The stranger in France

by Sir John Carr · English · Gutenberg #20296 · 428,053 chars · public domain (US)

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Title: The stranger in France
or, a tour from Devonshire to Paris illustrated by engravings in aqua tint of sketches taken on the spot.

Author: Sir John Carr

Release date: January 6, 2007 [eBook #20296]

Language: English

Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20296

Credits: Produced by Robert Connal, Wilelmina Maillière and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
(This file was produced from images generously made
available by the Bibliothèque nationale de France
(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr)

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STRANGER IN FRANCE ***

Produced by Robert Connal, Wilelmina Maillière and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
(This file was produced from images generously made
available by the Bibliothèque nationale de France
(BnF/Gallica) at http://gallica.bnf.fr)

Transcriber's note: Original spellings (and their inconsistencies) have
been maintained. A few obvious printer's error have been corrected: a
list of this corrections can be found at the end of the text.

THE
STRANGER IN FRANCE:

OR,
A TOUR FROM DEVONSHIRE TO PARIS.

ILLUSTRATED BY
ENGRAVINGS IN AQUA TINTA

OF
SKETCHES, TAKEN ON THE SPOT,

JOHN CARR, Esq.

LONDON:

PRINTED FOR J. JOHNSON, NO. 72, ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD.
SOLD ALSO BY W. HANNAFORD, TOTNES.

_Bryer, Printer, Bridge Street, Black Friars._

1803.

PREFACE.

The little tour which gave birth to the following remarks, was taken
immediately after the exchange of the ratifications of a peace,
necessary, but not inglorious to my country, after a contest unexampled
in its cause, calamity, extension, vicissitudes and glory; amidst a
people who, under the influence of a political change, hitherto
unparallelled, were to be approached as an order of beings, exhibiting a
moral and political form before but little known to themselves and to
the world, in the abrupt removal of habits and sentiments which had
silently and uninterruptedly taken deep root in the soil of ages.

During a separation of ten years, we have received very little account
of this extraordinary people, which could be relied upon. Dissimilar
sensations, excited by their principles and proceedings, ever partially
and irregularly known, have depicted unaccording representations of
them, and, in the sequel, have exhibited rather a high-coloured,
fanciful delineation, than a plain and faithful resemblance of the
original. Many are the persons who have been thus misled.

These fugitive sketches, in which an attempt is made to delineate, just
as they occurred, those scenes which, to _my_ mind at least, were new
and interesting, were originally penned for the private perusal of those
whom I esteem; and by their persuasion they are now offered to the
public eye. Amongst them I must be permitted to indulge in the pride and
pleasure of enumerating William Hayley, esq. a name familiar and dear to
every elegant and polished mind. Enlightened by his emendations, and
supported by the cherishing spirit of his approval, I approach, with a
more subdued apprehension, the tribunal of public opinion; and to my
friends I dedicate this humble result of a short relaxation from the
duties of an anxious and laborious profession. If, by submitting to
their wishes, I have erred, I have only to offer, that it is my first,
and shall be my last offence.

_Totnes, August, 1802._ JOHN CARR.

[Symbol: right pointing index] The engravings which accompany this work, are
of sketches made on the spot by an untutored pencil, and are introduced
for the purpose of illustration only.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

_Torr Abbey.--Cap of Liberty.--Anecdote of English Prejudice.--Fire
Ships.--Southampton River.--Netley Abbey._ page 1.

CHAPTER II.

_French Emigrants.--Scene on the Quay of Southampton.--Sail for
Havre.--Aged French Priest.--Their respectable Conduct in
England.--Their Gratitude.--Make the Port of Havre.--Panic of the
Emigrants.--Landing described.--Hôtel de la Paix.--Breakfast
Knife.--Municipality._ p. 6.

CHAPTER III.

_Passports procured.--Coins.--Town of
Havre.--Carts.--Citoyen.--Honfleur.--Deserters.--Prefect de
Marine.--Ville de Sandwich.--French Farmers.--Sir Sydney
Smith.--Catherine de Medicis.--Light Houses.--Rafts._ p. 20.

CHAPTER IV.

_Cheap travelling to Paris.--Diligences.--French Postilions.--Spanish
Postilions.--Norman Horses.--Bolbec.--Natives of Caux.--Ivetot.--Return
of Religion.--Santerre.--Jacobin.--The Mustard-pot.--National Property._
p. 31.

CHAPTER V.

_A female french fib.--Military and Civil Procession.--Madame
G.--The Review.--Mons. l'Abbé.--Bridge of Boats.--The
Quay.--Exchange.--Theatre.--Rouen.--Cathedral.--St. Ouens.--Prince of
Waldec.--Maid of Orleans._ p. 40.

CHAPTER VI.

_First Consul's Advertisement.--Something ridiculous.--Eggs.--Criminal
Military Tribunal.--French Female Confidence.--Town House.--Convent of
Jesuits.--Guillotine.--Governor W----._ p. 50.

CHAPTER VII.

_Filial Piety.--St. Catharine's Mount.--Madame Phillope.--General
Ruffin's Trumpet.--Generosity.--Love Infectious.--Masons and Gardeners._
p. 62.

CHAPTER VIII.

_Early dinner.--Mante.--Frost.--Duke de Sully.--Approach the
Capital.--Norman Barrier.--Paris.--Hôtel de Rouen.--Palais Royal._
p. 72.

CHAPTER IX.

_French Reception.--Voltaire.--Restaurateur.--Consular
Guard.--Music.--Venetian Horses.--Gates of the Palace.--Gardens of
the Thuilleries.--Statues.--The faithful Vase.--The Sabine
Picture.--Monsieur Perrègaux.--Marquis de Chatelet.--Madame
Perrègaux.--Beaux and Belles of Paris._ p. 79.

CHAPTER X.

_Large Dogs.--A Plan for becoming quickly acquainted with
Paris.--Pantheon.--Tombs of Voltaire and Rousseau.--Politeness of an
Emigrant.--The Beauty of France.--Beauty evanescent.--Place de
Carousel.--Infernal
Machine.--Fouché.--Seine.--Washerwomen.--Fisherwomen.--Baths._
p. 90.

CHAPTER XI.

_David.--Place de la Concorde.--L'Église de Madeleine.--Print-shops.--Notre
Dame.--Museum or Palace of Arts.--Hall of Statues.--Laocoon.--Belvidere
Apollo.--Socrates._
p. 101.

CHAPTER XII.

_Bonaparte.--Artillery.--Mr. Pitt.--Newspapers.--Archbishop of
Paris.--Consular Colours.--Religion.--Consular Conversion.--Madame
Bonaparte.--Consular Modesty.--Separate Beds.--A Country
Scene.--Connubial Affection.--Female Bravery._ p. 113.

CHAPTER XIII.

_Breakfast.--Warmth of French Expression.--Rustic Eloquence.--Curious
Cause assigned for the late extraordinary Frost.--Madame R----.--Paul
I.--Tivoli.--Frescati._ p. 128.

CHAPTER XIV.

_Convent of blue Nuns.--Duchesse de Biron.--The bloody Key.--Courts of
Justice.--Public Library.--Gobelines.--Miss Linwood.--Garden of
Plants.--French Accommodation.--Boot Cleaners.--Cat and Dog
Shearers.--Monsieur S---- and Family._ p. 140.

CHAPTER XV.

_Civility of a Sentinel.--The Hall of the Legislative Assembly.--British
House of Commons.--Captain Bergeret.--The Temple.--Sir Sydney Smith's
Escape.--Colonel Phillipeaux._ p. 150

CHAPTER XVI.

_A fashionable Poem.--Frere Rickart.--Religion.--Hôtel des
Invalides.--Hall of Victory.--Enemies' Colours.--Sulky Appearance of an
English Jack and Ensign.--Indecorum.--The aged Captain.--Military
School.--Champ de Mars.--The Garden of Mousseaux._ p. 163.

CHAPTER XVII.

_Curious Method of raising Hay.--Lucien Bonaparte's
Hôtel.--Opera.--Consular Box.--Madame Bonaparte's Box.--Feydeau
Theatre.--Belle Vue.--Versailles.--The Palace of the Petit Trianon.--The
Grounds._ p. 175.

CHAPTER XVIII.

_Bonaparte's Talents in Finance.--Garrick and the Madman.--Palace of the
Conservative Senate.--Process of transferring Oil Paintings from Wood to
Canvas.--The Dinner Knife.--Commodities.--Hall of the National
Convention.--The Minister Talleyrand's Levee._ p. 188.

CHAPTER XIX.

_The College of the Deaf and Dumb.--Abbé
Sicard.--Bagatelle.--Police.--Grand National Library.--Bonaparte's
Review.--Tambour Major of the Consular Regiment.--Restoration of
Artillery Colours._ p. 201.

CHAPTER XX.

_Abbè Sieyes.--Consular Procession to the Council Chamber.--10th of
August, 1792.--Celerity of Mons. Fouche's Information.--The two
Lovers.--Cabinet of Mons. le Grand.--Self-prescribing Physician.--Bust
of Robespierre.--His Lodgings.--Corn Hall.--Museum of French
Monuments.--Revolutionary Agent.--Lovers of married Women._
p. 214.

CHAPTER XXI.

_Picturesque and Mechanical Theatre.--Filtrating and purifying
Vases.--English Jacobins.--A Farewell.--Messagerie.--MalMaison.--Forest
of Evreux.--Lower Normandy.--Caen.--Hon. T. Erskine.--A Ball.--The
Keeper of the Sachristy of Notre Dame.--The two blind
Beggars.--Ennui.--St. Lo.--Cherbourg.--England._ p. 230.

GENERAL REMARKS. p. 252.

[Illustration: _Torr Abbey_]

THE STRANGER IN FRANCE

CHAPTER I.

_Torr Abbey.--Cap of Liberty.--Anecdote of English Prejudice.--Fire
Ships.--Southampton River.--Netley Abbey._

It was a circumstance, which will be memorable with me, as long as I
live, and pleasant to my feelings, as often as I recur to it, that part
of my intended excursion to the Continent was performed in the last ship
of war, which, after the formal confirmations of the peace, remained, of
that vast naval armament, which, from the heights of Torbay, for so many
years, presented to the astonished and admiring eye, a spectacle at once
of picturesque beauty, and national glory. It was the last attendant in
the train of retiring war.

Under the charming roof of Torr Abbey, the residence of George Cary,
esq., I passed a few days, until the Megæra was ready to sail for
Portsmouth, to be paid off, the commander of which, captain Newhouse,
very politely offered to convey my companion, captain W. Cary, and
myself, to that port.

In this beautiful spot, the gallant heroes of our navy have often found
the severe and perilous duties of the boisterous element alleviated by
attentions, which, in their splendid and cordial display, united an
elegant taste to a noble spirit of hospitality.

In the Harleian Tracts there is a short, but rather curious account
preserved of the sensation produced at the Abbey on the 5th of November,
1688, after the prince of Orange had entered the bay with his fleet, on
their passage to Brixham, where he landed:--

"The prince commanded captain M---- to search the lady Cary's house, at
Torr Abbey, for arms and horses. The lady entertaining them civilly,
said her husband was gone to Plymouth: they brought from thence some
horses, and a few arms, but gave no further disturbance to the lady or
her house."

Throughout this embarrassing interview, the lady Cary appears to have
conducted herself with great temper, dignity and resolution, whilst, on
the other hand, the chaplain of that day, whose opinions were not very
favourable to the revolution, unlike his present amiable and enlightened
successor[1], left his lady in the midst of her perplexities, and fled.

[1] Rev. John Halford.

In the Abbey, I was much pleased with an interesting, though not very
ornamental trophy of the glorious victory of Aboukir. The truckle heads
of the masts of the Aquilon, a french ship of the line, which struck to
the brave captain Lewis, in that ever memorable battle, were covered
with the bonnet rouge; one of these caps of liberty, surmounted with the
british flag, has been committed to the care of the family, by that
heroic commander, and now constitutes a temporary ornament of their
dining-room.

Here we laid in provision for our little voyage, without, however,
feeling the same apprehension, which agitated the mind of a fair damsel,
in the service of a lady of rank who formerly resided in my
neighbourhood, who, preparing to attend her mistress to the Continent,
and having heard from the jolly historians of the kitchen, that the food
in France was chiefly supplied by the croaking inhabitants of the green
and standing pool, contrived, very carefully, to carry over a piece of
homebred pork, concealed in her workbag.

Early in the morning after we set sail, we passed through the Needles,
which saved us a very considerable circuitous sail round the southern
side of the Isle of Wight, a passage which the late admiral Macbride
first successfully attempted, for vessels of war, in a ship of the line.

The vessel, in which we sailed, was a fireship; a costly instrument of
destruction, which has never been applied during the recent war, and
only once, and that unsuccessfully, during the preceding one. We had
several of them in commission, although they are confessedly of little
utility in these times, and from the immense stores of combustibles with
which they are charged, threaten only peril to the commander and his
crew.

We soon after dropped anchor, and proceeded to Portsmouth, in search of
a packet for Havre-de-Grace. In the street, our trunks were seized by
the custom-house officers, whilst conveying to the inn, but after
presenting our keys, and requesting immediate search and restoration,
they were returned to us without further annoyance. Finding that the
masters of the french packets were undetermined when they should sail,
we resolved upon immediately leaving this celebrated seaport, and
proceeding by water to Southampton, distant about twenty-four miles;
where, after a very unpleasant passage, from its blowing with
considerable violence soon after we left Portsmouth, we arrived, in a
little wherry, about twelve o'clock at night, at the Vine inn, which is
very conveniently situated for passengers by the packets.

It will not be required of me, to attempt a minute description of the
Southampton river, at a time when I expected, with some reason, as I
afterwards understood, to sink to the bottom of it. An observation very
natural to persons in our situation occurred to me all the way, viz.
that the shores seemed to be too far distant from each other, and that
had there been less water, the scenery would have been more delightful;
an observation which, however, the next day confirmed, when it presented
the safe and tranquil appearance of a mirror.

[Illustration: _Southampton._]

Finding that the packet for France was not likely to sail immediately,
we hired a boat, and proceeded down the river, to view the beautiful
ruins of Netley Abbey, in the great court of which we dined, under the
shade of aged limes, and amidst the flappings of its feathered and
restless tenantry.

As I am no great admirer of tedious details, I shall not attempt an
antiquarian history of this delightful spot. I shall leave it to more
circumstantial travellers, to enumerate the genealogies of the worthies
who occupied it at various eras, and to relate, like a monumental
entablature, when, where, and how they lived and died; it will be
sufficient to observe, that the site of this romantic abode was
granted by Henry VIII, in 1757, to a sir William Paulet, and that after
having had many merry monks for its masters, who, no doubt, performed
their matutinæ laudes and nocturnæ vigiliæ with devout exactness; that
it is at length in the possession of Mr. Dance, who has a very fine and
picturesque estate on that side of the river, of which these elegant
ruins constitute the chief ornament. The church still exhibits a
beautiful specimen of gothic architecture, but its tottering remains
will rapidly share the fate of the neighbouring pile, which time has
prostrated on the earth, and covered with his thickest shade of ivy.

Our watermen gave us a curious description of this place, and amused us
not a little with their ridiculous anacronisms.

"I tell you what," said one of them, contradicting the other, "you are
in the wrong, Bob, indeed you are wrong, don't mislead them gentlemen,
that there Abbey is in the true roman style, and was built by a man they
call----, but that's neither here nor there, I forget the name, however,
its a fine place, and universally allowed to be very old. I frequently
rows gentlefolks there, and picks up a great deal about it."

On our return the tide was at its height, the sun was setting in great
glory, the sky and water seemed blended in each other, the same red rich
tint reigned throughout, the vessels at anchor appeared suspended in the
air, the spires of the churches were tipped with the golden ray; a scene
of more beauty, richness, and tranquillity I never beheld.

CHAPTER II.

During the whole of the second day after our arrival, the town of
Southampton was in a bustle, occasioned by the flocking in of a great
number of french emigrants, who were returning to their own country, in
consequence of a mild decree, which had been passed in their favour. The
scene was truly interesting, and the sentiment which it excited,
delightful to the heart.

A respectable curé, who dined in the same room with us at our inn, was
observed to eat very little; upon being pressed to enlarge his meal,
this amiable man said, with tears starting in his eyes, "Alas! I have no
appetite; a very short time will bring me amongst the scenes of my
nativity, my youth, and my happiness, from which a remorseless
revolution has parted me for these ten long years; I shall ask for those
who are dear to me, and find them for ever gone. Those who are left will
fill my mind with the most afflicting descriptions; no, no, I cannot
eat, my good sir."

About noon, they had deposited their baggage upon the quay, which formed
a pile of aged portmanteaus, and battered trunks. Parties remained to
protect them, previous to their embarkation. The sun was intensely hot,
they were seated under the shade of old umbrellas, which looked as if
they had been the companions of their banishment.

Their countenances appeared strongly marked with the pious character of
resignation, over which were to be seen a sweetness, and corrected
animation, which seemed to depict at once the soul's delight, of
returning to its native home, planted wherever it may be, and the regret
of leaving a nation, which, in the hour of flight and misery, had nobly
enrolled them in the list of her own children, and had covered them with
protection.

To the eternal honour of these unhappy, but excellent people, be it
said, that they have proved themselves worthy of being received in such
a sanctuary. Our country has enjoyed the benefit of their unblemished
morals, and their mild, polite, and unassuming manners, and wherever
destiny has placed them, they have industriously relieved the national
burden of their support by diffusing the knowledge of a language, which
good sense, and common interest, should long since have considered as a
valuable branch of education.

To those of my friends, who exercise the sacred functions of religion,
as established in this country, I need not offer an apology, for paying
an humble tribute of common justice to these good, and persecuted men;
who, from habit, pursue a mode of worship, a little differing in form,
but terminating in the same great and glorious centre. The enlightened
liberality of the british clergy will unite, in paying that homage to
them, which they, in my presence, have often with enthusiasm, and
rapture, offered up to the purity, and sanctity of their characters.
Many of them informed me, that they had received the most serviceable
favours from our clergy, administered with equal delicacy, and
munificence.

Amongst these groups were some females, the wives and daughters of
toulonese merchants, who left their city when lord Hood abandoned that
port. The politeness and attention, which were paid to them by the men,
were truly pleasing. It was the good breeding of elegant habits,
retaining all their softness in the midst of adversity, sweetened with
the sympathy of mutual and similar sufferings.

They had finished their dinner, and were drinking their favourite
beverage of coffee. Poor wanderers! the water was scarcely turned brown
with the few grains which remained of what they had purchased for their
journey.

I addressed them, by telling them, that I had the happiness of being a
passenger with them, in the same vessel; they said they were fortunate
to have in their company one of that nation, which would be dear to them
as long as they lived. A genteel middle aged woman offered to open a
little parcel of fresh coffee, which they had purchased in the town for
the voyage, and begged to make some for me. By her manner, she seemed to
wish me to consider it, more as the humble offering of gratitude, than
of politeness, or perhaps both were blended in the offer. In the
afternoon, their baggage was searched by the revenue officers, who, on
this occasion, exercised a liberal gentleness, which gave but little
trouble, and no pain. They who brought nothing into a country but the
recollection of their miseries, were not very likely to carry much out
of it, but the remembrance of its generosity.

At seven o'clock in the evening we were all on board, and sailed with a
gentle breeze down the river: we carried with us a good stock of
vegetables, which we procured fresh, from the admirable market of
Southampton. Upon going down into the cabin, I was struck, and at first
shocked, with seeing a very aged man, stretched at his length upon
pillows and clothes, placed on the floor, attended by two clergymen, and
some women, who, in their attentions to this apparently dying old
gentleman, seemed to have forgotten their own comfortless situation,
arising from so many persons being crowded in so small a space, for our
numbers above and below amounted to sixty. Upon inquiry, they informed
me, that the person whose appearance had so affected me, had been a
clergyman of great repute and esteem at Havre, that he was then past the
age of ninety five years, scarcely expected to survive our short voyage,
but was anxious to breathe his last in his own country. They spoke of
him, as a man who in other times, and in the fulness of his faculties,
had often from his pulpit, struck with terror and contrition, the
trembling souls of his auditors, by the force of his exalted eloquence;
who had embellished the society in which he moved, with his elegant
attainments; and who had relieved the unhappy, with an enlarged heart
and munificent hand--A mere mass of misery, and helpless infirmities,
remained of all these noble qualities!

