little box to
+the best advantage. They seem to prefer the philosophical sulkiness
+which Shakspeare's Iden describes himself as enjoying between four
+garden walls.[51] On passing Aubagne, however, the valley of Gemenos
+makes ample amends to the eye, uniting the verdure and wild character of
+a Swiss vale, to the rich productions of Provence. After about three
+miles, the road narrows to a mere cleft in the hills, which we threaded
+for several miles, emerging at last upon the green bason of ground on
+which Cujes stands. Here, for the first time, we saw capers, with a
+profusion of every sort of esculent vegetable, which the inhabitants
+cultivate with great assiduity, losing not an inch of ground. To such a
+pitch, indeed, does their laudable economy proceed, that every
+inhabitant of Cujes keeps a pet dunghill before his house, fearing no
+doubt to lose sight of it; and in this wilderness of sweets the good
+women sat basking and gossiping with great satisfaction.
+
+[Footnote 51: See Second Part of Henry VI. Act 4.]
+
+At Cujes we breakfasted in the same salle-a-manger with an agreeable old
+Marseillois and his wife, who confirmed Peyrol's account of the bloody
+revolutionary committee at Orange, and added circumstances which, at
+this distance of time, seemed still fresh in their minds. The latter had
+been confined four months in the prison at L'Isle, near Avignon, from
+which detachments of persons were daily sent to be tried at Orange, none
+of whom returned. Among the sufferers were a Mad. Vidou, a superannuated
+widow of ninety, who was guillotined in company with her son, an amiable
+and respectable man, and was unconscious of her fate till the last.
+Forty nuns of the convent of Bollene were also among the prisoners,
+accused of a plot to bring about a counter-revolution, and four had been
+already guillotined on this charge when the fall of Robespierre took
+place. Three of this lady's friends had been reported as emigrants, and
+lost their property, merely from not having been at home when the
+commissaires made their visit. The wife of one of these offered to
+recall him in ten minutes, if necessary: "Non, Citoyenne, c'est egal;"
+and he was accordingly enrolled and treated as an emigrant, though he
+never had been absent a single day from his home. In a nation where
+almost every person of a certain age has such incidents as these burnt
+into his recollection, it is not wonderful that the general character
+should somewhat alter, and that the lively thoughtless Frenchmen of
+Sterne should become nearly an obsolete race. It may be perhaps a
+fanciful idea to trace to the same source the nature of a Frenchman's
+vanity, which has generally more reference to mental qualities, than to
+those goods of which fortune or the will of a despot may deprive him in
+an instant. "Bene vixit qui bene latuit" should seem the motto of the
+bulk of the nation.
+
+The first part of the road from Cujes to Toulon traverses great
+inequalities of ground, affording very odd bird's eye glimpses of the
+sea through little chasms in the line of cliffs to the right. Beausset,
+through which we passed, is as filthy a town as Cujes, and the country
+as beautifully cultivated, and as rich in flowers, fruit, and corn; it
+is difficult, indeed, to find animal and vegetable nature more strongly
+contrasted. If I may be allowed to parody the words of a noble poet--
+
+    "They are brown as the dunghills whereon they decline,
+    "And all, save the dwelling of man, is divine."
+
+About three miles from Beausset, the road inclines towards a barrier of
+high and nearly perpendicular rock to the right, which it appeared
+impossible either to penetrate or ascend. A large string of mules,
+however, which met us from Toulon, loaded with barilla for the great
+glass works at Beausset, showed us that the one or the other was
+practicable, and on advancing a little farther, we distinguished the
+chasm through which the road to Toulon is conducted, surmounted by the
+black ruins of an old castle to the left. On the right of the road in
+this place, a singular cluster of conical rocks occurs, which, both
+from their form and position, seem exactly like a heap of gigantic
+shells, piled up to batter the old ruin on the opposite cliff. Their
+appearance was that of a mass of large pebbles, held together by
+indurated clay; but as each probably weighed some scores of tons, it was
+impracticable to bring away one as a geological specimen; nor would such
+specimen give a more accurate idea of the singular and wild effect of
+the whole mass, than a single corner stone of the Colosseum would of the
+grandeur of the whole amphitheatre. The country name of the castle is
+Chateau Negro, as we understood from some gens d'armes whom we met in
+the pass; and the houses adjoining it, which seem actually overhanging
+the perpendicular edge of the rock, belong to the ancient bourg of
+Emenos. Nothing, one would suppose, but the overruling motive of
+security, ever could have induced human beings to take up their abode in
+such an eagle's nest as this, and its date is therefore probably as
+ancient as it professes to be. In days of old, the castle must have been
+completely the key of the pass, many hundred yards of which would have
+been exposed to stones and arrow-shot from it. A turn to the right
+conducted us into the heart of the Val d'Ollioules, as this mountain
+chasm is called, which is somewhat on the scale of the celebrated pass
+of Pont Aberglasllyn in Wales, but far exceeds it in striking effect. A
+dreary whiteness, unrelieved by hardly a single blade of vegetation,
+covers the whole, as if it had been recently cleft by a volcanic
+eruption, and had as yet had no time to smooth down the sharpness of its
+original fissure; and nothing occurs to break the silence, except the
+trickling of a narrow brook, which just finds room to creep along the
+side of the road, the distant bleating of numberless adventurous goats,
+climbing over head from the mere love of peril, and the occasional echo
+of large stones disengaged by their leaps. One of these, of a size which
+would have shattered the carriage to pieces, came whirling and crashing
+down just in the direction which it had quitted. The whole spot, in
+short, is such as Tasso might have imagined to be the scene of Ismeno's
+incantation, and the congress of devils whom he convoked; and at a
+sudden turn of the road, the Chateau Negro peeps from between the
+opposite heights in such a new and striking position, as to seem,
+without much stretch of imagination, the abode of the wizard himself.
+After threading all the sharp angles of this savage pass, some of which
+are chiseled out to admit the road, the eye is at length relieved by a
+vista of sky, and the sight of the little town of Ollioules close at
+hand, sheltered in a grove of orange trees and olives, and just filling
+up the entrance of the pass. The view is completed by some singular
+gothic ruins to the right, and by the town of Six Fours in the distance,
+which is situated on such a commanding conical hill, that we mistook it
+for the citadel of Toulon. On emerging from the pass, we turned abruptly
+to the left, pursuing our route along the foot of the mountain barrier
+through whose bowels we had just penetrated, and which acts on the
+climate and productions of Toulon like a high south wall. Some corn was
+already reaped at Ollioules; and it may be said almost without
+exaggeration, that the two last miles of the road make a difference of
+at least a degree in latitude, if one could be allowed to judge by one's
+feelings. There is nothing remarkable in the situation of Toulon itself,
+which is flat and uninteresting; but the shores of the bay possess great
+beauty and variety, and the mountains which overhang the town are very
+bold in their outline. The bastides of the wealthy inhabitants are
+sprinkled along the foot and sides of this abrupt range, overlooking
+extensive views of the bay and its vicinity, and disposed with better
+taste and less encumbered with walls than those in the neighbourhood of
+Marseilles. Instead of a multitude of white spots, vying in numbers with
+the trees which surround them, the mansions of the Toulonais are placed
+just thickly enough to agreeably enliven the woods, pleasure grounds,
+and vineyards from which they peep at scattered and irregular distances.
+We found ourselves well accommodated at the Croix de Malte, situated in
+one of the best parts of the town, which although airy, neat, and well
+watered by little streams conducted through the streets, possesses no
+building or feature worth recollection, save its strong and regular
+fortifications.
+
+May 26.--A morning of very pleasant lounging, without any particular
+object. We rose at five, and not obtaining admission to the platform of
+the Fort du Malgue, walked about on the heights near it, which are
+situated on the south-east of the town, and form one of the best
+panoramic points in its vicinity. The mountain cape to the south, under
+which the entrance to the harbour winds, the distant islands of Hieres,
+and in a different direction, the town of Six Fours, are striking
+objects from this place. There is certainly more local propriety in this
+latter name, than in its more classical and ancient appellation, Sextii
+Forum, from which it has probably been corrupted in the derivation by
+some wag, for no one would suppose that such a situation afforded room
+to heat more than six ovens, or indeed bread to fill even one.