During the early part of the night, we made but little way--behind, the
dark shadowy line of land faded in mist; before us, the moon spread a
stream of silver light upon the sea. The soft stillness of this repose
of nature was broken only by the rippling of the light wave against the
head and sides of the vessel, and by the whistling of the helmsman, who,
with the helm between his knees, and his arms crossed, alternately
watching the compass and the sail, thus invoked the presence of the
favouring breeze.

Leaving him, and some few of our unfortunate comrades, to whom the
motion of the sea was more novel than gratifying, we descended into the
steerage, (for our births in the cabin were completely occupied by
females). As we were going down the ladder, the appearance of so many
recumbent persons, faintly distinguishable by the light of a solitary
taper, reminded us of a floating catacomb; here, crawling under a cot
which contained two very corpulent priests, upon a spare cable, wrapt up
in our own great coats, we resigned ourselves to rest.

The next day, without having made much progress in our little voyage, we
arose, and assembled round the companion, which formed our breakfast
table; at dinner, we were enabled to spread a handsome table of
refreshments, to which we invited all our fellow passengers who were
capable of partaking of them, many of whom were preparing to take their
scanty meal, removed from us at the head of the vessel. For this little
act of common civility, we were afterwards abundantly repaid, by the
thankfulness of all, and the serviceable attentions of some of our
charming guests, when we landed; an instance of which I shall afterwards
have occasion to mention. The wind slackened during the day, but in the
evening it blew rather fresh, and about nine o'clock the next morning,
after a night passed something in the same way as the former, we were
awakened being informed that we were within in a league of Havre; news
by no means disagreeable, after the dead dulness of a sea calm.

The appearance of the coast was high, rugged, and rocky; to use a good
marine expression, it looked ironbound all along shore. To the east,
upon an elevated point of land, are two noble light houses, of very
beautiful construction, which I shall have occasion to describe
hereafter.

At some little distance, we saw considerable flights of wild ducks. The
town and bason lie round the high western point from the lights, below
which there is a fine pebbled beach. The quays are to the right and left
within the pier, upon the latter of which there is a small round tower.
It was not the intention of our packet captain to go within the pier,
for the purpose of saving the port-anchorage dues, which amount to eight
pounds sterling, but a government boat came off, and ordered the vessel
to hawl close up to the quay, an order which was given in rather a
peremptory manner. Upon our turning the pier, we saw as we warped up to
the quay, an immense motley crowd, flocking down to view us. A panic ran
throughout our poor fellow passengers. From the noise and confusion on
shore, they expected that some recent revolution had occurred, and that
they were upon the point of experiencing all the calamities, which they
had before fled from; they looked pale and agitated upon each other,
like a timid and terrified flock of sheep, when suddenly approached by
their natural enemy the wolf. It turned out, however, that mere
curiosity, excited by the display of english colours, had assembled this
formidable rabble, and that the order which we received from the
government boat, was given for the purpose of compelling the captain to
incur, and consequently to pay, the anchorage dues. In a moment we were
beset by a parcel of men and boys, half naked, and in wooden shoes, who
hallooing and "sacre dieuing" each other most unmercifully, began,
without further ceremony, to seize upon every trunk within their reach,
which they threw into their boats lying alongside.

By a well-timed rap upon the knuckles of one of these marine
functionaries, we prevented our luggage from sharing the same fate. It
turned out, that there was a competition for carrying our trunks on
shore, for the sake of an immoderate premium, which they expected to
receive, and which occasioned our being assailed in this violent manner.
Our fellow-passengers were obliged to go on shore with these vociferous
watermen, who had the impudence and inhumanity to charge them two livres
each, for conveying them to the landing steps, a short distance of about
fifty yards. Upon their landing, we were much pleased to observe that
the people offered them neither violence nor insult. They were received
with a sullen silence, and a lane was made for them to pass into the
town. The poor old clergyman who had survived the passage, was left on
board, in the care of two benevolent persons, until he could be safely
and comfortably conveyed on shore. We soon afterwards followed our
fellow-passengers in the captain's boat, by which plan we afforded these
extortioners a piece of salutary information, very necessary to be made
known to them, that although we were english, we were not to be imposed
upon. I could not help thinking it rather unworthy of our neighbours to
exact from us such heavy port dues, when our english demands of a
similar nature, are so very trifling. For such an import, a vessel of
the republic, upon its arrival in any of the english ports, would only
pay a few shillings. Perhaps this difference will be equalized in some
shape, by the impending commercial treaty, otherwise, a considerable
partial advantage will accrue to the french from their passage packets.
Upon our landing, and entering the streets, I was a little struck with
the appearance of the women, who were habited in a coarse red camlet
jacket, with a high apron before, long flying lappets to their caps, and
were mounted upon large heavy wooden shoes, upon each of which a worsted
tuft was fixed, in rude imitation of a rose. The appearance and clatter
of these sabots, as they are called, leave upon the mind an impression
of extreme poverty and wretchedness.

They are, however, more favoured than the lower order of females in
Scotland. Upon a brisk sprightly chamber-maid entering my room one day
at an inn in Glasgow, I heard a sound which resembled the pattering of
some web-footed bird, when in the act of climbing up the miry side of a
pond. I looked down upon the feet of this bonny lassie, and found that
their only covering was procured from the mud of the high street--adieu!
to the tender eulogies of the pastoral reed! I have never thought of a
shepherdess since with pleasure.

I could not help observing the ease, dexterity, and swiftness, with
which a single man conveyed all our luggage, which was very heavy, to
the custom-house, and afterwards to the inn, in a wheelbarrow, which
differed from ours, only in being larger, and having two elastic handles
of about nine feet long. At the custom-house, notwithstanding what the
english papers have said of the conduct observed here, we were very
civilly treated, our boxes were only just opened, and some of our
packages were not examined at all. Away we had them whirled, to the
Hôtel de la Paix, the front of which looks upon the wet-dock, and is
embellished with a large board, upon which is recorded, in yellow
characters, as usual, the superior advantages of this house over every
other hôtel in Havre. Upon our arrival, we were ushered up a large dirty
staircase into a lofty room, upon the first floor, all the windows of
which were open, divided, as they always are in France, in the middle,
like folding doors; the floor was tiled, a deal table, some common rush
chairs, two very fine pier glasses, and chandeliers to correspond,
composed our motley furniture. I found it to be a good specimen of
french inns, in general. We were followed by our hostess, the porter,
two cooks, with caps on their heads, which had once been white, and
large knives in their hands, who were succeeded by two chamber-maids,
all looking in the greatest hurry and confusion, and all talking
together, with a velocity, and vehemence, which rendered the faculty of
hearing almost a misfortune. They appeared highly delighted to see us,
talked of our dress, sir Sidney Smith, the blockade, the noble english,
the peace, and a train of etceteras. At length we obtained a little
cessation, of which we immediately seized the advantage, by directing
them to show us to our bedrooms, to procure abundance of water hot and
cold, to get us a good breakfast as soon as possible, and to prepare a
good dinner for us at four o'clock. Amidst a peal of tongues, this
clamorous procession retired.

After we had performed our necessary ablutions, and had enjoyed the
luxury of fresh linen, we sat down to some excellent coffee, accompanied
with boiled milk, long, delicious rolls, and tolerably good butter, but
found no knives upon the table; which, by the by, every traveller in
France is presumed to carry with him: having mislaid my own, I requested
the maid to bring me one. The person of this damsel, would certainly
have suffered by a comparison with those fragrant flowers, to which
young poets resemble their beloved mistresses; as soon as I had
preferred my prayer, she very deliberately drew from her pocket a large
clasp knife, which, after she had wiped on her apron, she presented to
me, with a "voila monsieur." I received this dainty present, with every
mark of due obligation, accompanied, at the same time, with a resolution
not to use it, particularly as my companions (for we had two other
english gentlemen with us) had directed her to bring some others to
them. This delicate instrument was as savoury as its mistress, amongst
the various fragrancies which it emitted, garlic seemed to have the
mastery.

About twelve o'clock we went to the hall of the municipality, to procure
our passports for the interior, and found it crowded with people upon
the same errand. We made our way through them into a very handsome
antiroom, and thence, by a little further perseverance, into an inner
room, where the mayor and his officers were seated at a large table
covered with green cloth. To show what reliance is to be placed upon the
communications of english newspapers, I shall mention the following
circumstance: my companion had left England, without a passport, owing
to the repeated assurances of both the ministerial and opposition
prints, and also of a person high in administration, that none were
necessary.

The first question propounded to us by the secretary was, "citizens,
where are your passports?" I had furnished myself with one; but upon
hearing this question, I was determined not to produce it, from an
apprehension that I should cover my friend, who had none, with
suspicion, so we answered, that in England they were not required of
frenchmen, and that we had left our country with official assurances
that they would not be demanded of us here.

They replied to us, by reading a decree, which rigorously required them
of foreigners, entering upon the territories of the republic, and they
assured us, that this regulation was at that moment reciprocal with
every other power, and with England in particular. The decree of course
closed the argument. We next addressed ourselves to their politeness
(forgetting that the revolution had made sad inroads upon it) and
requested them, as we had been misled, and had no other views of
visiting the country, but those of pleasure, and improvement, that they
would be pleased to grant us our passports for the interior. To this
address, these high authorities, who seemed not much given to "the
melting mood," after making up a physiognomy, as severe, and as _iron
bound_ as their coast, laconically observed, that the laws of the
republic must be enforced, that they should write to our embassador to
know who we were, and that in the mean time they would make out our
passports for the town, the barriers of which we were not to pass.
Accordingly, a little fat gentleman, in a black coat, filled up these
official instruments, which were copied into their books, and both
signed by us; he then commenced our "signalement," which is a regular
descriptive portrait of the head of the person who has thus the honour
of sitting to the municipal portrait painters of the département de la
Seine inferieure.

This portrait is intended, as will be immediately anticipated, to afford
encreased facilities to all national guards, maréchaussées, thief
takers, &c. for placing in "durance vile" the unfortunate original,
should he violate the laws.

The signalement is added in the margin, to the passport, and also
registered in the municipal records, which, from their size, appeared to
contain a greater number of heads and faces, thus depicted, than any
museum or gallery I ever beheld.

How correct the likenesses in general are, I leave to the judgment of
others, after I have informed them, that the hazle eyes of my friend
were described "yeux bleu" in this masterly delineation.

If the dead march in Saul had been playing before us all the way, we
could not have marched more gravely, or rather sulkily, to our inn.
Before us, we had the heavy prospect of spending about ten days in this
town, not very celebrated for either beauty, or cleanliness, until the
municipality could receive an account of us, from our embassador, who
knew no more of us than they did. The other english gentlemen were in
the same predicament.

However we determined to pursue the old adage, that what is without
remedy, should be without regret, and, english like, grew very merry
over a good dinner, consisting of soups, and meat, and fowls, and fish,
and vegetables (for such is the order of a french dinner) confectionary
and a desert, accompanied with good Burgundy, and excellent Champaign.
Our misfortunes must plead our excuse, if the dinner is considered
extravagant. Uncle Toby went to sleep when he was unhappy; we solicited
consolation in another way. Our signalements afforded us much diversion,
which at length was a little augmented by a plan which I mentioned, as
likely to furnish us with the means of our liberation. After dinner I
waited upon a young gentleman who was under the care of a very
respectable merchant, to whom I had the good fortune to have letters of
introduction. Through his means I was introduced to Mons. de la M----,
who received me with great politeness. In the hurry and occupations of
very extensive commercial pursuits, this amiable old gentleman had found
leisure to indulge himself in works of taste. His noble fortune enabled
him to gratify his liberal inclinations. I found him seated in his
compting-house, which, from its handsome furniture and valuable
paintings, resembled an elegant cabinet. I stated the conduct of the
municipality towards us, and requested his assistance. After he had
shown me his apartments, a fine collection of drawings, by some of the
first masters, and some more excellent paintings, we parted, with an
assurance that he would immediately wait upon the mayor, who was his
friend, and had no doubt but that he should in the course of the next
day enable us to leave Havre when and in what manner we pleased. With
this agreeable piece of intelligence, I immediately returned to the inn,
where it induced us to drink health and success to the friendly merchant
in another bottle of champaign.

CHAPTER III.

If Havre had been a Paradise, the feelings of restraint would have
discoloured the magic scenery, and turned the green to one barren brown.

As we could relish nothing, until we had procured our release, the first
place we visited the next morning was, once more, the residence of the
municipality, where we found that our worthy friend had previously
arranged every thing to our wishes, and upon his signing a certificate,
that we were peaceable citizens, and had no intention to overturn the
republic, our passports were made out, and upon an exchange of a little
snuff, and a few bows, we retired. The other two englishmen had their
wishes gratified, by the same lucky incident, which had assisted us.
Having changed our guineas for french money, and as in future, when
money is mentioned, it will be in the currency of the country, it
perhaps may not be unacceptable to subjoin a table of the old, and new,
and republican coins. For every guinea of full weight, which we carried
over, we received twenty-four livres, or a louis d'or, which is equal to
twenty shillings sterling, of course we lost one shilling upon every
good guinea, and more, according to the deficiency of weight. The course
of exchange and commission, with our country, I afterwards found at
Paris, to be one shilling and eight pence, in the pound sterling,
against us, but the difference will be progressively nearer par, as the
accustomed relations of commerce resume their former habits. I was
surprised to find the ancient monarchical coin in chief circulation, and
that of the republic, very confined. Scarce a pecuniary transaction can
occur, but the silent, and eloquent medallion of the unhappy monarch,
seems to remind these bewildered people of _his_ fate, and _their_ past
misfortunes. Although the country is poor, all their payments are made
in cash, this is owing to the shock given by the revolution, to
individual, and consequently to paper credit.

To comprehend their money, it must be known, although the french always
calculate by livres, as we do by pounds sterling, that the livre is no
coin, but computation.

MONARCHICAL COINS.

GOLD.
_s._ _d._
A louis d'or is twenty four livres french, or 20 0 English.

SILVER.

A grand ecu, or six livre piece, 5 0
An ecu, or three livre piece, 2 6
The vingt quatre sols piece, 1 0
A douze sols piece is twelve pence french, or 0 6
A six sols piece is 6d french, or 0 3

COPPER MIXED WITH SILVER.

A deux sols, or two pence french, and one penny english, is nearly the
size of our sixpence, but is copper, with a white or silverish mixture,
twelve of these make a vingt quatre sols piece, or one shilling english.

They have also another small piece of nearly the same size and colour,
but not so white, and rather thinner, which is one sol and a half, three
halfpence french, or three farthings english.

COPPER.

A sol is like our halfpenny, value one penny french, or a halfpenny
english, twenty-four of these make an english shilling.

A deux liard piece is half a sol french, or a farthing english.

A liard is a farthing french, and of the value of half a farthing
english.

NEW COIN.

A thirty sols piece, is a very beautiful and convenient coin, worth one
shilling and three pence english, having a good impression of the late
king's head on one side, and the goddess of liberty on the other; it was
struck in the early part of the revolution.

REPUBLICAN COIN.

SILVER.

A fifteen sols piece is half of the above and very convenient.

COPPER.

A six liard is a bit of copper composition, such as the fine cannon are
made of, and is worth three sols french, or a halfpenny, and a farthing
english.

A cinq centimes is worth a halfpenny and half a farthing english.

The centimes are of the value of half farthings, five of which are equal
to the last coin, they are very small and neat.

An early knowledge of these coins, is very necessary to a stranger, on
account of the dishonest advantages which french tradesmen take of their
english customers.

To return to my narrative: finding ourselves at liberty to pursue our
route, we went from the municipality to the bureau des diligences, and
secured our places in the voiture to Rouen, for the next day.

After this necessary arrangement, we proceeded to view the town, which
is composed of long and narrow streets. The fronts of the houses, which
are lofty, are deformed by the spaces between the naked intersections of
the frame work being filled up with mortar, which gives them an
appearance of being very heavy, and very mean.

The commerce formerly carried on at Havre, was very extensive. There is
here also large manufactories for lace. The theatre is very spacious,
well arranged, and as far as we could judge by day-light, handsomely
decorated. The players did not perform during our stay. In the
vegetable market place, which was much crowded, and large, we saw at
this season of the year abundance of fine apples, as fresh in appearance
as when they were first plucked from the tree.

In our way there we were accosted by a little ragged beggar boy, who
addressed himself to our compassionate dispositions, by the appellation
of "très charitable citoyen," but finding we gave nothing, he
immediately changed it to "mon chère très charitable monsieur."

The strange uncouth expression of citoyen is generally laid aside,
except amongst the immediate officers under government, in their
official communications, who, however, renounce it in private, for the
more civilized title of "monsieur."

The principal church is a fine handsome building, and had been opened
for worship, the Sunday before we arrived: On that day the bell of the
Sabbath first sounded, during ten years of revolution, infidelity, and
bloodshed!!!

The royal arms are every where removed. They formerly constituted a very
beautiful ornament over the door of the hotel of the present prefect, at
the head of the market place, but they have been rudely beaten out by
battle axes, and replaced by rude republican emblems, which every where
(I speak of them as a decoration) seem to disfigure the buildings which
bear them. When I made this remark, I must, however, candidly confess,
that my mind very cordially accompanied my eye, and that natural
sentiment mingled with the observation. The quays, piers, and arsenal
are very fine, they, together with the docks, for small ships of war and
merchandize, were constructed under the auspices of Lewis XIV, with
whom this port was a great favourite.

We saw several groups of men at work in heavy chains. They were soldiers
who had offended. They are dressed in _red_ jackets and trowsers, which
are supposed to increase their disgrace, on account of its being the
regimental colour of their old enemy, the english. When my companion,
who wore his regimentals, passed them, they all moved their caps to him
with great respect.

The town, and consequently the commerce of Rouen, was most successfully
blockaded, for near four years, by british commanders, during the late
war, and particularly by sir Sidney Smith. It was here, when
endeavouring to cut out a vessel, which in point of value, and
consideration was unworthy of such an exposure, that this great hero,
and distinguished being was made a prisoner of war. The inhabitants, who
never speak of him, but with emotions of terror, consider this event as
the rash result of a wager conceived over wine. Those who know the
character of sir Sidney, will not impute to him such an act of _idle_
temerity. No doubt he considered the object, as included in his duty,
and it is only to be lamented, that during two lingering years of
rigorous, and cruel confinement, in the dungeons of the unhappy
sovereign, his country was bereaved of the assistances of her immortal
champion, who, in a future season, upon the shores of Acre, so nobly
filled up the gloomy chasm of suspended services, by exploits, which to
be believed, must not be _adequately_ described, and who revenged, by an
act of unrivalled glory, the long endurance of sufferings, and
indignities hateful to the magnanimous spirit of modern warfare, and
unknown to it, until displayed within the walls of a prussian
dungeon[2].

[2] The cruel imprisonment of la Fayette is alluded to.

I shall hereafter have occasion to mention this extraordinary character,
when I speak of his escape from the Temple, the real circumstances
attending which are but little known, and which I received from an
authority upon which the reader may rely.

This town is not unknown to history. At the celebrated siege of it, in
the time of Catharine de Medicis, that execrable princess, distinguished
herself by her personal intrepidity. It is said, that she landed here,
in a galley, bearing the device of the sun, with these words in greek,
"I bring light, and fine weather"--a motto which ill corresponded with
her conduct.

With great courage, such as seldom associates with cruel, and ferocious
tyrants, she here on horseback, at the head of her army, exposed herself
to the fire of the cannon, like the most veteran soldiers, and betrayed
no symptoms of fear, although the bullets flew about her in all
directions. When desired by the duke of Guise, and the constable de
Montmorenci not to expose her person so much, the brave, but sanguinary
Catharine replied, "Have I not more to lose than you, and do you think I
have not as much courage?"

The walk, through la ville de Sandwiche, to the light houses, which are
about two miles from Havre, is very pleasing. The path lay through flax
and clover fields. In this part of the country, the farmers practise an
excellent plan of rural economy, which is also used in Dorsetshire,
and some few other counties, of confining their cattle by a string to a
spot of pasture, until they have completely cleared it.