+
+The town of Hieres, seen at a distance in a contrary direction, appears
+to much more advantage. The nature of its soil is said to be peculiarly
+favourable to the growth of the orange and lemon trees, for which it is
+celebrated, but the climate can hardly exceed that of Toulon in
+mildness. We were particularly struck with the softness of the sea
+breeze during this morning's walk, and the vivid verdure of every thing
+around us, contrasting strongly with the dry and naturally sterile
+character of the immediate neighbourhood of Marseilles. The vegetable
+productions of the latter place seem wrung by the hand of industry from
+a rocky and hide-bound soil, whereas a walk near Toulon almost realizes
+the ideas of some favoured green spot in a tropical climate, where the
+sun has both soil and moisture to act upon. The pleasure of sitting down
+upon cushions of lavender and other aromatic plants, under myrtle hedges
+in flower, of gathering capers in their natural state, and tracing the
+most curious and rich varieties of our own wild and garden flowers, amid
+the infinite profusion of others which we could not name, may seem
+trifling to a scientific botanist, but is no small addition to the
+morning's walk of a plain traveller. A visit to the Jardin des Plantes
+will complete the illusion to the most critical eye: and the lovers of
+romance may fancy themselves at once in Juan Fernandez, or in the Isle
+of France, as they walk in the open air, under the shade of palm-trees,
+and seeing tea, coffee, guava fruit, and a hundred other exotic
+luxuries, growing in their natural state. This establishment, which we
+visited in the course of the day, appears a favourite walk of the
+inhabitants of Toulon, and is conducted in a manner which reflects the
+highest credit on their taste and liberality. The system of irrigation
+is well contrived, and the whole, from its variety and extent,
+interesting to the commonest observer.
+
+We were unsuccessful in our attempts to see the arsenal, the object best
+worth attention in Toulon; as it is open to none but naval officers,
+the very class of men, one would suppose, whose prying eyes it would be
+least desirable to admit. The young officer at the gate, however, was
+very pleasant and communicative, and conversed with us in excellent
+English; a language which he had partly acquired as a prisoner during
+the war, and partly by his education at the Marine School of this place,
+where our language is one of the first things taught. An inveterate John
+Bull might remark, "Ay, these fellows know they are sure to be made
+prisoners, if they fight with us; and that is the reason they take this
+precaution." Our English pride was certainly gratified this evening, but
+it was by the voluntary civility which we experienced during our walk
+from this young man and several others who had been prisoners in our
+country. It is peculiarly pleasing to find those who visited England
+under circumstances commonly the most unfavourable, expressing grateful
+recollections of their treatment, and ready to acknowledge them by
+little attentions. We found, indeed, nothing but friendly faces among
+that very class of people of whom we should have been most shy of making
+inquiries, and at the very place where we should have expected them to
+excite the least pleasant recollections. Two marines accosted us on the
+quay, to point out a sand-bank which the English had attempted to cut
+through during the siege of Toulon, in order to facilitate the entrance
+into the harbour; and on our inquiry whether they had penetrated as far
+as a station where we saw a 140 gun ship and some others laid up, they
+answered with a laugh, "Ah oui, Messieurs, ils etoient la, et encore
+plus loin, je vous en reponds."
+
+It were to be wished on many accounts, that the French government would
+keep their galley-slaves as much out of sight as they do their arsenal.
+Under the ancient regime, these unfortunate creatures were only employed
+in the works of the latter place, which they never left; but under the
+present system, those only who are condemned for life are so treated,
+and the rest are employed in different parts of the port, where they
+perform the work of horses, in the most public manner, chained by the
+leg in pairs. Some were drawing timber, and stone carts; and others,
+rather more favoured, were laying the pavement of the pier, with a
+single heavy iron link on one leg. How far economy may justify this
+arrangement, or whether the exposure of incorrigible offenders may
+answer as a public example, it is not for a mere visitor to determine;
+but certainly a plan more adapted to deaden and sear the sense of shame
+which may still remain in them, and brutalize their minds by constant
+irritation, can hardly be devised. The mildness and temper with which
+the guard and superintendants appear to behave is not likely to
+counteract sufficiently the effect of the constant gaze of passengers, a
+circumstance which to judge by one's own sensations must tend to stifle
+those feelings of repentance which solitary confinement naturally
+induces, and harden every manly particle of the mind into rebellion. It
+is hard to reproach them with the natural effects of this rough mode of
+regeneration; but I think I never saw a worse or more obdurate set of
+countenances. One fellow in particular, when civilly directed by the
+overseer to change the position of a stone, gave him a look of deadly
+malignity when his back was turned, which reminded me strongly of the
+look of Kemble in Zanga, while pronouncing the emphatic "Indeed!"
+Strange as it may appear, we were informed that there were several
+colonels, generals, priests, and men who could afford to spend 300
+francs a day, among this body. These contrive, it seems, by bribery, to
+procure more variety of food than the bread, soup, and vegetables, which
+are the regular allowance; and are permitted to purchase better linen
+than the ordinary convicts; but the dress and regulations are to outward
+appearance the same in all. Those condemned for military insubordination
+are marked by a bullet round their necks, and the convicts cast for life
+by a green cap. The individuals whose term of confinement is nearly
+expired wear only an iron ring round the ankle, as it is presumed they
+will not incur the penalty of fifty blows and three years additional
+confinement by an attempt to escape: there are others, however,
+sentenced for five, ten, fifteen, or twenty years, and these are heavily
+ironed and more strictly watched.
+
+A detachment of the celebrated Thibet goats, who are to make the fortune
+of the French shawl-manufacturers, is now in harbour, and others are
+performing quarantine at Marseilles. The specimen of their fleece which
+was shown us, resembles the coat of the musk ox. The wool of which the
+shawls are made grows at the roots of the longer hair, and is of a warm
+and delicately fine texture; a circumstance which should seem to prove
+these animals natives of the cold and mountainous districts of Thibet,
+and capable by dint of British skill and enterprise, of being
+naturalized in our own country.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XII.
+
+FREJUS--CANNES--ISLE OF ST. MARGUERITE--ANTIBES.
+
+
+MAY 27.--From Toulon to Puget les Crottes, 23 miles. On passing the
+small town of La Valette, from which the road to Hieres diverges, the
+mountain barrier under which Toulon is situated ends abruptly in a
+precipice, fortified by a strong redoubt. From this spot a detachment of
+the combined forces were driven by the republicans, who scaled the rock
+during the night at the most imminent risk; and the evacuation of Toulon
+was the ultimate consequence of this daring coup de main, in which
+Buonaparte is said to have first distinguished himself. After passing
+this point, and leaving on the right the distant hills of Hieres, no
+remarkable feature presents itself. The country is chiefly an extensive
+olive forest, varied by a few vineyards, and enlivened by hedges of
+pomegranate, and Spanish broom. We found Puget les Crottes but a bad
+exchange for the fountains, and clean airy streets of Toulon: and it
+better deserves the name of Puget le Crotte, by which it is laid down by
+some mistake in some maps. The inn was perfectly worthy of the place; a
+frowzy kennel of bustling Yahoos, totally deficient in that readiness
+and attention which can put a reasonable traveller in good humour with
+the worst accommodations. Our servant fought his way to the kitchen fire
+to execute our orders; finding them neither attended to by the old dame
+who presided in the kitchen, of whom Gil Blas's Leonarda was a faint
+type, nor by the maid who screamed rejoinders at the top of the stairs,
+to the ravings of her mistress at the bottom, in a tone that deafened
+us. The arrival of the Draguignan diligence, which we had passed on the
+road, heavily laden with money and passengers, and travelling at a foot
+pace, escorted like a condemned cart by two gens d'armes, accounted for
+this mighty sensation. We were glad enough to escape from the din of
+tongues and the steams of garlic, and resume our road, which did not
+offer any variety, till we had nearly reached La Luc, 17 miles from
+Puget, whose situation and red sandy soil reminded us of a Herefordshire
+glen. The junction of two main roads has created a tolerable inn at this
+small place, which may with safety be recommended to persons on an
+abstemious regimen, and to none else.
+
+May 28.--To La Muy 19 miles, without any remarkable feature, though the
+character of the country is rather pleasing. La Muy is a wretched
+village, whose _tout ensemble_ is completed by a ruinous house of the
+Count de Muy: this, as well as his castle at Grignan, was destroyed in
+the Revolution, and the annexed property alienated from him. To Frejus
+12 miles: the few last of which improve as to scenery. We saw cork trees
+for the first time, and a profusion of myrtle in hedges and bushes.
+There is something peculiarly stagnant and wo-begone in the appearance
+of Frejus, which, however, is in more strict poetical character with its
+Roman ruins, than the populous and wealthy streets of Nismes would be.
+The inn where we dined and slept preserved the same character most
+rigidly; indeed, Madame, whose ideas seemed perfectly in unison with
+those of mine hostess of La Luc, wished apparently that our feast at
+Forum Julii should be entirely intellectual, and that we should rise
+from dinner with unclouded heads, to enjoy a walk among its antiquities.
+We were really diverted by the formal parsimony with which the good
+woman had contrived to invent a dinner for four, out of what would have
+hardly have sufficed as a whet to an English farmer. Were I blest with
+the culinary accuracy of the facetious Christopher North, or his friend
+Dr. Morris, I could better record a bill of fare which would form a
+complete contrast to the vaunted luxuries of their inspiring deity, Mr.
+Oman of Edinburgh. Suffice it, as a specimen, that three pettitoes of
+an unfortunate roasting-pig, or rather pigling, which I fear must have
+died a natural death, formed the most substantial part of our repast.
+
+The amphitheatre of Frejus, to pass to a more dignified subject, is
+situated without the walls of the town, on the side by which we had
+entered from Toulon; and is sufficiently perfect to be interesting,
+though it must suffer by a comparison with the better known, and finer
+specimens of the same sort which exist. There is also a temple, and an
+arch, the latter known by the name of the Porte Doree, neither of which
+possesses any thing remarkable when compared with the ruins of Nismes
+and Orange. The aqueduct built by Vespasian, and situated to the
+north-east of the town, is on a more extensive scale, and taken with its
+concomitants, better merits the attention of a painter: even when viewed
+from under the walls of Frejus, which it adjoins at one end, it
+possesses as sombre a character of repose as Poussin could have wished,
+and which is unbroken by the intervention of mean houses, and busy
+figures. Its scattered groupes recede from the eye up a solitary valley,
+interspersed with clumps of olive trees, and backed by pine forests, and
+the foreground derives a degree of wildness from the profusion of
+Spanish broom of an unusual size and beauty, with which its scattered
+blocks are fringed. We walked also to the small village of St. Raphael,
+a mile or two from the town, which is the modern port of Frejus, and
+stands in what was formerly the main sea; while the Pharos which marked
+the entrance of the ancient harbour is now surrounded by an alluvial
+meadow, and in place of the numerous vessels which must have crowded the
+ancient quay, a brig, and two or three feluccas, were quietly at anchor.
+A change like this, of the very soil, and local features, speaks more
+strongly to the imagination than the most mighty and extensive ruins.
+
+29th.--We rose at a very early hour to pursue our route,
+
+    ----for our sleep
+    Was airy light, from pure digestion bred,
+    And temperate vapours bland,
+
+thanks to the precautions of mine hostess of the Chapeau Rouge: the
+first part of our road lay almost parallel with the line of ruins,
+marking the course of the aqueduct, and afforded a more just idea of its
+extent and size than the view which we had taken before. To judge from
+the scattered groupes of arches, it must have extended as far as the
+hills bounding the bay of Napoule, up whose sides we began to wind, at
+the distance of about two miles from Frejus, and continued to ascend for
+six more. This morning's drive was agreeable enough from its novelty, so
+little reminding us of the usual features of France. The bold and
+sombre character of its fine woods, undiversified save by an occasional
+patch of cultivation, or a solitary hut, and swept by bodies of clouds
+in their progress from the Mediterranean, reminded us more of the
+descriptions of Norwegian forests, and of the mountains haunted by the
+Wild Huntsman, than of Provencal scenery. The enormous extent of these
+forests has not, as may well be supposed, improved the state of society.
+About fifteen years ago a banditti, composed of deserters, and of the
+peasantry of the country, and regularly organized, held them for a
+length of time, and defied the efforts of a numerous body of
+gend'armerie sent to subdue them. We observed also the traces of a wider
+spread conflagration, which we understood to have caused damage to the
+amount of a million of francs, and the perpetrators of which had equally
+escaped detection: it had made but a small comparative gap in these
+immense tracts of wood.
+
+Soon after passing the post-house of Estrelles, situated on the summit
+of the mountain, the view which opens on the other side becomes
+strikingly fine, and extensive. The shores of the bay of Napoule,
+beautifully wooded and interspersed with white villas, lie under foot in
+a complete bird's-eye view, backed by the sweeping mountains of the
+neighbourhood of Grasse, and terminated by the cape where Antibes
+stands. Farther still the back-ground is surmounted by the colossal
+groups of the Maritime Alps. The descent from this hill to level ground
+is about seven miles of road as excellent as the former part of the
+stage; the whole having been very much improved by Buonaparte; and
+although the distance from Frejus to Cannes cannot be less than
+twenty-eight miles, it appears to occupy a shorter space of time than
+many much shorter stages.
+
+A nearer approach to Cannes in no way disappointed us: the bay of
+Napoule, in the centre of which it is situated, presents, in different
+points of view, every variety of Italian scenery; and there may be
+conjectures less probable than that it was called originally by mariners
+the bay of Napoli, from some fancied likeness. To the latter celebrated
+spot it bears somewhat of a resemblance, but a stronger still to the
+Porto Venere, or bay of Spezia, both in the wilder and the softer part
+of its features; and the illusion is kept up by the grouping and form of
+the houses, and the Italian patois of the inhabitants, who are mostly a
+colony of Genoese fishermen. Nor ought the Hotel des Trois Pigeons to be
+forgotten, though its cleanliness and comfort, and the cheerful alacrity
+of its inmates, remind the traveller more of some quiet country inn on
+the Devon or Somerset coast, than of any thing Italian or French. It
+stands on a little rock just out of the town, looking on the sea, and
+facing the island of St. Marguerite; and there is perhaps no scene in
+which more historical recollections are combined under one point of
+view, than that which its windows command. The island, whose garrison
+and buildings are distinguishable by the naked eye, was for many years
+the prison of the mysterious Masque de Fer, whose identity, like that of
+Junius, has hitherto baffled conjecture. In the room where we were
+sitting Murat passed some of the time intervening between his expulsion
+from Naples, and the crisis of his fate; and on the sands about half a
+mile to the left, is the spot where Buonaparte first landed from Elba,
+and bivouacked during the night, surrounded by numbers whom curiosity
+had drawn out of the town to behold him. There is perhaps something
+characteristic of the different fortunes of this singular man, in the
+place from which he had embarked for Elba a year before, and in that
+where he first set foot on his return, full of hope and confidence. The
+former was Frejus, a place dreary and comfortless, surrounded by
+memorials of departed greatness, shrunk within a small part of its
+former limits, and deserted by the very sea, and it might have been
+mercifully chosen on purpose as the scene of his exit, in order to blunt
+his regret at leaving France. The latter was Cannes, a place,[52] as I
+have fully described it, full of cheerfulness, beauty, and rich distant
+prospects, corresponding almost in brilliancy to those which his mind
+was forming at the time.