[Illustration: _Light-house at Havre_]

Upon the hill, ascending to the cliffs, are several very elegant
chateaus and gardens, belonging to the principal inhabitants of the
town.

Monsieur B----, the prefect de marine, has a beautiful residence here.
We were accidentally stopping at his gate, which was open, to view the
enchanting prospects, which it presented to us, when the polite owner
observed us, and with that amiableness, and civility, which still
distinguish the descendants of the ancient families of rank in France,
of which he is one, requested us to enter, and walked with us round his
grounds, which were disposed with great taste. He afterwards conducted
us to his elegant house, and gave us dried fruit, and excellent
burgundy, after which we walked round the village to the light houses.
From him we learnt, that the farmers here, as in England, were very
respectable, and had amassed considerable wealth during the war. The
approach to the light houses, through a row of elms, is very pleasant;
they stand upon an immense high perpendicular cliff, and are lofty
square buildings, composed of fine light brown free stone, the entrance
is handsome, over which there is a good room, containing four high
windows, and a lodging room for the people, who have the care of the
light, the glass chamber of which we reached, after ascending to a
considerable height, by a curious spiral stone stair case. The lantern
is composed, of ninety immense reflecting lamps, which are capable of
being raised or depressed with great ease by means of an iron windlass.
This large lustre, is surrounded with plates of the thickest french
glass, fixed in squares of iron, and discharges a prodigious light, in
dark nights. A furnace of coal, was formerly used, but this has been
judiciously superseded by the present invention. Round the lantern, is a
gallery with an iron balustrade, the view from this elevation upon the
beach, the entrance of the Seine, Honfleur (where our Henry III is said
to have fought the french armies, and to have distinguished himself by
his valour) the distant hills of Lower Normandy, and the ocean, is truly
grand. It brought to my mind that beautiful description of Shakspeare--

------------------The murmuring surge
That on th' unnumbered idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high: I'll look no more,
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.

We did not visit the other tower, as it was uniform with this. The woman
who has the charge of the light, was very good humoured, and very
talkative, she seemed delighted to show us every thing, and said she
preferred seeing englishmen _in_ her tower as friends, to the view she
frequently had of them _from_ it as enemies, alluding to the long, and
masterly blockade of this port by a squadron of english frigates. She
carried us to her little museum, as she called it, where she had
arranged, very neatly, a considerable collection of fossils, shells, and
petrefactions. Here she showed us with great animation, two british
cannon balls, which during the blockade, had very nearly rendered her
husband and herself, as cold and as silent as any of the petrefactions
in her collection. In this little cabinet was her bed, where amidst the
war of winds and waves, she told us she slept as sound as a _consul_.

In the basins of Havre, we saw several rafts, once so much talked of,
constructed for the real, or ostensible purpose of conveying the
invading legions of France, to the shores of Great Britain. I expected
to have seen an immense floating platform, but the vessels which we saw,
were made like brigs of an unusual breadth, with two low masts. The
sincerity of this project has been much disputed, but that the french
government expended considerable sums upon the scheme, I have no doubt.

I must not omit to mention, the admirable mode, which they have here,
and in most parts of France, of constructing their carts. They are
placed upon very high wheels, the load is generally arranged so as to
create an equipoise, and is raised by an axle, fastened near the shafts.
I was informed by a merchant, that a single horse can draw with ease
thirty-six hundred weight, in one of these carts. These animals have a
formidable appearance, owing to a strange custom which the french have,
of covering the collar, with an entire sheep's skin, which gives them
the appearance of having an enormous shaggy mane.

At night, we settled our bills which amounted to forty livres each. A
considerable charge in this country, but we had lived well, and had not
thought it worth our while, on account of the probable shortness of our
stay, to bargain for our lodging, and board, a plan generally proper to
be used by those, who mean to remain for some length of time, in any
place in France.

[Illustration: _Paris Diligence._]

CHAPTER IV.

_Cheap travelling to Paris.--Diligences.--French
Postilions.--Spanish Postilions.--Norman Horses.--Bolbec.--Natives
of Caux.--Ivetot.--Return of Religion.--Santerre.--Jacobin.--The
Mustard-pot.--National Property._

Before I proceed on my journey, I must beg leave to present a very cheap
mode of travelling to Paris, from Havre, to those who have more time at
their command than I had. It was given to me by a respectable gentleman,
and an old traveller.

_Sols._
From Havre to Honfleur, by the passage-boat 10
From Honfleur to Pontaudemar, by land 3
From Pontaudemar to Labouille 3
From Labouille to Rouen, by water 12
From Rouen to Rolleboise, by land 6
From Rolleboise to Pontoise, by water 30
From Pontoise to Paris, by land 30

This progress, however, is tedious and uncertain.

At day-break we seated ourselves in the diligence. All the carriages of
this description have the appearance of being the result of the earliest
efforts in the art of coach building. A more uncouth clumsy machine can
scarcely be imagined. In the front is a cabriolet fixed to the body of
the coach, for the accommodation of three passengers, who are protected
from the rain above, by the projecting roof of the coach, and in front
by two heavy curtains of leather, well oiled, and smelling somewhat
offensively, fastened to the roof. The inside, which is capacious, and
lofty, and will hold six people with great comfort, is lined with
leather padded, and surrounded with little pockets, in which the
travellers deposit their bread, snuff, night caps, and pocket
handkerchiefs, which generally enjoy each others company in the same
delicate depositary. From the roof depends a large net work, which is
generally crouded with hats, swords, and band boxes, the whole is
convenient, and when all parties are seated and arranged, the
accommodations are by no means unpleasant.

Upon the roof, on the outside, is the imperial, which is generally
filled with six or seven persons more, and a heap of luggage, which
latter also occupies the basket, and generally presents a pile, half as
high again as the coach, which is secured by ropes and chains, tightened
by a large iron windlass, which also constitutes another appendage of
this moving mass. The body of the carriage rests upon large thongs of
leather, fastened to heavy blocks of wood, instead of springs, and the
whole is drawn by seven horses. The three first are fastened to the
cross bar, the rest are in pairs, all in rope harness and tackling. The
near horse of the three first, is mounted by the postilion, in his great
jack boots, which are always placed, with much ceremony, like two tubs,
on the right side of his Rosinante, just before he ascends. These
curious protectors of his legs, are composed of wood, and iron hoops,
softened within by stuffing, and give him all the dignity of riding in a
pair of upright portmanteaus. With a long lash whip in his hand, a
dirty night cap and an old cocked hat upon his head, hallooing
alternately "à gauche, à droit," and a few occasional sacre dieus, which
seem always properly applied, and perfectly understood, the merry
postilion drives along his cattle. I must not fail to do justice to the
scientific skill with which he manages on horseback, his long and heavy
coach whip; with this commanding instrument, he can reanimate by a
touch, each halting muscle of his lagging animals, can cut off an
annoying fly, and with the loud cracking of its thong, he announces,
upon his entrance into a town, the approach of his heavy, and clattering
cavalcade. Each of these diligences is provided with a conducteur, who
rides upon the imperial, and is responsible throughout the journey, for
the comfort of the passengers and safety of the luggage. For his trouble
the passenger pays him only thirty sols for himself, and fifteen more
for the different postillions, to be divided amongst them, for these the
donor is thanked with a low bow, and many "bien obligés," in the name of
himself and his contented comrades.

Our companions proved to be some of our old friends the emigrants, who
had thrown aside their marine dishabille, and displayed the appearance
of gentlemen. We were much pleased with again meeting each other. Their
conversation upon the road was very interesting, it was filled with
sincere regret for the afflictions of their country, and with
expressions of love and gratitude towards the english. They told us many
little tales of politeness, and humanity which they had received from my
countrymen in the various towns, where their destiny had placed them.
One displayed, with amiable pride, a snuff box, which he had received as
a parting token of esteem, another a pocket book, and each was the
bearer of some little affectionate proof of merit, good conduct, or
friendship.

One of these gentlemen, the abbè de l'H----, whose face was full of
expression, tinctured with much grief, and attendant indisposition, with
a manner, and in a tone, which were truly affecting, concluded a little
narrative of some kindness which he had received, by saying, "if the
english and my country are not friends, it shall not be for want of my
prayers. I fled from France without tears, for the preservation of my
life, but when I left England, I confess it, I could not help shedding
some." They did not disgrace the generous abbè--such a nation was worthy
of such feelings.

Our horses were of the norman breed, small, stout, short, and full of
spirit, and to the honour of those who have the care of them, in
excellent condition. I was surprised to see these little animals running
away with our cumbrous machine, at the rate of six or seven miles an
hour.

We traced the desolating hand of the revolution as soon as we ascended
the first hill.

Our road lay through a charming country. Upon the sides of its
acclivities, surrounded by the most romantic scenery of woods and corn
fields, we saw ruined convents, and roofless village churches, through
the shattered casements of which the wind had free admission.

We breakfasted at a neat town called Bolbec, seven leagues from Havre,
where we had excellent coffee, butter, and rolls. All the household of
our inn looked clean, happy, and sprightly.

This is the principal town of the province of Caux, the women of which
dress their heads in a very peculiar, and in my humble opinion,
unbecoming manner. I made a hasty sketch of one of them who entered the
yard of the inn with apples for sale.

[Illustration: _A Woman of the province of Caux in Normandy._]

Such a promontory of cap and lace I never before beheld. She had been at
a village marriage that morning, and was bedecked in all her finery. The
people of this province are industrious and rich, and consequently
respectable. At the theatre at Rouen I afterwards saw, in one of the
front boxes, a lady from this country, dressed after its fashion; the
effect was so singular that it immediately induced me to distinguish
her, from the rest of the audience, but her appearance seemed to excite
no curiosity with any other person. Our breakfast cost us each fifteen
sous, to which may be added two sols more, for the maids, who waited
upon us with cheerful smiles, and habited in the full cushvois costume,
and which also entitled us to kisses and curtsies. I beg leave to oppose
our breakfast charge to the rumours which prevailed in England, that
this part of France was then in a state of famine. From this town, the
road was beautifully lined with beech, chesnut, and apple trees. The
rich yellow of the rape seed which overspread the surface of many of the
fields on each side, was very animating to the eye. From this vegetable
the country people express oil, and of the pulp of it make cakes, which
the norman horses will fatten upon. We had an early dinner at Ivetot,
five leagues distant from Bolbec. In ancient periods this miserable town
was once the capital of a separate kingdom. In our dining room were
three beds, or rather we dined in the bed room. I use the former
expression out of compliment to the pride of our little host, who
replied with some loftiness to one of our companions, who, upon entering
the room, and seeing so many accommodations for repose, exclaimed, with
the sharpness of appetite, "my good host, we want to eat, and not to
sleep;" "gentlemen," said our mortified little maitre d'hôtel, "this
chamber is the dining room, and it is thought a very good one." From its
appearance I should have believed him, had he sworn that it was the
state room of the palace of this ancient principality, of which this
wretched town was once the capital. It reminded me of an anecdote
related by an ancient english lady of fashion, when she first paid her
respects to James I, soon after his accession to the crown of England.
She mentions in her memoir, that his royal drawing room was so very
dirty, that after the levee she was obliged to recur to her comb for
relief. In plain truth, James I and his court were lousy.

Our master of the house was both cook and waiter. At dinner, amongst
several other dishes, we had some stewed beef, I requested to be
favoured with a little mustard, our host very solemnly replied, "I am
very sorry, citizen, but I have none, if you had been fortunate enough
to have been here about three weeks since, you might have had some." It
was more than I wished, so I ate my beef very contentedly without it.
With our desert we had a species of cake called brioche, composed of
egg, flour, and water; it is in high estimation in France.

It was in this town _only_ that I saw a specimen of that forlorn
wretchedness and importunity, which have been said to constitute the
general nuisance of this country.

In the shop of a brazier here, was exposed, a new leaden crucifix, about
two feet and a half high, for sale; it had been cast preparatory to the
reinauguration of the archbishop of Rouen, which was to take place upon
the next Sunday week, in the great cathedral of that city.

In consequence of the restoration of religion, the beggars, who have in
general considerable cleverness, and know how to turn new circumstances
to advantage, had just learnt a fresh mode of soliciting money, by
repeating the Lord's Prayer in French and Latin. We were treated with
this sort of importunate piety for near a mile, after we left Ivetot.

I have before mentioned, that the barbarous jargon of the revolution is
rapidly passing away. It is only here and there, that its slimy track
remains. The time is not very distant when Frenchmen wished to be known
by the name of Jacobins; it is now become an appellation of reproach,
even amongst the surviving aborigines of the revolution. As an instance
of it, a naval officer of rank and intelligence, who joined us at
Ivetot, informed us, that he had occasion, upon some matters of
business, to meet Santerre a few days before; that inhuman and vulgar
revolutionist, who commanded the national guards when they surrounded
the scaffold during the execution of their monarch. In the course of
their conversation, Santerre, speaking of a third person, exclaimed, "I
cannot bear that man; he is a Jacobin." Let all true revolutionary
republicans cry out, Bravo! at this.

This miscreant lives unnoticed, in a little village near Paris, upon a
slender income, which he has made in trade, not in the _trade of blood_;
for it appears that Robespierre was not a very liberal patron of his
servants. He kept his blood-hounds lean, and keen, and poorly fed them
with the rankest offal.

After a dusty journey, through a very rich and picturesque country, of
near eighty miles, we entered the beautiful boulevards[3] of Rouen,
about seven o'clock in the evening, which embowered us from the sun.
Their shade was delicious. I think them finer than those of Paris. The
noble elms, which compose them in four stately rows, are all nearly of
the same height. Judge of my surprise--Upon our rapidly turning the
corner of a street, as we entered the city, I suddenly found coach,
horses and all, in the aisle of an ancient catholic church. The gates
were closed upon us, and in a moment from the busy buzzing of the
streets, we were translated into the silence of shattered tombs, and the
gloom of cloisters: the only light which shone upon us, issued through
fragments of stained glass, and the apertures which were formerly filled
with it.

[3] Environs of a town, planted with stately trees.

My surprise, however, was soon quieted, by being informed, that this
church, having devolved to the nation as its property, by force of a
revolutionary decree, had been afterwards sold for stables, to one of
the owners of the Rouen diligences.

An old unsaleable cabriolet occupied the place of the altar; and the
horses were very quietly eating their oats in the sacristy!!

At the Bureau, we paid twelve livres and a half for our places and
luggage from Havre to this town.

[Illustration: _Rouen, from Mount St. Catherine._]

CHAPTER V.

Having collected together all our luggage, and seen it safely lodged in
a porter's wheelbarrow, Captain C. and I bade adieu to our fellow
travellers, and to these solemn and unsuitable habitations of ostlers
and horses, and proceeded through several narrow streets, lined with
lofty houses, the shops of which were all open, and the shopkeepers,
chiefly women, looked respectable and sprightly, with gay bouquets in
their bosoms, to the Hôtel de l'Europe; it is a fine inn, to which we
had been recommended at Havre, kept by Madame F----, who, with much
politeness, and many captivating movements, dressed à-la-Grec, with
immense golden earrings, approached us, and gave us a little piece of
information, not very pleasant to travellers somewhat discoloured by the
dust of a long and sultry day's journey, who wanted comfortable rooms,
fresh linen, a little coffee, and a good night's repose: her information
was, that her house was completely full, but that she would send to an
upholsterer to fit up two beds for us, in a very neat room, which she
had just papered and furnished, opposite to the porter's lodge (all the
great inns and respectable townhouses in France have great gates, and a
porter's lodge, at the entrance.) As we wished to have three rooms, we
told her, we were friends of Messrs. G----, (the principal merchants of
Rouen). She said, they were very amiable men, and were pleased to _send
all their friends to her house_ (a little french fib of Madame F----'s,
by the by, as will appear hereafter); and she was truly sorry that she
could not accommodate us better. We looked into the room, which also
looked into the street, was exposed to all its noise, and very small. So
we made our bows to Madame F----, and proceeded with our wheelbarrow to
the Hôtel de Poitiers--a rival house. It is situated in the beautiful
boulevards, which I have mentioned, and is part of a row of fine
stonebuilt houses. Upon our ringing the bell, Madame P---- presented
herself. We told her, we were just arrived at Rouen, that we had the
honour of being known to Messrs. G----, and should be happy to be placed
under her roof, and wished to have two lodging rooms and a sitting room
to ourselves. Madame P----, who possessed that sort of good and generous
heart, which nature, for its better preservation, had lodged in a
comfortable envelope of comely plumpness, observed, that Messrs. G----
were gentlemen of great respectability, were her patrons, and always
_sent their_ friends to _her_ house (a point upon which these rival
dames were at issue, but the truth was with Madame P----); that she
would do all in her power to make us happy; but at present, on account
of her house being very crowded, she could only offer us two bedrooms.
We were too tired to think of any further peregrinations of discovery;
so we entered our bed-rooms, which, like most of the chambers in France,
had brick floors without any carpetting; they were, however, clean;
and, after ordering a good fire in one of them (for the sudden and
unusual frost, which, in the beginning of summer, committed so much
ravage throughout Europe, commenced the day we had first the honour of
seeing Madame P----); and, after enjoying those comforts which weary
wanderers require, we mounted our lofty beds, and went to rest.

The next day we presented our letter, and ourselves, to Madame G----,
the amiable mother of the gentlemen I have mentioned. She received us
with great politeness, and immediately arranged a dinner party for us,
for that day. It being rather early in the morning, we were admitted
into her chamber, a common custom of receiving early visits in France.

About eleven o'clock we saw a splendid procession of all the military
and civil authorities to the hôtel[4] of the prefect, which was opposite
to our inn.

[4] Hôtel, in France, means either an inn, or private house of
consequence.

The object of this cavalcade was to congratulate the archbishop of Rouen
(who was then upon a visit to the prefect, until his own palace was
ready to receive him) on his elevation to the see.

This spectacle displayed the interference of God, in thus making the
former enemies of his worship pay homage to his ministers, after a long
reign of atheism and persecution.

About twelve o'clock, which is the hour of parade throughout the
republic, we went to the Champ de Mars, and saw a review of the 20th
regiment of chasseurs, under the command of generals St. Hiliare and
Ruffin, who, as well as the regiment, had particularly distinguished
themselves at Marengo.

The men were richly appointed, and in general well mounted. They all
wore mustachios. They were just arrived from Amiens, where, as a mark of
honour, they had been quartered during the negotiation.

The officers were superbly attired. St. Hiliare is a young man, and in
person much resembles his patron and friend, the first consul; and, they
say, in abilities also.

Some of the horses were of a dissimilar size and colour, which had a bad
effect; but I was informed, upon making the remark, that they had lost
many in battle, and had not had time properly to replace them. They were
all strong and fiery, and went through their evolutions with surprising
swiftness.

At dinner our party was very agreeable. Next to me sat a little abbè,
who appeared to be in years, but full of vivacity, and seemed to be much
esteemed by every person present. During the _time of terrour_ (as the
French emphatically call the gloomy reign of Robespierre) the blood of
this good man, who, from his wealth, piety, and munificence, possessed
considerable influence in Rouen, was sought after with keen pursuit.
Madame G---- was the saviour of his life, by concealing him, previous to
her own imprisonment, for two years, in different cellars, under her
house, which she rendered as warm and as comfortable as circumstances,
and the nature of the concealment, would allow. In one of these cells of
humane secresy, this worthy man has often eaten his solitary and
agitated meal, whilst the soldiers of the tyrant, who were quartered
upon his protectress, were carousing in the kitchen immediately above
him.