+
+[Footnote 52: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+Far different must have been the feelings of Murat during the anxious
+interval of forced leisure which he spent at this place; and I will
+confess, that while listening to the landlord's simple account of the
+manner in which he passed his time, we forgot the massacre of Madrid in
+the well-known anecdote of the drowning officer's rescue. During the
+first eight days he remained shut up in the bed-room or sitting-room
+which we occupied, in expectation of despatches from Buonaparte, to whom
+he wrote on his arrival at Cannes. At the end of this time, having
+received no answer, he used to beguile his impatience by rambling on the
+sea shore, or watching the sports of the peasants, till at length,
+evidently heart-sick and desperate, he set out for Toulon on the rash
+expedition which closed his career. "Toujours, toujours, il avoit la
+mine triste.--Ah! si vous l'aviez connu, vous auriez pleure son sort--il
+etoit un si bel homme!--d'une taille superbe!" said our honest host,
+whose knowledge of Murat was probably confined to his soldier-like
+figure, and his desolate state: he could have been no judge of the small
+extent of Buonaparte's obligations to his brother-in-law, whose former
+defection was but repaid in kind. He pointed out a green spot under the
+walls of an old castle which overlooked the inn, where he had frequently
+observed Murat lying with his face concealed in his hands, or in his
+more cheerful moments, watching the dances of the country people who
+resorted thither, and whose sports seemed to interest him considerably.
+It would be a task for the hand of a master poet or painter, to describe
+an ambitious and desperate man, softened for a time by disappointment,
+overleaping in thought the immeasurable distance between his present and
+his former self, and contemplating the sports of his youth with a sort
+of melancholy pleasure, yet under the influence of the strong fatality
+which hurried him to his end. It is by mixing somewhat of this feeling
+in the character of Macbeth, that Shakspeare has excited a momentary
+interest even for a murderer and usurper, who perceives "his life fallen
+into the sere and yellow leaf," and pauses for a moment in melancholy
+reflection as he rushes to "die with harness on his back."
+
+    "Out, out, brief, candle," &c.
+
+Having spent an hour among the sunny basking places which abound in the
+rocks of this place, we hired a fishing-boat to convey us to the island
+of St. Marguerite. It was impossible to help being diverted by the
+uncouth appearance of our new conductors, which was two or three
+degrees wilder than that of poor Murat's amphibious subjects: one fellow
+in particular, was
+
+      "A man,
+    Cast in the roughest mould Dame Nature boasts,
+    With back much broader than a dripping pan,
+    And legs as thick about the calves as posts,"[53]
+
+or indeed thicker, and tanned a bright copper colour by sun and salt
+water; his broad face grinning with good humour, from beneath a mane as
+shaggy as a lion's. It may be supposed that two or three such rowers,
+proud of the new honour of officiating in a pleasure-boat, got us on
+more quickly than the less athletic boatmen of show lakes, and we soon
+landed at the small fort which was the object of our pursuit, and which
+the commandant politely allowed us to explore. At its eastern extremity
+is situated a guard-house, a chamber of which on the ground floor served
+as the prison of the mysterious captive; it is airy and commodious
+enough, in comparison with places of the sort in general; but the height
+of its only window, strengthened by treble bars from the sea, and the
+perpendicular cliff which it overhangs, with the dangerous breach under
+it, are sufficient protections against any escape. For the last five
+years no persons have been confined in this fort, which was formerly
+used exclusively as a state prison, but in the Revolution its benefits
+were extended to persons of all ranks. Restraint, indeed, is not at
+present the order of the day within its precincts, to judge from
+appearances. The soldiers seemed to have little or nothing to do, but to
+flirt with two or three gaudily-dressed negresses, who showed their
+white teeth and their black muzzles from the doors of the casernes, and
+to laugh at the chaplain of the garrison, for such I conclude was the
+grade of the old priest, who met us, toddling about in a state of
+drunken fatuity, very much resembling the condition of Obadiah in the
+Committee, with a nose exhibiting the visible effects of a fight or a
+fall. Having escaped at last from the good man's persecuting attentions,
+we got back to Cannes in time to make a sketch from the precise spot
+where Buonaparte landed.[54]
+
+[Footnote 53: See Colman.]
+
+[Footnote 54: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+May 30.--From Cannes to Antibes eleven miles; a pleasant drive, chiefly
+running close to the sea. Though considerably flattered in Vernet's
+beautiful picture at the Louvre, Antibes, nevertheless, leaves a
+pleasing impression on the mind, from its airy, well-frequented,
+prosperous appearance, and the bustle arising from the presence of a
+garrison. Its inner harbour, and the neck of land which defends it,
+terminated by a little picturesque fort, seem beautifully constructed by
+nature for their respective purposes; but I do not know of any thing
+else meriting notice.
+
+
+
+
+CHAP. XIII.
+
+NICE--COL DE TENDE--CONCLUSION.
+
+
+FROM Antibes to Nice, sixteen miles, along a beautiful sweep of coast,
+the whole extent of which, crowned by the gigantic chain of Maritime
+Alps, lies in full view for the whole way. No sketch, much less any
+description, can give an idea of the combined effect of this extensive
+bay, or the air of cheerfulness spread over the whole; among all the
+celebrated first views of Italy, there are probably few which speak to
+the imagination in a more imposing as well as pleasing manner. We
+crossed the frontier by a long wooden bridge over the Var, a broad, wild
+stream, roaring down with violence after the storm of the preceding
+night. We were immediately struck with the different culture of the
+vines, festooning as near Naples, over the other trees, in a manner more
+picturesque than useful. The straw hats of the Nissardes, also
+resembling an inverted wicker corn basket, gave quite a new and
+laughable character to the human apex. Such little novelties as this,
+which would excite no more attention in a professed book of costumes,
+than a view into an old fancy clothes shop, are nevertheless recollected
+with interest when seen in travelling, as connected with particular
+trains of thought or association, which they preserve fresh in the mind;
+and to forget these extraordinary potlids of straw, and the fanciful
+little red toques occasionally substituted for them, would be to forget
+an important feature of the Italian frontier.
+
+Much as I had heard of Nice, I was not disappointed either in the first
+view, or in the nearer survey of it. The situation of its ruined citadel
+on a commanding and insulated rock, and its narrow valley of almost
+tropical richness, surrounded by tier above tier of mountains, and
+studded with villas and orange-groves, present every variety of beauty;
+and there is a stateliness of proportion, and a careless elegance in its
+white houses, and an airiness in their situation, which very much remind
+the eye of the best parts of Naples near the Chiaja and Villa Real. The
+first glance of Nice, in short, bespeaks a higher and more fashionable
+tone of society than that of any French town, excepting Paris, through
+which we had passed. It is impossible, nevertheless, for a person
+looking beyond the mere amusement of the moment, to banish a certain
+train of morbid ideas which connect themselves with the sight of this
+beautiful town. There are few persons perhaps moving in good English
+society, whose ears do not familiarly recognise the hopeless phrase of
+"being sent to die at Nice," and many have watched the departure of the
+wrecks of what was once health, strength, and beauty, consigned to this
+painted sepulchre with the certainty of never returning from it. Thus
+the very efficacy of the air of Nice, which has brought it into vogue
+when all other resources have failed, has inseparably connected it in
+the mind with despondency and decay. If such ideas occurred to us, they
+were certainly not removed by the sight of a funeral which past the
+windows of the inn, within an hour or two after our arrival; the corpse
+laid on an open bier, the hands crossed, and ornamented with flowers,
+and the monks and attendants all joining in a solemn chant. A bell was
+also tolling in another quarter, the signal that a man just condemned to
+the galleys was passing in procession through the town, as is customary.
+
+    "But let the stricken deer go weep,
+    The hart ungalled play."