Soon after our coffee, which, in this country, immediately succeeds the
dinner, we went to view the bridge of boats, so celebrated in history.
This curious structure was contrived by an augustine friar named Michael
Bougeois, it is composed of timber, regularly paved, in squares which
contain the stories, and is 1000[5] feet in length; it commences from
the middle of the quay of Rouen, and reaches over to the Fauxbourg of
St. Sever, and carries on the communication with the country which lies
south of the city. It was begun in the year 1626, below it are the ruins
of the fine bridge of 13 arches, built by the empress Maud, daughter of
Henry I of England. This ingenious fabric rests upon 19 immense barges,
which rise and fall with the flowing and subsiding of the tide. When
vessels have occasion to pass it, a portion of the platform sufficient
to admit their passage is raised, and rolled over the other part. In the
winter, when any danger is apprehended from the large flakes of ice,
which float down the river, the whole is taken to pieces in an hour. The
expense of keeping it in repair is estimated at 10000 livres, or 400
pounds sterling per annum, and is defrayed by government, it being the
highroad to Picardy. Upon the whole, although this bridge is so much
admired, I must confess it appeared to me a heavy performance,
unsuitable to the wealth, and splendour of the city of Rouen, and below
the taste and ingenuity of modern times. A handsome light stone
structure, with a centre arch covered with a drawbridge, for the passage
of vessels of considerable burden, or a lofty flying iron bridge, would
be less expensive, more safe, and much more ornamental.

[5] The french feet are to the english as 1068 to 1000.

The view from this bridge up the Seine, upon the islands below mount St.
Catharine, is quite enchanting. Upon the quay, although it was Sunday, a
vast number of people were dancing, drinking, and attending shows and
lotteries. Here were people of various nations, parading up and down in
the habits and dresses of their respective countries, which produced
quite the effect of a masquerade. The river Seine is so deep at this
place, that ships of three hundred tons burden are moored close to the
quay, and make a very fine appearance. The exchange for the merchants is
parallel with the centre of the quay, and is a long paved building of
about 400 feet in length, open at top, having a handsome iron
balustrade, and seats towards the Seine, and a high stone wall towards
the town. Over all the great gates of the city, is written, in large
characters, "Liberty, Equality, Humanity, Fraternity or Death:" the last
two words have been painted over, but are still faintly legible.

In the evening we went to the french opera, which was very crowded. The
boxes were adorned with genteel people, and many beautiful young women.
The theatre is very large, elegant, and handsome, and the players were
good. I was struck with the ridiculous antics, and gestures of the chef
in the orchestra, a man whose office it is to beat time to the
musicians. In the municipality box which was in the centre, lined with
green silk, and gold, were two fine young women who appeared to be
ladies of fashion, and consequence; they were dressed after the antique,
in an attire which, for lightness, and scantiness I never saw equalled,
till I saw it surpassed at Paris. They appeared to be clothed only in
jewels, and a little muslin, very gracefully disposed, the latter, to
borrow a beautiful expression, had the appearance of "woven air."--From
emotions of gratitude, for the captivating display which they made, I
could not help offering a few fervent wishes, that the light of the next
day might find them preserved from the dreaded consequences of a very
bitter cold night.

Rouen, upon the whole, is a fine city, very large, and populous. It was
formerly the capital of the kingdom of Normandy. It stands upon a plain,
screened on three sides, by high, and picturesque mountains. It is near
two leagues in compass, exclusive of the fauxbourgs of St. Severs,
Cauchoise, Bouveul, St. Hiliare, Martainville and Beauvisme. Its
commerce was very celebrated, and is returning with great rapidity. Most
of the fine buildings in this city, and its environs are Anglo-Norman
antiquities, and were founded by the English before they left Normandy.

The cathedral is a grand, and awful pile of gothic architecture, built
by our William the Conqueror. It has two towers, one of which, is
surmounted by a wooden spire covered with lead, and is of the prodigious
height of 395 french feet, the other is 236 feet high.

The additional wooden spire, and the inequality of the towers produce
rather an unfavourable effect. During the revolution, this august
edifice was converted into a sulphur and gunpowder manufactory, by which
impious prostitution, the pillars are defaced, and broken, and the whole
is blackened, and dingy.

The costly cenotaphs of white marble, enriched with valuable ornaments
containing the hearts of our Henry III, and Richard I, kings of England,
and dukes of Normandy, which were formerly placed on each side of the
grand altarpiece, were removed during the revolution.

The altarpiece is very fine. Grand preparations were making for the
inauguration of the archbishop, which was to take place the following
Sunday. There were not many people at mass; those who were present,
appeared to be chiefly composed of old women, and young children. Over
the charity box fastened to one of the pillars was a board upon which
was written in large letters "Hospices reconnoissance et prospérité à
l'homme généreux et sensible." I saw few people affected by this
benedictory appeal. I next visited the church of St. Ouens, which is not
so large as the cathedral, but surpasses that, and every other sacred
edifice I ever beheld, in point of elegance. This graceful pile, has
also had its share of sufferings, during the reign of revolutionary
barbarism. Its chaste, and elegant pillars, have been violated by the
smoke of sulphur and wood; and in many places, present to the distressed
eye, chasms, produced by massy forges, which were erected against them,
for casting ball. The costly railing of brass, gilt, which half
surrounded the altar, has been torn up, and melted into cannon. The
large circular stained window over the entrance called La Rose du
Portail is very beautiful, and wholly unimpaired. The organs in all the
churches are broken and useless. They experienced this fate, in
consequence of their having been considered as fanatical instruments
during the time of terrour. The fine organ of St. Ouens is in this
predicament, and will require much cost to repair it[6].

[6] The ornaments of the churches of England experienced a similar fate
from the commissioners of the Long Parliament, in 1643.

I cannot help admiring the good sense which in all the churches of
France is displayed, by placing the organ upon a gallery over the grand
entrance, by which the spectator has an uninterrupted view, and commands
the whole length of the interior building. In the English cathedrals, it
is always placed midway between the choir and church, by which, this
desired effect is lost.--St. Ouens is now open for worship.

In spite of all the devastations of atheistic Vandalism, this exquisite
building, like the holy cause to which it is consecrated, having
withstood the assailing storm, and elevating its meek, but magnificent
head above its enemies, is mildly ready to receive them into her bosom,
still disfigured with the traces of blind and barbarous ferocity.

Behind the altar, I met the celebrated prince of Waldec. He, who
possessed of royal honours, and ample domains, revolted in the day of
battle, from his imperial master, and joined the victorious and pursuing
foe. I beheld him in a shaded corner of one of the cloisters of St.
Ouens, in poor attire, with an old umbrella under his arm, scantily
provided for, and scarcely noticed by his _new_ friends. A melancholy,
but just example of the rewards due to treachery and desertion.

I have described these churches only generally, it cannot be expected of
me to enter into an elaborate history of them, or of any other public
edifices. The detail, if attempted, might prove dull, and is altogether
incompatible with the limited time, and nature of my excursion.

After we left St. Ouens, we visited the Square aux Vaux, where the
celebrated heroine of Lorrain, Joan d'Arc, commonly called the Maid of
Orleans was cruelly burnt at the stake, for a pretended sorceress, but
in fact to gratify the barbarous revenge of the duke of Bedford, the
then regent of France; because after signal successes, she conducted her
sovereign, Charles, in safety, to Rheims, where he was crowned, and
obtained decisive victories over the English arms. We here saw the
statue erected by the French, to the memory of this remarkable woman,
which as an object of sculpture seems to possess very little worthy of
notice.

CHAPTER VI.

_First Consul's Advertisement.--Something
ridiculous.--Eggs.--Criminal Military Tribunal.--French Female
Confidence.--Town House.--Convent of
Jesuits.--Guillotine.--Governor W----._

Upon looking up against the corner wall of a street, surrounded by
particoloured advertisements of quack medicines, wonderful cures, new
invented essences, judgments of cassation, rewards for robbers, and
bills of the opera, I beheld Bonaparte's address to the people of
France, to elect him first consul for life. I took it for granted that
the spanish proverb of "tell me with whom you are, and I will tell you
what you are," was not to be applied in this instance, on account of the
company in which the _Consular application_, by a mere fortuitous
coincidence, happened to be placed.

A circumstance occurred at this time, respecting this election, which
was rather ridiculous, and excited considerable mirth at Paris. Upon the
first appearance of the election book of the first consul, in one of the
departments, some wag, instead of subscribing his name, immediately
under the title of the page, "shall Napoleone Bonaparte be first consul
for life?" wrote the following words, "I can't tell."

This trifling affair affords rather a favourable impression of the
mildness of that government, which could inspire sufficient confidence
to hazard such a stroke of pleasantry. It reached Mal Maison with great
speed, but is said to have occasioned no other sensation there, than a
little merriment. Carnot's bold negative was a little talked of, but as
it was solitary, it was considered harmless. To the love of finery which
the french still retain to a certain degree, I could alone attribute the
gay appearance of the eggs in the market, upon which had been bestowed a
very smart stain of lilac colour. The effect was so singular that I
could not help noting it down.

On the third day after our arrival in this city, we attended the trial
of a man who belonged to one of the banditti which infest the country
round this city. The court was held in the hall of the ancient
parliament house, and was composed of three civil judges (one of whom
presided) three military judges, and two citizens. The arrangements of
the court, which was crowded, were excellent, and afforded uninterrupted
accommodations to all its members, by separate doors and passages
allotted to each, and also to the people, who were permitted to occupy
the large area in front, which gradually rose from the last seats of the
persons belonging to the court, and enabled every spectator to have a
perfect view of the whole. Appropriate moral mottoes were inscribed in
characters of gold, upon the walls. The judges wore long laced bands,
and robes of black, lined with light blue silk, with scarfs of blue and
silver fringe, and sat upon an elevated semicircular bench, raised upon
a flight of steps, placed in a large alcove, lined with tapestry. The
secretaries, and subordinate officers were seated below them. On the
left the prisoner was placed, without irons, in the custody of two
gendarmes, formerly called maréchaussées, who had their long swords
drawn. These soldiers have a very military appearance, and are a fine,
and valuable body of men. I fear the respectable impression which I
would wish to convey of them will suffer, when I inform my reader, that
they are servants of the police, and answer to our Bow-street runners.
The swiftness with which they pursue, and apprehend offenders, is
surprising. We were received with politeness, and conducted to a
convenient place for hearing, and seeing all that passed. The accusateur
general who sat on the left, wore a costume similar to that of the
judges, without the scarf. He opened the trial by relating the
circumstances, and declaiming upon the enormity of the offence, by which
it appeared that the prisoner stood charged with robbery, accompanied
with breach of hospitality; which, in that country, be the amount of the
plunder ever so trifling, is at present capital. The address of the
public accuser was very florid, and vehement, and attended by violent
gestures, occasionally graceful. The pleaders of Normandy are considered
as the most eloquent men in France, I have heard several of them, but
they appear to me, to be too impassioned. Their motions in speaking
frequently look like madness. He ransacked his language to furnish
himself with reproachful epithets against the miserable wretch by the
side of him, who with his hands in his bosom appeared to listen to him,
with great sang froid. The witnesses who were kept separate, previous to
their giving their evidence, were numerous, and proved many robberies
against him, attended with aggravated breaches of hospitality. The court
entered into proofs of offences committed by the prisoner at different
times, and upon different persons. The women who gave their testimony,
exhibited a striking distinction between the timidity of english
females, confronting the many eyes of a crowded court of justice, and
the calm self possession with which the french ladies here delivered
their unperturbed testimony. The charges were clearly proved, and the
prisoner was called upon for his defence. Undismayed, and with all the
practised hardihood of an Old Bailey felon, he calmly declared, that he
purchased the pile of booty produced in the court, for sums of money,
the amount of which, he did not then know, of persons he could not name,
and in places which he did not remember. He had no advocate. The subject
was next resumed, and closed by the official orator who opened it. The
court retired, and the criminal was reconducted to the prison behind the
hall. After an absence of about twenty minutes, a bell rang to announce
the return of the judges, the prisoner entered now, escorted by a file
of national guards, to hear his fate. The court then resumed its
sitting. The president addressed the unhappy man, very briefly,
recapitulated his offences, and read the decree of the republic upon
them, by which he doomed him to lose his head at four o'clock that
afternoon.

It was then ten minutes past one!! The face of this wretched being
presented a fine subject for the pencil. His countenance was dark,
marked, and melancholy; over it was spread the sallow tint of long
imprisonment. His beard was unshorn, and he displayed an indifference to
his fate, which not a little surprised me. He immediately retired, and
upon his return to his cell, a priest was sent for to prepare him for
his doom. At present, in the provinces, all criminal offences are tried
before military tribunals, qualified, as I have described this to be, by
a mixture of civil judges and bourgeois.

It is one of the peculiar characteristics of such tribunals, to order
immediate punishment after conviction. In the present instance, the fate
of the offender was well known, for his crimes were many, and manifest,
and as the interval allowed by military courts between the sentence, and
its fulfilment, is so very short, the administrators of the law had
postponed his trial for five months from the period of his commitment,
for the purpose of affording him an indulgent procrastination. This
mode, although arising from merciful motives, is, I am aware, open to
objection; but it would be unfair to comment upon laws, which prevailed
in times of revolution, and are permitted only to operate, until the
fine fabric of french criminal jurisprudence, which is now constructing,
shall be presented to the people. To the honour of our country, and one
of the greatest ornaments of the british bar, the honourable T. Erskine,
in the year 1789, furnished the french, with some of these great
principles of criminal law, which it was impossible to perfect during
the long æra of convulsion, and instability which followed, and which
will constitute a considerable part of that great, and humane code,
which is about to be bestowed upon the nation, and which will, no doubt,
prove to be one of the greatest blessings, which human wisdom can confer
upon human weakness.

Its foundation is nearly similar to that of our own. The great and
enlightened genius whose name I have mentioned, has provided that the
contumacy of _one_ juryman shall not be able to force the opinion of the
rest.

After the court had broken up, I visited the town house, which, before
the revolution, was the monastery of the benedictines, who, from what
appeared of the remains of their establishment, must have been
magnificently lodged, and well deserved during their existence, to bear
the name of the blessed. The two grand staircases are very fine, and
there is a noble garden behind. Upon entering the vestibule of the
council chamber, formerly the refectory, I thought I was going behind
the scenes of a theatre. It was nearly filled with allegorical banners,
pasteboard and canvas arches of triumph, altars, emblems of liberty, and
despotism, and all the scenic decorations suitable to the frenzied
orgies of a republican fête. Thank God! they appeared to be tolerably
well covered with dust and cobwebs. At the end of this noble room,
seated upon a high pedestal, was the goddess of liberty, beautifully
executed in marble. "Look at that sanguinary prostitute," cried Mons.
G----, to me, pointing to the statue, "for years have we had liberty and
bloodshed, _thank Heaven!_ we are now no longer _free_." Upon which, he
wrote his name in the first consul's book, which was here lying open,
upon a table, for the purpose of receiving the suffrages of the
department.

The laconic irony, and manner of the speaker, afforded me a tolerably
good display of the nature of the blessings conferred upon the french,
by their late political philosophy.

From this place I proceeded to the ci-devant convent of the jesuits,
built by one of the munificent dukes de Bourbon. It is a magnificent
oblong stone building. In the centre of the court was a tree of liberty,
which, like almost all the other trees, dedicated to that goddess, which
I saw, looked blighted, and sickly. I mention it as a fact, without
alluding to any political sentiment whatever. It is a remark in frequent
use in France, that the caps of liberty are without heads, and the trees
of liberty without root. The poplar has been selected from all the other
trees of the forest, for this distinguished honour, from a whimsical
synonymy of its name with that of the people. In french, the poplar is
called peuplier, and the word peuple signifies people. This fine
building is now converted into an university of learning, and the fine
arts. From the number of the students, I should suppose the fashionable
fervour of study had not as yet reached Rouen.

The professor of philosophy, with great politeness sent a young man to
show me the museum of pictures, for which purpose the church of the
jesuits, is at present used. There are several paintings in it, the only
fine one, was a dying Jesus by Vandyke, which was exquisite. Upon my
expressing my admiration, a young student near me said "oui monsieur
c'est très jolie." This misapplied remark, from an easy and natural
combination of sound, could not fail of seeming a little singular as
applied to such a subject, but every thing that pleases in France is
très jolie. From this painting, I was, by importunity, led to view the
other parts of the collection, which were composed of large pictures, by
french masters; and so natural is local prejudice, every where, that I
was almost held down, before the works of the _best artists of Rouen_,
upon which, as I am at liberty _here_, I shall beg to make no comment.

In the students' room, below, were some paintings curious, and valuable
only, from their great antiquity, and a few good copies by the pupils. A
picture was pointed out to me as a very fine thing, the subject was a
fat little cherub, with a full flowing wig, fiddling to St. Francis, who
from his gloomy appearance seemed not to possess half the musical genius
of a dancing bear.

Upon my return through the market place, I beheld the miserable wretch,
at whose trial I was present in the morning, led out to execution. He
was seated upon the bottom of a cart, stripped above to his shirt, which
was folded back, his arms were pinioned close behind, and his hair was
closely cropped, to prevent the stroke of the fatal knife from being
impeded. A priest was seated in a chair beside him. As the object of my
excursion was to contemplate the manners of the people, I summoned
resolution to view this gloomy and painful spectacle, which seemed to
excite but little sensation in the market place, where its petty traffic
and concerns proceeded with their accustomed activity, and the women at
their stalls, which extended to the foot of the scaffold, appeared to be
impressed only with the solicitude of selling their vegetables to the
highest bidder. A small body of the national guards, and a few boys and
idlers surrounded the fatal spot. The guillotine, painted red, was
placed upon a scaffold, of about five feet high. As soon as the criminal
ascended the upper step which led to it he mounted, by the direction of
the executioner, a little board, like a shutter, raised upright to
receive him, to which he was strapped, turned down flat, and run into a
small ring of iron half opened and made to admit the neck, the top part
of which was then closed upon it, a black leather curtain was placed
before the head, from which a valve depended, which communicated to a
tub, placed under the scaffold to receive the blood, the executioner
then touched a long thin iron rod, connected with the top of the
instrument, and in a moment the axe descended, which was in the form of
a square, cut diagonally, heavily charged with lead. The executioner and
his assistants placed the body in a shell, half filled with saw dust,
which was almost completely stained over with the brown blood of former
executions; they then picked up the head, from a bag into which it had
fallen, within the curtain, and having placed it in the same gloomy
depository, lowered the whole down to the sextons, who covering it with
a pall bore it off to the place of burial.

The velocity of this mode of execution can alone recommend it. The pangs
of death are passed almost in the same moment, which presents to the
terrified eye of the sufferer the frightful apparatus of his disgraceful
dissolution. It is a dreary subject to discuss; but surely it is a
matter of deep regret, that in England, criminals doomed to die, from
the uncertain and lingering nature of their annihilation, are seen
writhing in the convulsions of death during a period dreadful to think
of. It is said, that at the late memorable execution of an african
governor for murder, the miserable delinquent was beheld for _fifteen
minutes_ struggling with the torments of his untimely fate! The
guillotine is far preferable to the savage mode, formerly used in
France, of breaking the criminal upon the wheel, and leaving him
afterwards to perish in the most poignant agonies.

As I have alluded to the fate of governor W----, I will conclude this
chapter by relating an anecdote of the terror and infatuation of guilt,
displayed in the conduct of this wretched man, in the _presence_ of a
friend of mine, from whom I received it--A few years before he suffered,
fatigued with life, and pursued by poverty, and the frightful
remembrance of his offences, then almost forgotten by the world, he left
the south of France for Calais, with an intention of passing over to
England, to offer himself up to its laws, not without the cherished hope
that a lapse of twenty years had swept away all evidence of his guilt.

At the time of his arrival at this port town, the hotel in which Madame
H---- was waiting for a packet to Dover was very crowded--the landlord
requested of her, that she would be pleased to permit two gentlemen, who
were going to England, to take some refreshment in her room; these
persons proved to be the unfortunate Brooks, a king's messenger, charged
with important dispatches to his court, and governor W----. The latter
was dressed like a decayed gentleman, and bore about him all the
indications of his extreme condition. They had not been seated at the
table long, before the latter informed the former, with evident marks of
perturbation, that his name was W----, that having been charged in
England with offences, which, if true, subjected him to heavy
punishment, he was anxious to place himself at the disposal of its laws,
and requested of him, as he was an english messenger, that he would
consider him as his prisoner, and take charge of him.