+
+The English dance and dress during an assize week, and the lively
+Nissards, more naturally still, enjoy their fine climate, and elegant
+town, without entering into the gloomy reflections which haunt the mind
+of an Englishman on his arrival. The cafes and public walks were
+swarming with company, and the whole place appeared to take its tone of
+gaiety from the gaudy young officers, whose troops were quartered in the
+extensive barracks; the peasants were dancing their grand round on the
+quay, or fighting between jest and earnest with open hands; the native
+dandies managed their green fans with the same adroitness as their fair
+companions; the shops displayed every luxury and accommodation; and
+every thing, in short, savoured of the habits of a continental
+Cheltenham.
+
+The Hotel des Etrangers, where we established ourselves, is somewhat
+high in its charges, but proportionably good, and possesses a delightful
+garden of orange-trees adjoining. After being kept awake by mosquitos,
+which seem more prevalent than at Marseilles, and whose little angry
+note of preparation had apprized us of an attack, we walked in the
+morning to the citadel hill, whose solid masses of ruin had attracted
+our notice on the first view of the town. This point affords the best
+general idea of Nice and its vicinity, though in the month of May, it is
+not attained without a roasting walk. The heat indeed was tremendous, as
+may be expected in a triangular tongue of land only a few miles in
+extent, and encircled by lofty mountains; and the mildness of the
+climate in winter, as we were informed, bears a full proportion to its
+oppressiveness in summer. Green peas are to be had all the year:
+mulberries and gourds were already ripe, and every garden was a wood of
+the finest orange and lemon-trees loaded with ripe fruit. The
+thermometer too is seldom or never lower than 55 in the depth of winter.
+At the foot of the citadel hill is a road blasted out of the solid rock,
+running along the edge of the sea, and connecting Nice with its port;
+along which we walked towards the afternoon. I should be inclined to
+remark this spot, near which is an esplanade of good houses, as the most
+sheltered and desirable quarter of Nice. The breeze, which had begun to
+freshen, was just perceptible where we stood, though its effects in the
+open sea were visible by the plunging of the waves under our feet; and
+it appears hardly possible for any but a south or south-west wind to get
+at this point. Whether or not the part of Nice north of the citadel be
+equally calculated for an invalid, I should doubt. The mountain gully
+running up towards Escarene may possibly bring down searching winds from
+the north-east; and on the whole the marine esplanade seems to afford a
+situation cooler in summer, and warmer in winter, than the interior of
+the town.
+
+Such as are tolerably active pedestrians will find themselves well
+repaid for an evening's toilsome walk to the height which divides Nice
+from Ville Franche, and whose situation is marked by a small fort.[55]
+
+[Footnote 55: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+From hence the view to the west is very wide, including nearly the route
+of the two preceding days. Towards the east it is less extensive, but
+more striking. The town of Ville Franche, and the beautiful little basin
+which forms its port, appear as completely under the feet, as if you
+could leap over them to the opposite side of the water; and the headland
+between that town and Monaco, up and down which the road to Savona is
+seen meandering, is more boldly defined and on a larger scale than that
+of Lulworth Cove, and though strongly resembling it possesses greater
+beauty and variety.
+
+One of Buonaparte's projects was to render the Corniche, as this giddy
+track is expressively called, practicable for carriages; but the
+Sardinian government, instead of completing, have defaced (as we heard,
+out of jealousy) the part which he had begun: this is, I think, rather
+too absurd for belief. It is at the same time probable enough, that the
+undertaking has been abandoned for want of adequate funds. We were
+lighted homewards by myriads of fire-flies, a circumstance which
+produces on a person unaccustomed to the sight, a more novel and
+brilliant effect than any other accompaniment of an Italian climate.
+
+June 2.--Our original idea had been to have proceeded to Genoa either by
+a felucca or the Corniche, but learning that the latter route was
+impracticable, excepting on mules, and that the variable nature of the
+wind on this coast rendered feluccas a dangerous and uncertain mode of
+performing the journey, we preferred the road into Italy by the Col di
+Tende.
+
+To Escarene twelve miles: the first four skirt along the beautiful
+valley at whose mouth Nice stands, following, and sometimes crossing,
+the course of the river Poglion; the rest gradually winds up into the
+heart of the mountains, through deep ravines and woods of gigantic
+olives, which in this district become picturesque forest-trees. We
+breakfasted at Escarene, a quiet pretty village, possessing tolerable
+accommodation. To Sospello fifteen miles of good road, the first seven
+or eight of which ascend the lofty wall of mountain which closes up the
+entrance of the valley, and appears at a distance like a score of
+corkscrews laid in a Vandyke figure. Up the whole of this we walked,
+mounting, by an easy but tedious circuit of good road, a long series of
+crags, and courses of torrents, and sometimes looking almost
+perpendicularly down upon the point which we had passed half an hour
+ago. Nothing can be more bare or desolate than the rocky mountain ridge
+in which this ascent terminates, and on which vegetation seems at its
+last gasp. A dance of Satyrs might be appropriately introduced to
+complete the wildness of a sketch from this spot, but that it does not
+afford a single berry or blade of grass to regale them, even if they
+could live like their cousins the goats. A large family of peasants, as
+wild and merry as these "hairy sylvans," accompanied us up the mountain
+with their cattle, on their way to the summer chalets, exhibiting the
+laughing side of human nature in a manner which it is delightful to
+witness in the poor.
+
+"Pleased with a feather, tickled with a straw,"
+
+and grateful for the slightest civility, they seemed to consider the
+mere change of place as a festival. The wife had twitched off her
+husband's cocked hat, which she wore in frolic; the bare-legged children
+appeared ready to dance to their own voices as they walked; and the very
+infant, committed in his cradle to the entire discretion of the family
+donkey, was equally pleased and satisfied with his own situation, as he
+headed the patriarchal cavalcade.
+
+The view of the Mediterranean and the coast of France, which this point
+commands, is prodigious; and the intermediate ranges of mountains which
+shut out Nice, and which appeared elevated peaks when seen from its
+citadel, seem from this spot only masses of wavy ground. From hence a
+descent much steeper than the ascent and almost equally long, conducted
+us into the rich and well-inhabited valley in which Sospello stands. The
+inn at this place is rather below mediocrity; the mistress sturdy and
+rapacious in her demands, and shameless in retracting them when forced
+to do so.