The messenger, who was much surprised by the application told him, that
he could not upon such a representation take him into custody, unless he
had an order from the duke of Portland's office to that effect, and that
in order to obtain it, it would be proper for him to write his name,
that it might be compared with his hand writing in the office of the
secretary at war, which he offered to carry over with him. Governor
W---- still pressed him to take him into custody, the messenger more
strongly declined it, by informing him that he was the bearer of
dispatches of great importance to his court, that he must immediately
cross the Channel, and should hazard a passage, although the weather
looked lowering, in an open boat, as no packets had arrived, and that
consequently it was altogether impossible to take him over, but again
requested him to write his name, for the purpose already mentioned; the
governor consented, pens and paper were brought, but the hand of the
murderer shook so dreadfully, that he could _not write it_, and in an
agony of mind, bordering upon frenzy, he rushed out of the room, and
immediately left the town.

The messenger entered the boat, and set sail; a storm quickly followed,
_the boat sunk in sight of the pier_, and all on board but one of the
watermen, perished!!!

The great disposer of human destiny, in vindication of his eternal
justice, rescued the life of this infatuated delinquent from the waves,
and from a sudden death, to resign him to the public and merited doom of
the laws.

CHAPTER VII.

_Filial Piety.--St. Catharine's Mount.--Madame Phillope.--General
Ruffin's Trumpet.--Generosity.--Love Infectious.--Masons and
Gardeners._

I have before had occasion to mention the humane conduct of Madame G----
towards the persecuted abbè; she soon afterwards, with the principal
ladies of the city, fell under the displeasure of Robespierre, and his
agents. Their only crime was wealth, honourably acquired. A committee,
composed of the most worthless people of Rouen, was formed, who, in the
name of, and for the use of the nation, seized upon the valuable stock
of Messrs. G----, who were natives of France. In one night, by
torchlight, their extensive warehouses were sacked, and all their stores
were forcibly sold in the public marketplace to the best bidder: the
plundered merchants were paid the amount of the sale in assignats, in a
paper currency which then bore an enormous discount, and shortly
afterwards retained only the value of the paper upon which the national
note was written. In short, in a few hours an honourable family, nobly
allied, were despoiled of property to the amount of 25,000_l._ sterling.
Other merchants shared the same fate. This act of robbery was followed
by an act of cruelty. Madame G----, the mother, who was born in England,
and who married a French gentleman of large fortune, whom she survived,
of a delicate frame and advanced in years, was committed to prison,
where, with many other female sufferers, she was closely confined for
eleven months, during which time she was compelled to endure all sorts
of privations. After the committee of rapine had settled their black
account, and had remitted the guilty balance to their employers, the
latter, in a letter of "friendly collusion, and fraudulent familiarity,"
after passing a few revolutionary jokes upon what had occurred, observed
that the G----s seemed to bleed very freely, and that as it was likely
they must have credit with many persons to a large amount, directed
their obedient and active banditti to order these devoted gentlemen to
draw, and to deliver to them, their draughts upon all such persons who
stood indebted to their extensive concern. In the words of a celebrated
orator[7], "Though they had shaken the tree till nothing remained upon
the leafless branches, yet a new flight was on the wing, to watch the
first buddings of its prosperity, and to nip every hope of future
foliage and fruit."

[7] Vide Sheridan's oration against Hastings upon the Begum charge.

The G----s expected this visit, and, by an ingenious, and justified
expedient, prevented their perdition from becoming decisive.

Soon after the gates of the prison were closed upon Madame G----, her
eldest son, a man of commanding person, and eloquent address, in
defiance of every friendly, and of every affectionate entreaty, flew to
Paris.

It was in the evening of the last winter which beheld its snows
crimsoned with revolutionary carnage, when he presented himself,
undismayed, before that committee, whose horrible nature will be better
described by merely relating the names of its members, then sitting,
than by the most animated and elaborate delineations of all its deadly
deeds of rapine and of blood. At a table, covered with green cloth,
shabbily lighted, in one of the committee rooms of the national
assembly, were seated Robespierre, Collot d'Herbois, Carnot, and David.
They were occupied in filling up the lists for the _permanent_
guillotine, erected very near them, in la Place de la Revolution, which
the executioners were then clearing of its gore, and preparing for the
next day's butchery. In this devoted capital more blood had, during that
day, streamed upon the scaffold, than on any one day during the
revolution.

The terrified inhabitants, in darkness, in remote recesses of their
desolate houses, were silently offering up a prayer to the great God of
Mercy to release them, in a way most suitable to his wisdom, from such
scenes of deep dismay, and remorseless slaughter.

Robespierre, as usual, was dressed with great neatness and gayety; the
_savage_ was generally _scented_, whilst his associates were habited, en
Jacobin, in the squalid, filthy fashion of that era of the revolution,
in the dress of blackguards.

Mr. G---- bowed, and addressed them very respectfully. "I am come,
citizens, before you," said this amiable son, "to implore the release of
my mother; she is pining in the prison of Rouen, without having
committed any offence; she is in years; and if her confinement
continues, her children whose fortunes have been placed at the disposal
of the national exigencies, will have to lament her death; grant the
prayer of her son, restore, I conjure you, by all the rights of nature,
restore her to her afflicted family." Robespierre looked obliquely at
him, and with his accustomed sharpness, interrupted him from proceeding
further, by exclaiming, "what right have _you_ to appear before us,
miscreant? you are an agent of Pitt and Cobourg (the then common phrase
of reproach) you shall be sent to the guillotine--Why are you not at the
frontiers?" Monsieur G----, unappalled, replied, "give me my mother, and
I will be there to morrow, I am ready instantly to spill my blood, if it
must be the price of _her_ discharge." Robespierre, whose savage soul
was occasionally moved by sights of heroic virtue, seemed impressed by
this brave and unusual address. He paused, and after whispering a few
words to his associates, wrote the discharge, and handing it over to a
soldier, for the successful petitioner, he fiercely told him to retire.

Mr. G---- instantly set out for Rouen, where, after a long, and severe
journey, he arrived, exhausted with fatigue, and agitation of mind;
without refreshment, this excellent man flew to the gates of the prison,
which contained his mother, and presented the discharge to the gaoler,
who drily, with a brutal grin, informed him, that a trick had been
played off upon him, that he had just received a counter order, which he
held in his hand, and refused to release her!!!

It turned out, that immediately after Mr. G---- had left the committee
room, the relenting disposition, which he had momentarily awakened in
the barbarous breast of Robespierre, had subsided.

The generous sentiment was of a short, and sickly growth, and withered
under the gloomy, fatal shade of his sanguinary nature. A chasseur had
been dispatched with the counterorder, who passed the exulting, but
deluded G---- on the road.

A short time after this, and a few days before Madame G----, and
her unhappy companions were to have perished on the scaffold, the
gates of their prison flew open, the world was released from a
monster--Robespierre was no more.

This interesting recital I received from one of the amiable sufferers,
in our way to St. Catharine's Mount. The story afforded a melancholy
contrast to the rich and cheerful scenes about us.

From the attic story of a lofty house, built under this celebrated
cliff, we ascended that part of it, which, upon the road to Paris, is
only accessible in this manner. When we reached the top, the prospect
was indeed superb; on one side we traced for miles, the romantic
meanders of the Seine, every where forming little islands of poplars;
before us, melting away in the horizon, were the blue mountains of Lower
Normandy; at their feet, a variegated display of meadows, forests, corn
fields, and vineyards; immediately below us, the city of Rouen, and its
beautiful suburbs. This delicious, and expanded prospect, we enjoyed
upon a seat erected near a little oratory, which is built upon the top
of the mountain, resting, at one end, upon the pedestal of a cross,
which, in the times of the revolution, had been shattered and
overturned.

From this place, before dinner, we proceeded to la Montagne; a wild and
hilly country, lying opposite to St. Catharine's. Here we were overtaken
by a storm, upon which, a curé, who had observed us from his little
cottage, not far distant, and who had been very lately reinstated in the
cure of the church, in the neighbouring village, came out to us, with an
umbrella, and invited us to dinner. Upon our return to our inn, to
dress, we were annoyed by a nuisance which had before frequently
assailed us. I knew a man, who in a moment of ill humour, vented rather
a revengeful wish that the next neighbour of his enemy might have a
child, who was fond of a _whistle_ and a _drum_! A more insufferable
nuisance was destined for us; the person who lodged in the next room to
mine, was a beginner (and a dull one too) upon the _trumpet_. It was
general Ruffin, whom I have mentioned before, forcing from this brazen
tube, sounds which certainly would have set a kennel of hounds in a cry
of agony, and were almost calculated to disturb the repose of the dead.
General Ruffin, in all other respects, was a very polite, and indeed a
very _quiet_ young man, and a brave warrior; but in the display of his
passion for music, I fear he mistook either his talent or his
instrument. At one time we thought of inviting him to dine with us, that
we might have a little respite, but after debating the matter well over,
we conceived that to entertain an italian hero, as he ought to be
received by those who admire valour even in an enemy, was purchasing
silence at a very advanced price, so we submitted to the evil with that
resignation which generally follows the incurable absence of a remedy.
We now addressed ourselves to Madame P----, to know how long the general
had learned the trumpet, and whether his leisure hours were generally
occupied in this way. Madame P. was, strange to tell, not very able to
afford us much information upon the subject. She was under the influence
of love. The natural tranquillity of her disposition, was improved by
the prospect of connubial happiness, which, although a widow, and
touching the frontier of her eight and thirtieth year, she shortly
expected to receive from the son of a neighbouring architect, who was
then a minor. In this blissful frame of mind, our fair hostess scarcely
knew when the trumpet of general R---- sounded. Her soul was in harmony
with all the world, and it was not in the power of the demon of discord,
nor even of this annoying brazen tube, to disturb her. Madame P---- well
deserved to be blessed with such equanimity, and if _she_ liked it, with
such a lover, for she was a generous and good creature.

A gentleman to whom I was afterwards introduced, when the revolution
began to grow hot, fled with his lady and his children into a foreign
country, where, upon the relics of a shattered fortune he remained,
until things wore a better aspect, and enabled him, with a prospect of
safety, to return to his native country. In better times, upon his
annual visits to a noble chateau, and large estates which he once
possessed in this part of Normandy, he was accustomed to stop at the
Hôtel de Poitiers. His equipage was then splendid, and suitable to his
affluent circumstances. Upon his return to France, this gentleman,
harassed by losses, and fatigued by sickness, arrived with his
accomplished lady, and their elegant children, in a hired cabriole, at
the gate of Madame P----. As soon as their name was announced, the
grateful hostess presented herself before them, and kissing the
children, burst into tears of joy; when she had recovered herself, she
addressed her old patron, by expressing her hopes, that he had amended
his fortune abroad, and was now returning to enjoy himself in
tranquillity at home. "Alas! my good Madame P----," said this worthy
gentleman, "we left our country, as you know, to save our lives, we have
subsisted upon the remains of our fortune ever since, and have sustained
heavy and cruel losses; we have been taken prisoners upon our passage,
and are now returning to our home, if any is left to us, to solicit some
reparation for our sufferings. Times are altered, Madame P----, you must
not now consider me as formerly, when I expended the gifts of Providence
in a manner which I hope was not altogether unworthy of the bounty which
showered them upon me, we must bow down to such dispensations, you see I
am candid with you; we are fatigued, and want refreshment, give us, my
good landlady, a little plain dinner, such as is suitable to our present
condition."

Madame P---- was so much affected, that she could make no reply, and
left the room.

Immediately all the kitchen was in a bustle, every pot and pan were
placed in instant requisition, the chamber-maids were sent to the
neighbouring confectioners for cakes, and the porter was dispatched all
over the city for the choicest fruits. In a short time a noble dinner
was served up to this unfortunate family, followed by confectionary,
fruits, and burgundy. When the repast was over, Mons. O---- ordered his
bill, and his cabriole to be got ready. Madame P----entered, and in the
most amiable manner requested him, as she had exceeded his orders, to
consider the dinner as a little acknowledgement of her sense of his past
favours; money, though earnestly pressed upon her, she would not
receive.

The whole of this interesting party were moved to tears, by this little
act of nature and generosity. When they entered their carriage, they
found in it bouquets of flowers, and boxes of cakes for the little
children. No doubt Madame P----moved lighter that day, than she ever did
in her life, and perhaps found the remembrance of her conduct upon the
occasion almost as exquisite as the hours of love, which she appeared
most happily to enjoy, when we had the honour of being under her roof.

Monsieur O---- could not help exhibiting much feeling, when he related
this little event to me. I must not fail to mention that all the house
seemed, for the moment, infected with the happy disease of the mistress.
General Ruffin's valet de chambre was in love with Dorothée, our
chamber-maid; the porter was pining for a little black eyed grisette,
who sold prints and pastry, in a stall opposite; and the ostler was
eternally quarrelling with the chef de cuisine, who repelled him from
the kitchen, which, in the person of the assistant cook, a plump rosy
norman girl, contained all the treasure of his soul--love and
negligence reigned throughout the household. We rang the bells, and
sacre dieu'd, but all in vain, we suffered great inconvenience, _but who
could be angry?_ In the course of our walks, and conversations, with the
workmen, whom we met, we found that most of the masons, and gardeners of
Rouen, had fought in the memorable, bloody, and decisive battle of
Marengo, at which it appears that a great part of the military of
France, within four or five hundred miles of the capital, were present.
The change they presented was worthy of observation; we saw men
sun-browned in campaigns, and enured to all the ferocity of war, at the
sound of peace assuming all the tranquil habits of ingenious industry,
or rustic simplicity. Some of them were occupied in forming the
shapeless stone into graceful embellishments for elegant houses, and
others in disposing, with botanic taste, the fragrant parterre. After
spending four very delightful days in this agreeable city, I bade adieu
to my very worthy companion, captain W. C----, whose intention it was to
spend some time here, and those friends, from whom I had received great
attention and hospitalities, and wishing the amiable Madame P---- many
happy years, and receiving from her the same assurances of civility,
about seven o'clock in the evening I seated myself in the diligence for
Paris, and in a comfortable corner of it, after we had passed the pavé,
resigned myself to sleep.

CHAPTER VIII.

_Early dinner.--Mante.--Frost.--Duke de Sully.--Approach the
Capital.--Norman Barrier.--Paris.--Hôtel de Rouen.--Palais Royal._

At day break, the appearance of the country in all directions was
delightful. The faint eastern blush of early morn, threw a mild,
refreshing light over the moist and dew-dripping scenery.

The spirit of our immortal bard, awaking from the bosom of nature,
seemed to exclaim--

------------Look love, what envious streaks
Do lace the severing clouds, in yonder east;
Night's candles are burnt out; and jocund Day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.

About eight o'clock in the morning, we arrived at Mante, a picturesque
town, built upon a fertile mountain, at the base of which the Seine
flowed along, rippling against its many islands of beautiful poplars. At
this hour, upon our alighting at the inn, we found a regular dinner
ready, consisting of soups, meats, fowls, and confectionary. To the no
small surprise of the host, I expressed a wish to have some breakfast,
and at length, after much difficulty, procured some coffee and rolls.

The rest of the party, with great composure, tucked their napkins in the
buttonholes of their waistcoats, and applied themselves to the good
things before them, with very active address. What a happy race of
people! ready for every thing, and at all times; they scarcely know the
meaning of inconvenience.

In the midst of difficulty, they find accommodation; with them, every
thing seems in harmony. After paying thirty sols for my repast, a charge
which announced our approach to the capital, I walked on, and made my
way to the bridge over another winding of the Seine, at the bottom of
the town; which is a light, and elegant structure. The houses along the
sides of the river are handsome, and delightfully situated. The
principal church is a fine gothic building, but is rapidly hastening to
decay; some of its pinnacles are destroyed, and all its windows broken
in.

A small chapel, in the street opposite, which had an appearance of
considerable elegance, was converted into a slaughter-house. Embosomed
in woods, on the other side of the bridge, is a fine chateau, formerly
belonging to the count d'Adhemar; here, while enjoying the enchanting
prospect about me, I heard the jingling approach of our heavy diligence,
in which, having reseated myself, we proceeded upon a fine high road,
through thick rows of walnut, cherry, mulberry, and apple trees, for
several miles, on each side of which, were vineyards, upon whose
promising vintage, the frost had committed sad devastation. For a vast
extent, they appeared blackened and burnt up. It was said that France
sustained a loss of two millions sterling, by this unusual visitation.

In the course of our journey, I experienced in the conduct of one of our
two female companions, an occurrence, allied to that, which is related
by Sterne, of Madame de Rambouillet, by which he very justly illustrates
the happy ease, with which the french ladies prevent themselves from
ever suffering by inconvenient notions of delicacy.

A few miles from Mante, on the borders of the Seine, we passed one of
the venerable chateaus of the celebrated duke de Sully, the faithful,
able, and upright minister, of Henry IV of France, one of those great
geniuses, who only at distant æras of time, are permitted to shine out
amongst the race of men. Historians unite in observing that the duke
performed all the duties of an active and upright minister, under a
master, who exercised all the offices of a great and good king; after
whose unhappy fate, this excellent man retired from the busy scenes of
the world, and covered with time and honours expired in the
eighty-second year of his age in the year 1641, at his castle of
Villebon. The house is plain, and large. The grounds are disposed after
the fashion of ancient times.

As we approached the capital, the country looked very rich and
luxuriant. We passed through the forest of St. Germains, where there is
a noble palace, built upon a lofty mountain. The forest abounds with
game, and formerly afforded the delights of the chase to the royal
Nimrods of France. Its numerous green alleys are between two and three
miles long, and in the form of radii unite in a centre. The forest and
park extend to the barrier, through which, we immediately entered the
town of St. Germains, distant from Paris about twelve miles, which is a
large and populous place, and in former periods, during the royal
residence, was rich and flourishing, but having participated in the
blessings of the revolution, presents an appearance of considerable
poverty, and squalid decay. Here we changed horses for the last post,
and ran down a fine, broad paved, royal road through rows of stately
elms, upon an inclined plane, until the distant, and wide, but clear
display of majestic domes, awful towers, and lofty spires, informed us
that we approached the capital. I could not help comparing them with
their cloud-capped brethren of London, over whose dim-discovered heads,
a floating mass of unhealthy smoke, for ever suspends its heavy length
of gloom. Our carriage stopped at the Norman Barrier, which is the grand
entrance to Paris, and here presents a magnificent prospect to the eye.
The barrier is formed of two very large, and noble military stone
lodges, having porticoes, on all sides, supported by massy doric
pillars. These buildings were given to the nation, by the national
assembly in the year 1792, and are separated from each other, by a range
of iron gates, adorned with republican emblems. Upon a gentle declivity;
through quadruple rows of elms, at the distance of a mile and a half,
the gigantic statues of la Place de la Concorde (ci-devant, de la
Revolution) appear; beyond which, the gardens, and the palace of the
Thuilleries, upon the centre tower of which, the tricoloured flag was
waving, form the back scene of this splendid spectacle. Before we
entered la Place de la Concorde, we passed on each side of us, the
beautiful, and favourite walks of the parisians, called les Champs
Elysées, and afterwards, on our left, the elegant palace of the
Garde-meuble; where we entered the streets of Paris, and soon afterwards
alighted at the bureau of the diligences; from which place, I took a
fiacre (a hackney coach) and about six o'clock in the evening presented
myself to the _mistress_ of the hôtel de Rouen, for the women of France
generally transact all the masculine duties of the house. To this hotel
I was recommended by Messrs. G----, upon mentioning whose name, I was
very politely shown up to a suite of pleasant apartments, consisting of
an antiroom, bedroom, and dressing-room, the two latter were charmingly
situated, the windows of which, looked out upon an agreeable garden
belonging to the palace of the Louvre. For these rooms I paid the
moderate price of three livres a day. Here, after enjoying those
comforts which travellers after long journies, require, and a good
dinner into the bargain, about nine o'clock at night I sallied out to
the Palais Royal, a superb palace built by the late duke d'Orleans, who
when he was erecting it, publickly boasted, that he would make it one of
the greatest brothels in Europe, in which prediction he succeeded, to
the full consummation of his abominable wishes. This palace is now the
property of the nation. The grand entrance is from the Rue St. Honorè, a
long street, something resembling the Piccadilly of London, but
destitute, like all the other streets of Paris, of that ample breadth,
and paved footway, for the accommodation of pedestrian passengers, which
give such a decided superiority to the streets of the capital of
England. After passing through two noble courts, I entered the piazza,
of this amazing pile; which is built of stone, upon arches, supported
by corinthian pilasters. Its form is an oblong square, with gardens, and
walks in the centre. The whole is considered to be, about one thousand
four hundred feet long, and three hundred feet broad. The finest shops
of Paris for jewellery, watches, clocks, mantuamakers, restaurateurs[8],
china, magazines, &c., form the back of the piazza, which on all the
sides, of this immense fabric, affords a very fine promenade. These
shops once made a part of the speculation, of their mercenary, and
abandoned master, to whom they each paid a rent after the rate of two or
three hundred pounds sterling per annum. This place presents a scene of
profligate voluptuousness, not to be equalled upon any spot in Europe.
Women of character are almost afraid to appear here at noon day; and a
stranger would conceive, that at night, he saw before him, one third of
the beauty of Paris.