+
+From the valley of Sospello, which appears as completely insulated by
+nature from the society of the world as Rasselas's happy valley, we
+wound next morning up another eight miles of ascent as steep and tedious
+as the last. On a wild heath between the tops of two mountains called
+the Col de Brouais, in which this ascent terminated, we unexpectedly
+discovered a hut tenanted by an old gend'arme, a pet lamb, a kid, and
+two tame hares, to all which quadrupeds we were introduced by the master
+with great glee, while waiting for the carriage under his roof. We were
+so much pleased and diverted by the whimsical manner in which this merry
+contented mortal lived among his menagerie, that we sent the horses on
+to Breglio, and complied with his eager desire of entertaining us at his
+cabaret, if a hut the size of a tea-caddy, without another human
+habitation visible for four miles, could be so called. He produced, to
+our surprise, bread, milk, cheese, fresh curd, eggs, fruit, and
+preserves, all clean and neatly served, and was equally surprised at our
+giving him two francs a head, which tender he at first remonstrated
+against with great naivete as too extravagant. The trouble which he had
+taken in fetching most of these articles from a distance of five miles
+appeared not to enter into this honest fellow's calculation. The French
+were encamped in some force on the Col de Brouais at the time of the
+session of the Comtat of Nice and of Savoy by the king of Sardinia in
+1796. It was, also, about four years previous to our visit, infested by
+a band of robbers, to whom its lofty situation afforded great
+facilities: these were, however, swept off and conveyed to the galleys
+by the exertions of the mountain patrole, of whom our host was one, and
+the whole of the country is now perfectly safe and undisturbed. After
+contemplating for a short time the principal summit of the Col de Tende,
+which from this point appears at its full height, we dived into the
+intervening valley of Breglio by a rapid descent, like the road into a
+mine. The trout stream, which runs past this place in its way to
+Vintimiglia, is such as would cause a traveller fond of fishing, to
+regret the want of his rod and tackle. After leaving Breglio we ascended
+the course of this river till it narrowed into a defile between two
+rocks; on entering which the town of Saorgio appears, after a mile or
+two, piled on the top and shelving side of the precipice to the right in
+a singular manner. The architect who planned it must have taken his idea
+from a colony of swallows' nests in a sand-rock, for it seems hardly
+possible to get to or from it without wings: to judge of it from the
+road, there is no room or footing for streets; a man might jump down the
+chimney of his neighbour's house, or be dashed to pieces on its roof, by
+leaping from his own ground floor; and the fall of a house in the upper
+tier would probably open a clear downward passage to the valley. A
+traveller desirous of making a sketch of what is an unique thing in its
+way, would do well to get three hours start of his carriage from
+Breglio,[56] and scramble among the heights to the right of the river,
+for a point which gives a more accurate idea of Saorgio than we could
+obtain from the valley. The view is attempted in aquatinta in Beaumont's
+Maritime Alps, and badly as it is executed, the original drawing must
+have been good, and, as far as I can judge, have given an accurate idea
+of it. The peasants call the place by some name sounding in their patois
+like Chavousse; it cannot, however, be mistaken. This is the only spot
+between Breglio and Tende which would be adapted for a drawing; but the
+scenery, nevertheless, is of the most stupendous and extraordinary
+nature I ever witnessed, exceeding, on the whole, the defile of Gondo
+and Iselle in the route of the Simplon, and more decided, though less
+varied in its features, than that justly admired spot. The pass is not
+on a larger scale than the Val d'Ollioules, as far as Saorgio; but after
+leaving the latter village, the rocks rise to a much greater height, and
+assume a more savage character. It is impossible to form an adequate
+idea of the depth of the defile and its effect on the eye, without
+actual inspection; the nearest approach to it will be made by conceiving
+a chasm rent from top to bottom by an earthquake through Snowdon, or
+any other mountain of similar height. For about twelve miles you travel
+in the condition of those fabled criminals,
+
+    "Quos super atra silex jamjam lapsura, cadentique
+    Imminet assimilis."
+
+[Footnote 56: There is, I believe, no inn at Saorgio.]
+
+Jutting rocks, whose gradual change of posture is marked by the
+inclination of the pines on them, hang toppling over your head at a
+height to which the strongest voice could not be heard from the valley;
+and above and between them just peep glimpses of still more elevated
+heights, where a tree appears hardly of the size of a pin's head. A
+peculiar gray, sombre atmosphere overspreads the whole at noon day,
+similar to that which prevails during a solar eclipse; and the deep echo
+of the river is the only sound heard for miles. On the whole, I never
+saw any place so calculated to convey gloomy and wild ideas, and the
+Sicilian name of "Val Demone," or John Bunyan's "Valley of the Shadow of
+Death," would be appropriately applied to this savage spot. Nor would
+the danger be imaginary at the breaking up of a frost, or after violent
+rains, which might bring one of the highest rocks perpendicularly down
+without the intervention of a single crag to give warning and break its
+fall. The visible rents made in the road from time to time, and the
+obstructions in the deep bed of the stream, show sufficient marks of
+these formidable incursions. In one place the valley originally
+afforded only a passage for the river, and the road has been cut and
+blasted along the cheek of the rock: Close to this spot an inscription
+on the stone informs you that this road was the work of the late king of
+Sardinia; and he had in truth a right to be proud of such an
+undertaking. The whole road from Nice to Turin is admirable, presenting
+hardly a single mauvais pas. The natural difficulties which the
+construction of the road presents have been surmounted in a manner which
+might be a study to a civil engineer, and the whole is, perhaps, as fine
+a specimen of labour and skill as Buonaparte's route over Mont Cenis or
+the Simplon. The natural features of its wilder parts resemble those in
+the pictures of Salvator Rosa, but on a larger scale than he ever
+attempted to give an idea of.
+
+Within a mile or two of Tende,[57] the chasm in the rocks (for it was no
+more) widens into a small narrow valley of a peculiarly quiet character,
+in which the monastery of St. Gervase occupies one of those retired
+green spots which prove so well the good taste of the monks of old. A
+turn which this valley takes to the left affords the view, first, of the
+old castle of Tende, looking quite ghastly in the dusk of evening, and
+next of the town of Tende itself, which stands piled like Saorgio,
+against the shelving side of the valley. Tende is a large and
+apparently flourishing town, affording two inns of very respectable
+appearance. The Albergo Imperiale is high in its charges, but makes
+amends for it by the liberality and comfort of its appointments. It
+fronts one of the principal peaks which form the chain of the Col di
+Tende, which we contemplated as it caught the last rays of the evening
+sun, forming different guesses how we were to get up it.
+
+[Footnote 57: Vide Cooke's Views.]
+
+June 4.--From Tende to Limone 15 miles. We left Tende at a quarter
+before four: after twisting and re-twisting for about an hour and a half
+among narrow defiles, through which the first part of the rise is
+gradually conducted, we reached a mountain valley at a high level above
+the sea, closed at the opposite end by the main ridge of the Col di
+Tende. Here the chief ascent commences, in a regular zigzag up a jutting
+shoulder of the mountain. The road is wide and good, and free from
+ravine or precipice; but from its continual turns, (of which I counted
+not less than sixty-five) is difficult and embarrassing to any but a
+crane-necked carriage; though in no place could an overturn produce
+worse consequence than a roll of a few yards. The distance may be
+abridged on foot, either by crossing the zig-zags, or by taking the
+summer path to the right through a fine range of Alpine pasture, which
+exhibits a profusion of hardy flowers growing up to the edge of the
+snow-drifts: amongst many others, whose names were unknown to us, we
+observed blue and yellow crocusses, hearts-ease, oxlips, cowslips,
+primroses, and two sorts of gentianella. In this direction the road
+cannot be missed to the turf cabaret which stands on the sharp edge of
+the mountain. It is curious to look back a moment from this elevated
+spot down the narrow valley behind you, and observe the road curling
+from below your feet into blue distance, like the coils of an
+immeasurable white snake.
+
+At this fine season of the year, it exhibits a busy scene of passengers
+and loaded strings of mules, toiling up in your rear, or lessening in
+the perspective till hardly visible at the bottom of the ascent. The
+site of the cabaret borders on the line of perpetual snow, and though
+inferior in height to the crest of the Simplon road, stands in a
+situation, I should conceive, much more exposed to the effects of sudden
+hurricanes and snow storms. The road appears to be commanded by no spot
+where avalanches could accumulate, as on the precipice where you first
+overlook Brieg, and must, therefore, during the winter, be rather
+difficult than dangerous. On the other hand, no mountains intervene on
+the Turin side, to blunt the edge of the north winds from the Savoy
+Alps; and in the direction of Nice, the south-west winds must be
+concentrated and driven up the mountain avenue of Tende with the roar of
+artillery. I can, therefore, easily credit Beaumont's account, that
+many mules are annually lost in consequence of the tempestuous weather
+on the Col. We did not, however, taste any of the mule-hams at the
+cabaret, which, according to that writer, are afforded to the frugal
+natives by these casualties, but contented ourselves with a spoonful of
+brandy, and a taste of their good brown bread. Had our stomachs been
+desperate, other refreshments, I believe, were to be had.
+
+The view to the north from this "raw and gusty" ridge affords a more
+striking idea of height and space combined, than any other prospect with
+which I am acquainted; though not on the whole so imposing as the first
+glimpse of the Swiss side of the Simplon. The eye is carried directly
+over two or three lower peaks of the Col, grinning with snow drifts, to
+the great range of Alps south-west of Mont Cenis, which appear hanging
+in mid air like the domains of a cloud-king; their jagged and glittering
+tops distinctly defined, but their bases melting into the hazy abyss
+which the plain of Piedmont presents.