[8] Restaurateur is now universally used instead of traiteur.

Under the roof of this palace are two theatres, museums of curiosities,
the tribunate, gaming houses, billiard rooms, buillotte clubs, ball
rooms, &c., all opening into the gardens, the windows of which threw,
from their numerous lamps, and lustres, a stream of gay and gaudy light
upon the walks below, and afforded the appearance of a perpetual
illumination. At the bottom was a large pavilion, finely illuminated, in
which were groups of people regaling themselves with lemonade, and ices.
Upon this spot, in the early part of the revolution, the celebrated
Camille Desmoulins used to declaim against the abuses of the old
government, to all the idle and disaffected of Paris. It is said that
the liveries of the duc d'Orleans gave birth to the republican colours,
which used to be displayed in the hats of his auditors, who in point of
respectability resembled the motley reformers of Chalk Farm. From the
carousing rooms under ground, the ear was filled with the sounds of
music, and the buzzing of crowds; in short, such a scene of midnight
revelry and dissipation I never before beheld.

Upon my return to my hôtel, I was a little surprised to find the streets
of this gay city so meanly lighted. Lamps placed at gloomy distances
from each other, suspended by cords, from lofty poles, furnish the only
means of directing the footsteps of the nocturnal wanderer.

CHAPTER IX.

I forgot, in my last chapter, to mention that I paid for my place, and
luggage in the diligence, from Rouen to Paris, a distance of ninety
miles, twenty-three livres and eighteen sols. The next morning after my
arrival, and a good night's repose in a sopha bed, constructed after the
french fashion, which was very lofty, and handsome, and very
comfortable, I waited upon my accomplished friend, Madame H----, in the
Rue Florentine. I had the honour of knowing her when in England, from
very early years; I found her with her elegant and accomplished
daughter, in a suite of large rooms, very handsomely furnished after the
_antique_, which gives to the present fashionable furniture of France,
its form and character. These rooms composed a floor of a noble stone
built house, which contained several other families; such is the
customary mode of being lodged in the capital. She received me in the
most charming manner, and had expected me for some days, previous to my
arrival, and was that evening going to her country house at Passi, a few
miles from Paris, whither she pressed me to accompany her, but I
declined it, on account of the short time which I had before me to
spend in Paris. Madame H---- was not only a beauty, but a woman of wit
and learning, and had accordingly admitted Voltaire amongst the number
of her household gods; the arch old cynic, with his deathlike sarcastic
face, admirably represented, by a small whole length porcelain statue,
occupied the centre of her chimney piece. Upon finding that I was
disposed to remain in town, she recommended me to a restaurateur, in the
gardens of the Thuilleries, one of the first eating houses in Paris, for
society, and entertainment, to the master of which she sent her servant,
with my name, to inform him, that she had recommended an english
gentleman of her acquaintance to his house, and requested that an
english servant in his service might attend to me, when I dined there.
This was a little valuable civility, truly french. This house has been
lately built under the auspices of the first consul, from a design,
approved of by his own exquisite taste; he has permitted the entrance to
open into the gardens of the consular palace. The whole is from a model
of one of the little palaces of the Herculaneum, it is upon a small
scale, built of a fine white stone, it contains a centre, with a
portico, supported by doric pillars, and two long wings. The front is
upon the terrace of the gardens, and commands an enchanting view of all
its beautiful walks and statues. On the ground floor the house is
divided into three long and spacious apartments, opening into each other
through centre arches, and which are redoubled upon the view by immense
pier glasses at each end. The first room is for dinner parties, the next
for ices, and the third for coffee. In the middle is a flying
staircase, lined on each side with orange trees, which ascends into a
suite of upper dinner rooms, all of which are admirably painted after
the taste of the Herculaneum, and are almost lined with costly pier
glasses.

My fair countrywomen would perhaps be a little surprised to be told,
that elegant women, of the first respectability, superbly dressed for
the promenade, dine here with their friends in the public room, a custom
which renders the scene delightful, and removes from it the accustomed
impressions of grossness. Upon entering, the guest is presented with a
dinner chart, handsomely printed, enumerating the different dishes
provided for that day, with their respective prices affixed. All the
people who frequent this place are considered highly respectable. The
visitor is furnished with ice for his water decanters, with the best
attendance at dinner, and with all the english and foreign newspapers. I
always dined here when I was not engaged. After parting from Madame
H----, who intended returning to town the next day, I went to see the
consular guard relieved at the Thuilleries. About five companies of this
distinguished regiment assemble in the gardens, exactly at five minutes
before twelve o'clock, and, preceded by their fine band of music, march
through the hall of the palace, and form the line in the grand court
yard before it, where they are joined by a squadron of horse. Their
uniform is blue, with broad white facings.

The consular guard were in a little disgrace, and were not permitted to
do the entire duty of the palace at this time, nor during several
succeeding days, as a mark of the first consul's displeasure, which had
been excited by some unguarded expression of the common men, respecting
his conduct, and which, to the jealous ear of a new created and untried
authority, sounded like the tone of disaffection. Only the cavalry were
allowed to mount guard, the infantry were, provisionally, superseded by
a detachment from a fine regiment of hussars. On account of the
shortness of this parade, which is always dismissed precisely at ten
minutes past twelve o'clock, it is not much attended. The band is very
fine, they had a turkish military instrument, which I never heard
before, and was used instead of triangles. It was in the shape of four
canopies, like the roofs of chinese temples, one above another,
lessening as they ascended, made of thin plates of brass, and fringed
with very little brass bells, it was supported by a sliding rod which
dropped into a handle, out of which, when it was intended to be sounded,
it was suddenly jerked by the musician, and produced a good effect with
the other instruments. The tambour major is remarked for his noble
appearance, and for the proportions of his person, which is very
handsome: his full dress uniform on the grand parade is the most
splendid thing, I ever beheld. The corps of pioneers who precede the
regiment, have a singular appearance. These men are rather above six
feet high, and proportionably made, they wear fierce mustachios, and
long black beards, lofty bear skin caps, broad white leathern aprons,
which almost touch their chins, and over their shoulders carry enormous
hatchets. Their strange costume seemed to unite the dissimilar
characters of high priest, and warrior. They looked like _military
magi_. The common men made a very martial appearance. Their officers
wore english riding boots, which had an unmilitary effect. Paris at
present exhibits all the appearances of a city in a state of siege. The
consular palace resembles a line of magnificent barracks, at the
balconies, and upon the terraces of which, soldiers are every where to
be seen lounging. This palace is partitioned between the first and
second consuls, the third principal magistrate resides in a palace near
the Louvre, opposite to the Thuilleries. The four colossal brazen
horses, called the venetian horses, which have been brought from Venice,
are mounted upon lofty pedestals, on each side of the gates of the grand
court yard of the palace. When the roman emperor Constantine founded
Constantinople, he attached these exquisite statues to the chariot of
the Sun in the hippodromus, or circus, and when that capital was taken
possession of by the venetian and french crusading armies, in 1206, the
venetians obtained possession of them, amongst many other inestimable
curiosities, and placed these horses in four niches over the great door
of the church of St. Marco. Respecting their previous history, authors
very much differ; some assert that they were cast by the great statuary
Lysippus, in Alexander's time, others that they were raised over the
triumphal arch of Augustus, others of Nero, and thence removed to the
triumphal arch of Constantine, from which he carried them to his own
capital.

They are said to be composed of bronze and gold, which much resembles
the famous composition of the corinthian brass. Although these statues
are of an enormous size, they are too diminutive for the vast pile of
building which they adorn. The same remark applies to the entrance
gates, of massy iron, which have just been raised by the directions of
the first consul. The tricolour flag, mounted upon the centre dome of
the palace, is also too small. From the court yard I entered the
gardens, which are very beautiful, and about seven o'clock in the
evening, form one of the favourite and fashionable walks of the
parisians. They are disposed in regular promenades, in which are many
fine casts from the ancient statues, which adorn the hall of antiques,
and on each side are noble orange trees, which grow in vast moveable
cases; many of these exotics are twenty feet high. Until lately many of
the antiques were placed here, but Bonaparte, with his accustomed
judgment and veneration for the arts, has had them removed into the
grand national collection, and has supplied their places by these
beautiful copies, amongst which I particularly distinguished those of
Hippomanes, and Atalanta, for the beauty of their proportions, and the
exquisite elucidation of their story. Here are also some fine basins of
water, in the middle of which are jets d'eau. The gravel walks of the
gardens are watered every morning in hot weather, and centinels are
stationed at every avenue, to preserve order: no person is admitted who
is the carrier of a parcel, however small. Here are groups of people to
be seen, every morning, reading the prints of the day, in the refreshing
coolness of the shade. For the use of a chair in the gardens, of which
there are some hundreds, the proprietor is thankful for the smallest
coin of the republic. At the bottom of the steps, leading to the
terrace, in front of the palace, are some beautiful vases, of an immense
size, which are raised about twelve feet from the ground: in one of
them, which was pointed out to me, an unpopular and persecuted Parisian
saved nearly all his property, during the revolution. A short time
before the massacre of the 10th of August, 1792, when the domiciliary
visits became frequent and keen, this man, during a dark night, stole,
unobserved by the guards, into the garden, with a bag under his arm,
containing almost all his treasure; he made his way to the vase, which,
from the palace, is on the right hand, next to the Feuillans, and, after
some difficulty, committed the whole to the capacious bosom of the
faithful depositary: this done, he retreated in safety; and when the
time of terrour was passed, fearful that he should not be able to raise
his bag from the deep bottom of the urn without a discovery, which might
have rendered the circumstance suspicious, and perhaps hazardous to him,
he presented himself before the minister of the police, verified the
narrative of the facts, and was placed in the quiet possession of his
property, which in this manner had remained undisturbed during all that
frightful period. From the gardens I went to the exhibition of David's
celebrated painting of the suspension of the battle between the Sabines
and the Romans, produced by the wives of the latter rushing, with their
children in their arms, between the approaching warriors. David is
deservedly considered as the first living artist in France, and this
splendid picture is worthy of his pencil. It is upon an immense scale.
All the Figures (of which there are many) are as large as life. The
principal female raising her terrified infant, and the two chief
combatants, are inimitable. I was informed, by good authority, that the
court of Russia had offered 7000_l._ sterling for it, an unexampled
price for any modern painting! but that David, who is very rich, felt a
reluctance in parting with it, to the emperor, on account of the climate
of Russia being unfavourable to colour.

From this beautiful painting, I went to pay my respects to Mons. O----,
who resided at the further end of Paris, upon whom I had a letter of
credit. Upon my arriving at his hotel, I was informed by the porter that
his master was at his chateau, about ten miles in the country, with his
family, where he lay extremely ill. This news rendered it necessary for
me to leave Paris for a day and a night at least.

From Mons. O---- I went to Mr. Perregaux, the rich banker and
legislator, to whom I had letters of introduction. He lives in the Rue
Mont Blanc, a street, the place of residence of the principal bankers,
and is next door neighbour to his rival Mons. R----, whose lady has
occasioned some little conversation. Mons. P----'s hotel is very superb.
His chief clerks occupy rooms elegantly fitted up, and decorated with
fine paintings. He received me in a very handsome manner, in a beautiful
little cabinet, adorned with some excellent, and costly paintings. After
many polite expressions from him, I laughingly informed him of the
dilemma in which I was placed by the unexpected absence of Mons. O----;
upon which Mons. P---- in the most friendly manner told me that the
letters which I had brought were from persons whom he highly esteemed;
and that Mr. O---- was also his friend; that as it might prove
inconvenient for me to wait upon him in the country, he begged to have
the pleasure of furnishing me with whatever money I wanted, upon my own
draughts. I felt this act of politeness and liberality very forcibly,
which I of course declined, as I wished not only to take up what money I
wanted in a regular manner, but I was desirous of seeing Mr. O----, who
was represented to me as a very amiable man, and his family as elegant
and accomplished. I was much charmed with the generous conduct of Mons.
P----, from whom I afterwards received great attentions, and who is much
beloved by the English. I felt it a pleasurable duty not to confine the
knowledge of such an act of liberality to the spot where it was so
handsomely manifested. The sessions of the legislative assembly had
closed the day before my arrival, a circumstance I much regretted, as
through his means I should have been enabled to have attended their
sittings. The bankers of France are immensely rich, and almost command
the treasury of the nation. Mons. P----, with the well-timed, silent
submission of the flexible reed, in the fable, has survived the
revolutionary storm, which by a good, but guiltless policy, has passed
over him, without leaving one stain upon his honourable character, and
has operated, like the slime of the Egyptian inundation, only to
fructify, and increase his fortunes. He once however narrowly escaped.
In the time of Robespierre, the Marquis de Chatelet, a few nights before
his execution, attempted to corrupt his guards, and told them, if they
would release him, Mons. P---- would give them a draft to any amount
which they might choose then to name. The centinels rejected the bribe,
and informed their sanguinary employer of the offer, who had the books
of Mons. P---- investigated: he was in no shape concerned in the
attempted escape; but hearing, with extraordinary swiftness, that the
marquis, whose banker he had been, and to whom an inconsiderable balance
was then due, had implicated him in this manner, he instantly with
dexterity, removed the page which contained the last account of the
unhappy nobleman, and also his own destiny, and thus saved his life.
Mons. P---- is a widower; his daughter, an only child, is married to a
wealthy general, a man of great bravery, and beloved by Bonaparte.

I dined this day at the Restaurateur's in the Thuilleries, and found the
effect of Madame H----'s charming civility to me. There were some
beautiful women present, dressed after the antique, a fashion
successfully introduced by David. This extraordinary genius was desirous
of dressing the beaux of Paris after the same model; but they politely
declined it, alleging that if Mons. David would at the same time create
another climate, warmer, and more regular for them, they would then
submit the matter to a committee of fashion. The women, though said, in
point of corporal sufferance, to be able to endure less than men, were
enchanted with the design of the artist, and, without approaching a
single degree nearer to the sun, unmindful of colds, consumptions, and
death, have assumed a dress, if such it can be called, the airiness of
which to the eye of fancy, looked like the mist of incense, undulating
over a display of beauty and symmetry, only to be rivalled by those
exquisite models of grecian taste which first furnished them with these
new ideas of personal decoration.

The French ladies every morning anoint their heads with the antique oil,
scented; their sidelocks are formed into small circles, which just touch
the bosom; and the hair behind is rolled into a rose, by which they
produce a perfect copy of the ancient bust.

CHAPTER X.

_Large Dogs.--A Plan for becoming quickly acquainted with
Paris.--Pantheon.--Tombs of Voltaire and Rousseau.--Politeness of
an Emigrant.--The Beauty of France.--Beauty evanescent.--Place de
Carousel.--Infernal
Machine.--Fouché.--Seine.--Washerwomen.--Fisherwomen.--Baths._

In the streets of Paris, I every where saw an unusual number of very
large, fierce looking dogs, partaking of the breed of the newfoundland,
and british bulldog. During the time of terrour, these brave and
faithful animals were in much request, and are said to have given the
alarm of danger, and saved, in several instances, the lives and property
of their masters, by their accustomed fidelity. Upon my arrival in this
great capital, I was of course desirous of becoming acquainted with its
leading features as soon as possible, for the purpose of being enabled
to explore my way to any part of it, without a guide. The scheme which I
thought of, for this purpose, answered my wishes, and therefore I may
presume to submit it to others.

On the second day after my arrival, I purchased a map of Paris, hired a
fiacre, and drove to the Pantheon. Upon the top gallery which surmounts
its lofty and magnificent dome, I made a survey of the city, which lay
below me, like the chart with which I compared it. The clouds passed
swiftly over my head, and from the shape of the dome, impressed me with
an idea of moving in the air, upon the top, instead of the bottom of a
balloon. I easily attained my object, by tracing the churches, the
temple, the abbey, the palaces, large buildings, and the course and
islands of the river, after which I seldom had occasion to retrace my
steps, when I was roving about, unaccompanied. On account of no coal
being used in Paris, the prospect was perfectly clear, and the air is
consequently salubrious. The Pantheon, or church of St. Genevieve, is a
magnificent building from the designs of Mons. Soufflet, one of the
first architects of France: it was intended to be the rival of the St.
Paul's of London; but, though a very noble edifice, it must fail of
exciting any emotions of jealousy amongst the admirers of that national
building. It is a magnificent pile, and when completed, is destined to
be the principal place of worship, and is at present the mausoleum of
the deceased great men of France. Upon the entablature over the portico
is written, in immense characters, "AUX GRANDS HOMMES--LA PATRIE
RECONNOISANTE." Parallel with the grand entrance, are colossal statues,
representing the virtues imputed to a republic. Soon after the
completion of the inner dome, about two years since, one of the main
supporting pillars was crushed in several places by the pressure. The
defective column has been removed, and until it can be replaced, its
proportion of weight is sustained by a most ingenious and complicated
wooden structure. Upon the spot where the altar is to be erected, I saw
another goddess of liberty, with her usual appendages carved in wood,
and painted, and raised by the order of Robespierre, for a grand
revolutionary fête, which he intended to have given, in this church,
upon the very day in which he perished. The interior dome is covered
with two larger ones, each of which is supported by separate pillars,
and pilasters, and the whole is constructed of stone only. The interior
of the lower dome is covered with the most beautiful carvings in stone.
The peristyle, or circular colonnade round the lower part of the
exterior of the dome, is very fine, but I must confess, I do not like an
ancient fashion which the french have just revived in their construction
of these pillars, of making the thickest part of the column a little
below the centre, and lessening in size to the base. Under this immense
fabric are spacious vaults, well lighted; supported by doric pillars,
the depositaries of the illustrious dead of France. At present there are
only two personages whose relics are honoured with this gloomy
distinction. Rousseau and Voltaire very quietly repose by the side of
each other. Their remains are contained in two separate tombs, which are
constructed of wood, and are embellished with various inscriptions.
Hamlet's remark over the grave of Ophelia, strongly occurred to me.

"Where be your gibes now? your gambols? your songs? your flashes of
merriment that were wont to set the table on a roar? not one now to mock
your own grinning? quite chapfallen?"

At either end of the tomb of Jean Jacques, are two hands, darting out of
the gates of death, supporting lighted torches, and below, (it is a
little singular) are inscriptions illustrating the _peaceful_, and
benevolent virtues of the enclosed defunct!

Peace to their manes! may they enjoy more repose, than that troubled
world which their extraordinary, yet different talents seemed equally
destined to embellish and to embroil, though it would be difficult to
name any two modern writers, who have expressed, with more eloquence, a
cordial love of peace, and a zealous desire to promote the interests of
humanity!!