+
+As far as I can estimate, we were about five hours in performing the
+ascent from Tende. Two more hours took us to Limone, at a jog trot, down
+a zigzag road, less abrupt in its turns than that on the other side. At
+Limone the post-road to Turin begins. The post-house is a tolerably good
+inn: the douaniers, the most troublesome we had yet met with, refusing
+to compound for the customary donation, and asking for money when their
+search was ended. We had, therefore, the sweet revenge of first watching
+them as pick-pockets, and next refusing them as beggars.
+
+To Coni fifteen miles; the first seven or eight through a beautiful
+valley fringed with chestnut woods; every thing, however, appeared
+diminutive, as our eyes had not yet recovered the strain which the
+enormous scenery of the Col had occasioned. In this fine open valley,
+goitres abound as much as near Sion; this malady, therefore, cannot be
+attributed, as some think, to the stagnation of air.
+
+Coni, a neat arcaded town, deserves mention for the beauty of its
+situation, and the fine Alpine panorama which it commands. The
+glittering pinnacle of Monte Viso, is the most striking feature through
+this and the following day's journey.
+
+June 5.--Breakfasted at Savigliano, a large flourishing town; slept at
+Carignan, and reached Turin to breakfast next day.
+
+June 6.--The best of Turin is seen in the general survey of the town and
+its princely environs, particularly on the Moncaliere side. Our
+principal amusement was derived from Zuchelli's masterly performance at
+the Opera Buffa. The plot of the piece turned partly on the
+discomfitures and discontents of a supercilious English dandy, which
+part this singer performed with an immoveable countenance, which kept us
+in a roar of laughter, his grave rich toned bass voice giving a double
+effect to the solemn absurdity of the character. For the sake of
+avoiding open offence to our countrymen, the hero was styled a Danish
+count; but the portrait was perfect to the very tail of the coat, and
+could not be mistaken, and the countenances of some of his prototypes in
+the next box showed, that the satire, fair and gentlemanly as it was,
+cut deeper than the awkward puppet-show of "Les Anglaises pour rire."
+The Neapolitan character was handled more unmercifully in the part of a
+guttling, fulsome old coxcomb, as cowardly as the Dane was quarrelsome.
+
+Milan, its inimitable cathedral, and its other curiosities, have, I am
+aware, been well-trodden ground for some years. No one, however, appears
+to notice the courier's little spaniel in the Archduke Rainier's hall,
+who has watched for his master's return from Russia more than a year
+without stirring from his mat, and whom the good-natured Viceroy feeds
+and protects without allowing him to be disturbed. I hope he will find a
+place in some future animal biography, for the credit of his species. As
+to the splendid Fete Dieu, which we just arrived in time to witness,
+with its military, civil, and ecclesiastical pageantry,--the beggar-boys
+plucking the guttering wax from the long tapers of the priests, and the
+priests occasionally singeing their noses in return, I could no more
+undertake to describe, than to sort a bag of gaudy feathers of different
+birds.
+
+The best companion over the Simplon with which I am acquainted, is a
+little French tract, written, I think, by a M. Mallet, and touching
+slightly, but sufficiently, on all subjects of interest connected with
+that stupendous route. The short account which it gives of the life of
+Cardinal Borromeo may be read through while walking up the hill of Arona
+to visit his colossal statue, which deserves a higher rank than perhaps
+it holds, either as a work of art or an achievement of labour. The
+attitude of the figure is easy and graceful, and the artist has managed
+the flowing cardinal's robe with great taste. There is also an
+expression of benevolence and majesty in the countenance and extended
+hand, suitable to one's conceptions of this apostolic character, who
+seems looking and waving a blessing on his native Arona. The height of
+the figure and pedestal is stated at 104 feet; but the effect of its
+grace and proportion renders this difficult of belief, until you look
+back at the distance of two miles on the road to Baveno, and see it like
+a walking giant overtopping the neighbouring woods by more than the head
+and shoulders.
+
+With this noble statue ends my admiration of Borromean taste: for it is
+not to be borne that the Isola Bella, which nature intended as a central
+finish to such a fairy land as the Lago Maggiore, should have been
+tortured into a piece of confectionary less elegant than the good taste
+of Gunter or Grange would have devised as the centre of a bowl of lemon
+cream. The Isola Madre, it is true, is beautiful; for no Italian
+landscape gardener has yet assailed it with his line and rule.
+
+Our welcome into Switzerland was novel, but pleasing to lovers of
+animals. Several herds of cattle met us on our road to Brieg,
+accompanying their masters to the mountain chalets, and fairly beset us
+with their attentions. The cows crowded and shouldered each other to be
+scratched; one large goat; slipping under their legs, put her head under
+my arm, and took my hand in her mouth; and a whole flock of sheep turned
+round and ran after us in order to obtain more notice. I had no idea
+before that any animal but the dog might be tamed to such a degree of
+instinctive tact, as to perceive whether or not its caresses will be
+acceptable to a stranger; and I am convinced, that the celebrated Ritson
+might have made more converts to his Braminical system by importing and
+exhibiting a Swiss flock, than by writing a book against animal food,
+and classing eggs as a vegetable succedaneum.
+
+It would be as superfluous to describe the well-known ground of
+Switzerland, as that of Cumberland; and indeed when once within sight of
+Geneva, one is almost at home. One and one only stage seems to remain,
+more desirable still.
+
+    "Cum peregrino,
+    Labore fossi venimus larem ad nostram,
+    Desideratoque acquiescimus lecto."
+
+
+
+THE END.
+
+* * *
+
+
+
+
+BOOKS PUBLISHED
+
+BY
+
+JAMES CAWTHORN, COCKSPUR STREET.
+
+
+ITINERARY OF PROVENCE AND THE RHONE, made during the Year 1819, By JOHN
+HUGHES, A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford: Illustrated by the following
+Views, engraved in the line manner from Drawings by Dewint, by W.B.
+Cooke, G. Cook, and J.C. Allen. Royal Quarto or Imperial Octavo. Isle of
+St. Marguerite, the Prison of the Masque de Fer--Chateau
+Rochepot--Lyons--Lyons Cathedral--Mont Blanc from a height above
+Lyons--Tower of Mauconseil, Vienne--Chateau La Serve--Valence and
+Dauphine Mountains--Montelimart--Chateau Grignan, Two Views--Castle of
+Montdragon--Triumphal Arch at Orange--Avignon, Two Views--Aqueduct of
+Pont du Gard--Castle of Beaucaire and Bridge of Boats--Tarascon--Arch
+and Mausoleum at St. Remy--Orgon--Bay of Marseilles--Cannes, where
+Buonaparte remained the night of his landing from Elba, and where Murat
+sheltered when he fled from Naples, Two View--Maritime Alps, from the
+Castle of Nice--Castle of Tende.
+
+*** This Work is sold with or without the Illustrations.
+
+     "I informed my friend that I had just received from England a
+     journal of a tour in the South of France by a young Oxonian friend
+     of mine, a poet, a draughtsman, and a scholar,--in which he gives
+     such an animated and interesting description of the Chateau
+     Grignan, the dwelling of Madame de Sevigne's beloved daughter, and
+     frequently the place of her own residence, that no one who ever
+     read the book would be within forty miles of the same, without
+     going a pilgrimage to the spot. The Marquis smiled, seemed very
+     much pleased, and asked the title at length of the work in
+     question; and writing down to my dictation, 'An Itinerary of
+     Provence and the Rhone made during the Year 1819, By John Hughes,
+     A.M. of Oriel College, Oxford,'--observed, he could now purchase no
+     books for the chateau, but would recommend that the Itineraire
+     should be commissioned for the library to which he was abonne in
+     the neighbouring town."--_Sir Walter Scott's Quentin Durward_.
+
+     "The tower of Mauconseil must have been very difficult to express;
+     for the water on the right is between a light coloured stone-quay
+     and the tower itself, also very bright; yet the artist, W.B. Cooke,
+     has contrived to give it a fine and natural transparency entirely
+     in keeping with the scenery around. The second is a simple and
+     lovely landscape, with a sky exquisitely managed: but Avignon is
+     still a greater favourite with us. The rich architectural
+     structures on one hand, the silvery river, the picturesque bridge,
+     the distant Alps of Dauphine, and the little bit of rustic scenery
+     on the foreground of the left, all combine to render this a very
+     charming view; and Mr. Allen has great merit in executing it as he
+     has done. The Chateau Grignan is of a different and darker
+     character, and an extremely interesting performance. Upon the
+     whole, the lovers of elegant art will find this publication well
+     entitled to their attention."--_Literary Gazette_, No. 309.
+
+A JOURNEY THROUGH ALBANIA and other Provinces of TURKEY in Europe and
+Asia, in Company with the late Lord Byron; including a Life of Ali
+Pasha, and illustrated by Views of Athens, Constantinople, and various
+other Plates, Maps, &c. By JOHN CAM HOBHOUSE, Esq. M.P. Second Edition,
+with Corrections. 2 vols. 4to. 5l. 5s. boards.
+
+     "Both the general reader and the scholar may look for no small
+     portion of information and amusement from the present volume. The
+     work itself will have a standard place in all Collections of
+     Voyages and Travels; a place which it will fully merit, by the
+     industry and ardour of research conspicuous throughout, as well as
+     by the spirit vivacity and good sense of the general
+     narrative."--_Quarterly Review_, XIX.
+
+     "The narrative which he has produced bears unquestionable marks of
+     a curious, capacious and observant mind; and the same may be said
+     of the poetical production of his friend Lord Byron, who
+     accompanied him on his Travels. As Reviewers are sometimes charged
+     with a propensity to cavilling, we will not close these
+     introductory remarks without declaring in round terms in justice to
+     Mr. Hobhouse, and in vindication of ourselves, that we have
+     received as much pleasure and instruction from the perusal of these
+     Travels as from that of any others which have ever come before us,"
+     &c. &c.--_British Review_, No. IX.
+
+HORAE IONICAE, descriptive of the Ionian Isles and Part of the adjacent
+Coast of Greece, together with other Poems. By WALLER RODWELL WRIGHT,
+Esq. Third Edition. 7s 6d. boards.
+
+    "Wright?[58] 'twas thy happy lot at once to view
+    Those shores of glory, and to sing them too;
+    And sure no common muse inspired thy pen
+    To hail the land of gods and godlike men."
+
+[Footnote 58: 'Mr. Wright, late Consul General for the Seven Islands, is
+author of a very beautiful Poem just published: it is entitled Horae
+Ionicae, and is descriptive of the Isles and the adjacent Coast of
+Greece.'--_Lord Byron's English Bards_.]
+
+AN HISTORICAL SKETCH of the LAST YEARS of the REIGN of GUSTAVUS the
+FOURTH, late KING OF SWEDEN, including a Narrative of the Causes,
+Progress, and Termination of the late Revolution; and an Appendix
+containing Official Documents, Letters, and Minutes of Conversations
+between the late King and Sir John Moore, General Brune, &c. &c. 10s.
+6d. boards.
+
+BEAUTIES of DON JUAN; including those Passages only which are calculated
+to extend the real fame of Lord Byron. 10s. 6d.
+
+     "This is a very captivating volume with all the impurities of Don
+     Juan expurgated, and yet displaying a galaxy of connected lustre,
+     which is well calculated to throw a halo of splendour round the
+     memory of Lord Byron. It may with perfect propriety be put into
+     female hands, from which the levities and pruriences of the entire
+     poem too justly excluded it in spite of all its charms of
+     genius."--_Literary Gazette_, 599.
+
+     "We cannot conclude our observations without again congratulating
+     the Compiler upon the success which has attended his labour, and
+     strongly recommending the work to those who desire that the female
+     branches of their family should participate in the beauties of this
+     modern Prince of Poesy."--_Public Ledger_.
+
+AN ACCOUNT of the EMPIRE of MOROCCO and the DISTRICT of SUSE, compiled
+from Miscellaneous Observations during a long Residence in and various
+Journies through those Countries. To which is added, an interesting
+Account of TIMBUCTOO, the great Emporium of Central Africa. By J.G.
+JACKSON, Esq. Quarto. Second Edition. 2L. 12s. 6d. boards.
+
+     "The observations which he has himself made upon these parts, and
+     the notices which he has collected respecting the interior from
+     native travellers, form a work of considerable value both in a
+     commercial and literary view, and leads us to rejoice that
+     merchants who have resided in foreign countries are beginning more
+     and more to communicate information on their return home," &c.
+     &c.--_Edinburgh Review_.
+
+MELANGES et LITTERATURE D'HISTOIRE de MORALE et de PHILOSOPHIE, par
+COMTE D'ESCHERNEY. 3 vols. 1l. 1s.
+
+THE WONDERS of a WEEK AT BATH, in a Doggrel Address to the Hon. T.
+S----, from F. T----, Esq. of that City. Price 7s. boards.
+
+     It contains a satirical description of the present style of life
+     and amusements at Bath, with delineations of some individual
+     characters. His lines are easy and flowing, and his _general_
+     satire not wanting in vivacity," &c. &c.--_British Critic_.
+
+MEMOIRS of the LIFE of MRS. ELIZABETH CARTER, with a New Edition of her
+Poems. By the Rev. MONTAGU PENNINGTON, M.A. 2 vols. 8vo. Second Edition.
+10s. 6d. boards.
+
+TRAITS and TRIALS; a Novel. 2 vols. 14s. boards.
+
+     "A pretty little tale, in which we find more discernment of
+     character and acquaintance with human nature than are usually
+     discoverable in the first attempts of novel writers,"--_Monthly
+     Review_.
+
+OURIKA; a Tale by the Duchess de DURAS. 2s. 6d.
+
+     "About a month ago a very pretty story under this title was
+     published in Paris. It soon not only attracted attention but became
+     quite the rage; and every thing in fashion and drama and picture
+     has since been Ourika. There are Ourika dresses, Ourika
+     Vaudevilles, Ourika prints. Madlle. Mars blacked her face to
+     perform Ourika, but did not like her appearance in the glass, and
+     refused the character. Such an event, like Mad. George's insult,
+     was enough to set all that sensitive metropolis in a flame; and
+     every mouth and every journal has rung and is ringing with
+     Ourika."--_Literary Gazette_, 383.
+
+
+THE LAY of the SCOTTISH FIDDLE; a Poem in Five Cantos. 7s. 6d. boards.
+
+     "I believe that the nature of this American Poem was known to the
+     proprietor of the Quarterly Review. So far as it was a burlesque on
+     the Lay of the Last Minstrel, I know it was; yet was he as a
+     publisher so anxious to get it, that he engaged Lord Byron to use
+     his utmost influence with me to obtain it for him, and his Lordship
+     wrote a most pressing letter upon the occasion. He asked me to let
+     Mr. Murray, who was in despair about it, have the publication of
+     this Poem as the greatest possible favour."--_Dallas's
+     Recollections of Byron_, p. 270.
+
+ADRASTUS; a Tragedy: AMABEL, or the Cornish Lovers; and other Poems. By
+R.C. DALLAS, Esq. 7s. 6d. boards.
+
+ANECDOTES, hitherto _unpublished_, of the PRIVATE LIFE of PETER THE
+GREAT, on the Authority of Mons. Stehling, Member of the Council of
+State to the EMPRESS CATHARINE, and Translated from the French of The
+Count D'Escherney, Chamberlain to the King of Wirtemberg. 5s. boards.
+
+     "These are some very entertaining anecdotes of Peter the Great, and
+     place the private character of that Sovereign in a most amiable
+     point of view," &c. &c.--_Gentleman's Mag._
+
+A CATALOGUE of a MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTION of BOOKS, New and Second-hand,
+on Sale for Ready Money.
+
+* * * The Public are most respectfully informed, they can be supplied
+with Clean and Perfect Copies of most of the New and Costly Works _as
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #20891 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20891)