The church of St. Genevieve is entirely composed of stone and iron, of
the latter very little is used. It has already cost the nation very near
two millions sterling. As I was returning from the Pantheon, I was
addressed by one of our emigrant companions, to whom I have before
alluded. He had just arrived in Paris, intended staying about a month,
and then returning to Toulon. He warmly made me an offer of his
services, and during my stay here, sent every morning to know if he
should attend me as a friendly guide, to conduct me to any place which I
might wish to see, or to prevent me from suffering any imposition from
tradesmen. His attentions to me were always agreeable, and sometimes
serviceable, and strongly impressed upon my mind, the policy, as well as
the pleasure, of treating every being with civility, even where first
appearances are not favourable, and where an expectation of meeting the
party again is not probable. In the course of the day I was introduced
to Madame B----, who resides, by permission of the first consul, in a
suite of elegant apartments in the Louvre, which have been granted to
her on account of her merits and genius, and also in consideration of
the losses which she has sustained by the revolution. In her study she
presented me to Mademoiselle T----, the then celebrated beauty of
Paris; her portrait by David, had afforded much conversation in the
fashionable circles; she was then copying, with great taste, from the
antique, which is generally the morning's occupation of the french
ladies of fashion. She is certainly a very handsome young woman: but I
think if the painter of France was to visit a certain western county of
England, he would discover as many attractions for the display of his
admirable pencil, as were at this time to be found in the study of
Madame B----. When we left her, Madame B----asked me what I thought of
her; I candidly made the above remark to her, "Ah!" said she, "you
should have seen her about a month since, she was then the prettiest
creature in all France;" how so, has she suffered from indisposition?
"oh no," replied Madame B----, smilingly, "but a _month_, you know,
makes a considerable difference upon the face of beauty."

I was much obliged to Madame B---- for the remark, which is greatly
within an observation which I have frequently made, on the evanescent
nature of youthful beauty. Madame B----'s calculations of the given
progress of decay, were eighteen times more swift than mine. The subject
of our conversation, and the busts by which we were surrounded,
naturally led us to talk of the french ladies, and they reminded us,
though _slightly_, of their present _dress_. Madame B----entered into a
particular account of the decorations of a lady of fashion in France. I
have not patience enough to enumerate them here, except that the wife of
a fournisseur will not hesitate paying from three to four hundred pounds
for a Cachemire shawl, nor from four to five hundred pounds for a laced
gown, nor a much larger sum for diamonds cut like pearls, and threaded.
In this costly manner, does the ingenuity of art, and the prodigality of
wealth do homage to the elegance of nature. The entrance to Madame
B----'s apartments seemed at first, a little singular and unsuitable,
but I soon found that it was no unusual circumstance, after groping
through dirty passages, and up filthy staircases to enter a noble hall
and splendid rooms.

Upon leaving Madame B---- I passed the Place de Carousel, and saw the
ruins of the houses, which suffered by the explosion of the infernal
machine, which afforded so much conversation in the world at the time,
by which the first consul was intended to have been destroyed in his way
to the National Institute of Music. This affair has been somewhat
involved in mystery. It is now well known that Monsieur Fouché, at the
head of the police, was acquainted with this conspiracy from its first
conception, and by his vigilant agents, was informed of the daily
progress made in the construction of this destructive instrument, of the
plan of which he had even a copy. The conspirators proceeded with
perfect confidence, and as they thought with perfect security. Three
days before it was quite completed, and ready for its fell purpose, from
some surprise or dread of detection, they changed their place of
meeting, and in one night removed the machine from the spot where it had
been usually deposited. The penetrating eye of the police lost sight of
them. Fouché, and his followers exercised their unrivalled talents for
pursuit and discovery to no purpose. The baffled minister then waited
upon Bonaparte, to whom he had regularly imparted the result of every
day's information respecting it, and told him that he could no longer
trace the traiterous instrument of his assassination, and requested him,
as he knew it must be completed by this time, not to go to any public
places, until he had regained a knowledge of it. Bonaparte replied, that
fear only made cowards, and conspirators brave, and that he had
unalterably determined to go with his accustomed equipage to the
National Concert that very evening. At the usual hour the first consul
set off undismayed from the Thuilleries, a description of the machine,
which was made to resemble a water cask, being first given to the
coachman, servants, and guards. As they proceeded, the advance guard
passed it unobserved, but the coachman discovered it just as the
consular carriage was on a parallel with it; instantly the dexterous and
faithful charioteer lashed his horses into full speed, and turned the
corner of the Rue Marcem. In one moment after, the terrible machine
exploded, and covered the street with ruins. The thunder of its
discharge shook the houses of Paris, and was heard at a considerable
distance in the country. The first consul arrived in safety at the Hall
of Music, and with every appearance of perfect tranquillity, entered his
box amidst the acclamations of the crowded multitude. The range of
buildings which was shattered by the explosion, has long offended the
eye of taste, and presented a gloomy, and very inconvenient obstruction
to the grand entrance of the palace. Bonaparte, with his usual judgment,
which converts every event into some good, immediately after this
affair, purchased the houses which were damaged, and the whole of this
scene of ruins and rubbish is removing with all possible expedition, to
the great improvement of this grand approach.

Whilst I was strolling along the banks of the Seine, I could not help
remarking that it would suffer much by a comparison with the Thames, so
finely described by sir John Denham--

Though deep, yet clear, though gentle yet not dull:
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full.

The Seine is narrow, and very dirty; its waters, which are finely
filtrated when drawn from the fountains of Paris, produce an aperient
effect upon strangers, who are generally cautioned not to drink much of
them at a time.

The tide does not reach further than several miles below Paris; to this
cause I can alone attribute, though perhaps the reason is insufficient,
that the river is never rendered gay by the passing, and repassing of
beautiful pleasure boats, to the delights of which the parisians seem
total strangers. Its shores are sadly disfigured by a number of black,
gloomy, and unwieldy sheds, which are erected upon barges, for the
accommodation of the washerwomen, who, by their mode of washing, which
is, by rubbing the linen in the river water, and beating it with large
flat pieces of wood, resembling battledores, until the dirt, and
generally a portion of the linen retire together, make a noise very
similar to that of shipwrights caulking a vessel. This is an abominable
nuisance, and renders the view up the river, from the centre of the Pont
de la Concorde, the most complete mélange of filth and finery, meanness
and magnificence I ever beheld. Whilst I am speaking of these valuable,
but noisy dames, I must mention that their services are chiefly confined
to strangers, and the humbler class of parisians. The genteel families
of France are annoyed by the unpleasant domestic occurrence of washing,
when in town only once, and when in the country only twice in the course
of the year. Their magazines of clothes are of course immense, for the
reception and arrangement of which several rooms in their houses are
always allotted. It is the intention of the first consul gradually to
unkennel this clattering race of females, when it can be done with
safety. To force them to the tub, and to put them into the suds too
suddenly, might, from their influence amongst the lower classes of
citizens, be followed by consequences not very congenial to the repose
of the government.

To show of what importance the ladies of the lower class in Paris are, I
shall relate a little anecdote of Bonaparte, in which he is considered
to have exhibited as much bravery as he ever displayed in the field of
battle.

The poissardes, whose name alone will awaken some emotion in the mind of
the reader, from its horrible union with the barbarous massacres which
discoloured the capital with blood during the revolution, have been from
time immemorial accustomed, upon any great and fortunate event, to send
a deputation of their sisterhood to the kings and ministers of France,
and since the revolution to the various rulers of the republic, to ofter
their congratulations, accompanied by a large bouquet of flowers. Upon
the elevation of Bonaparte to the supreme authority of France,
according to custom, they sent a select number from their body to
present him with their good wishes, and usual fragrant donation. The
first consul sternly received them, and after rejecting their nosegay,
fiercely told them to retire, and in future to attend to their husbands,
their children, and their fisheries, and never more to attempt an
interference in matters relating to the state. Upon which he ordered the
pages in waiting to close the door upon them. He thought no doubt that
"Omnium manibus res humanæ egent: paucorum capita sufficiunt."--"Human
affairs require the hands of all, whilst the heads of few are
sufficient."

These formidable dames, so celebrated for their ferocity, retired
chagrined and chapfallen from the presence of the imperious consul, and
have not attempted to force either their congratulations, or their
bouquets upon any of the public functionaries since that period. Such a
repulse as this, offered to a body of people, more formidable from their
influence than the lazzaroni of Naples, would in all human probability
have cost any one of the kings of France his crown. I received this
anecdote from the brother of one of the ministers of France to whom this
country is much indebted. Before the high daring of Bonaparte, every
difficulty seems to droop, and die.

Near the Pont de la Concorde is a handsome, and ornamental building,
which is erected upon barges, and contains near three hundred cold and
tepid baths, for men and women. It is surrounded by a wooden terrace,
which forms an agreeable walk upon the water, and is decorated with
shrubs, orange trees, and flowers, on each side.

This place is very grateful in a climate which, in summer, is intensely
warm. There are other public baths, but this is chiefly resorted to by
people of respectability. The price is very moderate, thirty sols.

CHAPTER XI.

_David.--Place de la Concorde.--L'Église de
Madeleine.--Print-shops.--Notre Dame.--Museum or Palace of
Arts.--Hall of Statues.--Laocoon.--Belvidere Apollo.--Socrates._

During my stay in Paris I visited the gallery of David. This celebrated
artist has amassed a fortune of upwards of two hundred thousand pounds,
and is permitted by his great patron, and friend Bonaparte, to occupy
the corner wing of the old palace, from which every other man of genius
and science, who was entitled to reside there, has been removed to other
places, in order to make room for the reception of the grand National
Library, which the first consul intends to have deposited there. His
apartments are very magnificent, and furnished in that taste, which he
has, by the influence of his fame, and his elegance of design, so
widely, and successfully diffused. Whilst I was seated in his rooms, I
could not help fancying myself a contemporary of the most tasteful times
of Greece. Tunics and robes were carelessly but gracefully thrown over
the antique chairs, which were surrounded by elegant statues, and
ancient libraries, so disposed, as to perfect the classical illusion. I
found David in his garden, putting in the back ground of a painting. He
wore a dirty robe, and an old hat. His eyes are dark and penetrating,
and beam with the lustre of genius. His collection of paintings and
statues, and many of his own studies, afforded a perfect banquet. He
was then occupied in drawing a fine portrait of Bonaparte. The presence
of David covered the gratification with gloom. Before me, in the bosom
of that art, which is said, with her divine associates, to soften the
souls of men, I beheld the remorseless judge of his sovereign, the
destroyer of his brethren in art, and the enthusiast and confidential
friend of Robespierre. David's political life is too well known. During
the late scenes of horror, he was asked by an acquaintance, how many
heads had fallen upon the scaffold that day, to which he is said coolly
to have replied, "_only one hundred and twenty!!_ The heads of twenty
thousand more must fall before the great work of philosophy can be
accomplished."

It is related of him, that during the reign of the Mountain, he carried
his portfolio to the front of the scaffold, to catch the last emotions
of expiring nature, from the victims of his revolutionary rage.

He directed and presided at the splendid funeral solemnities of
Lepelletier, who was assassinated by Paris, in which his taste and
intimate knowledge of the ceremonies of the ancients, on similar
occasions, were eminently displayed.

Farewell, David! when years have rolled away, and time has mellowed the
works of thy sublime pencil, mayst thou be remembered only as _their_
creator; may thy fame repose herself upon the tableau of the dying
Socrates, and the miraculous passage of the Alpine hero, may the
ensanguined records of thy political frenzy, moulder away, and may
science, who knew not blood till thou wert known, whose pure, and
hallowed inspirations have made men happier, and better, till thou wert
born, implore for thee forgiveness, and whilst, with rapture she points
to the immortal images of thy divine genius, may she cover with an
impenetrable pall, the pale, and shuddering, and bleeding victims of thy
sanguinary soul!

The great abilities of this man, have alone enabled him to survive the
revolution, which, strange to relate, has, throughout its ravages,
preserved a veneration for science, and, in general, protected her
distinguished followers. Bonaparte, who possesses great taste "that
instinct superior to study, surer than reasoning, and more rapid than
reflection," entertains the greatest admiration for the genius of David,
and always consults him in the arrangement of his paintings and statues.
All the costumes of government have been designed by this artist.

David is not without his adherents. He has many pupils, the sons of
respectable, and some of them, of noble families residing in different
parts of Europe. They are said to be much attached to him, and have
formed themselves into a military corps, for the purpose of occasionally
doing honour to him, and were lately on the point of revenging an insult
which had been offered to his person, in a manner, which, if
perpetrated, would have required the interest of their master to have
saved them from the scaffold.

But neither the gracious protection of consular favour, nor the
splendour of unrivalled abilities, can restore their polluted possessor,
to the affections and endearments of social intercourse. Humanity has
drawn a _sable circle_ round him. He leads the life of a proscribed
exile, in the very centre of the gayest city in Europe. In the gloomy
shade of unchosen seclusion, he passes his ungladdened hours, in the
hope of covering his guilt with his glory, and of presenting to
posterity, by the energies of his unequalled genius, some atonement for
the havoc, and ruin of that political hurricane, of which he directed
the fury, and befriended the desolations, against every contemporary
object that nature had endeared, and virtue consecrated.

After leaving the gallery of David, I visited la Place de la Concorde.
This ill fated spot, from its spaciousness, and beauty of situation, has
always been the theatre of the great fêtes of the nation, as well as the
scene of its greatest calamities. When the nuptials of the late king and
queen were celebrated, the magnificent fireworks, shows, and
illuminations which followed, were here displayed. During the
exhibition, a numerous banditti, from Normandy, broke in upon the vast
assemblage of spectators: owing to the confusion which followed, and the
fall of some of the scaffolding, the supporters of which were sawed
through by these wretches, the disorder became dreadful, and universal;
many were crushed to death, and some hundreds of the people, whilst
endeavouring to make their escape, were stabbed, and robbed. The king
and queen, as a mark of their deep regret, ordered the dead to be
entombed in the new burial ground of l'Église de Madeleine, then
erecting at the entrance of the Boulevard des Italiens, in the
neighbourhood of the palace, under the immediate inspection and
patronage of the sovereign. This building was never finished, and still
presents to the eye, a naked pile of lofty walls and columns. Alas! the
gloomy auguries which followed this fatal spectacle, were too truly
realized. On _that_ spot perished the monarch and his queen, and the
flower of the french nobility, and many of the virtuous and enlightened
men of France, and in _this_ cemetery, their unhonoured remains were
thrown, amidst heaps of headless victims, into promiscuous graves of
unslacked lime!

How inscrutable are the ways of destiny!

This spot, which, from its enchanting scenery, is calculated only to
recall, or to inspire the most tender, and generous, and elegant
sentiments, which has been the favoured resort of so many kings, and the
scene of every gorgeous spectacle, was doomed to become the human
shambles of the brave and good, and the Golgotha of the guillotine! In
the centre, is an oblong square railing, which encloses the exact spot
where formerly stood that instrument of death, which was voted permanent
by its remorseless employers.

A temporary model in wood, of a lofty superb monument, two hundred feet
high, intended to be erected in honour of Bonaparte and the battle of
Marengo, was raised in this place, for his approval, but from policy or
modesty, he declined this distinguished mark of public approbation. I
was a little surprised to observe, in the windows of the principal print
shops, prints exposed to sale, representing the late king, in his full
robes of state, under which was written, Le Restaurateur de la liberté,
(an equivoque, no doubt) and the parting interview between that unhappy
sovereign and his queen and family in the temple, upon the morning of
his execution.

This little circumstance will show the confidence which the present
rulers feel in the strength and security of the present government; for
such representations are certainly calculated to excite feelings, and to
restore impressions which might prove a little hazardous to both, were
they less powerfully supported.

I was also one morning a little surprised, by hearing from my window,
the exhilarating song of "Rule Britannia" played upon a hand organ; upon
looking down into the street, I beheld a Savoyard very composedly
turning the handle of his musical machine, as he moved along, and a
french officer humming the tune after him. Both were, no doubt, ignorant
of the nationality of the song, though not of the truth of its
sentiment.

In the course of one of my morning walks, I went to the metropolitan
abbey of Notre Dame, which is situated at the end of a large island in
the Seine, which forms a part of Paris, and is filled with long narrow
streets. It is a fine gothic pile, but in my humble opinion, much
inferior to our Westminster abbey, and to the great churches of Rouen.

From this building I visited, with a large party, the celebrated museum,
or palace of the arts, which I afterwards generally frequented every
other day.

This inestimable collection contains one thousand and thirty paintings,
which are considered to be the chefs d'oeuvre of the great ancient
masters, and is a treasury of human art and genius, unknown to the most
renowned of former ages, and far surpassing every other institution of
the same nature, in the present times.

The first apartment is about the size of the exhibition room of
Somerset house, and lighted as that is, from above. It contains several
exquisite paintings, which have been presented to Bonaparte by the
princes, and rulers of those states which have been either subdued by
his arms, or have cultivated his alliance. The parisians call this
apartment Bonaparte's nosegay. The most costly pictures in the room, are
from the gallery of the grand duke of Tuscany. Amongst so many works,
all exquisite and beautiful, it is almost temerity to attempt to select,
but if I might be permitted to name those which pleased me most, I
should particularize the Ecce Homo, by Cigoli Ludovico Cardi.

The breast of the mild and benevolent Saviour, striped with the bruises
of recent punishment, and his heavenly countenance, benignly looking
forgiveness upon his executioners, are beautifully delineated.
L'Annonciation, by Gentileschi, in which the divine look of the angel,
the graceful plumage of his wings, and the drapery of the virgin, are
incomparable. La Sagesse chassant les Vices, which is a very ancient and
curious painting, by Andrea Mantegna, in which the figure of Idleness,
without arms, is wonderfully conceived. Les Noces de Cana, by Paul
Veronese, which is considered to be the best of his works. It is the
largest painting I ever beheld. The figures which are seated at the
banquet, are chiefly the portraits of contemporary royal personages of
different nations. From this room we passed into the gallery of the
Louvre.

I cannot adequately describe the first impressions which were awakened,
upon my first entering it, and contemplating such a galaxy of art and
genius. This room is one thousand two hundred feet long, and is lined
with the finest paintings of the french, flemish, and italian schools,
and is divided by a curious double painting upon slate, placed upon a
pedestal in the middle of the room, which represents the front and back
view of the same figures.

The first division of this hall contains the finest works of le Brun,
many of which are upon an immense scale. L'Hyver ou le Deluge, by
Poussin, is truly sublime, but is unfortunately placed in a bad light.
There are also some beautiful marine paintings, by Verney. Les
Religieuses, by Philipe de Champagne, is justly celebrated for the
principal figure of the dying nun. Vue de Chevet d'une eglise, by
Emanuel de Witte, is an exquisite little cabinet picture, in which the
effect of a ray of light shining through a painted window, upon a
column, is inimitable, and the perspective is very fine. There are here
also some of the finest works of Wouvermans, and a charming picture by
Teniers. La Vierge, l'enfant Jesus, la Madeleine, et St. Jerome, by
Antoine Allegri Correge, is considered to be a picture of great beauty
and value. There are also some glorious paintings by Reubens. I have
thus briefly selected these pictures from the rest, hoping, at the same
time, that it will not be inferred that those which I have not named, of
which it would be impossible to offer a description without filling a
bulky volume, are inferior to the works which I have presumed to
mention. The recording pen must rival that matchless pencil, which has
thus adorned the walls of the Museum, before it can do justice to such a
magnificent collection.

This exhibition is public three days in the week, and at other times is
open to students and to strangers, upon their producing their passports.
On public days, all descriptions of persons are here to be seen. The
contemplation of such a mixture is not altogether uninteresting.

The sun-browned rugged plebeian, whose mind, by the influence of an
unexampled political change, has been long alienated from all the noble
feelings which religion and humanity inspire, is here seen, with his
arms rudely folded over his breast, softening into pity, before the
struggling and sinking sufferers of a deluged world, or silently
imbibing from the divine resigned countenance of the crucified Saviour,
a hope of unperishable bliss, beyond the grave. Who will condemn a
policy by which ignorance becomes enlightened, profligacy penitent, and
which, as by stealth, imparts to the relenting bosom of ferocity the
subdued, and social dispositions of _true_ fraternity?

To amuse, may be necessary to the present government of France, but
surely to supplant the wild abandoned principles of a barbarous
revolution, with _new_ impressions, created by an unreserved display of
the finest and most persuasive images of resigned suffering, heroic
virtue, or elegant beauty, cannot be deemed unworthy of the ruler of a
great people.

At this place, as well as at all the other national exhibitions, no
money for admission is required or expected. No person is admitted with
a stick, and guards attend to preserve the pictures from injury, and the
exhibition from riot. The gallery of the Louvre is at present,
unfortunately, badly lighted throughout, owing to the light issuing
chiefly on one side, from long windows. This inconvenience, however, is
soon to be remedied; by observing the same manner of lighting, as in the
adjoining apartment.

From the museum, we descended into la Salle des Antiques, which contains
all the treasury of grecian and roman statuary. The first object to
which we hastened, was the statue of Laocoon, for so many ages, and by
so many writers admired and celebrated. This superb specimen of grecian
sculpture, is supposed to be the united production of Polydorus,
Athenodorus, and Agesander, but its great antiquity renders its history
somewhat dubious. In the beginning of the sixteenth century it was
discovered at Rome amongst the ruins of the palace of Titus, and
deposited in the Farnese palace, whence it has been removed to Paris, by
the orders of Bonaparte, after the conquest of Italy. It represents
Laocoon, the priest of Apollo and Neptune, and his two sons writhing in
the folds of two hideous serpents. The reader will remember the
beautiful lines of Virgil upon the subject,

"----------------et primum parva duorum
Corpora natorum serpens amplexus uterque
Implicat, et miseros morsu depascitur artus.
Post, ipsum auxilio subeuntem ac tela ferentem
Corripiunt, spirisque ligant ingentibus: et jam
Bis medium amplexi, bis collo squamea circum
Terga dati, superant capite et cervicibus altis.
Ille simul manibus tendit divellere nodos--"

Or, in the english habit which Dryden has given them,

"And first around the tender boys they wind,
Then with their sharpen'd fangs, their limbs and bodies grind.
The wretched father, running to their aid,
With pious haste, but vain, they next invade:
Twice round his waist the winding volumes roll'd,
And twice about his gasping throat they fold.
The priest, thus doubly chok'd, their crests divide,
And tow'ring o'er his head in triumphs ride.
With both his hands he labours at the knots--"

Pliny mentions this statue as the admiration of the age in which he
flourished.

I fear that I shall be guilty of a sort of profanation when I remark,
that the figures of the two sons of Laocoon appear to exhibit rather
more marks of maturity, and strength of muscle than are natural to their
size, and to the supposed tenderness of their age. It is, however, a
glorious work of art.

We next beheld the Belvidere Apollo. This statue, in my humble opinion,
surpasses every other in the collection. All the divinity of a god beams
through this unrivalled perfection of form. It is impossible to impart
the impressions which it inspires. The rivetted beholder is ready to
exclaim, with Adam, when he first discerns the approach of Raphael,

"--------------behold what glorious shape
Comes this way moving: seems another morn,
Risen on mid-noon; some great behest from Heav'n."

The imagination cannot form such an union of grace and strength. During
my stay in Paris, I frequently visited this distinguished statue, and
discovered fresh subjects of amazement, and admiration as often as I
gazed upon it. One of its remarkable beauties, is its exquisite
expression of motion. Its aerial appearance perpetually excites the idea
of its being unstationary, and unsupported. As it would be a rash, and
vain attempt to give a complete description of this matchless image, I
must, reluctantly, leave it, to inform my reader, that on the other side
of the Hall are the original Diana (which is wonderfully fine) and
several very beautiful Venuses. The Venus de Medicis is not here. There
are also some fine whole length statues of roman magistrates, in their
curule chairs.

In the Temple of the Muses, are exquisite busts of Homer and Socrates.
Pliny informs us that the ancient world possessed no original bust of
the former. That of the latter seems to have been chisseled to represent
the celebrated athenian before he had obtained his philosophical triumph
over those vices, which a distinguished physiognomist of his time once
imputed to him from the character of his features.

CHAPTER XII.

_Bonaparte.--Artillery.--Mr. Pitt--Newspapers.--Archbishop of
Paris.--Consular Colours.--Religion.--Consular Conversion.--Madame
Bonaparte.--Consular Modesty.--Separate Beds.--A Country
Scene.--Connubial Affection.--Female Bravery._

A little anecdote is related of Bonaparte, which unfolded the bold, and
daring character of this extraordinary man in early life: when he was
about fifteen years of age, and a cadet in the military school at
Paris--by the by, the small distance between this seminary and his
present palace, and the swiftness of his elevation, afford a curious
coincidence--in the vast plain of the Champ de Mars, the court, and the
parisians were assembled to witness the ascent of a balloon. Bonaparte
made his way through the crowd, and unperceived, entered the inner
fence, which contained the apparatus for inflating the silken globe. It
was then very nearly filled, and restrained from its flight by the last
cord only. The young cadet requested the aeronaut to permit him to mount
the car with him; which request was immediately refused, from an
apprehension that the feelings of the boy might embarrass the
experiment. Bonaparte is reported to have exclaimed, "I am young, it is
true, but I neither fear the powers of earth, nor of air," and sternly
added, "will you let me ascend?" The aeronaut, a little offended at his
obtrusion, sharply replied, "No, Sir, I will not; I beg that you will
retire." Upon which the little enraged officer, drew a small sabre,
which he wore with his uniform, instantly cut the balloon in several
places, and destroyed the curious apparatus, which the aeronaut had
constructed, with infinite labour and ingenuity, for the purpose of
trying the possibility of aerial navigation.

Paris was almost unpeopled this day, to view the spectacle. The
disappointment of the populace, which was said to have exceeded seven
hundred thousand persons, became violent and universal. The king sent to
know the reason of the tumult, when the story was related to him, the
good humoured monarch laughed heartily, and said, "Upon my word that
impetuous boy, will make a brave officer."--The devoted king little
thought that he was speaking of his successor.--The young offender was
put under arrest, and confined for four days.

This man is certainly the phenomenon of the present times. It is a
circumstance worthy of remark, that the artillery has furnished France
with most of its present distinguished heroes, who have also been bred
up in the same military school with Bonaparte. A short time before my
arrival at Paris, this great genius, who displays a perfect knowledge of
mankind, and particularly of the people over whom he rules, discovered
that the parisians, from a familiarity with his person, and from his
lady and his family having occasionally joined in their parties of
amusement, began to lose that degree of awe and respect for him, which
he so well knows how to appreciate, as well as to inspire. In
consequence of this, he gradually retired from every circle of fashion,
and was at this period, almost as inaccessible as a chinese emperor.
The same line of conduct was also adopted by the principal officers of
government. He resided almost wholly at Mal Maison, except on state
days, when only those strangers were permitted to be introduced to him,
who had satisfired the ambassadors of their respective nations, that
they had been previously presented at their own courts. If Bonaparte is
spared from the stroke of the assassin, or the prætorian caprice of the
army, for any length of time, he will have it in his power to augment
the services which he has already afforded to the republic, by
rebuilding the political edifice of France, with many meliorations, for
which some materials may be collected from her own ruins, and some from
the tried and approved constitutions of other countries. If his ambition
will permit him to discharge this great undertaking faithfully, in a
manner uniform with that glory which he has acquired in the field, and
influenced only by the noble desire of giving rational liberty, and
practicable happiness to the people over whom he sways, they will in
return, without jealousy or regret, behold the being to whose wisdom and
moderation they will be thus indebted, led to the highest seat amongst
them--they will confer those sanctions upon his well merited
distinction, without which all authority is but disastrous usurpation--a
comet's blaze, flaming in a _night of dismay_, and _setting in gloom_.

The dignity of such a legislator will be self-maintained, and lasting.
Upon him, the grateful french will confer those unforced, unpurchased
suffrages, which will _prevent_ that fate, which, in their absence, the
subtilty of policy, the fascinations of address, the charm of
corruption, and even the terror of the bayonet can only
_postpone_.--Yes, Bonaparte! millions of suffering beings, raising
themselves from the dust, in which a barbarous revolution has prostrated
them, look up to thee for liberty, protection, and repose. They _will_
not look to thee in vain. The retiring storm still flashing its
lessening flame, and rolling its distant thunders will teach thee, _were
it necessary_, not to force them to remeasure their vengeance by their
wrongs.

In Paris, the achievements of the first consul are not much talked of,
so true is the old adage, that no man is a hero to his own domestic. The
beauties of a colossal statue, must be contemplated at a distance.

The french at present work, walk, eat, drink, and sleep in tranquillity,
and what is of more consequence to them, they dance in security, to
which may be added, that their taxes are neither very heavy, nor
oppressive. In every party which I entered, I found the late minister of
Great Britain was the prevailing subject of curiosity. I was overpowered
with questions respecting this great man, which in their minute detail,
extended to ascertain what was the colour of his eye, the shape of his
nose, and whether in a morning he wore hussar boots, or shoes. This
little circumstance could not fail of proving pleasant to an englishman.
They informed me, that throughout the war, they regularly read in their
own diurnal prints, our parliamentary debates, and the general outline
of most of our political schemes, which were furnished by people in the
pay of the french government, who resided in England notwithstanding the
severity of the legislative, and the vigilance of the executive
authorities. Whilst I am mentioning the subject of newspaper
intercourse, I cannot help lamenting, that since the renewal of national
friendship, the public prints of both countries are not more under the
influence of cordiality and good humour.

The liberty of the press is the palladium of reason, the distributor of
light and learning, the public and undismayed assertor of interdicted
truth. It is the body and the _honour guard_ of civil and political
liberty. Where the laws halt with dread, the freedom of the press
advances, and with the subtle activity of conscience, penetrates the
fortified recesses and writes its _fearful sentence on the palace wall_
of recoiling tyrants. As an englishman, my expiring sigh should be
breathed for its preservation; but as an admirer of social repose and
national liberality, I regret to see its noble energies engaged in the
degrading service of fretful spleen, and ungenerous animadversion. When
the horizon is no longer blackened with the smoke of the battle, it is
unworthy of two mighty empires to carry on an ignoble war of words. If
peace is their wish, let them manifest the great and enlightened
sentiment in all its purity, and disdain to irritate each other by acts
of petulant and provoking recrimination.

A short time preceding my arrival in France, Bonaparte had rendered
himself very popular amongst the constitutional clergy, by a well timed
compliment to the metropolitan archbishop. The first consul gave a
grand dinner to this dignified prelate, and to several of his brethren.
After the entertainment, Bonaparte addressed the archbishop by
observing, that as he had given directions for the repairing of the
archiepiscopal palace, he should very much like to take a ride in the
archbishop's carriage, to see the progress which the workmen had made.
The prelate bowed to the first consul, and informed him that he had no
carriage, otherwise he should be much flattered by conducting him
thither. Bonaparte good humouredly said, "how can that be? your coach
has been waiting at the gate this half hour," and immediately led the
venerable archbishop down the steps of the Thuilleries, where he found a
plain handsome carriage, with a valuable pair of horses, and a coachman,
and footmen dressed in the livery which Bonaparte had just before
informed him would be allotted to him, when his establishment was
completed. The whole was a present from the private purse of the first
consul. Upon their arrival at the palace, the archbishop was agreeably
surprised by finding that the most minute, and liberal attention had
been paid to his comfort and accommodation.

The clergy seem to be in favour with Bonaparte. When he assisted in the
last spring at the inauguration of the archbishop of Paris, in the
metropolitan church of Notre Dame, and gave to the restoration of
religion "all the circumstance of pomp" and military parade, he was
desirous of having the colours of his regiment consecrated by the holy
prelate, and submitted his wishes to his soldiers. A few days
afterwards, a deputation waited upon their general in chief, with this
reply, "Our banners have already been consecrated by the blood of our
enemies at Marengo; the benediction of a priest cannot render them more
sacred in our eyes, nor more animating in the time of battle." Bonaparte
prudently submitted himself to their prætorian resolution, and the
consular colours remain to this hour in the same _unchristianlike_
condition, as when they first waved at the head of their victorious
legions. This anecdote will in some degree prove a fact which,
notwithstanding the counter reports of english newspapers, I found every
where confirmed, that although religion is _new_ to the french, yet that
the novelty has at present but little charm for them. I had frequent
opportunity of making this remark, as well in the capital as in the
departments of the republic through which I passed. In Paris, the
Sabbath can only be considered as a day of dissipation to the lovers of
gayety, and a day of unusual profit to the man of trade. Here, it is
true, upon particular festival days, considerable bodies of people are
to be seen in the act of worship, but curiosity, and the love of show
assemble them together, if it was otherwise their attendance would be
more numerous and regular. The first consul does not seem to possess
much fashionable influence over the french in matters of religion,
otherwise, as he has the credit of attending mass, with very pious
punctuality, in his private chapel at Mal Maison, it might be rather
expected, that devotion would become a little more familiar to the
people.

Upon another subject, the _profession_ of the chief magistrate has been
equally unfortunate. To the few ladies who are admitted into his social
circles, he has declared himself an enemy to that dress, or undress (I
am puzzled to know what to call it) which his friend, David, has, so
successfully, recommended, for the purpose of displaying, with the least
possible restraint, the fine proportions of the female form. Madame
Bonaparte, who is considered to be in as good a state of subordination
to her _young_ husband, as the consular regiment is to their _young_
general, contrives to exhibit her elegant person to great advantage; by
adopting a judicious and graceful medium of dress, by which she
tastefully avoids a load of decoration, which repels the eye by too
dense a covering, and that questionable airiness of ornament which, by
its gracious and unrestrained display, deprives the imagination of more
than half its pleasures. Bonaparte is said not to be indifferent to
those affections which do honour to the breast which cherishes them, nor
to the morals of the people whom he governs.

It is well known that in France, in the house of a new fashionable
couple, _separate chambers_ are always reserved for the _faithful_ pair,
which after the solemnities of marriage very seldom remain long
unoccupied. The first consul considers such separations as unfriendly to
morals. A few months since, by a well timed display of assumed
ignorance, he endeavoured to give fashion to a sentiment which may in
time reduce the number of these _family accommodations_. The noble
palace of St. Cloud was at this time preparing for him; the principal
architect requested of him to point out in what part of the palace he
would wish to have his separate sleeping room. "I do not know what you
mean," said the young imperial philosopher, "crimes only divide the
husband from his wife. Make as many bed rooms as you please, but only
_one_ for me and Madame Bonaparte."

I must now quit the dazzling splendour of imperial virtues for the more
tranquil, but not less fascinating appearance of retired and modest
merit.

It was in the afternoon of one of the finest days in June, when Madame
O----, with her nephew, a very amiable young man, called in their
carriage and took me to the chateau of her husband, to whom I had
letters of introduction. After passing through a charming country for
nine miles, adorned on each side with gardens and country houses, we
arrived at the pleasant village of la Reine. As soon as we entered it,
the sight of the carriage, and of their benefactress, seemed to enliven
the faces of the villagers, who were seated in picturesque groupes at
the doors of their cottages. Such animated looks were not lighted up by
curiosity, for they had seen Madame O---- a thousand and a thousand
times, but because they had seldom seen her without experiencing some
endearing proof of her bountiful heart. We left the village to the
right, and proceeded through a private road, lined with stately walnut
trees, of nearly a mile in length, which led to Monsieur O----'s. It was
evening; the sky was cloudless, the sun was setting in great glory, and
covered the face of this romantic country with the richest glow. Near
the gate of a shrubbery I beheld a very handsome boy, whose appearance
at once bespoke him to be the son of a gentleman, the animated smile of
Madame O----, immediately convinced me that it was her son; "see," said
the delighted mother, "it is my little gardener;" the little graceful
rustic had a small spade in his hand, which he threw down, and ran to
us. We alighted at the entrance of the garden, into which we entered,
under a beautiful covered treillage, lined with jessamine and
honeysuckles. At the end were two elegant young women, waiting, with
delight, to receive their mother, from whom they had been separated only
a few hours. With this charming family I entered the house, which was
handsome but plain. The hospitable owner rose from his sofa, and, after
embracing his elegant lady with great affection, he received me with all
the expressions and warmth of a long friendship. Soon afterwards his
servant (a faithful indian) entered, and spread upon the table, Madeira,
Burgundy, and dried fruits. It was intensely hot: the great window at
the end of the room in which we were sitting, opened into the gardens,
which appeared to be very beautiful, and abounded with nightingales,
which were then most sweetly singing. "They are my little musicians,"
said Monsieur O----, "we have made a pleasant bargain together, I give
them crumbs of bread and my bowers to range in, and they give me this
charming music every evening."

Monsieur O---- was an invalide, the revolution, poignant vexations,
heavy losses, and a painful separation from his native country, for the
preservation of his life, and that of his family, had undermined his
health. Grief had made sad inroads upon a delicate constitution. It was
his good fortune to be the husband of one of the finest, and most
amiable women in France, and the father of an affectionate, beautiful,
and accomplished family. His circumstances had been once splendid; they
were then respectable, but he had passed through events which threatened
his _all_. Those sufferings which generous souls sustain for the sake of
others, not for themselves, had alone destroyed the resemblance which
once existed between this excellent man and his admirable portrait,
which, at the further end of the room, presented the healthy glow, and
fine proportions of manly beauty. He expressed to me, in the most
charming manner, his regret, that indisposition confined him to the
country, and prevented him from receiving me in Paris suitable to his
own wishes, and to those claims which I had upon his attentions, by the
letters of introduction which I had brought to him; but added, that he
should furnish me with letters to some of his friends in town, who would
be happy to supply his absence, and to make Paris agreeable to me.
Monsieur O---- was as good as his word.

This amiable gentleman possessed a countenance of great genius, and a
mind full of intelligence.

After an elegant supper, when his lady and daughters had withdrawn, he
entered into a very interesting account of his country, of the
revolution, and of his flight for the salvation of himself and family. A
tolerably good opinion may be formed of the devastation which have been
produced by the late republican government, by the following
circumstance, which Monsieur O---- assured me, on the word of a man of
honour, was correct.

His section in Paris was composed of one thousand three hundred persons,
of rank and fortune, of whom only five had escaped the slaughter of the
guillotine!!

Madame O---- and her charming family, seemed wholly to occupy his heart
and affections.

He spoke of his lady with all the tender eulogium of a young lover.
Their union was entirely from attachment, and had been resisted on the
part of Madame O----, when he first addressed her, only because her
fortune was humble, compared with his. He informed me, and I must not
suppress the story, that in the time of blood, this amiable woman, who
is remarkable for the delicacy of her mind, and for the beauty and
majesty of her person, displayed a degree of coolness and courage,
which, in the field of battle, would have covered the hero with laurels.
One evening, a short period before the family left France, a party of
those murderers, who were sent for by Robespierre, from the frontiers
which divide France from Italy, and who were by that archfiend employed
in all the butcheries, and massacres of Paris, entered the peaceful
village of la Reine, in search of Monsieur O----. His lady saw them
advancing, and anticipating their errand, had just time to give her
husband intelligence of their approach, who left his chateau by a back
door, and secreted himself in the house of a neighbour. Madame O----,
with perfect composure, went out to meet them, and received them in the
most gracious manner. They sternly demanded Mons. O----, she informed
them that he had left the country, and after engaging them in
conversation, she conducted them into her drawing room, and regaled them
with her best wines, and made her servants attend upon them with unusual
deference and ceremony. Their appearance was altogether horrible, they
wore leather aprons, which were sprinkled all over with blood, they had
large horse pistols in their belts, and a dirk and sabre by their sides.
Their looks were full of ferocity, and they spoke a harsh dissonant
patois language. Over their cups, they talked about the bloody business
of that day's occupation, in the course of which they drew out their
dirks, and wiped from their handles, clots of blood and hair. Madame
O---- sat with them, undismayed by their frightful deportment. After
drinking several bottles of Champaign and Burgundy, these savages began
to grow good humoured, and seemed to be completely fascinated by the
amiable and unembarrassed, and hospitable behaviour of their fair
landlady. After carousing till midnight, they pressed her to retire,
observing that they had been received so handsomely that they were
convinced Monsieur O---- had been misrepresented, and was no enemy to
the _good cause_; they added that they found the wines excellent, and
after drinking two or three bottles more, they would leave the house,
without causing her any reason to regret their admission.

Madame O----, with all the appearance of perfect tranquillity and
confidence in their promises, wished her unwelcome visitors a good
night, and after visiting her children in their rooms, she threw herself
upon her bed, with a loaded pistol in each hand, and, overwhelmed with
suppressed agony and agitation, she _soundly_ slept till she was called
by her servants, two hours after these wretches had left the house. He
related also another instance of that resolution which is not
unfrequently exhibited by women, when those generous affections, for
which they are so justly celebrated, are menaced with danger. About the
same period, two of the children of Monsieur O---- were in Paris at
school: A rumour had reached him, that the teachers of the seminary in
which they were placed, had offended the government, and were likely to
be butchered, and that the c

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